Blossom Ridge Farm

What Bonnie did on Sunday.

What Kathy did on Sunday.

The photos show why we are Blossom Ridge Farm.

Bonnie spent Sunday working on a couple of raised beds in her veggie garden. She planted bush beans, carrots and Swiss chard. She will be putting boards around the two new raised beds eventually.

Kathy weed whipped the vineyard and did some more tilling. She has two more rows of vines to till.

Mike was by yesterday and took the cover off the AC. We decided it wasn't worth the effort to take it off in the summer and put it back on in the winter. Mike will be here this week to extend our driveway and do some other work he wasn't able to get to on Friday.

Rex will be back with the hose for the washer. Kathy brought the vent pipe for the dryer from the villa, so we have everything we need to get the installation of those two appliances completed.

Kathy and Rex forgot to change the broiler setting to LP from natural gas and didn't get the oven setting closed enough. Bonnie tried to bake on Saturday and was greeted by a huge flame in the oven. Kathy got the stove manual out and knows how to set those two things to LP but Bonnie wants Rex to do it.

We are still without a microwave. Bonnie will be taking it back to Ft. Wayne and, hopefully, we will get it back soon...or a new one.

Millie had an episode today and Kathy isn't certain what it was. It didn't last long.

June and Scooby stopped by to say hi when they were walking at the campground.

Keeping busy indoors!

Bathroom - wall colors photographed lighter than they are.

(Click on photos to enlarge.)

View of kitchen from dining area.

(Walls are darker than they appear in photo - a dark salmon.)

Kitchen

Kathy spent the day doing laundry, trying out the dishwasher, and picking up the cottage for a few photos. She touched up some walls with paint. We actually did very well moving things in and did very little damage to the walls and floors. The floors still need to be cleaned, especially the bamboo, but we are continuing to move things to the farm from The Fort, so won't do a thorough job of cleaning until we are completely done moving. Not to mention that it is silly to clean the bamboo when the basement steps are still so filthy. They will be washed down, sanded and painted.

Kathy programmed the water softener yesterday and it charged last night without a hitch.

The washer takes very little soap because of the soft water. We will need to remember that! Bonnie is enjoying the soft water...especially in the shower. Kathy is trying to find out how many ppm the iron content is in our water. She set the water softener hardness higher because of the iron content, but would like more accurate info. And she is thrilled to now have some clean undies to wear. Bonnie suggested she buy some more. What a novel idea!

The basement floor is holding up. It did need another coat of paint and is filthy from all the traffic. It will be difficult to keep it clean until the drainage tile work is completed and some gravel is put down at the walk-out. Right now, every time Kathy lets Millie and Gizmo out to answer the call of nature, she has to stick their feet in a pan of water to wash off the mud! That is only because it rained quite a bit yesterday. Today Gizmo took off while Kathy was cleaning the mud from Millie's feet. He found his way back to the basement, but not before Kathy was wet and muddy from trying to locate him!

The washer and dryer seem to be performing well. There was a question as to whether the washer would be able to push water up 8' or more to the drain that would remove it from the house. Kathy had checked the manual and it stated that the washer could do it...and it has so far today. We do need a longer drain hose. Rex had to extend the one we had for a temporary fix and it is leaking a little where two hoses are hooked together. We also neglected to bring the flexible dryer tubing from The Fort and we have a temporary fix there, too. Kathy will be picking that up tomorrow on her lunch break from work and Rex will be responsible for picking up a longer drain hose.

Kathy decided to test the dishwasher this evening and it seemed to do a good job and did not leak. No leaks is always a good thing.

Rex and Kathy worked on getting more hot water coming out of the shower head. The water was warm but was not hot. The hardware came shipped from the factory pre-set to save hot water, but it was too cool for us. Bonnie will be happy now because Kathy took a shower this afternoon and can attest to the fact that the water is now much hotter.

