Not Dead in the Heart of Dixie (48 page)

Kevin and the boys are gung-ho. They can't wait to start working on the fence. Boy, are they in for a surprise.

I visited Pop and Jesse today.

Mr. Hobbs was there, keeping Pop updated about the plants in the garden and greenhouses. Pop is throwing a fit to go back to his motorhome. I believe Hisa will let him go tomorrow.

Jesse was in good spirits. He was playing backgammon with Carisa while I was there. Hisa told Elaine she’ll keep him two more days before letting him go back to the Hobbs house where Elaine will take over his care.

I will be having a big argument with Carisa. I don't want her spending hours over there near the
pond and the Masterson property.

Nana said school will begin for Amber and Michael the first Monday after she
gets Pop back to the motorhome. She wants Amber and Michael three days a week, five hours per day. She wants the teenagers two days a week, five hours per day, for now.

She's been working on lesson pla
ns while sitting with Pop. She'll go crazy on me when September comes. She'll be wanting to teach five days a week, seven hours a day. Nana LOVES teaching. She said the kids can have a summer break starting at the end of May and ending the first week in September.

She's been on Mick's back about getting school books. He told her he would try to get them by the end of next week. Oh, Mick, haven't you learned? You never make a promise to Nana th
at you aren't sure you can keep.

I have laundry duty. I hate laundry. At least the weather is nice. We've had temps in the high sixties. It won't
be long 'til the hot weather and flies get here. We'll all be carrying insect repellant in our pockets every time we go outside. That's one of the new "Kapper Hill Compound Commandments."

Elaine has been studying cheese making books while she sat with Jesse. She says she has lots of things to try as soon as she gets the chance. We're still getting three gallons of milk a day from the goats. We're going through it faster since Rona's boys
have arrived.

The only things holding me back from a complete state of happiness is the thought of HDI's,
summer heat, gangs, and flies.

I think I'll head down to the basement and get the cake mix and frosting for Carisa's birthday cake. I'm making a yellow cake with chocolate frosting. I'll add a jar of sweet cherries between the layers and on the top. I'll have to ask her what she wants for supper that day.

Bye for now.

Thursday, Ma
rch 13

Rona came in the
back door wearing an "Auburn" Snuggie. It caused me to burst out in a good ol' rebel yell "ROLL TIDE!" How dare she wear that thing in my house! I'm a huge Crimson Tide fan.

We had pancakes for breakfast and the
house was packed full of people. There will be a lot of work going on today. We needed our tummies full. Elaine kept making pancakes until everyone was groaning. I wanted to crawl back in bed with my full, happy tummy.

The men will
back trailers into the large ditch this morning. They'll place one at a time and use the backhoe to push them up against one another. Then, another will be backed in and the process will repeat. When they're all in place someone will use the backhoe to start filling in around the wheels.

Those not on "filling duty" plan to head to the lumber yard and try to learn how to load logs with the crane truck. I'd love to be able to watch from a distance, of course. I told Mick to stress that they should stand way back while logs are in the air.

They'll bring home logs to store in Buttercup's meadow until the front portion of the fence is filled in and they’re ready to start the log fence across the back.

We
need to decide what to use for a gate across the driveway. Dane thinks we should take the gate from the trucking company. The men plan to go back and look it over.

After the backhoe finishes
its work in the front, it'll be used to dig the trench for the log fence across the back of the property. The log fence will take a lot of time. I'm glad we have Kevin, Luke, and Larson added to the crew.

We've been introducing Rona to all the daily chores. She hates laundry as much as I do. She's
really
gonna hate the way we have to do it now.

I asked Mick to get one of the extra pools set up while the others are backing trailers today. He said he would, but he really wants to work with the trailers.

It won't take him more than an hour to set up that darn pool. He only needs to put in one pipe at the top of the current pool and lay it across the top of the second. Mr. Hobbs said he’d help.

We nee
d more screens for a second lid, so Marisa, Rona, and I will go over to the ckd's house and the canning jar house after lunch. Mick doesn't like that idea at all. I told him that two of us would take down screens while the third stands watch. He still doesn't like it, but he decided to "allow' us to go (snort).

Valerie, Carisa and Merry will babysit while they organize the food that Josie left.

Nana is caring for Pop, and Elaine will be at Clinic Diane with Jesse and Hisa.

I told Mick
to hurry up and get the pool in place so he'll have plenty of time to do the trailer work. He flew outa here with a handful of pancakes folded with strawberry jam in the middle.

Mr. Hobbs asked if Luke, Larson, and Deuce could help him finish getting the fence around the garden after he help's Mick with the pool. Of course, Rona and I said yes.

The boys moaned. They wanted to help the men and watch the trailer work. I guess you can never get the obsession with construction equipment out of the male human brain.

Mick, Jason, and Dane will be backing trailers. Soo, Kevin, and Jeremy will be on
log duty. They'll take the Jeep and can come home for lunch without having to drive the log truck.

I just realized
how many people we have here. Wow! I hope the garden explodes with goodness. The food Josie left will be a tremendous help, but we need to start looking for more canned food and doing more hunting.

We
need to build the outhouse very soon. The toilets are protesting. Marisa's and Elaine's are still good, but they don't have a gazillion people using their toilets. Mick said we'll use one of the little wooden buildings to make a "deluxe outhouse."

I told him where two more of those display lots are
located. We might have a hillside full of little wooden buildings next winter because everyone wants to be inside the fenced compound.

