Well, it has been a little while since I last wrote, and it has been a very busy time which is not unusual for us here at Coffee Lake Farm.
I have been busy lately with the annual firewood chores, cutting down trees, limbing them, and then dragging them up closer to the buildings where I will need the wood. Then once it is closer to the house I have cut them into pieces, and  began the splitting of the big pieces, and then moving them over next to the wood stove where they will disappear, providing us with a nice warm home through the winter and next spring.

I have had some help with moving some of the split firewood. This last weekend Jennifer and Matias, came over and moved about 3 cord of wood using the garden tractor and small trailer and then stacked it close to the stove. Which I greatly appreciated, and Matias also treated us all to some nice barbequed ribs, for supper that night. Oh, I should mention my Mom and Dad stopped by, as they were out bumming around on a Sunday afternoon, with a visit to Wooden Nichols and also a stop at the farm, Dad even helped move some wood for a little while in the afternoon! Thanks Dad!

Having the folks close by has already been very cool, and Crystalie and I  have enjoyed a couple of nice suppers together with them, and also just getting to see them a lot more often, as they enjoy these golden years of their lives, now living in the Brainerd/Baxter area. Closer to a number of us kids and our families!

They have been busy getting settled in and have had  lots of company, since moving over here. I have been hauling away the mountain of boxes and storage tubs from their apartment, when they have gotten them emptied out. Which will come in handy shortly, as we will be cleaning out the Wooden Nichols store after the 25th of November. We will be emptying it out completely and working on storing all of that here at the farm. So needless to say things will not be slowing down at all, even into the Holidays!

The new job has been getting busier all the time, we have been going through budgeting for next year, and I have been working on some Dealer Tool Demo day events, which will start after Thanksgiving and run into the middle of December. Hopefully adding some more sales and getting some much needed exposure with my lumberyard type customers. Work is fast paced and never a lack of things to work on, as I am always prospecting for new customers and also working to increase our business with existing customers.

As you can see things are very busy, and Crystalie and I  enjoy our quiet evenings at home working on our projects or spending time online, and also playing Scrabble!

Happy Thanksgiving to all my readers and I will try to post some pictures this weekend, as I wrap up my firewood chores!

Well, here is an update since early September.

I have made two more trips to North Dakota to my Mom and Dad's, to assist with them with prepping to move to Baxter Minnesota in 2 weeks. This was to help move things to a consignment auction and to also haul back some steel siding I took off the old dairy barn.

The steel will be used later on Coffee Lake Farm for siding on the back barn studio where Crystalie works her magic with fabric and now also dried floral and evergreen arrangements. Between two different batches of steel I have I will be able to get the building sided, and even had some insulation in the process, making it tighter and easier to heat.

I also have mowed some grass form time to time, cleaning up the fall leaves around the yard. The garden has been completely cleaned out, and everything harvested has been now canned and we have some squash to move to a wintering place. Probably over to our Mitch and Kay's heated shop, for the winter where it will be close by for us to pick up when we need it.

Crystalie purchased a storage trailer from her brother Mitch, which is a 28 foot semi trailer, which is now located behind the shop and located next to the studio building. I installed a ramp with an old dock section I got from my brother Neal. I also then moved a bunch of items out of the shop, mostly tables and some shelving, and then proceeded to clean my shop up some. that is always an ongoing process...

Last weekend, I built a new section of fence, by the newly placed storage trailer and proceeded to clean up behind the shop, and cleaning up some old wood I stored back there. I also cut up two large pine trees, that were victims of last summers wind storm.

The new job is going well, and I have been adding new accounts and working existing accounts. I am always learning new things, and enjoying the busy pace of the job. I just completed my plans for 2013 and it will require lots of effort.... but all worth while!

Which I gladly offered to do, and so we scheduled this Saturday to put it back together. The thing is this time I had to assemble the roof on top of the crib part, rather than on the ground and having a logging truck lift it into place, and then bolt it on. So they rented some scaffolding and we started by bolting two sections onto the center support ring on each side of the roof, and then worked our way around it adding sections till we came to the part where they needed to be bolted back together in one large cone.  Needless to say it was a lot of standing on a ladder and fastening bolts with my air wrench and tools.Some pulling and tugging on the walls and trying it in to a circular shape.

 Parade that Livia, Addy and I attended this morning in sunny Garrison, MN. We of course made off with about a half gallon of candy also!

Well, we have been experiencing more of a Minnesota summer that last few days.

It has been hot, temps in the low 90's and also humid, which means the electric fans are running constantly in our home. We do not have air conditioners, or central air. I am not complaining as the nights cool off enough to allow the house to cool down and in the morning we can shut a few fans off to enjoy the peace and quiet.

We have 4 fans running right now including a ceiling fan in our bedroom, which helps to keep the room cooler of course. Yes we may be using some electricity, but at least we are a little more comfortable, and considering we typically only get about 2-3 weeks a year when we need to run the fans this much, we are ahead int he long run!