It Does Not Matter

Even though it Is Mothers Day at the Mini Farm, everyone still pulls their share of the work load. Saying that the wife was given the opportunity to be able to pick and choose what chores she wanted to do and she chose the garden. She did all the watering, weeding and adding some new plants here and there making it really stand out. She is really making the garden area look good and so far it is the spotlight of the backyard. We are all proud of what she has done.

I am sure yall are already tired of  hearing about the little cold smoker but I have an update. I fired it up this morning and did the first burn in. I only had to alter one thing to make it right. Where the roof attaches to the walls, I left the gaps open to increase the draw but it drawled a little to much and the wind was blowing the smoke out to quick making the temp climb to high. To fix the problem I cut strips of foil backed high heat insulation and stuffed them into the gaps. Now the smoke has a chance to hang around in the smoke house a little longer and the temp does not rise as quick. The problem I have now is that if I add to much wood, the temp runs up to 300 degrees. I wanted a cold smoker and not a cooker. To fix this I am either going to have to soak the wood and let it just smolder and keeping the temp at about 100 or I could add to the flue pipe making it longer so the smoke has a chance to cool before it enters the house. I might be able to add a damper to restrict the heat but let the smoke through.
The ideal way was to bury the flue pipe and let the ground do it's natural cooling but I decided to go a different way.

On another note. My mom scored me some big gallon glass jars so I can put by all my pasta, beans and rice. As it is now, I am storing them in the plastic bags that I bought them in but would much rather seal them in theses gallon containers using the little jar vacuum I have. I also plan to throw in a oxygen pack for good measure.  


Being that I spent way to much time on the smoke house, I got behind on some of the other never ending pressing stuff.
I used today and a willing child to get me caught up on the things I should have had done but was to lazy earlier this week to do.
We were able to finish the buck pen and move the two buck to their new home. Plus she wormed some of the goats and also trimmed some hooves while she had them caught up.
Then we had a junk guy come by and we de-junked a very large pile that we were storing behind the big barn. I am glad to see all that stuff gone.
I was also able to get the yard cleaned and de-trashed plus fixed some gates and mended some fences.
Now the wife and I are fixing a nice supper for Mother days and having my mom and some friends over. She decided on homemade tacos. That is always a hit but I feel bad because I am in here writing this and not helping so I guess I had better go.

Happy Mothers day to all the moms out there and I hope you had the day you dreamed of.