Kathy treated herself to a trip to town today and visited both Wal*Mart and Owen's. She got a few items and was delighted to see that Owen's carried some of her favorite Private Select items, including her favorite ice cream! That will please Marquette who gets a teaspoon or two of vanilla bean ice cream every night. Sometimes Possum joins him, but never Tacumwah. Marquette also gets a splash of skim milk in the morning too. He is the only cat of ours who seems to like milk.

All three cats ate well today. It is the first good meal Possum has eaten in almost a week.

Andy or his people were a no-show today so Kathy had no stove tonight. So with the microwave not working, it was sandwiches...again! Bonnie, on the other hand, met a friend at Casa's in The Fort for dinner. Maybe she will bring home a doggie bag? Kathy isn't too proud to accept leftovers from Casa's!

Oh, to be able to eat a homecooked meal again!

Railing is 1 1/2" wide and only our Bengal,

Tacumwah, is brave enough to walk it!

(Click on photos to enlarge.)

Possum setting the table. He appears to be

having a problem with the placemats.

Kathy had the day off today and worked with Rex to get the stove, washer, and dryer up and running. The stove is almost functional. There is a leak in the gas line at a connector near the house that needs to be fixed before the gas can be turned on to enter the house. Andy will be sending someone tomorrow morning to fix it.

Our brand new microwave is dead and we are NOT happy about it. And because the stove wasn't working yet, we had nothing to cook in or on. Kathy got her crock pot from The Fort and threw in some food Bonnie picked up yesterday at My Menu.

Most of the water leaks are fixed now. There is still one under the kitchen sink we are watching. Kathy and Rex were so busy working on the stove that they did not get the washer and dryer hooked up before Rex had to leave. He came back later in the evening with LeeAnn to hook them up. Kathy needs to do laundry because she is out of clean undies and will have to hand wash some or borrow some from Bonnie who always seems to have enough for 3 people. And Miss Millie needs her bedding washed.

Kathy tried the reverse osmosis water today and she said it is excellent. Rex needs some tubing in order to run it to the fridge for drinking water and ice.

Mike will be here on Friday to get the AC ready to go, fix some buckled siding, caulk the fiber cement siding, and put latches on the doors under the porch.

Bonnie planted part of her garden (the plants) Monday and Kathy started tilling around the grapevines. It rained today, so that kept Kathy out of the vineyard.

A HUGE thank-you to Rex and LeeAnn for working on our appliances today!

Settling in....

Dining area for country kitchen.

Sleeping loft with 2 sleepers!

Marquette in foreground and Possum on the chest.

We survived our first full day here at the farm. The cats were very active during the night exploring. All seem very comfortable here though none are eating well.

Unfortunately, Millie is ill again with whatever almost killed her a few weeks ago. The vet was unable to tell Kathy earlier this week if Millie had a bad tooth or swollen lymph gland because he wasn't able to get Millie's mouth open. Kathy doesn't understand how a trained vet would be unable to open the mouth of an 11-pound, 15-year-old dog. She hopes that Millie doesn't have to continue to fight this the rest of her life.

We hope to have our stove hooked up before Memorial Day is over with. Kathy is looking forward to some filet mignon and a bottle of wine she has been saving for our first big meal in the cottage.

Today we went to Wal*Mart for a few items and continued to find homes for the items we brought from Ft. Wayne the past few days. Tomorrow we must go back to The Fort for clothes and even more items.

The litter box, cat food and water had to be moved from the loft to the front porch/living room because one of the cats decided to drown a catnip mouse in the water bowl and spilled water all over the cork flooring. Luckily Kathy discovered it soon enough that there was no damage to the floor. Thank heavens Bonnie had sealed it! Bonnie was already complaining about cat litter on the cork flooring. It is much better to have these cat items on ceramic tile. We now have a no-tip water dish, a mat under it, and a special mat in front of the litter box to remove some of the litter from cat paws as the cats exit the box.

Kathy took Gizmo out for a walk today and he started rolling on a dead animal...a snake Kathy had almost stepped on twice on Wednesday while taking items into the basement through the double doors. Today's walk included a trip to the fence dividing Denny and Barbara's property from ours where Kathy marked the fence posts where the fence was the lowest and where we usually cross when going from the cottage to the cave (or vice-versa) for a visit.

