The Old Windmill

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I love windmills and through the years, heaven knows, I've worked on more windmills than I ever imagined I would. I have learned to read hand signals with the best of them and those of you who are ranch wives and work along side your husbands, know exactly what I mean by that. We become professional mind readers as this wave means one thing and that wave means another, unless it's accompanied by a head tilt then it means the same as the first. LOL. Honestly, we ranch wives have a sense of humor for a reason.

I wish I had pictures from the days when we were first married and we worked on windmills all the time, but it was just the 2 of us and that required all hands on deck. The ranch we lived on had 24 and nary a week went by when we weren't working on at least one. When the wind didn't blow, we had to hook up pump jacks to them and that required a whole other set of repair skills.

Poor DH married a gal that didn't know the first thing about windmills, but I'm a fast learner, although I might have dropped some sucker rod down the pipe once or twice. That won't make any sense to those of you who are not well versed in windmill speak, but in a simplified version, the sucker rods are jointed, and sometimes there were 12 or 15, and you often have to pull them using a block and tackle in order to replace the leathers or fix the check which is seated at the bottom. If you drop the sucker rod before they are connected, then you get to pull all the pipe to retrieve said sucker rod. In other words, this does not make for a happy hubby. Most of you could care less, but for those of you who have a mechanically inquisitive mind, I've included a simplified diagram:

I look back now and laugh, but there might have been a tear or two during those marathon windmill sessions and I think I ought to be awarded some kind of honorary degree since I'm pretty sure I have reached some sort of windmill pulling sidekick status through the years.

I still love windmills though and I have a hard time passing one by without capturing it with my camera:

Thankfully, this ranch only had 2 working windmills on it and we've converted them to solar wells so my windmill pulling days are over.

And you had to slog through all of that for me to tell you that I am working on a windmill once again:

I started this last year, or maybe the year before, but I became frustrated with the chart. I've done a lot of cross stitch through the years, but this chart is printed so tiny - each square is less than an inch - and I just could not keep track of what went where. It may have something to do with my aging eyes too:

but even with a magnifying glass and my reading glasses, I was unpicking more stitches than I was stitching so I laid it aside. Then a few weeks ago, I took the chart to town and had it enlarged for .33 cents.

 Money well spent and I am back to windmilling.

I had to pull a few stitches from when I worked on it previously, but at least I haven't dropped the sucker rod!

Helping the Boss

No ranch help means that I am called into action more than usual these days. Poor DH really does deserve better help, but hey...I'm cheap labor! And we've worked together for 30 years so he's stuck with me.

The horses needed a little tlc:

Combing out witches' knots:

                                                 

And we needed to process the heifers. The pictures aren't great because I'm not very skilled when it comes to moving cattle through an alley, sliding gates, spraying them, and taking pictures at the same time. I always thought I was a decent multi-tasker, but apparently not. DH brought them up in small bunches:

   While I worked the gates and brought them into the alley:

We just run them through the chute, pour on Cydectin and give them a quick vaccination:

                                            

And then DH drove them out of the pens:

                            

 about 5 miles to El Tank


                            

where I picked him up:

Happy heifers:

                           

We finished up just before noon and were thankful that there were leftovers for dinner. After dinner, I had a date with the lawn mower. We've had a spectacular year in the rain department and I've spent a lot of time behind this thing. Hopefully I'll be putting it away for the winter after this round. I can't get over how green everything is around here at the end of October.

                               

I am loving these shorter days, but it seems like we aren't getting much done. I guess it makes for more sewing time in the evenings, but I just don't sew once the sun goes down unless its hand stitching bindings or working on a cross stitch project. Speaking of...I haven't done any cross stitching since last winter. I left a project partially undone.

                                     


 This seems like a good time to pick it back up. I might even stitch past 9 tonight...unless I'm needed early in the morning. Guess I better check with the boss. :)