Littlest grandchild Claire is still here for another day or two. She came up with the idea that we needed to bake apple pies! That of course meant we had to take a special trip to the store just to get some Granny Smith apples. Did you know that they make the best pies? Just ask Claire, she will tell you.
Her first task is to peel off all of the little stickers that are on the apples. That is a very important job and she takes it very seriously.
Once the stickers are off, we wash all of the apples. Now it's time to set up the handy-dandy little apple peeler corer slicer device. It's such a cool little tool. They make some that clamp onto a table or the edge of a counter, but I like the one with the big suction cup base. It seems to hold better and you can clamp it anywhere that you have a smooth countertop.
All of the grandkids are really good at cranking out apples on this tool. Of course, the reward is that they get to eat the peelings that come off in long long long strings. Claire especially likes the ends of the apple where the peeler starts and stops. That's her extra special little piece to ask for.
She has even gotten so good at cranking the apples that she can stuff peelings in her mouth with one hand and crank with the other hand. My oh my, what a talent.
Once the apples are all ready...they are peeled, and the machine slices them too, we chop them up into sections and toss them in a bowl with:
white sugar,
brown sugar,
a little flour and cornstarch to thicken,
some cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice,
and a couple tablespoons of vanilla..
While that mixture soaks into the apples, we take care of getting the crusts ready. We had two store-bought crust in pans in the freezer, but we rolled out our own pie crust dough for the tops of each of those pans.
We rolled the top crust over the pies, crimped them down, and cut little vent slits in them. It's Claire's job to stick her finger into each of the slits and open it up a little wider.
Claire was making a special little apple pie all for herself. Steve saved a mini pie tin from a pot pie, so she could use up the scraps of dough and make her own little apple pie!
Claire sprinkled a cinnamon and sugar mixture over the top of the crusts on each pie, It bakes right on and is really tasty. At the end of this task, she gets to finally lick her fingers.
Patience is a virtue, or so they say. She had to be very patient to wait while the pies were in the oven. Apple pies take a long time, about 45 minutes. Every five minutes she would dash back to check and ask if they were done yet.
Tahhh Dahhhhhh!!
Just look at that!
The house is filled with the beautiful aroma of apple pies. What a wonderful Autumn treat. Tonight is a Packer game night at 7:15. They're playing out in San Francisco, so we will be content to curl up in our chairs and watch the game. This little blond Packer fan will be bouncing up and down until about 8:30 and then it will be time to pop her into bed. I don't think she'll make it all the way to half-time. Then we can relax and watch the rest of the game ourselves.
ON EDIT: 8:10 and she is still going strong and enjoying her pie!
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We are thinking about taking off later this week and doing some camping now that we've got the new bedroom window installed and the siding finished. Stay tuned, because we might make a loop around Corps of Engineer Parks along the west side of the state of Wisconsin.
Steve has a dentist appointment on Wednesday, but then we have nothing else on our calendar for a couple weeks. We can clear it off and head out and enjoy some Autumn camping before the snow flies.
We have been having rain rain rain for the past 48 hours. But that's OK because we have been dangerously dry here in northern Wisconsin. The rain has also spruced up the grass and we are getting some green color, finally. The trees are just starting to bud out with the tiniest leaves. A sure sign that Spring is on the way. Although, 3 years ago on this day we had a horrible ice storm and tons of snow!
When I woke up this morning there was a glowing orb of beautiful sunshine gleaming in through the foggy mists in the backyard. It just looked so surreal...
A few minutes later it got a little brighter and I snapped another picture. In this one you can see our finished little patio and the new position of all the fence panels in an arc. I can't wait for this whole backyard to be lush and green again.
Steve was able to borrow the big torque wrench from Nick to make sure that all of the lug nuts are securely torqued on the motorhome. They need to be 475 foot pounds and he actually had most of them that tight as it was with his air compressor and impact wrench. But now with the borrowed torque wrench, he is sure each one is torqued the same. How nice of Nick to lend it to him. When Steve returned it, he added a cash tip and brought him over a piece of freshly baked apple pie from last night.
Next, it was time to go for a little test drive and check out the brake situation. We wanted to be sure that the little bit of brake fluid leaking that we saw last fall was actually from that tiny switch that goes into the side of the master brake cylinder. After changing it, Steve had wiped everything down good to make sure that if there was a new leak, now we could spot it.
