Things That Make Me Happy

Yesterday I was headed out to feed the mules their supper and realized it was nearly a quarter to five and it was still light enough to see my hand in front of my face.  Yessssss! 

We lost a ton of snow to the rain, but it did lower the snowbanks enough so I could take the Christmas swag down off the fence.  The mule paddock is a massive block of ice, but I sanded it enough so the boys can move around. 

I had a little issue with the snow blower last week, too.  I took it out to do some cleanup only to discover that both tires had gone flat, and being tubeless, they were half off the rims.  After a bit of a struggle I was able to get one tire off and take it to a local garage to have it reseated.  A few days later the other tire thawed enough that I was finally able to take it off the axle, but I had searched YouTube and discovered I could fix it myself.  If you do a quick search, you'll see that all you need to do is use a rope or ratchet strap to help reseat the tire.  I wrapped a ratchet strap around the center of the tire and tightened it so the edge of the tire was behind the edge of the rim, then began to inflate it.  I wasn't quick enough to remove the strap and it kind of popped off, luckily and surprisingly not injuring me in the process.  If you watch how-to videos, it's actually pretty easy.  New skill learned!  And my snow blower is back in service just in time for the next storm.  Oh yeah - good idea to grease that axle when you put the tires back on. 

Speaking of tips and tricks, I was filling water jugs the other night and realized my faucet set up is pretty kewl.  Instead of struggling to fill water jugs in the bathtub (tall jugs+short faucet=half filled jugs and sore back from being bent at a weird angle) I fill them at the kitchen sink.  In the winter you can't generally use outside faucets up here (I don't have any of those, actually), and right now I'm avoiding using my livestock hydrant because of the extreme cold weather.  So for less than $10 I was able to set up my kitchen sink as a water station.  All it took was a faucet-to-hose connector that can be purchased at any hardware store, and a short hose.  I removed the aerator at the end of the faucet, put on the connector, and voilà!  I can hook up a hose or my little roll-out washing machine to my faucet.  And the aerator fits right back on the connector, so I'm always ready to roll.  I bought a four foot leader hose on Amazon for short money and now filling water jugs is a breeze.  Behold:

The connector also came in handy when my mixing valve in the shower blew.  I was able to run a garden hose from my sink through the house to the bathroom and take a shower of sorts.  Whatever works, amirite?