Countdown - Week 7

I'll take a break from posts about France to review what we accomplished in getting read to move this week. Last Sunday we arrived home from our trip to Europe a few hours early. Originally we had a 5 1/2 hour layover in Minneapolis. Luckily, we were able to catch the last two stand-by seats on an earlier flight. As we were out of bed on the ship by 3:15 AM, and it was 10 PM by our body clocks when we got home, we were understandably tired. However, we realized going to bed at 2:00 PM just wasn't going to work well, so we got busy! Within a few hours I had the lawn in the back and around the barn mowed, Mr. Dreamy had begun mowing the front acreage and I used the weed whacker to whack weeds along the garden fences and the barn.

Other happenings this week:

• removed wire "cages" from around the trees and rolled the wire into smaller bundles for the estate sale (they said, "throw out nothing"!) . I put the wire and the "T" posts (metal fence posts) in a staging area for the sale. (We have large herds of mule deer that wander around all year. They chew on tree branches, and in the fall they rub against the trees, none too gently,  to remove the velvet on their antlers. Trees in this arid part of Colorado have enough to contend with without dealing with damage from the deer.)

• determined sale/no sale items in the guest room and bathroom upstairs. I have a pile of things under a sheet that are designated for wherever we end up.
• doctored Malachi. When I went to feed the horses on Memorial day I realized Malachi had a HUGE lump between his jaw bones, and more inflammation on his neck. Clear yellow fluid was leaking from pores in the skin. Bleech! After discussions with his owner I cleaned up the area, and waited.... ugh! The abscess ruptured during the night and I began a cleaning routine.  The Vet came on Wednesday. She is not sure if the abscess is the result of a tooth infection or a disease called Strangles. He was put on a course of antibiotics and cleaning treatment 4 times a day.  If the infection returns after the course of antibiotics he will need x-rays to determine what tooth/teeth are involved. His owner agreed to take him to her house as she knows how crazy my days already are. If you want to see pictures... scroll all the way down. If you'd rather not... stop scrolling when I tell you to!
• yard work. We all did a bit in the yard. We contracted with a company to remove 20 dead trees, which they did while we were gone. However, they left two standing, so they came back to finish the job. The company removed our pitiful lawn in the front and brought in soil to prepare for sod. (unfortunately, there is now a shortage of sod so we have a beautifully prepared expanse of dirt.)

• The landscape guys replaced rock and the turned my vegetable beds, I worked on turning and weeding the back garden. It is planted. I even put some flowers in there.

• I trimmed some dead branches from trees and weed whacked around the trees, and around the garden beds. I sprayed the back yard for weeds. My sprayer broke and I've ordered new parts. Mr. Dreamy finished cutting the front acre.

• I'm making decisions and making piles. What to take? What to sell? I'm moving stuff from Point A to Point B and sometimes back again. I've packed a total of 24 boxes now - need to get more.
• we decided on the date for the sale. It's further off than I had hoped, but with our whacky schedule there was just no way to move it up. The sale begins on July 13 and ends that Sunday. We hope to have last minute things lined up so they can be done the next week and our house can be readied for going on the market. 
• Mr. Dreamy got a quote for paint work. He went out to buy the paint and do it himself! He finished painting the front fence. He started to scrape the picket fence. Ugh! It's awful work!

• Mr. Dreamy also bought baseboard molding for the basement and he began installing it. The baseboard pieces are 12' long. It was awkward to try to get them into the basement by traditional means. So, I went down and opened one of the basement windows sand we simply put the boards through to the basement that way. 
• While dealing with the basement window I realized how disgusting the windows were so I vacuumed all of the dead bugs and loose dirt out of the tracks of the windows. I washed the windows, inside and out and cleared out trash that had blown into the window wells. We put 2 bags of gravel into the wells and they now look much nicer.

Until I wrote everything down, I didn't think we had accomplished much of anything. But on paper, er... on computer screen... it looks like a lot! I wonder what next week will bring?



I hate to say how relieved I am at not having to attend to Malachi 4 times a day. Taking care of him takes a lot of time, and I'm feeling a real time crunch now. I am so thankful that Sharron recognized this and trailered him back to her house. She was going to move two of her horses anyway, she just changed which horses went on the trailer.

Stop scrolling if you don't want to see yucky pictures! 

The weeping lump before any treatment.

This shot shows the swelling on Malachi's neck, as well as that under his jaw.  He also seemed swollen  along the lymph node area moving up the jaw. 

By the morning the abscess had ruptured. It looks awful. It smells terrible. But, the pressure has been relieved! Oh, and this picture was taken after I cleaned it up!