It seems we’re writing about the weather a lot lately. In Minnesota, in the winter, it’s usually cold and either sunny, cloudy, or snowing. In Texas we’re finding, the weather changes more than in Minnesota, at least in the winter. We just went through another cold spell, with low overnight temps at around 30 degrees F. We had 40’s for high temperatures and so we were able to get a few things done outside. We bought some new gutter for the back porch and after tearing down the old, busted gutter, we put up the new one. While we were doing that, we wanted to move the rain barrel away from the porch by a few inches so we had to siphon all the water out.

That worked pretty well and we were able to move it and get it set up the way we wanted it. After that we put up the new gutter, which turned out pretty nice. Overnight the temperature rose with a warm front coming through which brought rain with it. Since 6:00 this morning we’ve had over an inch of rain which filled the water barrel once again. It’s also filled the yard with standing puddles again, so it’s back to using our rubber boots outside. It’s still raining, and they say we can expect a couple more inches.

The weather wizards say that we can expect another two days of rain. Once it dries up, we have to get back to cutting the old sidewalk out in preparation for the cement guys to come pour our pad for the new building. That’s supposed to happen on the 31st, if the weather cooperates. Pretty much everything in a person’s life is affected by the weather in some way.

In the mean time, we’re making plans for our new woodshop. Can you tell we’re excited by the prospect of having a woodshop once again? We can’t wait. We have lots of projects planned once we get electricity in the building. The first thing we’ll do is move all our machinery into the new space. Once that’s done, we’ll build new work benches for both rooms and then Barb has her eye on a nifty new giant tool box with a wood bench top and electric outlets. It’ll have room for sanders, skill saws, and other tools and needed supplies.

The new tool box will be something like this one in the picture below.

Weather Update

This is what happens when you have really flat land, clay soil, and 2.2 inches of rain in a few hours. And it’s not over yet. The weather forecast, as I mentioned earlier, is calling for rain for the next two days. While making a trip to the greenhouse a little while ago we found this little toad friend, apparently awakened from his hibernation nap by the rain.

He looks pretty sleepy and when I set him down, he didn’t move for a while. He was gone when I checked on him later, so I hope he found a safe place to lay up until the rain dries up.

As I look out the window, next to my computer, it’s still raining. It’s okay though. We’ll take this over below zero temps, and snow!