Kitchen Progress

After six or so months of living with open cabinets, my mom and I put up the upper cabinet doors today. Although it was rather convenient to be able to see everything and just reach in and grab stuff, I didn't like the cluttered look. If everything was lined up perfectly and matched somehow, I wouldn't have minded being doorless as much, but the cleaner look makes me happier.

 One of Chris's worries was that white cabinets would give the kitchen a bland, sterile look. To help with that, we went with darker countertops and oil-rubbed bronze hardware. The doors really brightened up the room. But the wall of white did seem a little stark and overwhelming, so to bring a little more warmth and color to the room, I brought down our Angry Birds and perched them atop the cabinets. (I know, I know, Angry Birds is so 2012, but it's the only thing I could think of and find that would work. Besides, I still like to play the game. The physics of it and all...)

May-O-Naze

I don't know how she did it, but for at least 97% of my elementary school days, my mother packed my lunch. (I figured by the time my kids hit 2nd grade, they could fix their own dadgum lunch. This must be why my older two eat cafeteria food 97% of the time. My mother was/is much nicer than I am.) Anyway, sometimes she would make me PB&Js. Sometimes she made mayo and cheese, except I didn't realize at that age that the mayonnaise wasn't really mayonnaise. It was Miracle Whip.

That is probably why I never really thought much about "mayonnaise". It was only something used to moisten the bread and cheese. It was certainly nothing that would add a nice flavor to food. I think I must have been a full-blown adult, living on my own, before I even tasted "real" mayonnaise. I remember being taken aback by the rich flavor of a packet of Hellman's and wondering why anyone would ever choose to use Miracle Whip as a substitute.

A few months back, I was staring at the label on my jar of Hellman's, wondering if Joe was sensitive to any of the ingredients. Thankfully, he isn't scary-allergic to anything that we know of, but he's always hated peanut butter, and any time it has gotten in his mouth, he complains about it making his mouth itch. We also recently discovered that lentils are on the 'no for Joe' list. Several spoonfuls of soup, and his mouth and stomach were in turmoil. He spent the next day at home with the squirts. That got me wondering. If Joe is allergic to at least two different legumes, could he be allergic to soybean products? Tuna melts are a quick easy meal I like to force on the family, but Joe complains about his mouth when we eat them. Either Joe is making it up to try to get out of eating them, or something- maybe the mayonnaise- really is causing him to react.

I did a quick internet search, and everything I found said that highly refined soybean oil is typically safe for those with soy allergies, since it doesn't contain the proteins that cause reactions. Just in case, I thought I'd try to pick up a jar of mayo that used something other than soybean oil, but every single jar in our local Kroger used soybean oil. Even the jars boasting use of the healthier olive oil used a significant amount of soybean oil. "Fine," I thought, frustrated that there are no health food stores near us. "I'll make my own mayonnaise."

So I did.

I should have known to expect yellow. After all, I did use a fresh egg from one of our free-ranging chickens. Our chicken's egg yolks are such a deep orange, marigolds are jealous. And so my REAL mayonnaise was a beautiful, sunny yellow. And I can't get over it.

To be perfectly honest, this homemade mayonnaise has such a zip and zing to it, I'm not sure I'd like it for everyday use, and I really don't know if the kids will like it. I may have to figure out how to tone it down a little. (Less vinegar/lemon juice?) And to be even more honest... I love the convenience of Hellman's, even though the ingredients are less than ideal. We'll see if this homemade mayonnaise kick lasts.

Teamwork

We've been busy around here lately. (Why do I even bother to say that out loud?) This time of year, it's hard to get to all the things on our list with the grass growing like mad. But with teamwork, all things are possible.

Since we are helping take care of part of our neighbor's property, it takes about eight total man-hours to mow everything we want and need to. (The grass on the go-kart track can not be allowed to get high.) Chris usually takes care of our property, while I handle the neighbor's with my riding mower. 

Friday, Chris decided to get a jump on the week's mowing. One half hour into it, he realized the blades has stopped turning (and cutting) the grass. Digging back into the memories of his Belmont Landscape Maintenance days, he remembered a problem they used to have with some of the mowers. The PTO switches would sometimes go bad. He pulled the part off his mower, and looked the part up online. It would cost us $30 and several days to get it fixed. Frustrated with the setback, we took a minute to daydream about selling his walk-behind mower that is too big for me to handle and buying a zero-turn I could use as well.

