10.16.22 Sunday

Mouse Trapline Tally:  8

(Total to-date for this year!)

So, it's been a busy week with Kevin home!  Let's recap...

Remember when I mentioned that the thermocoupler on the propane refrigerator went out?  While we have been waiting on the part to come from Canada, Kevin had an idea...

Apparently, he camped at a cabin years ago with this idea and it stuck in his head.  We had a shelving unit that we'd taken down from somewhere and pushed it aside.  We also have a sliding glass window in the back of the house in the pantry.

So he drilled holes in the box and mounted the box to the window.  The cold air from outside cools the food.  Here's the view from the inside.  

It's not a perfect, long-term solution but it works!  It hasn't made ice yet (I didn't realize how much I take ice for granted....), but the food and condiments are nice and cool.  Redneck ingenuity at it's finest!  

The only drawback I really see is that we may have just created a bear-bait station....😝

Next in line was the water line...

It's starting to freeze overnight and we realize that at some point during the winter, we will not be able to pump water up from the spring to the house.  We have large barrels and several containers in the pantry (in addition to the 100 gallon holding tank upstairs) that are filled to the brim in preparation for this.  Not looking forward to that frozen moment but we have prepared for it and realize that other people have lived here for decades and survived to tell the tales so we will be fine in the end.  Nonetheless, we spent the better part of a day raking leaves and hauling them down to cover over the water line, all the way from the house, down the hill, to where it pops up above the holding tank at the spring.  

Here's where we started...

Here's how it looked when we were done.  The plan is to cover the mound up with snow once it starts to fall heavy enough.  It took a lot of raking and hauling leaf loads to make that happen.  We're not 20-something anymore.  We were both super sore that night and the next day!

To be continued...