Forging aluminium

I felt this deserved it's own post, away from all the pictures of our animals, though chronologically it should be in the middle of all that. For years, Tim and I have talked about building a forge. We can work metal and wood in so many ways, but molding molten metals had escaped our abilities - until now.

After watching a few YouTube videos, Tim was inspired. Mixing 50/50 sand and plaster, Tim filled our steel bucket with a center mold holding open the space for the fire and the crucible: container of molten aluminium. At the bottom of the center opening is a steel pipe leading through the plaster-sand mix for air to come in through the bottom and feed the flames.

Once the mix set up, Tim carefully pried out the center mold and started testing his new creation. Filling the center with charcoal briquettes and forcing air into the bottom by duct taping a hair drier to the tube, the fire was soon going strong.

Tim fed our pop-can recycling into the steel bowl in the furnace one at a time and stirred with a piece of rebar.

The pop-cans turned into molten aluminium, glowing red with heat.

The first few crucibles we tried failed in the intense heat of the kiln. Finally Tim settled on placing a steel bowl over the flames, though it was cooler and slower melting than idea. In the future we hope to have a little narrower of a container for less heat-loss and hotter melting temperatures.

Once our entire bag of recycling was melted down, Tim poured the molten aluminium carefully into an empty soup can.

With a little work on the lathe, the finished product came out as a beautiful tea-light holder, with the irregularities catching the light at the top and smooth polished aluminum at the bottom. Very impressive!

Catch up. Eggs and Chicks, Goats and Compost, Visitors and Travels, Beaches and Baking

It has been a busy two weeks! Isn't it always busy? For living the simple life, we sure do keep things  busy around here. To start off the new year, I finally started delivering eggs to our neighbors! The idea is for Tilly (or a goat) to eventually do the delivering by carrying cartons of eggs in the snazzy new backpack we got for the four-legged girls.

The littlest roosters and hens are at their awkward teen stage, with feathers sticking out and colors changing. Unfortunately, the little gold chick seems set on being a rooster, though I am still hopeful it will be another of those extra-large-combed hens and we will somehow have 8 more heavy-laying hens. Mama and her five chicks (plus the three big tag-alongs from the last clutch) are spending more and more time out in the sun scratching for bugs with the rest of the flock.

Our flock is filling out the yard pretty well now with 12 hens, 2 roosters, 3 big chicks and 5 smaller chicks. Some day I hope to have 24 hens laying nearly two-dozen eggs a day to deliver to the neighbors plus my two roosters whom will need to be replaced soon for genetic diversity. Right now, we're only getting about 6 eggs a day, and the eggs are suspiciously consistent in color and shape, alluding to only 6 hens participating in the laying. I have nearly identified all the layers and it looks like the other 6 may be joining the 3 or 4 new little roosters in the freezer this spring.

Mom, Dad, Daniel, and Amanda all returned back to their homes after New Years, I took a brief trip with Daniel and Amanda down to Eugene, Oregon for a night on a special bunny mission, my friend Ray visited for a short night on her way through, Tim spent a few nights in Portland to visit friends and take a train trip, then I picked up my friend Alisha from the airport and Tim from the train station in one go and came home for a day or two before Tim's mom, Alice, joined us on the island. In the brief turn around between visitors, travels, and more visitors, I managed to finally get the barn clean! 

Petunia was her usual helpful self, insisting on riding in the wheelbarrow even when it was stacked to the max with hay. The barn, I'm afraid to say, was long over-due for cleaning. I cleaned the chicken part half-halfheartedly just before the chicks were born, in late November, but for the goats I had been using more of an "add more hay" approach for the floors. After many trips to the compost pile, both halves were thoroughly freshened and a small bit of the excessive stash of "winter hay" for the goats was put to good use as everybody's clean bedding. 

Unfortunately (for Alisha), I dumped all the hay next to the large pile of leaves next to the large pile of compost waiting to be turned. Fortunately (for me), Alisha is eager to be such a helpful guest and offered to lend a hand on the farm. Wanting to give her the full farm experience, I thought turning the compost would be a great help. Alisha imagined it would be fun, sort of romantic. Alisha talked about someday having her own garden and compost bins. Then Alisha talked about how really there was probably enough compost in those bins and they were looking plenty full. There's a reason I dread turning the compost - it is a huge job and takes forever, with much more to go by the time you are exhausted and ready for tea--er, I mean, it's a delight! I hope you will be the next visitor so I can share the majestic transformation of waist to productive soil with you too! The chore that is always ready for someone to do.

Esther stepped up to help with our compost-turning and piling activity by packing down those leaves and that hay to make room for more. Eventually most of the waist made it, more or less, into the compost bins and we declared the work "good enough!"

I didn't only force Alisha to provide me with labor, we also got to snuggle the goats in their nice clean barn.

We taught Alisha the proper way to hold a chicken, or in this case our most beautiful and tame rooster.

