One Last Post for the Year - Krumkake

Just an hour to sneak in one last post for the 2015 year. 

It's been a long time since we've made our favorite Christmas cookie: Krumkake: A Norwegian cookie of simple taste but addictingly good.

Here we all are just getting started.

The iron is still heating up.

Kiddo #3 had big eyes watching the production.

Halfway done.  Only one burned finger so far.

They turned out pretty good so I must say.  

This is Grandma Evie's grandmother's recipe

Christmas 2015

Christmas Eve.  Everyone is in a good mood.

Christmas Morning:  Hungry Hungry Hippos is a hit.

Cozy Christmas sockies on Christmas Day.

And baked French toast for Christmas breakfast.  Yum

My Good Helper part 2

Kiddo #1 swooped in and decorated the air compressor tank as I thought she might.  She really took it seriously.  However, she took the liberty to change the name from "Air Hog" over to "Air Pig".
Suits me fine, I guess.

This is a parade of pigs (some with chainsaws on their tails) following a combine named "Bacon".  There is also a random monkey and skunk in the procession.

It works just great.  We filled it up to 90psi, and #2 Kiddo checked all the tires in the garage.  I think I'll give him this task to do every month or so.

My Good Helper

Here is #2 Kiddo with his prized possession:  A junk air compressor.  We found it on the side of the road.  It is missing a few vital plumbing parts.  I picked it up for the tank alone.

#2 Kiddo has a real passion for taking stuff apart.  So, I let him take this junk air compressor all apart.  He ripped everything off of it, and now I have just the tank left.

We call it "The Air Hog".  Perhaps we can enlist the help of artistic Kiddo #1 to paint the tank pink and add some fabric ears and a tail.

More to come.

The Past Week

I went to an auction and bought this old Snapper mower.

I don't know much about it, but I brought it home for $7.50.

Can't go wrong with that, eh? 

I found my old Devil costume from when I was probably 5.  

It seems to suit Kiddo #3 pretty well.  He really lit up!

And #3 Kiddo had his Thanksgiving Party.  

That's always a highlight of the year.

Fall Fun

Lots of fun times these last few weeks.

Halloween and Trick-or-Treating.

Super happy kids.

Silly hat day plus ice cream sundaes. 

Purdue Homecoming 2015.  Lots of activities.

It was a picture perfect blue sky day.

A Walk in the Woods

Sunday was a good day.  We got the kids all dressed up for our usual outing to the "Creepy Classics" held at the Long Center in the downtown.  We arrived on time, but were sad to see there were a ton of people standing outside.  The time came and went, and we were all still outside.  We believe there was a mix-up, and the show was cancelled for the day, but that information was not delivered.

So, we went to the Celery Bog and hiked around.  The weather was perfect at 60 degrees, and the sun was bright.  Kids were dressed up for fun, except our fireman got too hot in his vinyl coat and shed it quickly.

New Shelves

We moved 8.5 years ago.  In that time, the extra middle room in the basement has served as a catch-all for junk.  I decided to clean it up and organize it.  I hauled 8.5 years of junk out to another room and built some shelves.

So I hauled out the 8.5 years of garbage we haven't used, 

and I found a pool table under all that stuff.

And  ping pong table, too!!

Kids have been a having fun time with those.

At the moment, the new shelf is 3 layers (ground, middle, and top).  It is in the shape of an L.  The long portion is 16 feet long, and the short part is 6 feet long.  This is a ton of new storage for us, but I'm sure my wife will be able to fill it up with things we won't use until our kids have to throw it out when we die.

I chose a simple design for shelves.  Screw some 2x2s to the wall.  Uprights are 2x2s also.  The 2x4s up front prevents shelves from sagging under heavy loads of future useless items.  

The next step is to go through our 8.5 years of accumulated garbage and get rid of alot of it.  I don't plan to read any parenting magazines from 2006 after all.  And those cassette tapes?  All of our cassette players don't work because the internal rubber belts have dry rotted.  

It should be a fun winter project.

Practically Brand New

A few weeks ago, I finished the engine rebuild of my bro-in-laws chainsaw.  I have been waiting for a few parts from around the globe;
1.  Chain guides from Hong Kong
2.  New air filter from Oklahoma
3.  New chain from Florida
4.  New bar from Missouri
5.  New fuel line and impulse line from Shenzhen
6.  Rim sprocket from Michigan

The last of the parts finally arrived, and everything is assembled to its final design.

I've run it a handful of times with the old bar and chain to break it in.  I have yet to run it long and hard.  My break in sessions have only been 5 minutes or so.

As you can see, everything cleaned up real nice, and everything is just like new.  It's all so clean I nearly hate running it.

The new bar is an upgrade.  I couldn't file the warp out of the old bar, so a new one had to be had.  I upgraded from the standard 18 inch to the 24 inch.  With the upgrade in horsepower, the book tells me this could be done.

A new chain was purchased too.  This is the square full chisel chain.  The old chain on the 18 inch bar needed quite a bit of help and filing, and was the anti-kickback version.  This full chisel is more aggressive.

I sat my regular chainsaw next to the new beast.  The biggest and most noticeable difference might be the cleanliness.  Second would be bar length.

Fun days ahead. 

Next up - carburetor tuning to compensate for the larger piston bore.

The Big Big Stump

As you may recall, earlier this year we had some big trees blow down on Father's Day.  It was a surprise for all of us.  Here are a few pictures from that event...Big Trees

I've set my two boys to work on it with shovels, loppers, gardening rakes, and sticks.  It's been an on and off project for them through the summer for them.  For the last many days, I've been helping them out.  After about 10 days of digging, we had some luck...

I was able to undermine most of the root system for one of the two stumps, and then I cut the intertwined roots between the two with a chainsaw.  The last tool in the arsenal was the old 1939 John Deere H with a mere 14hp.  It only weighs a little over 2000 pounds, but it has the most torque of any vehicle I own.

I was surprised to see my stump roll right out.

Perhaps in another 10 days I'll be able to get the other large stump yanked out.  We'll see...

Turkey Run Day

We had a nice day trip to Turkey Run State Park on Saturday.  

The weather was beautiful.  

The highlight was canoeing down Sugar Creek:

Number Three Kiddo wore that hat from breakfast time nearly to bedtime.

He wouldn't let it go.

We had some beach time.

It was a good day.  

I think it's time to take a camping trip to the Boundary Waters!

The Shiny New Engine

The drop-in engine kit arrived to replace the internally-welded-together-catastrophe MS290 engine.   It looks like a perfect match (except for the slightly larger internal bore, of course).

It's almost too beautiful to install!  I don't want to dirty it up.