Stone Mason and Blacksmith Class

July was crazy. 11 great dane puppies. What a handful.

I spent a week learning to build stuff with stone. I really enjoyed that. I am starting to gather rocks for a big wall I am building at the house here. Mac and his wife were 2 amazing people. They even started their own school in VA 30 years ago. Just great people. For anyone interested, here are their sites.

Witness Tree Studio

Charles Mcraven

The following week was a week of blacksmithing. I learned a lot. Wyatt came with me and had a blast. He really wants me to get a forge now. We used coal and gas forges and made some knives, tongs, swords, and other stuff.

Anyway, just got back from the ATL. Not much has changed there. Drew and Mel built a beautiful barn and I hung out with Max and Emma a good bit. I should have booked for 2 more days, but hindsight is 20/20.

We are drinking goat milk regularly now. 1 goat puts off a lot of milk. Although they are a pain in the ass sometimes.

Utah 2012

Took the kids down to Utah for a few days. We hit Zion and hiked the virgin narrows a couple of times. What a great hike through the water and 1000 ft walls. Definitely one of the top hikes in the world. Next time we need to go up to Kolob canyon, I heard that is good. We camped at Coral Pink sand dunes again. What a beautiful place that is.

We then headed to Bryce canyon which was my first time there. It is quite beautiful, but very touristy. We did the Queen garden hike and down at the bottom some kids had made hundreds of rock cairns everywhere, even in the trees. It was very cool and creative. Kodachrome state park was a great camp spot as well.

We'll have to go to capitol reef one day. Paul said it had fruit trees growing everywhere from an old settlement.

After that we hit Bryan Head which is a neat little town up in the mountains. It was a nice break from the heat. We then stopped to pick up our new yorkie George and headed to park city for a day. Quite a nice ski resort town and lots of activities at the olympic mountain like ziplines, bobsleds, and downhills into the water. We'll probably head back there one day.

So after days of intense desert heat and sunny skies, we hit a massive hail storm on the way back in montana. It was deafening in the car for about 20 miles. I had to slow down to 15 mph on the highway. Most cars had pulled over. Crazy weather here.

Potatoes are looking great, but everything else in the garden is so so. The beans are looking decent. Tomatoes are starting to come up but I may have planted them too late.

Spring in the Bitterroot

More great weather this month. We love it here. Our garden is almost done. The potatoes started coming out of the ground today. I still need to plant the strawberries, corn, and other veggies. It has been so busy dealing with all of the animals and babies. Mia had 3 puppies and is a great mom. Aunt mimi is taking one, our friends Olin and Megan are taking one, and we are going to keep the third and have 2 breeding girls. Baylee is due in about a month with great dane puppies. I expect a big litter from her. We have about 30 baby bunnies right now. They are mowing the grass daily. We made some rabbit jerky this week. The soy sauce marinated was good. Worstechire sauce, not so good. We'll keep experimenting. Goat had a little boy. He is the cutest little thing you have ever seen. Jakjak named him Zelda. It looks like our other goat may not have been pregnant after all, so that is kind of a bummer. We bought another baby goat yesterday because of that. Her name is oreo and it is fun to watch the 2 babies play. So we'll breed 3 this winter and hopefully have 3 milking goats next spring. Abbey, Maggie and I went into the mountains last weekend. We blew out a tire way back in. That was fun. Needless to say, we ran into snow drifts that were too high, so we did not make our destination. Maybe next time. Mikey and I canoed 15 miles of the bitterroot during high water. That was pretty intense. That is one dangerous river. We got spun around and dumped in under the Bells Crossing bridge. The water was ice cold and the look on Michaels face was priceless. Fortunately I am pretty calm under pressure and in crazy situations. I grabbed his vest and the canoe and we kicked it over to shore, warmed up a bit, then finished our trip. Last but not least, karma has apparently won again. Our crooked ex landlords have been stealing the current families rent and not paying the mortgage, so the bank has the house scheduled for foreclosure on July 1. I am hoping the current renters amber and mike can negotiate something with bank of america to stay in the house. They are good people and love it here too. Almost everyone we talk to in the bitterroot that knew the terrys are glad to see them gone. They just didn't fit in with the honest, hardworking, good morals of most people in the valley. It is so weird, though, how infatuated Nicole and Jason are with Monica and I. They still call and leave random voicemails on our cell phones from time to time that make no sense. I guess being dopers, they probably don't think clearly at times. Most of the messages sounded like they were drunk or doped up. I guess I would probably smoke dope too if I had to listen to nicoles squeaky ass voice everyday. Like fingernails on a chalkboard. Next month I learn how to build stuff out of stone from a top stone mason and I learn to make tools and shape steel in his blacksmithing class. Awesome.

Warm April In Bitterroot

What a beautiful April we have had in the bitterroot valley. It is 85 degrees today. We have been tilling, watering, and getting the garden ready. Everything is already green and growing in the yard and pasture. We have a ping pong table outside and usually play some rounds later in the evening before the sun goes down. Speaking of the sun going down, it doesn't until almost 9 pm now. I love the long days.