We definitely need one for the piglets. Right now, they're in a barn stall and I swear they've grown every day since w
e got them. They get table scraps we don't save for leftovers.

It's gonna be a long day. I better get started. See ya
later.

3:30 PM...

Marisa, Rona, and I got the screens today. There was no HDI activity, thank goodness. We got every
screen we could reach from both houses. Mick said we got more than enough to make the lid for the second pool. We also found food, sort of.

Behind the canning jar house is a garden spot. On the edge was a tiered garden bed full of strawberry plants.

We came back here to discuss with Mr. Hobbs and Pop how we should move the plants. Pop asked "Why move it at all?" I told him we want it inside the compound to keep the deer and rabbits from taking the fruit. He nodded in agreement.

He said we could build a raised bed using the railroad ties we have along flower beds at the front of the house. We can fill it with bags of soil that we got from Lowe's.

Pop said that now is the time to get it done because strawberries like cool(ish) weather. He said we should have moved them in February. I wish we’d found them in February.

We're gonna try to get the strawberry bed
put together tomorrow morning and get the plants in before supper. Pop said that the plants might be a little unhappy about the move and give us a small harvest this year, but next year should be good.

In the backyard
, we found two large apple trees, a peach tree, and a plum tree. There's a huge pecan tree a little further back. There's also a half-row of garlic in the garden that they must have planted last fall.

Pop said to watch the garden for stray veggies that might come up from seeds dropped last year. We'll be checking that garden at least once a week. That little old man and woman must have God's ear
, because they continue to bless us.

I walked down to the trailer fence to see how it was going. Mick said they won't finish before dark, but should be done and ready to start filling it in before lunch
tomorrow. It looks great. All the side doors on the trailers are facing the hill.

Dane said he'd like to weld the trailers together somehow
, but he'll worry about that later. With the wheels buried, the trailers won't be able to get pushed, turned over, or slide out of place easily. Smart men are awesome!

The log crew came home laughing. The entire morning they got a total of eight logs loaded. Kevin says he got the hang of it right before they left. He said we'll be surprised at how many logs they bring back this afternoon. I hope he's right. It must be tricky learning to operate that crane.

I can't remember who has supper duty, so I better head out there and check. See ya later.

10:30 PM...

             
I'm anxious to get the strawberry plants moved tomorrow. I hope Marisa and Rona are ready to start moving railroad ties right after breakfast. Jason said he and Jeremy will load up bags of garden soil and drive it around to the back so it'll be ready for us.

Nana and Merry had supper duty. We ha
d kielbasa, baked beans and mashed potatoes. It was delicious. Nana experimented and made fried blueberry pies with the dehydrated blueberries Josie left. They were good, but I'm partial to the apple ones.

Kevin didn't let us down. He brought home a full load of logs. He says he'll unload them in the meadow tomorrow morning and go back for more. He can go up Marisa's driveway and across the meadow
, but they'll have to use a pickup truck, the Kubota, or Buttercup to drag the logs the remaining 30 yards.

Mr. Hobbs
plans to help us build the strawberry bed. He said we can drag the railroad ties in place with the Kubota if we need to. I voted on saving our backs and doing it that way from the start. Rona and Marisa agreed.

Mick, Dane, and Deuce are going to experiment splitting logs lengthwise while Jason works with the backhoe tomorrow. He told Luke and Larson that they could be his guards and make sure no HDI's sneak up on him while he's going back and forth.

Carisa and Merry will be on laundry duty. We'll try to help them a little while we work on the strawberry bed. Hopefully, they can finish it all before supper.

Carisa plans to keep an eye on Jesse while Elaine and Rebecca make breakfast in the morning. I made sure that Hisa will be with them. Yep, I'm too paranoid to leave them alone together.

Valerie has babysitting duty. She loves being with the kids. She'll be a great Mom someday.

Hisa told Pop that he could try using the walker to go to the greenhouses tomorrow
, but to make sure he sits while he's in there. Mick already put lawn chairs in both greenhouses. I'm sure Nana will be with him the whole time.

I’m
having trouble keeping up with everyone.

Yesterday I asked Elaine to make sour cream. I have supper duty tomorrow night and I wanna make my famous beef stroganoff. I hope everyone likes it as much as I think they will. I'll make Carisa's birthday cake after she goes to bed.

Tomorrow will be a long day, so I better get some rest.

Bye for now.

Friday, March 14

Good morning to those that have read this far!

I have the crockpot plugged into the power strip and I have stew beef, two cans of mushroom soup and a couple of handfuls of dehydrated mushrooms along with a little ground pepper, salt, and secret spices. I put the gauge on “warm” so it will slow-cook 'til about 3:00 this afternoon. Then, I'll turn the heat up to “low.” I'll be serving beef stroganoff over egg noodles around 5:00 tonight.

We had banana-nut muffins and milk for breakfast. Yum!

I asked Carisa what she wants for her birthday supper tomorrow night, and she wants chicken nuggets and french fries. That sounds good to me, and it'll be easy to make since we still have the bag of chicken nuggets we got from Josie.

I'm get
ting ready to head out and work on our strawberry bed. Hopefully, we can get the plants moved this afternoon. It's drizzling rain outside but we're not gonna let that stop us.

Mick said they won't
go to the lumberyard today because it was already a little muddy and the rain is probably making it worse.

Mick and Soo will be using the backhoe to dig the outhouse a few yards from the tree-line
on the right. There's a flat spot there that should work well.