Weekly Project and Purchase Roundup, 5/26/17

What did I accomplish this week? Not much, at least in my sphere. I assisted the wife in turning 6 gallons of milk into blocks of mozzarella cheese to freeze–sometimes by keeping the little guy happy, sometimes by actually doing some of the work. My only purchase this week was a large canvas print of one of our wedding photos for the house. It cost me $65 including shipping. Hopefully I’ll have more to report next week, but this was a tough week, and I plan to take the weekend to rest before returning to productivity next week.

Weekly Project and Purchase Roundup, 5/19/17

My son began his first attempts at crawling this week. He still faceplants regularly, and sometimes moves backwards when he is trying to go forwards, much to his consternation. Watching him took precedence over getting a lot done this week, and rain and the need to mow the lawn twice contributed to less projects as well.

For Mother’s Day, I got the wife a new galvanized steel 3-gallon pail and a new clothesline. The clothesline is the tree type, that spins around a central pole. My first project of the week was installing it.

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Major Purchase: Bicycle

What: Raleigh Talus 2 bicycle

Cost: $230 (Including shipping)

Purchased From: Experticity.com

Because my wife and I own only one vehicle, it sometimes transpires that I need to bicycle to work and back. However, I’ve only been doing this when necessary, due to the fact that my current bicycle is an old clunker my wife’s folks were going to throw away. On a good day, you can shift between 4 of the 21 gears, but it does work in that it gets me to work and back. 
I’ve wanted to upgrade the bike situation for a while so that I can ride into work more regularly and go for recreational rides with the wife, who has a nice higher-end bike.

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Weekly Project and Purchase Roundup, Week Ending 5/13/17

In progress of lifting the deck

I know, I’m late in getting this out. Other than the muzzleloading rife I’ve already posted about, I made two other major purchases this week–posts for them are forthcoming. None of the major purchases, including the muzzleloader, were planned for this week. However, all three of them were things that have been on my list of things to buy for months.

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Major Purchase: Muzzleloading Rifle

No, I didn’t buy from ArmsList

What: Thompson/Center Firestorm Muzzleloading Rifle

Cost: $150

Purchased From: Local Retailer

I did not plan on buying a muzzleloader this week, but I stopped in at a local retailer to buy my fishing license, and saw two muzzleloaders in the rack marked at $150 each. When I saw that they were Thompson/Centers, I bought one, because I have never heard of them making a gun that wasn’t quality.

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Weekly Project and Purchase Roundup, 5/6/17

Getting started
Mostly done

Working overtime and some other obligations made this a week of few projects. The first and biggest was to remove a stump I’ve been mowing around since we moved in. When I started on it, my wife had the car grocery shopping, and I had no gas for my chain saw. I did most of the work armed only with a shovel, an axe, and a bow saw. After the wife got back, I bought some gas and finished with the chain saw.

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Major Purchase: FoodSaver

What: FoodSaver FM5480 2-in-1 Food Preservation System.

Cost: $120

Purchased From: Costco

Last fall, I discovered that about the time that the guys at work get their deer back from the processor (none of them do their own butchering), they are very willing to give away whatever’s left of last year’s deer. That was one consideration. Another is that we intend to freeze a number of vegetables from the garden this year. I’ve always used ziplock freezer bags in the past. Finally, this thing has the ability to vacuum the air out of a mason jar, and seal it with a standard canning lid. We’ve been looking for a way to seal my wife’s homemade sauerkraut that doesn’t require heating it and killing the cultures. This fits the bill. Now we can give friends and family sealed jars of kraut that they feel “safer” with, while still giving them a live culture product. Also, I will use it for my homemade wines, to prevent vinegar formation after racking and bottling.