NC Trip

Last weekend Matthew and I made a quick trip to North Carolina so that Matthew could ski before the weather started to warm up.  We stayed Friday night with Emily and Miran in Charlotte, then all four of us drove to Blowing Rock on Saturday where we enjoyed an outdoor dinner at a little restaurant with a wonderful view.  Next, we continued on to Grandfather Mountain State Park.  It was late in the day so we only had to time to drive to the top of a the mountain for a quick walk.  The winds were gusting at over 40 mph, brrr!

 

 

But the view was still beautiful.

 

After an evening of board games and a little sleep, I took Matthew to the slopes Sunday morning.  He skied all day on what snow remained.

 

While Matthew was enjoying himself, Emily, Miran, and I went gem mining.  We each got a bucket of dirt to sift through in search of various treasures.

 

After sifting through all of the dirt, we took our finds over to a counter where someone sorted through and told us what everything was (since most of them, to us, looked like a lump of rock!).

 

The most exciting part of mining, at least for me, was talking with the gem cutter about what our rocks might look like if they were cut.  Here is one that I decided to have cut and then shipped to me when it was finished.  The top rock is uncut and below is the cut garnet (about 8x10mm in size).  I would like to make a necklace out of it since it is my birthstone.

 

After mining and lunch we still had an hour or so until picking Matthew up.  We decided to check out a little hiking trail at the base of Grandfather Mountain.

 

Since gems were fresh on our minds, we spent most of the time looking for a ruby or sapphire among the rocks! (without any luck)

Reducing Waste

My New Year's Resolution for 2015 is to reduce the waste that we send to a landfill, especially plastic.  I was inspired by a story that I heard on NPR about people who are adopting a "zero waste" lifestyle.  They expanded the original Three R's to five, so now I will be trying to Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and finally Rot as much as I can in order to move towards producing zero waste.  Here are a few of the changes so far.

 

 

Instead of buying plastic-packaged horse treats, I dehydrated lightly salted carrot slices instead.  The horses love them, and so do I!

 

 

Another easy change was to build a compost (Rot) bin by the garden.  We had been piling our compost in the woods but with an actual bin we can now compost things like paper towels and horse feed bags (without a bin these blow around and are annoying).  This was a very easy project - we just had to screw together a few pallets!  It is definitely not pretty, but it will work.

 

I don't plan on putting this compost on the vegetable garden so we can rot things like meat and cardboard food containers.

 

The easiest thing so far has been buying produce without bags.  I have been doing this with many things for several years now (avocados, bananas, etc.) but I was still buying things like lettuce, potatoes, and apples in a plastic bag.  I guess it was just habit, because I don't know why I was buying the bags!  I also bought some cloth bags for buying supplies in bulk.  I have been visiting lots of local stores looking for various things like rice, rolled oats, flour, etc. in bulk without packaging.

 

I bought several glass storage jars for all of the items that I can find package-free.  They are labeled with re-usable chalk board stickers so that I can change/move them as necessary.  I love the way they look in the cupboards too!

 

 

At the end of last year I quit buying cereal and started making granola for breakfast instead.  It is a lot healthier and cheaper than cereal, plus I can find all of the ingredients package free.  I already make yogurt and it is great with the granola!

 

Another very easy switch - making my own salad dressing.

 

 

And finally, I found a couple of shops downtown that sell natural products.  I bought an all natural loofa (instead of the plastic ones usually in the grocery store) that can be composted when it is worn out.  Next time I may just buy the fabric to make one, but I wanted to see how this works first.  The Savannah bee company also makes Bee's Wrap that can be used in place of saran wrap (and its reusable) plus I bought some bee's wax that I will be using to refill lip balm tubes. 

 

I haven't been able to eliminate all waste yet (and probably won't be able to 100%), but we have definitely reduced it and I will continue to work at it!

New Door and More

I'm a little behind on posting, so here are a few of the things we have been up to over the last couple of weeks.  We bought a new front door before Christmas but just got around to installing it two weekends ago.  We had to move the hinges on the door and move the latches in the frame, but installation didn't take too long and the door works very well.

 

I still have to paint the outside, but it is so nice to have a clean and bar-free door!

