Woodhenge

The planets were aligned for Lizzie last weekend.

But first, a little background...

I have had a big vegetable garden for the past five years. In order to keep the critters out of it, I've had a 6-foot high fence made out of netting around it. It has served me well, but it was getting a bit worn and easy for said critters to breach. Also, I was spending some of the precious time I have for working in the garden repairing the fence for the garden. One morning, two large does were breakfasting on my brand new spinaches and lettuces. They were completely non-plussed when I tried to shoo them away. Rather than pulling out the big guns, literally, Hubby offered to help me re-do the fence.

We happened onto a sale on heavy-duty, tall, chicken wire at the local farm store. A neighbor offered to find us tall fence posts. All we needed to do was dig a few holes and pop those posts into them.

A piece of cake.

Yeah, right.

Here are some things to consider (for you non-farm types):

Can we get this project done before the asparagus starts coming up in early April (because, if we can't, the deer are going to have lunch, too.)

Can we get the old steel posts dug up and the netting cleared away so that we can put in the new stuff?

Is the ground thawed enough to dig into?

Is it thawed enough but not too wet to dig into?

Is the neighbor going to bring the posts when the ground is thawed and not too wet?

Can we dig 32 holes in a weekend?

Well, yes!! (to all of it!)

We started by digging holes by hand. After about one and a half holes, Hubby jumped in the truck and went to town to rent an auger for us. (What a guy!)

The gas-powered auger made things a bit easier, but it had to be man-handled (or, at times, woman-handled) and had no self-propulsion or lightness of being to it. :( We did get a system going and managed to bang out the 32 holes. (Our muscles suffered the consequences of this system the next day.)

We say "ni hao maa" here because this hole goes all the way to China. :) Seriously, though, the holes needed to be about 2.5 feet deep.

The ten-foot (plus) hedge poles were delivered about two hours behind schedule (much closer than 98% of the goings on at the farm) and promptly popped into their holes around the garden. Each pole was weighty enough to require two people to carry it, so, it was quite fortuitous that the now mostly-grown neighbor children showed up to help. In addition, daylight savings time had just kicked in so we had an extra hour of daylight to get it all done. We'll wrap the whole thing with the chicken wire next weekend. The hard part is done.

It was warm enough.

It was dry enough.

The auger was available to rent.

We had time to do it all.

The neighbor kids helped out.

The planets were aligned for Lizzie last weekend and she was well pleased!

We may even have more than three beets this year!

Nice Doing Business With You

I must begin this entry with a shout out to Akin's Building Center of Clarinda, Iowa.

Halla!

(I'd put up link to them, but they don't see the need for a website. It probably wouldn't bring them any more business than they already have.)

As you may have read in this space, we've been building a barn on our land. We got the roof on a couple of weeks ago and it was time to order the walls. We shopped around and found that our local (Clarinda) hardware store had the best deal, so we ordered from them, by phone, one day last week.

They said they could deliver the panels of metal and skylight plastic panels (they even had them cut to our specs for no extra charge). I told them we'd be at the farm on Saturday and could they deliver it all then? (They were very upfront with us that the delivery charge would be $12.50. I thought we could stomach that and gave them the green light.) 'Round about 11am on Saturday morning, there was a knock on our cabin door. It was the guys from Akin's with our walls.

They brought the panels, corners, and screws (which we hadn't ordered, but which they knew we would need). Andre helped them unload the materials and we contemplated the next phase of building the barn. (The goal is to make it more or less waterproof so that we can install a bed so that Andre can finally get a decent nap!)


I don't usually share personal, financial information, but, in this case, I must tell you that the total for the wall panels, et al, came to over $1,500. The reason this is significant is because all of the preceding happened without any money changing hands. We hadn't been in to Akin's to pay for anything that we had ordered and yet, somehow, it all came! I guess they knew we were good for it.

We went in later that day to settle up.

It was in no way out of the ordinary for the folks at Akin's.

God bless 'em!

A Man's World

So, we're building a new barn. The old one, which was actually rather new, was rolled up in a ball by a spring tornado last year along with the garden shed. Thankfully, the main two cabins were left untouched. Note to self -- get that building insurance before the coming spring.


With the help of our neighbor's son and his friend, the skeleton is in place for the new barn. The next step is the metal roofing material which can be had at any decent hardware store. The problem with the decent hardware stores in town is that they are used to dealing with men. My man, however, is busy working all day, so I thought I'd take it upon myself to get some prices on roofing material from the three or four various hardware stores in the area. Having been building things for some two and a half years now, I've learned one basic tenet...men assume I don't know what I'm doing until I "talk the talk" of construction for them, not unlike entering a password in order to gain access, or, at least, strutting by in a bikini to gain attention.

I begin by boning up on the Internet...gauge numbers, widths, linear feet prices, and such. Then, I go to the various stores and let them see that I am price shopping and sometimes get a cute young thing who has a brain in his head and sees that I actually do know what I am talking about. The more interesting conversations are on the phone with the not-so-cute older things that are sure that I don't know what I'm talking about.

Liz: Hello. I'd like to get some prices on roofing panels.

Old Guy: OK. Well, what exactly do you want? (tone = "Ha. She'll be stumped now!")

Liz: Well, I'd like to know how much you charge per linear foot for your 36-inch, 29-gauge, 13-foot, metal, ribbed, white or red...is there a price difference depending on color?...roofing metal, and I need 32 sections of it to cover 1,248 square feet of a barn roof.

Old Guy: Oh. Well, just a minute. (Obviously shaken and calling to his more knowledgeable buddy..."How much is blah blah blah?")

Other Old Guy: (His interminable coffee break rudely interrupted) It's $2.75 per linear foot.

Old Guy: It's $2.75 per linear foot.

Liz: OK. Thanks. And, I assume you don't have it in stock (since no one else did, again, the learning curve in action), so how long would it take to get it in?

Old Guy: (Showing, once again, his utter dispensability) "How long would it take to get it?"

Other Old Guy: Three weeks.

Old Guy: Three weeks.

Liz: Thanks so much! (Touché)