Tim demonstrated the goat teeter-totter and other goaty tricks (really that's about the extent of it).

And we took the goats for a nice stroll on the beach to our favorite climbing tree. Alisha is a photographer and graced us with mountains of wonderful pictures - another reason this is taking a little longer to put together! Too much of a good thing. 

After beach walking, there was just a little more to do with catching up on trimming hooves. Ideally, I should be checking their hooves every month about, or even giving them a quick look once a week when I feed them their herbal de-wormer, but I let it go a little long and petunia missed my great hoof-trimming day, so now I'll have to keep a better eye on them and make sure those hooves are back in good shape.

Alisha also gave me a hand adding 380-pounds of food to the barn. The feed store is having a sale and it's always good to have enough food! I am trying to keep better track of how much food everyone is going through. I think the chickens go through about 25-pounds of feed a weeks, the goats go through about 100-pounds a month and Tilly (not included in the 380-pounds of feed) goes through about 20 pounds a month. These may be optimistic guesses, and winter makes for more feed going through the barn. 

Tilly is continuing to work on her Canine Good Citizen skills and practiced her patience at the store while we bought all the feed. With so many visitors, Tilly has been struggling to stay focused and calm but is improving as always.

 After the store, it only seemed fair to take the little dog to the off-leash beach near town to burn up some of her abundant energy. Alice and Alisha and I braved the wind and high tide and let the wild one run. Tilly was promoted to an "available" sheriff dog, ready to search for the lost at a moments notice, which means any time we are called, she gets to come with me - even if it is only to sit in the car and wait while I help other teams with the search. This week we got one of those middle-of-the-night calls and drove through the fog to join the team in the dark. Tilly waited in the car and we called off the search before it reached her turn, but it was nice for me to have some comforting company in the car.

The beautiful and delicious bread I baked for Tim's lunches which I have no way of working into this post but which are so wonderful and which I am so proud of I had to include. Alisha laughed at how excited I was. They lived up to my hopes and more.

After staying up nearly all night with Search and Rescue, I was exhausted, in the mood for laying around watching movies and feeling like a bit of a zombie. Alisha and Alice lept on the opportunity of my weakened state and helped out with cleaning up the house and taking care of the animals. When Tim came home from work he was in worse shape then me, having caught some awful virus that has been making its way around the island. He stumbled in the door, had a bite to eat, and joined me in a very early bed time. He's still feeling terrible and keeping to the dark and warmth of bed. 

Merry Christmas and a happy new year!

What was the highlight of your last year and what are you looking forward to in the coming year?

So many highlights for us! Tim's hand healed and he was able to fish this summer and start working in a perfect job on the island. We got chickens this year, had chicks hatch under their mom, got goats, planted and harvested a garden, and Tilly went from a new trainee for Search and Rescue to an active K9 search team member, ready to save real lost people and a commissioned officer with the county, ready to help lead the training for becoming a state-wide search team. Grandpa has made good friends on the island, has been playing and even teaching bridge after a 20-year hiatus, and has great health, mastering those stairs and doing a large part of the gardening. I got to spend my first summer commercial fishing in Bristol Bay, we had many visitors, and got to do some visiting of our own. We spent time with family, and met new family. It has been a wonderful year, and it is hard to imagine how next year might top this one, but we have a few things we're looking forward to. 

The fish prediction for Bristol Bay this coming summer is twice what it was last year, making for a potentially record breaking year. Our goat, Petunia, seems to be showing signs of pregnancy, so we are still hoping their will be kids on the ground in February, Tilly and I look forward to helicopter trips to remote wilderness for days of camping and saving lives, and we look forward to more of all the joys we have had this past year. 

I am still blown away by the beauty of our island and our farm so often. Even coming from the beautiful land of Alaska, we have a stunning view.  This week, the temperature dove to below freezing yet again, but Whidbey has enough clouds for epic sunrises and sets without having so many as to create a permanent grey over the land.

Enough about the weather! It's Christmas! Tilly got to meet 'Santa' as the fire department made a stop at our Search and Rescue Canine Good Citizen training before continuing on the holiday tour through town. Knowing a big part of the fire department has some unexpected perks!

At home, our family congregated as Mom and Dad and Brother Daniel and Amanda and Uncle Dan and Uncle Joel and Alex joined Grandpa and Tim and I. Whew! A lot of family in this house! Also a lot of baked goods! Amanda and Daniel's gift to the family was an obscene amount of baked goods, starting with a pumpkin pie, pecan nutella pie, and lemon meringue pie, then dividing a mountain of sweets among the rest of the family: snowball cookies, ginger snaps, almond cupcakes with white chocolate and raspberry, fudge, 7-layer bars, pumpkin bars, no-bake cookies, and zucchini bread.

We celebrated Christmas Eve by going to the candlelight carol service at Grandpa's church while Tim and Amanda guarded the house, cared for the puppy, and watched their traditional Christmas-themed cartoons. After the service, we came home to play the White Elephant gift exchange before bed.   

