We went to the Tractor Supply Store on Saturday as our first OFFICIAL visit as Land Banonesses! We had to shop every aisle and look around and just enjoy the place! We’ve been there before, but it always felt a little awkward, because we were just wishers, not doers! Haha… now we allowed to actually look at stuff like 50 pound bags of feed and fence posts and muck boots!! Yah!

It’s very apparent that we are going to all need some decent footwear at the farm. Jessy especially is lacking in anything with a little more protection than sneakers. And she is my twisty ankle girl! She broke her lower leg when she was about 12 and ever since, she has a sort of weak ankle down there. I suspect it’s a little bit mental, and she babies that leg a wee bit, but as a result, she can find the SMALLEST divet in the ground and twist her ankle! So she needs a little work boot with a bit of higher support for sure.

Maggie and I are sturdier stock, but still, she has just sneakers and I have some little cheapy boots, but I can see they are going to be eaten alive out there! Good footware is esstential to keeping you working, if you ask me. Cold feet, twisted ankles, no traction and all, equals not good! So we did a little looking at TSS and found a few options. We’d like to check out a few other places, mainly because we’ve been told that Cabellas and Gander Mountain have nice sales going and we’re all about sales!

It’s Chick Days right now and they have the bug tubs with little baby chicks in them, so we just had to stop and oooogle all the babies! They are SOOOOOO cute! We just can’t wait to get our chicken palace ready to go. Soon… Soooooon! With the cold weather, we might just work a little more on the coop to stay warm!

Jessy is not too thrilled about the chicks… she is afraid of birds! But I think she’ll be okay in a while. She ACTUALLY touched one of the chicks I was holding! She did! That is huge for my chicken livered scardey cat! She was surprised that it did not leap from my hands to try and sever her jugular! In fact, it just sat there. Good first step in working on this fear of birds! She decided it was very soft and had to agree, it was cute too… haha… she will fall in love with them eventually!!!

Of course, Maggie was giving me those “OH MY GOSH CAN’T WE GET A FEW NOW??????” eyes really bad, but with all the coming and going, trying to keep some baby chicks alive too, that is just going to be too much. All in due time… soon… soooooooon!

Afterwards, we ended up with a three pack of gardening gloves, house numbers… 8 0 1…. and a good pair of branch lopers because we have a LOT of loping to do… both cutting up all the fallen stuff and then also to trim up a lot of the trees that are really in need of a little pruning.

We’re about to get out the door to go out there for a few hours today. It’s so cold out, we just are not tooo excited to work in the cold without adequate good cold wear. I hate to spend a small fortune just for a week or so… it says that next week, the first full week of April is supposed to be in the 50s and that will be WAY better than 27 degrees! So we’re bundling up in layers… tshirts and hoodies and coats… and we did get a pack of hardy cold weather socks at the store, and double gloves and hats! By the time winter comes back to Windhaven, we’ll be much more ready to do battle with her!

I called my good friend Bill, who lives out there and I used to play with in the first band I ever played in! Bill is my buddy for sure… and he’s so excited that I’m going to be about 5 miles from him! I am so excited as well… he’s one of my favorite people in the whole world and he is a horseman and he’s just so excited! He’s going to come out on Monday and see if he can’t get the water on and the heat as well! He says it’s probably just a few things that we need to get going. I’m sure he’ll be a HUGE help, and I really want him to see the place too! Monday will be a great day at the homestead!!!!

We finished our trip on Saturday with a trip to Walmart. Yeah… Walmart. I have been really good at avoiding the place for almost a year! But it seemed the easiest place to get everything and get it done. We needed a bunch of things like some cups and paper plates for lunching there, paper towels and some heavy duty cleaning supplies, socks, door hardware and painting stuff. We got it all done pretty quick and then outta there. Maggie says she saw a hardware store in Fayette! Yeah! That will be our new home I’m sure!

So far we have spent $231.13 in our home rehab adventure. A good deal of it was painting prep, some garden needs, and cleaning supplies. Some of it was bottle water and pop, some ready snacks and such. Including one lunch out, and dinner at the homestead. I like to keep the receipts for those inevitable returns, but also to see how the progress goes so we’re not wildly spending either. I think we’re ready for most of the coming week… only thing left is a bit of paint!