We thought we would go out and do some hard braking while driving around and make sure that everything is working correctly. Brakes are nothing to mess around with on that big of a motorhome. Being able to securely stop in any condition of course.
We decided to toss a picnic lunch and the dog into the motorhome and drive north on the highway. Just 10 miles up is a nice little county park called North Bay Shore Campground. We pulled into an empty campsite, nose first, just to look out at the nice view over the waters of Green Bay.
There was nobody around, but the campground is open already even though the water is not on. If it had been warmer out (and nicer), I think we would have just paid our fee and stayed there for the night. But it was starting to cloud over and began lightly misting. We decided to just stay there long enough to make a lunch, relax for a while, and enjoy our little outing.
The view out the front windshield was somewhat obscured by tree trunks. This is the same site we were camping on last summer, and then it was all lush and green and you could barely see the water.
Inside, we were cozy, warm and comfortable. I took a picture with the wide angle shot of the front part of the motorhome. Lunch is on the table and we are going to eat, relax, and watch the local news for a weather update.
I simmered up some apple cider in the cute little teapot my mom sent me from Florida. I added some spices that are for mulling wine or cider. It sure smelled good and it made a wonderful companion to the rest of the apple pie we had for dessert.
Binney was happy to come along. This is the first time we've gone in the motorhome without Finnegan, RIP. She seemed to be looking around for her little travelling buddy. She was sniffing some of the old toys that must still have his scent on them in the toy basket.
After a while, we drove on home and parked the motorhome back in it's spot along side of the garage. We will continue to load it up with items and get it ready to take on an outing, once the weather turns nicer. This upcoming week looks like every day will only be in the fifties and nights down in the thirties.
Speaking of apple pie, this little stinker came over last night for a couple hours. We had 6 big green apples and I told her that I didn't know what to do with them. She said that she had an idea. She helped bake the pie that we were talking about in the upper portion of this blog post.
We ate 3 pieces after dinner last night with her, she also brought 2 pieces home for her mommy and daddy. Now with one piece going to the guy who lent us the torque wrench, there were only 2 pieces left for us for lunch today. I guess it's time to bake another pie?
She also had to go out in the garage and check out the new canoe. There is a center seat that has now been dubbed the "Grandkid Seat". She practiced with the paddle on both sides and is eager to take a ride soon. Once the weather warms up we will go.
I am really looking forward to using the canoe this summer. We really missed owning one. We sold our last one in 2012 when we sold the house on the river. I really enjoyed floating around on lakes and doing a little fishing. Sometimes we've tossed in a line and I would relax back in the middle of the canoe with the cushion and a pillow and read a book or knit. Steve is a more active fishermen, always casting and trolling, casting and trolling. I catch bigger fish, though.
This is one of my most favorite photo of him a number of years back when he was fishing from our older red canoe. Soooo peaceful and relaxed. That is what retirement should be.
Hoping for many more years of relaxing days like this with our green canoe.
I told Claire that we are going to name the canoe:
"The Green Bean"
It kinda looks like one, don't it?
We did take a nap this afternoon and when we woke up, we were blessed with beautiful blue sky and sunshine again! Even with all the rain that we've had over the last 2 days, we only have a little bit of water backed up in the yard. Not like last year. Most of it has soaked in, due to the real dry conditions.
Earlier this year, Steve had been up in the attic removing all of the old insulation on the south attic portion of the house. At that time, he could tell there had been bats for quite a while up in that attic. We had been told by the previous owners that they had them eradicated and there shouldn't be any more up there. We couldn't tell if it was new or old bat doodoo, but there was a lot of it up there on top of the old insulation.
Steve had gone around and sealed up everywhere that we figured they could have been getting in and thought we had the problem handled.
But then, a few weeks ago, Steve and I we were up replacing the siding on the front gable of the house. Then I was painting over the new siding and older window frame and attic vent to "pretty up the place". Steve even replaced the screen on the vent and things looked nice and sealed up.
I had noticed a piece of trim that was loose and there was bat poop dangling down out of it. We sealed it up tight and thought that was the end of that. (NOTE: at the same time, I washed that window both inside and out, so it was clean and clear) ....
