Ok so I took a few days off around the house to head to deer camp Saturday morning( its actually tents in the woods).
Drama hit as I was 15 minutes from my house with another 1:15 to go.
Boy calls and asks where am I . Says trailer bearing blew but I'm at camp. Upon arrival and looking at it, there was no bearings, a shredded hub and the races were heat welded to the spindle. No idea how the wheel stayed on. First reaction was ok , thank goodness Nobody got hurt and secondly, its staying here until I come back with proper tools in a few weeks.
My son was determined to fix it the next day, armed with a hatchet, hammer, needle nose pliers and basically that's all.
I was about to take the king nut off and pound the outer race off using the hatchet as a chisel. Not so much the inner.
Sent him off to tsc for a chisel, hacksaw, 60 grit sandpaper, hub assembly and channel lock pliers.
$100.00 and 3 hrs later the new hub and wheel was finished.

From then on it was a fantastic weekend.
I'm usually a late night guy there but we were fast asleep by 10pm and up by 6AM.
Cameras had lots of great pictures. Camp work detail got accomplished.
Woke up to pouring rain yesterday. Breaking down 2 large tents and gear always sucks but it went pretty smooth.
Got home at 3pm and started back on the garden and farm duties.

As for that, it's coming to a close with probably our ( my ) , because it started as a we thing and it seems it's a me thing.
Canned 12 more pints bread and butter pickles last night. Blanched and packaged 3 colanders of green beans.
Tonight I just did 12 pints of salsa.
Our total return is
81 quarts sauce ( not all are in quart jars)
36 pints pickles ( they are still coming )
24 pints salsa
Tons of blanched and frozen zucchini and corn.
12 heads cabbage in the cellar and 12 on the root yet.
6 heads califlower which 1 is canned and pickled with beans and carrots.
24 really nice carrots
75 garlic
Jalapeno, Chile and bell peppers either canned, in sauce, dehydrated or still on the vine
All the herbs , lettuce and spinach we can eat or dehydrate.
Raspberry, BlackBerry, blueberry and strawberry jam all processed.
24 pints of peaches left

I really don't know what else I can grow to better the cupboards. Potatoes and melons do not fare well here. Onions take to long and space, brussel sprouts again maybe next year
Probably in 2 weeks I will start an applesauce run.

After getting back from city camping 😛. I pulled most everything from the ground. Pretty sick of looking at vegetables on the vine and we are in far better stockpile over last year.
Only thing left growing are 6 cabbage and various peppers. Herbs will continue until frost. Even now my wife is telling folks, all the foods we eat are coming from our land or hands.
Haven't bought meats or vegetables in well over a month and meats are secured for at least another 9 months. Next batch chickens hit freezer in 3 weeks. Pretty incredible what you can do when you open up your mind and wife is on board.

Time to focus on the great fall outdoors.

Good luck, Clint, and get it healed before the chrome hits the river.

Heal up quickly Clint, you'll definitely need a good jigging arm for Lakers.

Well my wood pile is pretty sad. I had about 2 cords hickory split and ready from last year. Got about another cord ash that was cut into chunks but not split so I decided to fire up the log splitter last night.
Of course nothing is easy.
GD ethanol !! Worst crap called fuel ever made.
An hr later after taking the carburetor apart and cleaning the jelly out, then turns to white powder once carb cleaner hits it , I get the splitter running again. Ugh !!
This weekend will be dedicated to dropping 4 more standing dead ( ash borers) ash trees and restocking the wood pile.
There are some more down ash and locust logs I can grab roadside that were cut a year and half ago.
Gotta get busy before the polar coaster hits

I have a few onions , Brussels sprouts and taters left. Pumpkin and winter squash to gather up. I may not be able to fish, but will join you guys up there for a day or two if you will have me

Hey I kinda got my weeks screwed up and thought next weekend was 28th. Probably because I turned off the news a long time ag, the days and weeks really mean nothing to me. Its amount of daylight and temperatures I care about.

Anyway, I will be up fishing on first light Sunday the 29th and fish Monday the 30th.
Would love to hang out with you Clint so get in touch.
Still haven't planned anything in lodge wise yet. Maybe Jack has an extra bunk at cannons I could rent for a night. If not no worries, I will find something.
As for screwed up dates, I'm now doing my chickens next weekend. They are ready and I'd prefer not to go 3 weeks out.

Got tired of cutting and splitting wood last night so I had my first real hangout fire of the year here. Great night to burn a bunch of old pallets and wood.
Today I went apple picking so I can make applesauce this week to cann.
I also have 1 last batch of dill pickles and a ton of peppers to pickle.
First off I'm working on putting the daisy mae into its winter resting spot. Then I have to close and cover the pool.
Lots going on, so little time.

