November 2016 Hunting, Thanksgiving, car repairs and good times.

November was a busy month so boredom was not a problem.

We still use the wood stove to cook meals since we have it going most of the time during the winter months anyway.

Susan freeing some sticking keys on the piano.  She also tunes them up on occasions.

Wash day outside. In warm weather (60 and above) she just takes the washer out to the tank where we store the rain water and does the wash there.  It's also close to the clothesline which saves time and work.

I've had this ax handle around for a couple of years now and finally got around to hanging it.  This is a "boy's ax" with a 24 inch handle.  I'm on the short side and just like the shorter handle better when using an ax.  About the only time I need one is when trimming limbs off of trees I've cut down for firewood.  I paint the heads bright orange to make it harder to overlook them in the woods.  One can of orange paint saves replacing a lot of tools.

Susan is shelling dried peas from our garden.  This is a good job on a rainy day when you must work indoors.

This is our "neighborhood."

Sunrise on November 9, 2016.

Scott helping Grandma make cookies.

Susan raked the leaves from most of the yard and deposited them in the garden to compost over the winter.

I'm switching out tires on a Subaru that we'll give to one of our kids and their family.

The water pump began leaking on our way back from Nevada so I'm putting in a new one.  I hit a snag when I went to change the thermostat (the gasket was leaking).  The leak had corroded the thermostat housing bolts and they broke off when I tried to remove them.  That'll mean drilling out the broken bolts from the aluminum intake manifold.  I'm not looking forward to that.

I also got some time in cutting firewood and Susan spent some time canning venison before we headed south.  One afternoon cutting up some trees on the east end of the property I had a spike buck and a doe come over and begin eating the lichen off the tree I'd cut down (while I was cutting it up on the other end of the trunk). I walked over tot he pickup and got my rifle from the window and shot the buck.  The doe looked up at the shot then resumed eating.  The buck ran about 50 feet and piled up dead.  We had a lot of deer this year with quite a few "B" tags given out.

Right after that the neighbor stopped by to tell us there was a sow grizzly with cubs in the neighborhood.  Susan stood guard with the 12 gauge while I field dressed and loaded up the deer. 

Scott painting golf balls just for the fun of it.

Scott wanted to go hunting with me so I unloaded his BB gun and he joined me in the deer stand.  A doe and her fawn came in to browse while we were there and he kept aiming and "shooting" at her.  I didn't tell him the gun was empty so when the deer didn't fall over dead he finally said he needed a new gun because his was broken.  He likes to go out with me but quickly gets bored and/or cold.  I go a little early then just take him the 50 yards back the cabin then I finish the day in the deer stand by myself.

We had to go to Eureka so on the way we drove a short way up into the mountains to a deer camp one of our daughters was in.  Their family (in-laws) make it an annual event setting up tents and campers for a week long hunt.  They normally do pretty well up there.

I've been searching for bucks and one morning I get up to find a new rub about fifteen feet from the back door.

This rub was out in the woods on a neighbor's property.

Scott playing in the laundry basket.

We decided to drive our little car down south for a couple of weeks but it needed new tires.  We opted to put new studded snow tires on it for this trip because it would be winter up here when we came back.  Scott is playing in the tire display in the tire store.  I worked here many years ago as a mechanic.  I think the wheels were made with wooden spokes back then.

Scott and I playing the Jurassic park machine at Walmart. Susan took a video of it and posted it on Facebook.  Scott is all excited and bouncing around and yelling as he plays.  I'm sitting stationary with a focused look while we shoot the attacking dinos with machine guns that never run out of ammo and never get too hot.  We both survived with nary a scratch on either of us.  It was fun!

Next Scott went to the machine where he is Batman driving whatever vehicle that skill level has.

As when shooting dinosaurs he always gets into the game with his whole being!

We ordered him a new snow suit.  We bought the boots locally from the logging/saw shop.

A grouse made the mistake of landing within sight of the cabin while we were having our morning cocoa.  I grabbed the pellet rifle and we had him for supper that evening.

Susan isn't surprised anymore when I suddenly jump up from my recliner, throw on an orange vest, grab the rifle from the rack above the back door and head outside in my pj's and house slippers.  However the buck got away this time.  I think some tree thinning is in order for next summer!

Thanksgiving dinner!  Emily (our youngest daughter) is due to gives us another grandchild (#11) in February.

Scott and his uncle Tristan.

Tristan, Scott, and his little brother looking down from the balcony.

Scott and his uncle Tim.

After dinner it's time to check my eyelids for light leaks.

On the road south again!  We'd planned to spend more time in MT but changed our mind and decided a short jaunt south was in order so we packed up the Hyundai and drove down to NV for a couple of weeks.

Scott's 6th birthday was celebrated in the motor home at Lake Mead.

Story time at the Overton library.

Lego time at the Overton library.

I bought an out-of-state fishing and small game license this year in NV.  So far the fish are worth about $60.00 a pound!

A second striped bass from the lake.  A few days after this we were on the road back to MT for Christmas.  (I also caught a few more fish before we left.)

28 February, 2015 Solar and camp fire cooking, power inverters, hiking, riding and tanks!

And life goes on ...

We had a couple of days with light wind so we got Scott's kite out for some fun.  This year he's old enough to fly the kite himself (although grandpa helped him gain some elevation a couple of times).

Sunny days offer a chance to do some solar cooking.  It's amazing how hot things can get inside the reflectors.

