Adding a Little Color to the Homestead

This past week has been a mess with regard to weather. Snow and ice - and then it warms up just enough during the day to all start melting and leave us with a muddy mess. Bernie has spent a great deal of time inside this week. And as a result, he's finished painting almost half the inside of the house. Yay!

You may not know this about the love of my life, but he is color blind. Thank the heavens. Because the dining room is a very dark green, and the kitchen is a very bright yellow. Bernie thinks they are black and bright, respectively. I assured him they look beautiful. And being the wonderful husband that he is, he simply said "As long as you like them." Although, when we were putting the kitchen back together after he painted, he picked up the French's Yellow Mustard bottle, held it up to the kitchen wall, and asked "Is that wall the same color as this?" I was amazed that he could notice the similarity, but I just chuckled and said "You are so funny". Don't tell him.

We learned we are getting money back on our income taxes for last year. That's a big deal to me, as we usually end up paying. It's not a big deal to Bernie because he feels they never should have taken it in the first place. I'm just thrilled not to have to write the IRS a check right now. We both feel that paying taxes to the Federal Government is robbery. Look up the definition of robbery. It's something to the effect of taking something from you that you do not willingly give. As in requiring it by law. But that's a subject for a different blog. I'm here to tell you about living on our homestead, not to remind you you're being robbed by the Federal Government.

So we learned we are getting money back on our income taxes for last year. And I left the homestead for the first time this week and went into town to pick up the paperwork from our accountant so we can go ahead and file. We stopped by to see Tex and Charlotte. Tex greeted us by looking at Bernie and saying "How in the world did you get HER off the homestead?" Is it that obvious? Maybe I should get out more.

I made some Sea Salt Spa Bars this weekend. These are kind of tough to make as they require cutting before they have cured overnight. I usually cut them within three hours, while they are still hot and VERY soft. It's not very easy to cut them while they are soft. I took a couple of pictures, but keep in mind, they are still soft and I haven't cleaned them up yet.

Here's one I made with Rosemary Essential Oil and a touch of Peppermint Essential Oil. I am really in love with this scent. Very nice:



And here's one I made with Raspberry Lilac fragrance oil. I had just cut this one when I took the picture, so forgive the washing machine background:



We did have quite a bit of wind this week that not only blew over 2 trees into the driveway, but blew the tin roof about 1/3 the way off the cabin roof. I don't think I need to tell you how much fun it was to tack the roof back down during all those high winds. Although Bernie did that actual task, I held the ladder for him and crawled up on the shed roof next to the cabin to do that for him. The wind kept blowing the tin roof OVER TOP of him. I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Not only am I afraid of heights, I am terrified of losing my husband and being stuck to care for this place all by myself. I told him I was going to kill him if he died. And I seriously meant it.

And through every thing we've done this week, this is a picture of what Elvis was doing:



In all fairness, Elvis really doesn't sleep ALL the time. Here's a picture I took of him wide awake:



He's just full of energy in that picture. You can tell because his eyes are open. Couldn't you just kiss his fur right off of him?

Bee Free,
Penny