Last weekend Kathy opened the shed doors to get a tool and must have scared the baby robins on the other side of the shed because there was quite a ruckus and baby robins tumbled every-which-way out of the nest. Kathy managed to scoop up two of the babies and put them back in the nest, but they just jumped out again. The parents were very unhappy as the babies scattered. Kathy was unhappy because she could not corral the robins. Bonnie said that we would not be able to use the shed when the babies got active enough to jump out. Now that doesn't make sense at all.

Our plants arrived yesterday...our herb assortment, tomato assortment and pepper assortment. Now to have the time to plant them!

The campground is full this weekend and Kathy especially enjoys seeing the campsites full of families enjoying all that Camp Timber Lake has to offer.

The Magnificent Seven!

Tacumwah was the first to go exploring...like immediately!

Marquette under the buffet. He got under and got stuck.

He had to be pulled out and his tummy barely cleared!

Possum wants to come down the stairs but....

The Magnificent Seven arrived at The Farm today and what an adventure we had! The girls definitely had it over the boys in adjusting. Gennie, Tacumwah and Millie seamlessly adjusted to the move. Gizmo did fine but he is raring to go exploring the out-of-doors. The two Timber Lake Tigers hid...one under the buffet where he got stuck, and the other under the bed in the loft. But the award for the very worse pet today goes to Little Bear who would NOT stop whining!

The cats were set up in the loft...litter box, dry food and water, and we took the kennels upstairs that they rode to the farm in and set them on the futon where we opened them. Tacumwah ate well at dinnertime and is very happy in the cottage. There isn't a counter or window ledge she hasn't been on. Marquette ate a little, but Possum was too nervous to eat. Little Bear, General and Millie ate well and Gizmo picked at his food.

The dogs and Gennie are in the walkout basement and Millie and Gennie are very happy there. All in all it was a pretty smooth transition.

Bonnie and Kathy are pooped and there is still so much to do at both homes and on the land at the farm. Kathy will need to go back to The Fort tomorrow for more things and to bring some clothes to wear to work at the library and on the farm.

The important thing is that we are here and so are our pets!

Moving time!

Our beautiful...

...Marquettes!

We have been moving for the past two days and we are pretty pooped. Bonnie rented a truck and we loaded it up Wednesday with furniture and took it to the cottage where we unloaded it. It took forever to load it, forever to unload it, and we didn't arrive home until after 10 p.m. The pets ate about 10:30 and Kathy didn't eat until after 11!

The absolute worst thing we hauled was a large metal cabinet. We put it on a dolly and took it to the walkout basement doors. There were so many ruts we almost lost it many times. Another horrid piece of furniture was Kathy's futon which we ended up taking apart. Richard saw us struggling and kindly offered to help. We thanked him but continued on by ourselves.

We brought our bicycles (3 of 4 of them) and discovered after we got them there that Kathy had a tire issue with her Specialized and will need to take the tire in for repair. Two of the bikes are currently in the basement and the third is in Barbara and Denny's outbuilding. Kathy discovered that we have more in that building than she thought and much of it can be tossed. Hopefully we can do that soon.

Today Rex came into The Fort and we packed up all the appliances and a few other things and then he met us on the other end and we unloaded. We have the use of the fridge and freezer but Rex will need to come back later this weekend to hook up the stove, run the reverse osmosis to the fridge, and hook up the washer and dryer. We have enough clean clothes for a couple days anyway.

Tomorrow is a big day; we take our 7 pets to live at the cottage. That will be the focus of our day...to get them settled in. We won't be going back to work until Tuesday, so the major trauma should be over by then. We will take it easy tomorrow and concentrate on the pets and do some more straightening and cleaning.

We need to spend some time in the vineyard (tilling), but it won't be tomorrow. Maybe Saturday and Sunday and then rest again on Monday before heading back to work on Tuesday.

We will continue to go through things at the villa and take what we want to the farm, giving/throwing the rest away.