 Monica was gone for 2 weeks on another one of her trips. It was peaceful and calm around here. Although all 4 kids got some crazy flu going around. It knocked them out for a few days. Unbelievably, I did not get it, although I was coughed on for days.

 Our crazy farm is about to grow a lot next month. We have 2 goats due. Mia the yorkie is due. And 5 rabbits are due. Oh, and we added 10 ducks last week. Although the neighbors dog killed 1 already. I dug out a series of ponds going down the back pasture for them. They love to play in water. The horses get in the ponds and play as well. But we are getting 8-12 eggs a day from the ducks and chickens. I fenced in the other side of the pasture so the horses have been feasting on fresh grass for the last 2 weeks. Those horses are crazy. Pepper ran full speed into the fence yesterday and almost knocked the post out of the ground. I can't believe she didn't get hurt. The great danes tied last week, so we'll have some great dane puppies in a couple of months.

 I can't wait until my blacksmithing and stone mason class this summer. I have been wanting to learn those skills for a while.

DOAF

I am getting pretty excited to launch my new site. I think it could become huge as a social platform to communicate with local friends and neighbors. Should be done soon.

It has been an active spring. Michael and I have been shooting a lot. We shoot skeet in the back yard. Abbey and I went horseback riding with Bill last weekend. That was a blast. The weather has been amazing. This winter was very mild. We'll have to start getting the garden in shape.

For anyone that does not believe in karma. The sleezebag ex landlords of ours are losing their home to the bank July 1. What goes around, comes around. They screwed us over along with plenty of other honest people, so it is only fitting. The tenants called me and told me, "Eric, you were right. They are crooks. The Terrys have been taking our money and not paying the mortgage on the house. BOA is auctioning the house July 1. So of course they have to find a new place now, just like we had to. But at least they won't have to deal with Bonnie and Clyde any more.

Baby goats due in May. I am very excited about the goats. We tried some goat milk last week and it was delicious. We plan on making ice cream, butter, cheese and other dairy products with it, too. Self sufficiency takes one step at a time. We have plenty of rabbit meat, that is for sure.

Jak is doing good on his reading lessons. He never wants to do them, but is getting better. I have to do most lessons with him twice. I think I started him a bit too early, but.....

Mild Winter in the Bitterroot

This winter has been much nicer than our first. A lot of sunny days and pretty mild weather for Montana. We have 2 pregnant goats now. 1 alpine and one lamancha. They are both due in May. We'll have a few babies running around and plenty of milk I guess. Our rabbits continue to breed like crazy. We are up to 30 or so. Nice, lean meat and great for rabbit and dumplings. We gets eggs every day although our duck has stopped laying this week. Not sure what is up with her.

Wyatt , Abbey and I went to atlanta during the last week of 2011 and stayed at mom and dads house. I must have put on 10 lbs. All they do it eat and eat and eat. :) Mom spent a couple of days in the hospital with pain in her midsection. We are still not sure what the cause was, but she seems to be better now.
The kids and I went up to Charlotte and went sailing with Gehrig on his 26 ft sailboat. I loved it and could definitely live on the water. My dream.

It is definitely good to be home back in Montana where people are real and care about each other. We have built some great relationships out here and this is definitely home. I am glad Jehovah led us out here, I believe God was leading us to a better way of life.

I started teaching Jak to read this week. I forgot how frustrating it can be to teach a 4 year old to read. But he is catching on. Typical boy, though. He can't sit still. I biked up to the kids school to drop off some lunch money and played football with Wyatts class at recess. Now they all want me to come up there every day at recess. :) Those were the days when I was Wyatt's age 10 and all we did was play football every day all day after school. There was nothing better than that.

Crazy Ex Landlords

So we are getting a solid 10 eggs per day now. One of our ducks mysteriously drowned in the horse trough the other day, kind of weird. I did not know ducks could drown. The ducks are very cool.
We are breeding the goat sometime soon so we'll have babies and milk in the spring. More self sufficient.

We had a great thanksgiving at David and Amys, kudos to them for throwing a great dinner party. The kids had fun playing with Nick and Jacob. I had the privilege to talk with Davids dad for a while. What a wealth of knowledge and experience he has.

And just when you think you have seen the last of our psycho ex landlords, we get 3 voicemail death threats from them. We of course have to go down and file a police report. They basically tell us that since he has no business ever coming to our house, if he does, use deadly force to protect our family if necessary. Then the next day, Jason Terry calls back apologizing. A totally different tone.

Now today someone is using my identity to sign up for match.com and datehookup.com. Probably the ex landlords. It is almost humorous, but we are having the FBI investigate them. This would equate to 5 felonies between the death threats, some cross state issues,  and identity theft. These 2 just keep digging their own grave. It is a shame.