Trying to get caught up

My goal in January was to return to blogging.  I've felt out of sorts with homeschooling and then I realized I've been missing a very important element: blogging about our weeks.  I was going to start in January catching up and getting back to a weekly routine.  Well, life never happens the way we want.

First, we had a broken water line.  Our pump sits in a well house in a hobbit sized hole in the ground that is not only small to get into but small inside.  The sides of the wellhouse were lined with stones when it was put in 80 years ago.  Both the house line and the line to the little barn ran underneath those stones.  Apparently, the stones shifted and either pinched or broke a line....and we never did figure out which one.  There was a small hole in the wall where another line had been put in (the automatic cow waterer) which conveniently did have a shut off valve.  The other two lines did not, so not only could we not figure out which line wasn't working, but we couldn't shut off any line at all, which meant no water anywhere on the property.  Its bad enough not having it in the house, but we have 3 horses, 3 pigs, 4 goats, and a bunch of cows out there. Thankfully we have great neighbors.

After three days without water, it was finally fixed.  We opted to make the hole in the side bigger and put all the lines through there.  Then we moved the pump above ground and now each line has a shut off valve.  Here we are in MN in the middle of winter though so we have to quickly build a casing for the pump and put heaters in there so the line didn't freeze.  Yeah, good times.

The week after this adventure, the colds hit the house.  Kevin, I, and one of the girls are the only ones that didn't get it.  Unfortunately, now Kevin has it.  I'm sleeping on the couch....he can keep that all to himself.  lol

We also had a lovely snowstorm....17 inches of the white stuff.  We were all stuck home one day.  Thankfully, we had some new puzzles to get us through.  I've found 4 pack puzzles (500 pieces each) of Thomas Kinkade's Disney puzzles.  We got the first for Kevin for Christmas (okay the girls were more excited about disney princesses than he was, but they all love puzzles).  I picked up two more boxes at Walmart for 13.97 each.  Score!!  Here's the first four done.

 And here's the snow:

We did manage a field trip to the RAD zoo early in January.  Its close by and we love going there.  The Reptiles and Amphibians are awesome! The girls love the alligators.  We were able to hold an alligator that day.  It was great!

 Have a wonderful weekend!