Denny and Barbara are in Houston meeting their newest grandchild and will be on the road a few weeks. We will miss them.

Tag teaming the baby robins!

Baby robins on Saturday, May 16th.

We are counting down the days, and by next week at this time, we should all be living at the cottage. Bonnie and Little Bear have already moved in. Kathy is still driving back to The Fort to care for pets. Bonnie has the basement floor looking great, but Kathy would still like to see one more coat of paint on it before the dogs are moved in.

We are very much enjoying watching the pair of robins feed their young. The heads of the adults disappear down the gullets of the babies! Kathy is taking a video camera today in the hope of capturing it. If she gets it, she can upload the video.

We have moved in some kitchen pots, pans, dishes, etc. The appliances move on Thursday and we will keep the rental van an extra day to move a few pieces of furniture. Then we can take our time sorting through the rest of the things at the villa to decide what we will take to the farm, and take Denny up on his offer to help us move with this van after his return from Houston. We are not pressured into doing this hastily since we still do not have the villa cleaned and on the market. We want to make certain that everything we take with us is something we really want or will use, and that it will have a place in the cottage.

Kathy ordered trash removal service for the farm this past week and it begins this Wednesday. It will be nice to have trash removal on both ends until we settle in.

Too muddy to work in the vineyard. The wire and Gripple tool arrived, so we are ready to put up our fruiting wire when we have the time and the weather cooperates. The weather has also prevented Rick Bauer from backfilling around the house and working on the perimeter drain. This is keeping the area at the walkout muddy which will not be a good thing once the dogs arrive and need to go outside into that area. Hopefully that work can be done in the next couple of weeks.

Birthdays and Mother's Day!

Quickly filling up the nest!

A lot of weed whacking!

Have to till.

No trip to the farm on Saturday. It was very, very windy in Fort Wayne and, we understand, also in Huntington County.

We did drive down today. Bonnie put a coat of primmer on the concrete floor in the basement. She thinks she will need two coats over the primer. When the floor is done, we can bring the dogs.

Kathy concentrated on the vineyard today. She weed whacked around the vines in the vineyard and into the area between the rows. She was thinking it would make it easier for Bonnie to till on the sides of each row of vines and for her to use Denny's tiller around each vine. Maybe it will. We shall see.

So it was Mother's Day and Kathy received a phone call from each of her children and Bonnie heard from her son also. In addition, Kathy spoke with her mother twice today.

We saw Denny and Barbara today and found out from Denny, after Barbara had gone home after a visit with us, that it was not only Mother's Day for Barbara, but it was also her birthday! So...happy birthday, Barbara!

Kathy hopes to do some tilling on Wednesday this week but that will be weather-dependent.

Denny and Barbara are waiting for a phone call from Houston saying they have another grandchild and then they will be off to Houston for a visit followed by a visit with other relatives. They will be gone for a month.

Kathy will be arranging for trash removal this week and Bonnie will be making arrangements to have our appliances transported to the cottage. The plan is still to move in by Memorial Day.

50 million nematodes...but who's counting?

The 3 robin eggs hatched!

Life cycle of a nematode!

Nematodes arrived late Tuesday.

A box in a box.

Package of 50 million nematodes.

Kathy stopped by the farm on Wednesday on her way to Logansport to put the nematodes in the fridge until she had time to apply them. On the way to Logansport it began to rain and she almost turned around to go back and spray the nematodes but decided against it.

On her way back from Logansport on Thursday morning it began raining, so she decided to apply the nematodes in the rain. As soon as she turned north on 200 E off 600 N, the rain stopped! Since it was wet and overcast, she applied the nematodes. She is hoping it rained last night and sent an email off to Barbara this morning, asking if it did.

The robin eggs had hatched since Sunday and Kathy got pictures of the wiggly little critters. They will be off on their own before we know it!

Kathy was dismayed to find the little fridge in the kitchen not working when she removed the nematodes on Thursday. It had been working on Wednesday. She plugged a lamp into the outlet and it didn't work either. So into the basement she went to see if a breaker had shut off. Sure enough, one had. She reset it and the fridge came back on. The other day the breaker to the water heater tripped and we had no hot water. Kathy is a little concerned about the tripping breakers. The breaker box and breakers are used. Could that be the issue? We must confer with Rex about this.

