Harvest time is coming on etc. etc.

Keith is on his way to Bend, Ore. with the crew that cooks for firefighters. Don't know how long he will be there, but he was excited to get on his way after spending a few days of downtime in Missoula. He picked the brains of our friends in the solar business and thought maybe we could get a solar set-up with an inverter that would pipe electricity into an outlet so we could run the laptop, rice cooker, and/or a small water heater. But that will involve saving some money since it would cost about $2k for something like that. Still, within reach in the long run.

And I've been a busy little internet troll searching for more tiny house info. The other day I found a DIY site that had a good option for pouring a concrete floor over a wood subfloor. Before, I had assumed we'd have to pour a slab or something and there were a lot of technical difficulties/ob-stackles involved, but this new technique is exciting. On an Extreme DIY site I saw how to lay a rock floor. But that looks a little too labor intensive for me. Maybe in the bathroom. But we're thinking redwood slats (a la sauna) for that and rocks could be slick...

I've also been doing some heavy duty doody research w/r/t composting toilets. Although I found one (the professional kind) on craigslist the other day--in Grangeville!--for $800 (about $600 cheaper than retail), we still can't afford an $800 toilet. Yet? Ever? I started writing a blog post about composting toilets and today a book I requested at the library came in so as soon as I glean some good info out of it I will have an update. Hint: It's called The Humanure Handbook.

Another CL score: a wood cook stove in Kooskia! For $200! We're going to go look at it later this week. Exciting!
Then I got a little carried away on ikea.com and started bookmarking THE BEST INVENTIONS EVER. I mean, seriously, the Swedes know what's going on. Illustrated thusly:

fold up wall-mount dish drainer: $30!

cutlery caddy: TWO DOLLARS!!

sweeeeeet rocking chair: $20

Good thing bookmarks are free. I think we may be placing an order with IKEA once we get winterized. Let's not put the cart before the horse.

The rest of us are keeping up with the garden...since the Garden Master is out on assignment. But we've had our fill of cucumbers, so I pulled up the remaining cucumber plants this evening and threw them to the neighbor goats. They go berserk for anything from the garden. (But potatoes are poisonous to them, FYI.) I just yell, "Goatie, goatie, goatie!!" and the come running. I fed them some carrot and beet tops, too.


The beans are going strong and the 2 rows we planted later are tall enough we had to string them tonight.

Ophelia is NOT helping, but very cute.

older beans

The tomatoes/etc. have been out of the greenhouse because we've been having 100°+ heat this past week and they would've cooked. It was good timing because the greenhouse has been overrun with weeds, mostly morning glory, so I took advantage of the heat help fry the weeds once I sprayed lemon juice & vinegar in there--and it worked great. So great that my dad (Mr. Roundup) said he would like to mix up some more and spray some parts of the lawn that are weed infested. No sign of the snake as I as spraying--whew!

before / after

Also, today I had lunch with my sister.

She is home from spending the summer in NY (and she's tan!!), and now she's headed back up to get her classroom ready for spunky 2nd graders. But she'll be back for the legendary celebration that is BBQ Days at the end of the month.