My brother drew a design for our duck house that we, alas, had to reject. We couldn’t get the city to approve the wifi tower, and PETA was unhappy with the spiral staircase. They said it would cause too much stress to the ducks. How else, I ask, were the ducks supposed to get to / from the landing pad?

The work on our duck house continues. The boys got the walls framed and are finishing up the walls. Mom and I did some priming, but we couldn’t keep up with the boys’ progress. Plus we were running low on primer. Here’s some photos of the progress. Eventually the whole thing will be painted brickish red. We got two cans of really pricey paint for $2 each (normally over $30 each), so who cares about the color. Maybe I’ll put a mosiac on the side or something fun later.

It’s back to work tomorrow for me. Andy will probably collapse all day and rest. Or maybe paint. Hee.

Dad, Andy, and Craig worked on building the duck house all day today. They got the base finished, and I started priming it while they worked on framing the walls.

I ran out of primer, and they ran out of 2x4s. Dad and Andy went off to the store, and Mom and I decided to whip up some jam. Too bad the propane ran out right before the fruit began to boil. Bummer. We weren’t able to get the tanks off, so we had to put things on hold and wait for the guys to get back and use their muscles of steel to unhook the tanks. They ran down to J&Js for a fill up, and we finally got to make jam. It’s YUMMY. Would be better without the seeds, but still yummy.

We made 8 pints of jam, and used up most of the berries we picked on Saturday. Time to pick more! I’d like to try and make a pie tomorrow, so not only will I need more berries but ‘ll also need to figure out how to strain most of the seeds out. It’s all a learning experience.