Christmas morning, Santa Puppy made her debut, helping deliver all the present-madness and flopping delighted and belly-up on the floor with her new orange squeaky toy. Amanda and Daniel had the best-dressed gift with a snow-bunny shaped present. Tim and I worked on hand-made presents for most of the family, including a song book for Mom of all the lullabies from my childhood.

As soon as presents were opened, Daniel, Amanda, Tim and I headed out the door and for the airport as Cousin Min Min headed for the house for another Christmas celebration. Tim and I hopped on the afternoon flight to Sacramento where his dad, Joe, and step-mom, Roni, picked us up in time for a laid-back Christmas dinner with Roni's daughter, Tierney. The next morning we headed out of town and into the mountains to meet Tim's birth mom, Dawn.

Joe and Roni

Meeting Dawn went as well as we could possibly imagine. Her and her family are clearly loving, intelligent, interesting, and welcoming family, just as we hoped they would be. Dawn's aunt, Sandy, and uncle, Troy, who's house we all stayed at are big fans of Alaska after several trips to Alaska and their home was decorated in a way that made us feel more at home than we've been since leaving our home state. Even the Christmas tree had little Yupik dolls in kuspuks as ornaments. We had a delicious Christmas dinner of fresh garden vegetables picked that day, well grilled meat (or so I hear), and the salmon Tim and I brought to contribute. Every one of the many, many dishes Aunt Sandy prepared was so well prepared and delicious. Cousins and other aunts and uncles joined in the feast, and among new faces we were family.

Tim last year from our annual photo album on the left, his birth-grandfather on the right.

In case there was still any doubt that Tim and Dawn were kin, Dawn brought out some pictures of her and her dad. At first, it was hard to see the resemblance she remembered in his face, looking at old pictures of a man with a mustache, then Dawn handed me a picture of her dad riding the lawn tractor and I paused to pull out our photo album from last year and lined up her picture with a matching picture of Tim in the same pose. Tim and Dawn both had blonde hair through their childhood only to turn dark as they grew up, dark eyes, and little ears. In Uncle Troy's 'man cave', we looked at pictures of him and his brother, Tim's birth-grandfather. There we saw the only picture of Dawn's dad as a young man and mustache-free. In his senior school picture, the resemblance to my handsome husband is so striking I forget I'm not looking at a picture of Tim.

Dawn's dad as a high school senior

In the morning after a long and happy night of laughter and talking and hugs, Uncle Troy and Aunt Sandy took us to see the rural community mining museum they run in town. Exploring mining ruins was one of Tim's favorite hobbies in Juneau and something we've been rediscovering in Washington, but not something we expected to find on our trip to California.

California was full of surprises, the biggest being how comfortable we were and the lack of awkwardness at our first time meeting Dawn after only a few weeks of knowing of each other. We were surprised by how familiar and welcoming the family was. We were surprised by the beautiful wilderness and forest, reminding us of home. 

Getting out of the big city, away from the coast, opened up beautiful views down the American River Canyon. In the bright sunshine, we explored the small town of Foresthill and enjoyed the special time together.

Too soon, it was time for us to head down the hill and continue our adventure with Joe and Roni while Dawn headed home to southern California. Back in Sacramento, we got to spend nights relaxing and chatting with Joe and Roni about past and future. The next day we had Christmas #4 with Roni's sister and family, including three grand-babies and a fourth on the way. 

On our last day in California, Roni took us to some of her favorite places. We went on a hike through Muir Woods and found the quieter trails through big trees and over wild rivers. The park had a huge number of visitors from all over the world, making parking a 30-minute walk from the front gait of the park. It is great to see so many people interested in visiting nature.

After our nature outing, Roni took us to her favorite Italian restaurant in San Francisco for a tiny cup of coffee and some delicious dinner.

While waiting for rush-hour traffic to let up, we went walking through China Town, admiring the many strange and wonderful things. Tim found some ironed-flat dried octopus in a window and Roni got us some salted plumbs, ginseng and ginger candies.

Tim and I said goodbye Joe and Roni after a great visit and flew back to Seattle where Brother Daniel and Amanda picked us up and took us to meet Mom and Dad and Grandpa and his friend Dee at the Space Needle. We found out lunch at the top is only $5 more than a ticket in the elevator and the food was delicious. From our tour of the Space Needle, we moved on to a tour of the Bowing "Future of Flight". After flying in the morning, seeing the inner workings of our airplane and the process of developing and creating these planes had an extra impact.

After a busy, busy week, and an exciting and delightful year, we reached the end of 2014! Dad and Tim went shopping for some special fireworks and Daniel and Tim put on a great show. Tilly hung out indoors and seemed to think we were strange for standing outside while lights exploded over our heads in the middle of the night when it was clearly time for bed.