Spring at Cold Comfort Farm

It's been quite a while since I've posted.  Over the last four weeks, I've traveled to Wyandotte, MI to assist my sister-in-law after back surgery (I enjoyed my visit with her very much), had a car accident (I was not hurt but my car was), wove two scarves and started a baby blanket while I waited for the repair to be completed, and then drove over 500 miles back home through the worst fog I've ever experienced.  I had no idea that I would experience fog ALL the way through the Michigan mitten and the Upper Pensula, but I did.  It took a lot of driving concentration but I was thrilled I was driving mid week, during the daytime, and the traffic was very light, especially in the U.P.   What a trip!

While I was gone, Mark accomplished quite a bit in our barn.  He worked at least 40+ hours - hard work hours.  Below is the before photo, then a photo "in process" and the after video follows.

Notice the overhead pipes in the picture below that held the milk as it was pumped from the cow and piped into the milk house room into the chilling vats....all those needed to be removed as well.

You can see the overhead pipes are gone and some of the stanchions have been removed

Here is after he cut out the milking stanchions with a metal saw and chopped out the cement base that held them in place or filed down what was left of the stanchion sticking out of the floor to prevent trip hazards or harm to animals.  He also turned off the electricity and removed four electrical panel boxes and all the overhead wiring.  The resulting openness is amazing. 

Now he has to do the same on the upper level of the first floor of the barn.  Then he will break out the cement floor on the lower left side, remove it and the stamp sand gravel beneath it so a new floor can be poured yet this spring.  We will have the cement guy fill in all the floor trenches when he pours the floor so that Mark can build stalls for animals.

We knew that converting a milking barn to an animal barn would take a lot of work - I just wish I could assist him more with this work.  He tells me that he gets more accomplished with me not home than with me here...something to do with his laziness - does he seem to you to be a lazy man???  Has he ever been???  

While I was gone, the temps were in the 40-50s here, the snow is completely gone, and this week's predictions are 60s across the entire week.  We are now doing work on the patio, patio garden, and prepping for the veggie garden and the compost pile.  Mark is still working on the barn, just a little slower.  Hehehe