Behind Again....

Well I'm really behind in posting again.

So I survived the Hilly Hundred. Had to walk part of 2 hills both days, but not bad for only riding about 12 times this year.

Up until Thanksgiving I spent a lot of time dealing with leaves. What I like to do is run them all through the chipper/shredder to grind them up really fine so that they don't blow all over the yard and they decompose faster. I use them in the flowerbeds and in the garden as mulch. Of course this entailed fixing the chipper/shredder first. (I broke it earlier in the year.)

Last year I just built a "box" out of straw bales to catch them as they exited the shredder. I then raked them into a garbage can and dumped them into the shredder. I did that for about two garbage cans full this year and decided it was too much of a pain.

So I built a ramp out of 2x12s and a mostly straw-bail box. I thought I would have to stand on the ramp and rake the leaves up into the shredder. This turned out to be unnecessary and it was still a bit of a pain emptying the "box". It also wasn't very mobile so I ended up moving a lot of leaves a fairly long distance to shred them.

The next go-round I build a light(er) weight ramp and built a box on top of my small trailer. This worked pretty well after a few tweaks to allow air-flow through the trailer. This was much more mobile, so I spent less time raking leaves long distances. Unfortunately I broke the chipper/shredder again. Luckily I was mostly done. The last few batches of leaves just got put directly in the garden.

I hosted Thanksgiving for my family for the third year in a row. I cooked turkey, stuffing and mashed potatoes for 11. They bring side dishes and I usually con my mom into making the gravy. Nothing got burnt. Nothing was under-cooked and nobody got sick so it must have been a success.