 

Last weekend we ran another 5k, this time in Statesboro.  The theme was chocolate and there were lots of goodies at the end!

 

And in case you didn't see these on facebook, here are some photos of Mow being silly with an old rag.

 

 

 

Endurance Ride at Broxton Bridge

Last weekend Mow and I competed in our third endurance ride.  This event was at Broxton Bridge Plantation, located about 70 miles away in South Carolina.  The weather was beautiful and we both had a great time.

 

We arrived Friday evening in time to check in, go through the vet check, and eat dinner.

 

I like the horse accommodations here-nice safe panels.  Here Mow has his number and is all settled in for the night.  It was very cold sleeping in my horse trailer (my contact solution actually froze!) but no rain this year.

 

 

We started the ride at 9:00 am on Saturday and the first loop was about 15 miles.  I was able to actually start with the group this time since Mow has settled in so much.  Here he is enjoying a snack between loops.

 

Mow and I during our hold (break time between loops).  It was a little cool, in the 50s, so Mow has his blanket to keep warm while we rest.

 

 

The second loop was about 10 miles and we finished the ride with a total ride time of about 3:35 (a lot faster than the 5:07 it took us last time!).  Mow had plenty of energy left so I hope to move up to the 50 mile ride soon.

Photo by Becky Pearman Photography

Rental House Work

Work on our property was put on hold this weekend while we worked on one of the rental houses.  We are down to only one vacancy right now but that house could use a lot of improvements.

 

In December we did some work on our old house before a tenant moved in this month.  I painted all of the kitchen cupboards as well as the kitchen walls and master bath walls.  We also replaced the towel rods, etc. in both full bathrooms to make the house a little less dated.  I did not get a photo of the updated baths but here are two of the kitchen improvements.  I wish that I had painted it while we lived there, it looks so much better!

 

The current empty rental will never look as nice as our old house, but we're doing what we can with new paint and fixtures.  Here's a before photo of one of the bedrooms (we aren't done yet, so no after shot).

 

We decided to paint the entire upstairs of this house (3 large bedrooms, hallway, and full bath).  With that many walls it made sense to use a power roller and try to get it all done at once.  I edged the rooms while Matthew rolled and we did finish all of the bedrooms and the hallway in one day.  I had already painted the bathroom so now we are left with painting the trim and most of the downstairs - we'll save that for another day! (If you are wondering why Matthew is wearing a hat, there is no heat in the house because the gas is turned off so it was a little chilly!)

Birthdays & Animals

We celebrated our birthdays this year by hosting another game night.  It was a great success with 13 attendees and we played many different games.  We also enjoyed our extra seating on our new chairs!

 

I didn't take any photos on our actual birthdays, but here are the roses that Matthew brought home for me on mine.

 

 

And here's my birthday (and Christmas, for the next 5 years or so...) gift - a new saddle!  I have been searching for a saddle for Mow now for over a year and finally found one that works for both of us.  It was the 10th saddle I tried and by far the most expensive, but at least it works!

 

 

Mow and I at our dressage lesson in the new saddle. 

 

And finally, no post from the Lazy G Ranch is ever complete without a few animal photos, so here's today's quota.

 

The horses have been extra frisky with the cool weather and often play in the mornings.  Here they are rearing up.

 

And here's on of Rabi kicking up his heels at Mow.

 

Lastly, a video of our foster cat, Mistletoe, playing fetch.  Happily, Mistletoe found her forever home and was adopted on my birthday!

Property Clearing

During the last week of my parents' visit we did a lot of work on our back two acres trying to prepare it for planting this spring.  We borrowed a tractor from a neighbor and my dad drove it while the rest of us did what we could by hand.

 

We started by consolidating the remainder of the stump piles and re-lighting them.

 

There was still a lot of sticks and brush to be picked up and piled on the stumps.

 

While the piles were burning, my dad used the box blade we bought to grade the dirt and smooth out the bumps.

 

My mom and I spent the rest of the week fueling the fires to burn down the stumps and raking up debris.

 

The piles took a while, but we eventually burned all of the remaining stumps and a lot of the brush.

 

I have spent the last couple of weeks continuing to rake up debris and level the ground by hand.  It takes forever, but certainly looks great when it is done!  I can't wait to have fresh green grass for the horses later this year.