Lead ewe with her twins.  Best color of the year.

I ran out of excuses to not work on the kitchen down draft fan.  Annmarie had suspected I was putting it off but I kept coming up with something else that needed to be done.  I ran out of “other things” to do, so today was day one of the vent fan fiasco.  Now, one might think I was sarcastic by this comment but you need to read more of the blog to understand what my true normal is usually like.  I unpacked the fan and found the fan body bent and the decorative top strip bent.  The fan body was not a big deal, I bent it back into place.  The chrome strip that goes on top of the raised fan had a peg bent and it needed to be replaced or it would not stay in place.  I called the Whirlpool help line.  I was told that the fan I had purchased was made in 2012 and was outside the manufacturer warranty.  I then led with the information that I had just purchased the fan from Fred’s appliance last month.  They then countered with wanting to know if I had contacted Fred’s to get the part.  I said no, I called them. We then found the part I needed and the helpful person, on the phone, said he would list the part in my file but they needed proof of purchase with a recent date before the part could be sent out.  I of course had thrown that away.  I had to call Fred’s and get someone to email me the receipt so I could in turn email it to Whirlpool who may have it on file in two days.  I just need to check back then and if everything is in order they will send me the part.  This only took 1.5 hours. 

After swapping blower motor, lift assembly does not move.

I then put the fan together and turned the blower motor so it vented to the rear.  I was ready to rock as soon as I had some power.  I dug around in the old house and found a metal conduit ring, now if I only had some wire and a plug.  I wanted a flush plug so I went to the local hardware store and found a 90 degree extension cord and cut off the female end.  I wired the fan and figured out how to mount the legs and what was needed to mount it to the wall.  I scooted it in place and it fit!  A whole 1/4 inch to spare.  I plugged it in and it worked!  The fan extended (see picture to the right) and I was able to adjust the speed of the blower.  All was good with the world, or so I thought.

 I looked at both sides of the fan when extended and noticed that the side closest to the stove was just a piece of smooth stainless steel, but the other side was a couple of metal screens and the place where the air was actually getting sucked down.  This is not good, it is wrong.  Having done a very unguylike thing, I had read the instruction manual several times. I didn’t want to screw it up.  There was a way to swap the blower motor to the other side!  I was saved.  I had to remove the blower motor and swap the wiring internally and take off the covers.  But, alas it was not that simple.  There is a lifting mechanism and it cannot be moved.  I continued to swap over all the pieces so I can get the fan opening on the right side near the stove.  Well this makes my fan 4 inches too wide for my opening.  This means I will have to cut into the cabinet to get it to fit and cut out through cabinet wall to vent it outside.  This is still doable, but now I have to build a wooden top with the fan in the center.  Again, this is possible but it is starting to get more complicated.  This puts the raise and lower button next to the window.  You need to reach over 30 inches to raise and lower the fan.  The fan speed switch is a diagonal switch that you physically move up and down.  It would be at the far end of the fan near the window.  You would have to feel it while stretching out to adjust the fan speed. 

So I did some brainstorming, We could go buy a stovetop only and I could build a custom cabinet next to the sink that would hold the fan and stovetop.  This is what this fan is really designed to accommodate.  I had to do some more research.  We would then not have an oven.  So the heating guys are coming tomorrow to install our new downstairs propane freestanding heater in the dining room/living room.  I could ask for a quote to install propane in the kitchen where the sideboard is now.  We could move the stove/oven there and just not fry anything and just use the oven.  Eventually, I could build a custom cabinet and put in a single or double oven in that wall.  I realize that this is not spending less money to solve the problem but it is a solution and one which I came up all on my own.  I will have to consult the boss tonight when she gets home, but truly I am not sure how we are going to tackle this problem. 

Spice cabinet organized.

I am moving on to the next project.  The kitchen countertops are 100% done.  I installed the outlet covers yesterday and managed to not electrocute myself again.  I touched a hot wire two days ago inserting spacers to get the outlet the correct distance from the box.  It hurt, a lot!  I even cleaned up the spice area, took everything down and washed the cupboard.  I threw out the duplicates and nearly empty spice jars and installed some plastic shelves in an attempt to make everything more visible.  It looks a lot better and I was surprised at how many spices had spilled inside the cupboard.  There was some green colored goo on two shelves.  I have no idea where it originated.  I had to scrape it off with a knife.
We cleaned everything as we put it back on the shelves.  The only thing left is the downdraft fan custom cabinet and install.  Annmarie says I am stalling because it is going to be difficult. My reason is I am trying to catch up on all the stuff I had put off while doing the countertops and backsplash.  I just finished our annual financial summary for the farm.  We need that to do our taxes.  I just need to print out the mileage for the pickup and my part of the taxes will be complete.  Annmarie does the hard part and I don’t want to be the holdup.  In reality I don’t mind the cabinet portion of the downdraft fan, I just don’t want to cut the hole through our outside wall.  I cannot be off even a little bit or bad things are going to happen.   I really do need to do these other things and am only procrastinating a little.  It looks like next week it is going to happen. 

Chicken coop

Yes, chickens really are dirty.  They are the dustiest creatures known to man.  My perch needs to be about two inches farther out from the wall to prevent the poop paintings.  Unfortunately, I don’t have the room for that as I would have to move every perch two inches forward.  I am thinking about adding another high perch directly over the lowest perch.  Almost no one uses the low perch and with a second high perch I think its use would vanish.  The chickens want to be the tallest person in the room. 

I seem to have stopped whatever virus/disease was present in my coop with some timely vector elimination practices.  Not a sick chicken to be had in the last week.  I am going to have to cull another rooster.  My babies from this fall should start laying in March and I just noticed this week that my “pullets” are not all girls!  One of them is a boy, he is starting to grow a larger comb and develop darker neck feathers and some longer tail feathers.  We are going to let him live and kill off the old rooster.  The rooster will help integrate the flock and having a new rooster will make the old guard more prone to integrate.  They won’t be so insular, at least that is the theory I am going to postulate.  Time will tell if I was right.  The egg yolks are starting to get a little more orange in color.  The chickens are starting to roam about more during the day. 

Today I used a metal rake to finish getting the mud in the barn lot out of the front creek and spread out more pasture grass seeds along both banks of the creek.  I am hoping the grass will grow and help stabilize the bank.  I would love to plant the bottoms in new grass seed but I am going to wait until after March.  I don’t want a freeze killing my new plants.  A little area like the creek bank is easily replanted.  I have 300# of chicken food left out in the coop.  Just enough to get through the winter.  I need to start watching out for the sales again.  I think I will buy it in 1000# increments.  It certainly makes it easier and really cuts down my feed costs. 

We had another set of twin lambs on Friday.  On Sunday, I decided that the momma needed a companion.   They just do better with a companion.  I decided that our old lead ewe #1 is pretty pregnant and the friendliest of the bunch so she should be easy to wrangle into the baby area.  Yes she is friendly, but she is also a Dorper so she is our largest sheep.  She did not want to go in the baby area despite the food quantity being endless.  I ended up having to catch her and straddle her body and neck and drag her forward with my legs and arms while straddling her.  Not the most gracious movement.  We were almost to the pen gate when she decided to bolt for the open door out into the barn lot.  I had to catch her by the neck at the last minute, I finally got the pen gate open and the dog stopping her from rejoining the main herd caused her to go into the pen.  The worst part was it had been raining all day long and her wool was saturated with water.  My jeans were soaking wet!  They have been doing fine and today I noticed her udder filling up with milk so hopefully she will have her babies in the next few days, or she is feeding the other ewe’s babies.