I think when we sealed up that entry point, we evidently sealed a couple bats up there that couldn't find their way back out!!!
Much to our dismay, a few bats must have been trapped. We didn't know it until two of them managed to crawl down INSIDE of the wall and appeared underneath the staircase in my she shed ... Flapping around and making an awful ruckus!!!
Steve was the hero and got them chased out the door each time. We looked closely at that nice clean window, and now the inside was covered with bat pee streaks and new bat poop sitting on the sill inside. Yup... we still had bats!
Now it was time to call in the experts.
Who do you call?
The Batman of course!
Ryan came and did a complete assessment around the house, and located every single point of entry that he felt that the bats were getting back in. He found 5 or 6 that we missed. Then he erected little external cages with one-way doors. The bats can get out, but not get back in. He sealed up everywhere that he saw that was an entry point. It was interesting to learn about the bats and the spaces they can get through. Their bones are hollow like birds and they can squeeze themselves down flat and get through openings smaller than a quarter of an inch!!
He even found spots along the chimney
that they were squeezing down between
the bricks and the liner.
He also said they leave a little trail of their bat poop (guano) or a trail of pee at the entry points to mark where they are getting in. This signals as a "roadmap" for other bats to also find their way in.
He put up all the gear and left the house set for two weeks to make sure all of the bats were out before coming to remove the cages with the one-way doors. This was the trickiest part of the house in the pic below. He got in a tiny one-way door in the opening up near the eave.
Ryan also suggested that we remove the rest of the insulation in the northern part of the house. That old insulation is actually tiny styrofoam balls and is a real mess to deal with. We were going to kind of ignore it, but Ryan said it's full of bat poo and pee, accumulated for many years. It's another road map to signal those bats to come in and find a way to a safe haven.
We contacted a company to come and give us an estimate of using a big vacuuming device to remove all of the old styrofoam ball type insulation. It's similar to the same stuff that's inside of bean bag chairs --- in other words, dealing with it is a real mess! On the 13th day, Steve was up in the attic with the insulation guy, to investigate changing out the insulation on the older side of the house and guess what they found???? One more bat!
Ack! They only saw one. They had disturbed it's sleep, because it was the middle of the day. It was squeaking and squawking at them and trying to snug itself up tighter into a corner of the attic.
So we called the Batman to let him know there's one more up there and to leave the one-way trap doors on a little bit longer. He came over and double-checked and said yes, it's best to leave it on just a little longer.
Once all of the bats are gone, he will seal up the last space where the one way door is. Then we are guaranteed for a whole year that the bats will not come back. What a nice way to get rid of them without any sprays or poison or killing them.
Bats are valuable and keep down a lot of the insect and mosquito population. That is fine. We just don't want them in our attic!!!
So our next big project will be having the insulation guys come and suck out all of that messy stuff on that north side of the house and blow in all new insulation on that side up to an R50 value. It's such a low roof height on that side, so it's hard to roll out more batt insulation. So we will opt to have blown in insulation done instead. They said they can get it all done in one day. They suck it all out directly into a huge covered dumpster and dispose of it. At the same time we will be adding a second layer of batt insulation to the new insulation we put on the south side of the house which is at R35 right now. There is more headroom there and we can easily unroll the batts ourselves. That way everything will be snug and tight and sealed in. And hopefully, no more bats!
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On my weaving front, I just completed a very interesting rug. Originally, I was just making it to sell in my Etsy store. But as I started weaving it, I realized I was really, really liking it. It was making a visual pattern of interest, and also I realized it was matching our stained glass light fixtures that we have throughout the house.
So I decided that I'm going to keep this one.
Steve was outside walking around in the dark (LOOKING FOR BATS!!!) and he snapped these pictures looking in through the window of me working away on my loom in the she shed. It's kinda cool looking in the big windows at night from outside.
This is such a comfortable cozy room. We spend a lot of time down here, more than we ever do up in the living room or the kitchen or the dining room. I'm so glad that we converted over this attached garage and mudroom into the she shed. It's almost more like a family room with a craft corner?
