Week One

The girls had a wonderful first week at school. Their teachers are great and the transition to middle school has been seamless. They rearranged the school, so they are in the same location as last year. We are getting the after school clubs all figured out, but they already started with Cross Country. They even had enough energy yesterday to have a couple friends over...barely. 

My mom was able to spend the night on Thursday and she helped out with making the first woodcrete wall and shuttling our car around to a couple mechanics. The wall turned out well on the bottom, but not the top, due to settling, and the car needs a big repair. The first mechanic couldn't do it, but I was really happy that they were able to refer me to a specialist who can! I thought we were going to need to take a trip down to the dealer in Appleton. What a relief that we found Mike. 

We were invited to the neighbor's birthday party at a bowling alley on Friday. It was a lot of fun. Met a new friend there who also has a woodshop and lives nearby. Managed to finish up the wood stove platform in the greenhouse yesterday and also got the connections figured out for the water jacket. Definitely a Yooper solution but hopefully it will work. 

We had a bonus cookout a week ago because Naomi lost her car key out at our campsite, so we had to go back for it anyway (she found it) and I also got a chance to finish clearing the trails. Should be able to get out there at least once more before the season ends. 

Found the missing key!

Oil leak.

Lots of shiitakes.

Getting ready...

...for the first day of middle school!

So far so good...

Portland seemed to stabilize the mix.

Final form taking shape.

First fire of the season.

Got the lids off.

Taping kit for the pond liner...missing some tape.