Wanting to make sure we wouldn't order a part we didn't need, I looked up a video on testing switches. Some shenanigans with the multi-meter revealed that the switch was still good. A few more more YouTube videos later, and we figured out we could test the mower's electric clutch by checking for electrical continuity through the clutch. Poking the probes into the wire harness sticking out of the clutch led us to believe the clutch was bad. I looked the part up online and discovered it would cost us  at least $180 and several days to get it fixed. 

At this point, it was getting late in the day, so we called it quits.

Saturday morning, Chris told me not to order the part yet. He wanted to pull the mower apart first. A few hours later, he had the clutch in hand. He wanted to test it again, just to make sure it was bad. This time, to my surprise, it looked good. We fiddled a bit with the section of wire harness that attaches the wires above the mowing deck to the clutch below and discovered a break in one of the wires. I went inside and looked the part up online. It would cost $15 and several days to get it fixed.

Instead, Chris decided we should try to fix it. He managed pulled the wire harness apart without breaking anything, reset the wire, and together we soldered it back into place, and it didn't cost us but a few hours of time. 

By the end of Saturday, the mowing was done.

And, now, because Chris doesn't want me to post a picture of him working on the mower, here is a picture of a lovely, little salamander I came across today.

Max

Chris found Max on the side of the road near the Duck River one day as he was driving home. He was most likely an unwanted kitten some jerk-wad tossed out the window as he was driving over the bridge, along with Max's litter mates, hoping they would all drown or something. Max was understandably terrified and doing his best to act vicious, so Chris had to don a pair of leather gloves just to pick him up.

The first few days with Max were rough, but slowly, he calmed down and came to trust us, though it was obvious to me that Max would never be quite right in the head. Removed from his mama too soon, he still kneads the floor with his front paws as he eats. Unless he is curled up on your lap, you can never be entirely sure when you pet him if he will accept the affection or try to claw your arm to pieces. For the first year, he was famous for ambushing your legs as you walked through the yard. Now, thankfully, he reserves this game for after dark.

So when Zivah spotted Max perched in a holly bush this morning, I thought this was just another of Max's quirks.

 But when we got closer, we noticed a mouse!

 Silly mouse, I thought. Max has you out on a literal limb.

 But the mouse had another trick up its sleeve:

It jumped over to a branch of the neighboring weeping mulberry and climbed away.

I thought for sure the mouse had outwitted Max, until Max dropped out of the holly and climbed the mulberry with ease.

At that point, we had to leave for school. I thought by the time I got back, either the mouse would have made an escape, or Max's belly would be a little fuller, but no. Twenty minutes later, Max had the mouse cornered.

Once again, I thought the mouse was done for, and I left to go inside and document the excitement of the morning. Instead of making his move, apparently Max let the mouse climb the stack of wood. An hour later, I found Max, still on the deck, napping. The mouse, not realizing Max had given up the chase, was still hiding in a crack between boards. I flushed him out, and Max gave a half-hearted chase. But this time, the mouse found an escape route Max just couldn't follow.

Moved and Improved

Last Sunday, our neighbor, Terry, came over to help us move the chicken coop. We had everything detached and ready to go when he showed up. He carefully lifted each side up off the cinder block "foundation" with the tractor forks while Chris and I wedged it higher. Then, two 6 inch posts were slid underneath and spaced as far apart as the forks on the tractor would allow. Then Terry picked the whole thing up with his tractor, and off we went.

 We expected the three hens that were inside laying eggs to come out scared and cackling when we started moving the coop, but the ruckus didn't scare them in the least. They went along for the ride and finished their business on the move.

 The next several nights, we managed to get most of the chickens in the coop by scattering feed inside and locking them in before they could get back out. Some, we had to catch, and a handful of others eluded capture and kept roosting in the stable.

Chris took a few days off work, and managed to finish building the run mostly on his own. He added some decking to part of the run to provide some extra protection from the weather.

Friday night brought some rain, and washed away a good bit of the chicken poop in the yard. With most of the chickens locked up in run for the weekend, the yard was relatively poop free for Easter's festivities.

As we have too many chickens to keep them in the run long-term, next project on the list is to fence in a bigger yard...