What's nice is that my looms can be set up all of the time, as well as my sewing machines and my big quilting frame. I don't have to put away all my stuff in between working on projects. I think it lends itself to more impulsive and creative work, because I can just pick up right where I left off --- instead of having to unpack and reset everything each time.
Yesterday, the rug was now done and cut off the loom. I triple fold the hems over and sew them on this very sturdy Singer sewing machine. I own three newer fancier machines and none of them can sew through the thick hems like this good old Singer.
It was a gift to me from my grandmother many years ago. One day, out of the blue, she told me to come up to her house and she had something to give me. This sewing machine made many, many of her quilts over the years, and also my Aunt MaryJane and Auntie Elsie had sewed their school clothes and even their high school formals on it.
It's from 1942. I still have the original manual book that came with it. I just love the formed bentwood case over the top. It is such a rugged but classic Singer.
For a while, I had lost the key to it and that just distressed me so much. For a couple of years, I had to open the case with a tiny screwdriver jammed in the lock. One day, we discovered the key had fallen back behind the cabinet shelf where it was stored in the old buffet at our old house. We pulled the key back out with a magnetic wand and now I keep it securely clipped to the handle on the sewing machine case. Then I will never lose it again! You can see the key in the photo below, hanging off the end of the case which I had just unlocked. As soon as I was done taking that photo, I took the key out of the lock and clipped it back up to the top handle!
The rug is now hemmed up and put in front of our two mission recliner chairs in the She Shed. We sit here all of the time to look out the windows, play cribbage or Yahtzee, or curl up to watch a movie.
This is what we sometimes watch out of the windows....
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I also hemmed up two other rugs that are going up for sale in my Etsy store.
This one I think I'm going to call "A Walk in the Woods". The colors just seemed to suggest little flecks of sky peeking through the green leaves, the gray and brown of the tree trunks as you walk past, a bit of tan in the middle of a foot beaten path through the center of the woods. And then the colors go back off into the trees again with flecks of blue in between the greens on the browns.
This other one I'm thinking is more like the waters on a beautiful northern Wisconsin lake in the middle of summer. You get the dark colors of the trees overhanging the water reflecting on the ripples. The bright blues are the summer sun shining down and reflecting off the water, as well as the darker blues of the deeper sections of the lake. I think this one will be called "Northern Wisconsin Lake" rug.
Earlier this week, my little baking assistant was here to help me get rid of a bag full of big green Granny Smith apples.
It's her job to make them go round and round! I just love this apple peeler corer slicer. There's one version out there that clamps onto the edge of a countertop. This other version is the type that sticks to any smooth surface with a big suction cup that I can engage by pushing a lever over. I like this one better. I've had both kinds over the years and this design I think works better overall.
That little stinker had all the apples done in no time flat. I have to help her remove the center cores, because that's a little hard for her to disengage them, but the rest of it she does all on her own.
Her bonus, of course, is to eat all the long stringy apple peelings. Well, not all of them, but she gobbles down quite a few.
I cut the slits in the top crust with the knife, and she sticks her finger in to widen them for air vents. She thinks that is kinda funny... I have started baking my apple pies now in a deep dish pizza pan. It prevents them from running over the edge and dribbling juice all over inside of my oven.
She carefully sprinkles
the cinnamon and sugar on top
before we start baking
We popped the pie in the oven and waited until the house was filled with wonderful aroma of fresh-baked pie. Yummmmm
Perfection!
Later on in the day, her parents came over for dinner. She was so very proud to show her mommy what she had made.
This very proud little girl
served apple pie
to everyone for dessert!
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We had great big thunderstorms come through early this morning. The thunder was rumbling and lightning was flashing --- soon our power flickered. Happily it came back on, because I was baking apple turnovers in the oven to go with our coffee. Otherwise I would have had to wade through the storm to put the half baked turnovers out in the propane oven in the motorhome.
I made a little video of my rain chain working, with the buckets just overflowing from the huge deluge of downpour.
It didn't last long.
We are now out on the front porch enjoying a little bit of the cool weather this morning before the heat rises later today. The heat index will be well over a hundred, and I'm sure our air conditioning will be chug chug chugging away to keep the house cool. For now, we'll enjoy a little bit of the cool air on the front porch before things change.
Another big storm is to come through later on tonight, and that will bring in a cold front and things should cool down again. We hope.
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