I am just getting wimpier and wimpier as I get older! I have a had a terrible cold that just WILL NOT go away. I have had it so long that I have lost all track of time. About the time that I think that I am getting over it, I relapse and it knocks me flat again!
Needless to say, I have not been very productive for the last week or so and it has not improved my holiday spirit one little bit. I managed to do a little shopping but honestly, I have no idea just who has what coming. I planned to make gift baskets for friends and neighbors with baked goodies, soap and lotion but..... That has not happened as of yet.
I should not have done it but--- I did---- We went to an auction yesterday. Managed to spend a reasonable amount of money on some nice additions to our farm. A hay rake and and large flat bed trailer. Seth thinks that we can pay for the trailer by using it to haul off just a couple of loads of the scrap metal that he has been gathering up on this farm.
Seth comes from a long line of scavengers on my side of the family. He is much better at sorting off the useless stuff and getting rid of it than I am. I just want to keep it all..... he is loading up the true junk and hauling it off. I am very impressed with his recycling ability. He found a small trailer frame with flat tires off in a pile of stuff in the woods. He scrounged enough scrap lumber to put a floor and side rails on it. Then he went looking for cast off tires..... just on a whim, he aired up the flat ones already on it. He put some tire goo in them, hitched it to the 4-wheeler and away we went! We have been using that thing to haul off the trees from the pasture cleaning. I do not know how we have managed to run this farm with out it! The tires have held with just an occasional air up for about 3 months.
Our cattle working pens are entirely possible because of Seth's frugal scavenging. There were lots of panels and pipes laying around when we bought this place. Many of them were bent, warped and actually not meant for livestock use. He has just kept working at it and re-adjusting and building until he has gotten a decent set of working pens set up. Luckily for us, our cattle are not hard to work and relatively tame. We are as gentle as we can be when we get them up so they are not really hard on the working set up. Still, it is pretty impressive what a determined teenage boy who doesn't know how to weld can get accomplished.
He is not saying it but..... he working very hard to get things set up so that while he is gone off for school, it won't be such hard work for me and Adam while Dad is off farm slaying dragons. What a guy.......
Your son sounds like a fine young man. Those small trailers can be as expensive as larger ones sometimes. For him to recycle a frame into a useable trailer is great.
ReplyDeleteI've had a cold for six weeks and can't shake it. I think it's my advancing age (70+) that makes it difficult for me to get over the cold. Hope you feel better soon.