Last Friday and Saturday Hubby and I went to Cheyenne, WY to visit our son and daughter-in-law, Dani who graduated from LCCC’s Equine Science program. We even got to visit the place where she has been working – training and breeding horses. It was great to get away but by Sunday morning we were back home, rested up and ready to get started on the giant jigsaw-puzzle-soon-to-be-hoop-house in our back yard.
Luckily we had done some of the ‘dirty work’ the weekend before.
This is how it all began…
May 12th we started with a fairly level piece of ground and dug 34 holes. Each one had to be at least 2 feet deep and 12 inches around.
Check out that great water hydrant in the middle of it all. Water is a wonderful thing!!!
Then we hired a professional.
We hired John (the best cement man in the world) and he brought his mixer and a truck full of sand – talk about a rolling mobile beach. Kind of makes you all nostalgic for a pair of flip-flops and a Pina colada doesn’t it?
We even used my anniversary gift – the big yellow ‘garden tractor’ on the left. Hubby brought a couple of scoops of gravel for mixing cement with it.
Even though it’s my loader I still let him drive it once in a while – if he behaves himself.
Yep, some girls just get diamonds and flowers.
Not me… I’m a lucky, lucky woman.
This is Johns’ ride. Don’t you just love big, red Mack trucks with shiny chrome stacks and big bumpers?
I do. Especially when they have great Mack bulldog hood ornaments like this.
So 2 weeks ago (on Mother’s day) we mixed and poured cement. Then we had to wait…
We waited for the cement to set up and we gave it time to cure and we waited some more because it rained… for several days… and then we went to Cheyenne…
But finally, last Sunday, with the ground stakes ready to take the weight of the hoops and a lot of help from our neighbor, Paul we ‘dove in’. We made pretty good progress without too many mistakes. The instructions could have been a little more in-depth but what really helped the most was to lay out all the pieces before we started putting anything together.
Actually, the worst part of the whole day was the wind. It started to blow by mid morning and by noon it was really starting to get with it. But we kept on working till about 5:00 when it got so bad it would just about blow us over as we stood on the ladders. It was darn exciting! See the ladders in the photo? That’s the way they looked if you weren’t holding them up.
We worked all day and didn’t quite get to the half-way point but now we can see just how big this thing is going to be.
I don’t think I have enough tomato plants started.
And it doesn’t look too bad for our first attempt.
Of course that was last Sunday and as of today (when I took the pictures) we have not been able to do anymore work on it because we had 40-50 mph winds on Monday and Tuesday and then rain ever since. I don’t know about you but patience has never been one of my strong points. Unfortunately, there’s not much I can do about it but whine and I’m sure you don’t want to hear that so instead here’s some photos of our Nanking Cherry bushes. This is the 5th summer for them and they look great.
They’ve had a pretty hard life so far. We planted them 2 years before the end of a 9 year drought and for the last 3 years we have had a horrible infestation of grasshoppers that have totally stripped the leaves and fruit from them but just look at them now.
Take that you pesky hoppers!
You’ve got to be tough to survive this country – just like the people who live here. We might have some scars and rough spots but once in a while we do put on a really good show.
RanchDaze 