We are still scheduled to move over Memorial Day and anticipate that Rex will have the rest of our plumbing and electrical done by then.

The vines look healthy. Kathy is watching 3 which she thinks may be dead. There are 4 in the "nursery" we could use as replacements. Bonnie will be tilling a swatch along both sides of each row and Kathy will use Denny's Mantis to go around each vine. We also need to build the soil up around each plant and that will involve breaking up some soil from the piles around the cottage and carting it to the vineyard in the wheel barrow. We need to fertilize also. So much to do.

Bonnie purchased a used mower from a friend that we can use in the vineyard and around the house for now, and we can hire someone to mow the rest of the acreage on a riding mower for this summer anyway. Kathy wants to use some weed killer along the fence between us and Denny and Barb's. Denny has already done his side of the fence.

Don't know what is on the agenda for this weekend. Kathy would like the vineyard tilled, but we also need to work on the basement and the bamboo and cork flooring.

Basement and vineyard work

Before...

...after. Ready for Bonnie and Little Bear.

Where is Little Bear?

Click to enlarge.

Another busy weekend. We took separate cars to the farm because Kathy was not going to spend the night. Her dog, Millie, has been very sick and she didn't want to take Millie to the farm where she might be upset and where Kathy would not be able to pay much attention to her.

In the mail on Saturday was the Certificate for Occupancy for the cottage. Hooray!

On the agenda for the weekend was the basement and the vineyard.

We moved everything from the main part of the basement into the utility room and Kathy swept the basement for the second time this week. By the time this was done on Saturday, it was late enough for Kathy to leave for The Fort. She had also had another success at trash-burning and had climbed a very high ladder to screw some halogen bulbs into our security light at the walk-out.

Bonnie mopped the basement concrete twice Saturday night and once Sunday morning. It still looks dirty. We have concrete paint and will soon begin applying coats of it. It worked very well for us in our 4-seasons room in The Fort and makes sense for as long as we have the dogs and bird.

Kathy was dismayed to see that the crack in the basement floor has gotten worse. Was it poured maybe 6 months ago? There is surely a way to repair it and keep it from getting even worse. So far there does not seem to be any water entering the basement through the crack which runs the entire width of the basement. Darn!

The leak under the bathroom sink has returned so we will need to tell Rex so he can look at it when he comes out to finish the electrical and plumbing on the cottage and hook up the gas line. We ran out of hot water this weekend so there is an issue somewhere, and the reverse osmosis sill needs to be hooked up before we move in and have our fridge hooked up. Then there are the two outside lights that need to be finished. So we still have quite a few things that need to be done.

Mike will be returning to caulk the fiber cement siding and put latches on the doors under the porch. Then there are the two areas on the cottage where the siding buckled and needs to be replaced. And Kathy wants screen doors too, so maybe she should start shopping for them so Mike can hang them.

Well, that was depressing. Even more to do than we thought!

Today we concentrated on the vineyard and now have 80 vines and 11 varieties. There are 3 or 4 vines that Kathy isn't sure will make it. We have 4 extra in the garden that can be transplanted if any of the vines in the vineyard die. The varieties we have are:

Whites - Vidal, Vignole, Traminette, Traminette-Ravat, Niagara, Frontenac Gris.

Reds - Corot Noir, Marquette, Noiret, Concord, Cabernet Franc.

Kathy is excited about having the own-rooted native varieties that she loves.

So Bonnie and Little Bear spent Saturday night and Kathy drove home to take care of the 6 pets at home and watch a movie (Iron Man) which was excellent. Bonnie did not sleep well because she couldn't get comfy on her futon, and she was overly tired and had a sore lower back. So even though it was nice being at the cottage and working outside, it was still tiring and not in the least restful. After we move in we have agreed that we will set aside at least one day a week to enjoy the farm and not work!