So as I pulled into our homestead I noticed something different out back. I took a walk to check on my eternally resting neighbors. Low and behold there were 2 big trees down. 1 is beech the other red oak. Huge score as they are easily available to drive right up with my truck.
Time to turn of the news and fire up the chainsaw till dark do us part

HT... my biggest concern about leaving it as a footer and blocking on it is drainage. If the cement which is left was stable and hadn't shifted from water over the years you would probably be ok with it but if any chance it will be prone to poor drainage or causing water to back up then I would bite the bullet and clean it down below basement floor level, install drainage bed and repour the base and then block the sides with new drainage behind it to save headaches down the road. 
Advantage to a complete redo is ability to expand it a bit if needed to make it easier to move stuff in and out of basement. 

I heard a lot of extra advice on drainage today. All good real way of doing things
This basement form was hand poured with my dad and me 45 years ago by hand.
We tossed everything in there we could find to fill space instead of wheelbarrow mixing more cement , even though he also worked in a cement plant.

After today's evaluation, and cutting firewood, I believe I will clean and level with a jackhammer what I can salvage.
Sunday I will take a large rotary hammer drill and put 3/4 holes through the bottom and against my 12" foundation to add rebar to secure a formed hand mixed pour of cement.
It seems the simplest method and I could care less who deals with the results 30 years from now

hot tuna
Yesterday was the 34th anniversary of farm aid. It was streamed live on YouTube and we watched or listened the entire show while celebrating our little garden and farm harvest.
Everything came to a close yesterday as we processed the final installment of our 30 chickens.
Lot of work for the wife and I but we are pleased from our efforts.
All 3 freezers are packed full of meats which should feed us through the winter and onto the next go around.
The house fridge freezers are full of vegetables and our cupboards stocked with canned goods.
Today I have some auto repair work to do then I'm going to gather my fishing gear together.
Until next spring, this thread will rest on my posting

I harvested my carrots today and will can them tomorrow. I have a few tomatoes left ,  3  rows of late taters and spouts left. Our pig will go next month and the cows in December. Fairly good year I guess. Although the garden part ends the farm part in non ending. We are getting the barn ready for winter and then the cycle starts again.

My egg chickens are love hate. For the months there is no snow if I let them free range they get into EVERYTHING. The scratch up the lawn, get in the garden and ABSOLUTELY ruin it if you dont fence it. Then there are the predators. Now if I keep them in the run they go through 4x the food and water and I have to tend them, but they dont get into EVERYTHING. I have given up on everything that is not fenced in. The eggs are nice, but cost me like $8 a dozen.  LOL

Eggs can be frozen in qt or gallon zippies and fed to hogs through next summer.... shells crushed and added to garden  

I'm kinda kicking myself for not going fishing. I was about ready to walk out the door when Jack called. The decision to NOT go was due in part from our conversation and the fact I was really tired from walking around at garlic festival in the heat, I was basically falling asleep on the couch and driving would have been tiring.

Anyway, I dropped a cool $150 at the festival getting approx 15 lbs of garlic.
The average price was about $10.00 a lb.
I plan on planting between 200 -300 plants this year in next few weeks. If all do as well as they did this year I should make a nice profit with some seed stock left over.
I have a lot of people asking for my goods so I will take orders for chickens and 2 pigs next season. The pigs will be by the 1/2 and processed.
Today I am going to get the garlic beds prepared. Work never ends here
Happy fishing to all.

Yeah RG, I was way overheated and could hardly keep my eyes open. I went to bed around 8pm, I hate driving and keeping my eyes open on the road would have been difficult.
I'm a workaholic at home. So many projects going on all the time its really put a hurting on my play. The saving grace is it will come to a close very soon as once we head to deer camp Columbus weekend all focus will be hunting until December then roll right into ice fishing until March then stripers late April till mid May so I do get in a solid 6 months of all play, no work . Wife never sees me on weekends during that time.
I composted and tilled my garlic beds this morning and they are ready to go.
I'm now going to grab the chainsaw to cut some more free firewood which will be a jumpstart for next winter. Gotta stay ahead on that so its ready to burn when needed.

While I do miss the years I've spent on the SR, I feel my time has really passed for now.
In the event I live to see retirement, its still our goal to take ownership in something up there. We truly love the area and with more time, I'd be able to take advantage of everything it has to offer.
Fare thee well and may the four winds blow me home again.

Peace and tuna

The 2 big beds will hold 75 each. The other smaller will do 40 each. 1 more to go to reach my goal