We have walls!

What a difference a day can make! The framer/roofer/concrete guy, Mark, brought his trailer with tools first thing this morning. Bill started hauling snow out of the way, the builder came and the 2 trucks with the walls got here at 11:30. The trucks were unloaded and gone by 12:15! By about 5:15 they had all of the outer walls in place! They hope to have it under roof by Sun. It sure was a cold day to work. Greg, the main man, is the one up in the corner hammering. He doesn't like having his picture taken.

White Everywhere

Algona got 8" of snow and Humboldt 4" so we are somewhere in between there. Everything outside is white and, if like last year, will be now until Spring! In Indiana we would have warmer temps. off and on that would melt the snow so it wasn't white all winter there. I remember talking to Tim about vehicle colors last year and he said that he doesn't like white vehicles because they can't be seen very well in the winter. Now I know why! My Pilot is white which is good in the summer - the dust doesn't show on it (we live on a gravel road).

The new header photo is from last winter. It's our driveway and trees on a day that the frost was sticking to the trees and really pretty.

The walls for our house were supposed to arrive today but with the weather, they're now coming tomorrow around noon. They will be on 2 semis coming from Minnesota. They say that building the walls off site saves about a week in framing time, and we've heard that they can have the walls up and under roof in maybe 3 days! We hope so! More snow is expected in a few days! Bill is having to keep the snow off of the "floor" of the house. The wind blew enough last night that there wasn't much on it today luckily.

Bill is getting the snow blower on one of the tractors and is putting a loader on another. I'm working on our Christmas cards this afternoon. Can't post a picture since many of you are getting one!

SNOW !

We have lots of snow coming down since it got dark. Before that, we had freezing rain. We're supposed to get around 5" of blowing snow. Here when the snow blows, it really drifts quick and high. I rescheduled an appointment I had in Humboldt at 9:00 tomorrow and an eye dr. apptmt. in Ft. Dodge. We were also going to do our Christmas shopping. Will hope Fri. works now.

I've been doing laundry and all things that need power today in case the power goes out which tends to happen a lot here. Bill says many of the lines around here are "very old" (being nice here). We did buy a generator late last winter that will run our furnace, refrigerator, the well, a few lights and TV so we can get by pretty well if we have to do that. We have about 15 gal. of gas on hand to run it.

After church and the Christmas Tea at the library yesterday, we had our Hometown Christmas which was quite a bigger event this year. There were 30 vendors set up in the old school gym (more on the school another time), we had Santa & Mrs. Claus there, a living nativity scene with a local couple and their baby, the Horse & Pony Club/Rodeo group had homemade chicken noodle soup, chili and potato bacon soup meals and sold out - before I got ours - but that was good for them. Peggy and I sing with the Community Choir and we had received a call from John asking if we would like to sing/carol at this event. There were about 7 of us and we sang Christmas carols for maybe 30 min. It was fun.

Full Day of Christmas

Bill and I were scheduled to help another couple serve refreshments after church today so yesterday I spent several hours baking caramel brownies (thought of you Marie), sugar cookies, made peanut butter fudge and hot spice tea. The other couple brought lots of pumpkin bread. It all went over well and all was consumed!

An interesting thing about the fudge was that it had 8 oz. of Velveeta in it! (ewww!) I was curious how that would taste so had to try it. It was good! I found the recipe in an article in the Oct./Nov. Country Woman magazine. In the article, there was a lady that always brought great fudge to the office potlucks but would never divulge the recipe. Finally at the potluck for her retirement she brought 2 pans of fudge - and a copy of the recipe for everyone. She had thought that everyone else could cook and bake better than she could so enjoyed having one thing she could make that everyone loved.

Peanut Butter Fudge

1/2 c. butter + 1 teaspoon
1 c. chunky peanut butter
1 package 8 oz. Velveeta, cubed
1 package (2 lbs.) confectioners' sugar
1-1/2 t. vanilla

(for choc. fudge, replace peanut butter with 1/3 c. cocoa - nuts optional)

1. Line a 9 x 13 pan with foil or parchment paper and grease with 1 t. butter.
2. In a large heavy saucepan, combine the peanut butter, cheese and stick of butter. Cook and stir over medium heat until melted. Remove from the heat. Gradually stir in confectioner's sugar and vanilla until blended (mixture will be thick - I used my hands at the end).
3. Spread into prepared pan. Chill for 2 hours or until firm.
4. Lift from pan with foil or parchment paper, discard foil or paper. Cut fudge into 1" squares. Store in airtight container in the refrigerator. Makes 3 pounds.

This afternoon at the library's Christmas Tea I was in a cute, short skit called Mrs. Magi with Bill's mom and 3 others. Had more attend than last year Peggy said.

Now I'm going to our Hometown Christmas. Will write about that tomorrow.

Small Town Grocery

I just ran to our little Rolfe grocery which reminded me to do this post. It's not open on Sun. and closes at 6:00 every night so you kind of have to plan ahead but it hasn't bothered me. I'm a "stock up" person. When I go to cook something, I don't want to have to run to the store. Plus here it might not be open!

Our grocery is on the verge of totally closing though. The town is very small anyway but not enough people shop here in town with the higher prices and it's not able to carry everything that the bigger stores do. About a year ago, some of us in town "invested" in the store to buy the owner out who had been ready to sell for a long time. Many improvements have been made and all looks good but still not enough customers. There is a town meeting next Wed. night to let everyone know how serious the situation is and that it will be closing very soon if people don't take an interest and shop there. Bill is on this Board too.

It's Friday

It is 10 degrees. Brrrr. But sunny!

Bill is at a morning meeting in Emmetsburg today - with Uncle Tim and a couple other local farmer friends. It includes lunch. An economist is the speaker. Bill says he always tells them what they don't want to know like they should've sold more (or all of their) grain at the higher prices!

Glenn and the boys are doing a quick trip to Indiana this weekend with friend Jeff to move his stuff out here. He bought a house here about a year ago. So I'm headed to Glenn's shop (Dunkerly Ag & Truck) this morning to drop off Mom's Christmas gift for them to take with them. His shop is in the town of Pocahontas.

The fire dept. Christmas party with meal is tonight which we'll go to. Bill is the Assistant Chief of the volunteer dept. I'm making Creme De Menthe and Caramel Brownies to take. Glenn, Rob, Ross, and Reed are also firemen for Rolfe.