Over three-hundred bucks for the new tagalong and Scott was mostly interested in playing in the box it came in!

We got this one because most of them just have a bicycle seat on them.  We were concerned that Scott would fall asleep or fall off a bike seat (messing around or just letting go of the handlebars) while we were riding so we looked for one that was more secure.  This one was expensive but the reviews were excellent so we got it.  We've made one trip to Overton using it and Scott loves it.  The pedals actually provide assistance and he was "helping" grandma pedals on some of the steeper/longer grades.

We're up at Roger's Spring looking at the fish ...

And tossing in some old bread.

Laundry day.  It was time to wash some sheets sleeping bags and the rest of the laundry. We do a little all the time at home and only take them to the laundry when we get backed up or have large items to wash.

Scott's holding up his new bed time toy.  It has a light in the middle that comes on with two taps and goes off automatically after a few minutes.

This is a familiar site on our road.  We are on the highway here going to Blue Point spring.  We heard they'd done some work to it and we wanted to see what they'd done so we rode bikes up there.

Scott is always finding something new to observe on the road and is telling us about the rumble strip on the side of the highway.  When we have Odie with us she runs along the side of the road beside me.  I call her and point and she knows to stay beside me and off the highway unless I "release" her to chase rabbits.

Scott discovered his "pockets" on the sides of his seat right away and uses them to store his refreshments while we're riding.

He picked out a model tank at the store.  We bought it with some misgivings about it's life expectancy but it was cheap and the pieces just snapped together so we gave it a try.

That was last week and it's  holding up better than a lot of the toys we've bought him.

We bought him a bicycle at the Salvation Army thrift store in Henderson and put some training wheels on it.  He rode it around camp a bit but it's hard to keep it moving because of the rough ground  (it keeps getting high centered).

Our  single "0" cables came in for the 3,000 watt inverter so I installed it.  I found out it's one of those that turns on a cooling fan when you turn on the inverter.  If I had known that I wouldn't have purchased it.  Most better quality inverters use a temperature sensor to turn on cooling fans.  The cheap ones turn on one fan as soon as the unit is turned on then have extra fans to turn on by temperature sensors if the unit gets hot.  I may just clip the power line to the fan later.  The way it is now the only time I can turn it on is when I actually want to use it.  I also have to go outside and switch the cord to the big inverter at the same time.  It's better than starting the generator when I need more power (usually for the vacuum, microwave, or electric heaters) but it's still an inconvenience I hadn't counted on.  I may be able to wire it where I can turn it on/off  and flip a couple of breakers inside but that' will be a future project.  Right now I'm leaning toward cutting a couple of wires.

We planted a very small garden this year.  It's just a few peas, onions, and a couple of tomato plants but we are looking forward to the fresh veggies.   These are the tomatoes.

Onions and peas.  Susan rolls the sticker plants over them at night to keep the dog, and coyotes from digging them up and the rabbits and burros from eating them.

Susan made Scott some rocket, train and plane pancakes using cookie cutters.

They came out pretty good and Scott loves them.

That snow is too close for comfort!  We had a cold night and when we got up the next morning there was new snow on the mountains to the south and north of us.

We took Scott's bicycle into Overton so he could ride it on pavement.  It's the first time he's been able to do that and really enjoyed it.

It's the first time he's used the child swings too.

And this was his favorite way to swing!

Scott in his batman cape throwing the ball for Molly (Rusty's dog).  He can't throw it that far but she's a good sport and brings it back to him.  Odie just looks at the ball and waits for  him to throw it again ... only farther!

Pork chops over a bed of coals!

Scott shooting his bow.

Scott and grandpa at Roger's Spring.  He likes me to swing him over the channel.  The water flow had decreased in their measuring system and they sent someone out to see why.  When the flows of a spring decrease it's possible that there's a problem in the aquifer feeding it (which could be a big problem in some cases).  In this instance the water had washed out a channel around the concrete spillway.  They just filled in the channel and everything's back to normal.

We took a little  hike back into the desert from the spring.  There were fresh burro tracks and Scott wanted to follow them.  Pretty soon he wanted to follow them from grandpas's shoulders which worked for me as well. (Faster!)

Susan and Scott goofing off.

Been a long day and we had a tired little boy who went to sleep snuggled against grandma while eating supper.

Grandma playing with Scott.  She's an "angel" and he's a "butterfly."

We decided to start making our own coffee drinks to take with us when we're driving late.  We couldn't find the kind we like on our last late trip into Henderson so I had some coffee from a 7-11 store.  It was very strong (Marine Corp coffee!) and even though I diluted it with about 20 percent water I still couldn't get to sleep for about three hours after we made it home.

Barbecue time!  Chicken breasts in the middle with red bell peppers around the edge.  In the foil we put sliced sweet potatoes with a gob of butter and some spices.  It was great!

Scott and Odie putting in some "quality time."

We've been questioning whether our wind generator was working so I installed an amp meter.  With a light wind we are getting about 10 amps output.  We  haven't had any high wind since then but if it's doing ten amps now it should be better with more wind.  We'll see!

Susan has a blog up that gives a little more info on what we're up to on a daily basis.  If you want to see it got to:  Steven and Susan Snowbirding, Season Five

I also have a new series on my Grit blog.  I'll be looking back over the last 12 years of our Montana homestead.  There'll be lots of photos!

Looking Back on our Mosquito Mountain Homestead