Spring Break work

It is apparent that I failed to post something about our spring break trip to the creek. Some of you may want to see these pictures. We have been working on the kitchen for over a year and now it is pretty close to finished.

Here are a couple of pictures of the living area. It also looks better than it did.

Butterfly on the boat cover

The garden has grown, first Tomatoes

It is amazing what a little rain will do to the garden. We have had more spring rain this year than we have had is several years and it shows. Lake Brownwood is up 6 feet and Proctor lake is 2 feet over the spillway. Proctor was so low that they had closed all the boat ramps two weeks ago.

Look for the tomatoes in the next picture. They are right in the center, a bit fuzzy but they are there.

The Garden

Here is a picture of our garden. We only have tomatoes, peppers and squash but there should be plenty of each. This year we are trying a drip irrigation system This allows us to water a few minutes every day and with a timer we can automate the process. The timer I have leaks so I will need a new one to do the automation bit. I will do it before we go away for more than a day. The garden uses 1 gallon per hour drippers and applies the water directly to the roots of the plant, thus saving water but getting what we need on the plants. They will only run for 5-10 minutes each day. We will also use the same system to water some flowers. In close proximity to the garden we have Canna  Lilies and roses, 2 of the roses are pictured below.

Smoking meat

For a while I have been wanting to get a smoker to make Bar-B-Que and I finally did it. This one is an electric smoker and it works quite well. We have used it 3 times to smoke a brisket, some spare ribs, and a pork loin. All three were good but it takes some getting used to when you try to figure out how long and how hot. Most meat is smoked at about 225-250 degrees. So far we have used Mesquite and Hickory wood chips to produce the smoke and various combinations of spices for a rub to season the meat. As you can see it also makes a good cup warmer. You can't see the smoke here but there was some. The pork loin is inside and I failed to get a photo of that to include. I will next time.

This gives you an idea of the size. There are two racks inside for the meat and a water pan on the bottom. There is also a chip pan to put the wood chips in. All in all it is a very useful device and we like it.

We also got a couple of chairs to go on the patio and we used it for breakfast the very next Saturday. The chairs are quite comfortable and seem to be more durable than the ones we used to have.

Thanksgiving 2014

It is Thanksgiving and as usual we were at the Creek house trying to complete a few tasks. When we were there last, at Spring Break, we started on the counter-top but were stymied by needing to rout some wood from the cabinet so the new counter-top would fit, So this trip we were trying to finish it. We cut the Formica for the back splash and finally managed to get it glued to the wall. After routing the front edge of the cabinets we got the counter-top to fit but alas, we had left it standing on edge and it warped through the long hot summer. So we have weights on it and are hoping that it will straighten out by itself Here is a photo of the counter-top. We will put in a stainless sink and finish it next trip.

  

Martha did a great job of cutting the back splash to fit the electrical outlets in the back. Then she also worked on the fireplace. Some of the brick that covers the wall behind it and the floor under it had fallen off and she glued it back on. It worked very well. We ran out of glue before she finished so we will need to finish that next trip as well.

Here is a picture of the house from the road. There used to be steps in the front but they were rotten so we took them out. We aren't sure we will put them back but the porch is a nice place to sit.

Finally there are plenty of birds to watch and here are a few pictures. The pinkish birds are Roseate Spoonbills. The have a very wide beak shaped like a table spoon. The other two are Brown Pelicans of which there are plenty. They are very majestic in flight.

There are also Blue Herons and various Egrets and other birds. They can be seen at my Picasa site, there is a link in the right column

Solar Eclipse

 About two weeks after the Blood Moon in the previous post, we had a solar eclipse. It was on October 23 and I wanted to try to get some photographs of it as it occurred. I have an old Jason 313 Optical telescope and it was equipped with a projection screen so I was able to see it fairly well. At the bottom of the post is a picture of the setup. The maximum eclipse occurred at sunset and we had interference from clouds, trees and the house. In the pictures, the dark areas are mostly clouds or trees although there are a couple of sun spots that are visible.

The sun spots are visible here in the left center area of the sun. The shadow of the moon is beginning to cover the sun The telescope setup is below