Movin' on up!

The dogs are moving up. Seriously. A mere three months ago, they had a tiny dog yard up in Grass Valley. Enter: Loma Rica House. Suddenly they find themselves with an acre of play-space. Yippee! The downside being that now they can get to full speed and both seem to be suffering (never at the same time of course) from hip/foot pain. This is what happens when you barrel roll over the top of your four legged friend. This past weekend, hubs and I decided to shift gears with our layout. Originally, we had planned that we wanted to have a huge garden right next to the barn. After allowing our chickens to scratch in that area for the past few weeks, we have discovered that the previous owners must have used part of that section of the yard as dumping grounds. We have unearthed cans and pieces of metal galore. Gross. NOT what I want to grow my veggies in.

Ponder, ponder, ponder....Ah-ha! Let's flip flop the placement of some of Chad's project trucks and the garden...Trucks don't care if they are sitting on top of metal. In fact, they like it! The long and short of it is that we decided to extend our yard (ie dog yard) quite a bit to include placement of the trucks. My garden will now be able to be viewed from the kitchen and the back deck which in all honesty, is much better.

Looking from current yard to new yard. Just removed the gate

Remainder of the old fence used to fix the fence in the next picture

Recycle, reduce, reuse! Fencing repaired with pieces from other fencing which was taken down

Other side of new dog yard looking back towards the barn and the house. Hubs is setting up sprinklers so we can get it nice and green :) 

 It was a long day, wrestling with fence boards, maneuvering barbed wire and man-handling the hog panels....but it's done! While I didn't actually do much (see, I can be honest), I did stay out with the boys all days and document as well as help carry things. I even attacked some fence boards with a drill (eh-hem). Earning my keep ;).

After being in the sun, we were ravenous and nothing sounded better than burgers. Unfortunately, I had no hamburger buns AND the buns I had made and frozen a few weeks ago were long gone. I had found a recipe online for self-proclaimed "40 minute hamburger buns" and figured I may as well try them out. The verdict? Pretty good....A little heavier than I would have liked, but good flavor. I will try them again and experiment with adding different things (such as whole wheat flour though I know that will increase the weight of them...). Work in progress.

End of a nice work day...Homemade hamburger buns to go with Meatball Burgers and Spicy Green Chili Chicken Burgers. Yum!

I am super excited to start adding fruit trees down in that dog yard along the fence line (added privacy AND food. Score!). We checked out the local nursery and found great options. Time to start saving up.

Back to the grindstone. Heading to the store after work today....SO excited about the huge meat sale Raley's is having (what does that say about me???). It's the little things, right? Stocking up makes me happy.

Peace Out :)