A Day in the LIfe by Paty Jager

A couple weeks ago I commented on Facebook that my hubby was helping a friend disc up a field that had been used as a dump in years gone by. Well here a few of my finds:

 These were some lids I found. One is for a glass canning jar, it is purple in color.  The larger top is a Gabriel Snubber made in Cleveland U.S. A.

 You can see that there is also the bottom of a jar. The wording on it is: Kerr and SandSprings. The rest of the writing is hard to see.

 

And the metal lid is an old Kerr jar lid.

This is a 1925 Oregon vehicle license plate.  

I have no clue what this rusty thing is. Hubby thinks it is part of farming equipment. It reminded me of the Army tethers a friend showed me this past summer. It has the hope on top to tie a rope or rein through and it is heavy.

 This is another piece most likely of farm equipment. From the looks of it, we think horse drawn equipment.

 This was the only whole glass piece I found. It is about 6 inches tall, the top is about an inch across and the bottom is about 2 1/2 inches across. There were lots of different colors of broken glass that would have been pretty in the cement counter tops that are the rage these days.

I couldn't find any writing or anything on this. But it's heavy cast iron and I'm thinking it was a cover or decoration on a stove. Anyone else have any guesses?

I forgot to take photos of the metal wheels and bed frames I also found. Those will show up in a post when I decide what to do with them. 

And that's another day in my life. Thanks for stopping in!

A Day in the LIfe by Paty Jager

This time the post is about a weekend spent with other writers.

This past weekend, I attended a Halloween luncheon on Thursday with my writer friends in Bend Oregon.

Friday morning a Bend writer friend and two writer friends from Eastern Oregon headed to the Oregon Coast. Rockaway Beach to be exact.  First we checked the trip cams and saw there was about 5 inches of snow on the pass we'd planned to take. We discovered going by way of Portland there was no snow. I texted my husband, an ex-truck driver, and asked what he suggested for missing Portland. He sent his recommendations, and we took off.

The drive was a bit longer than we'd hoped, but we talked writing the whole way. We arrived in Tillamook early and checked out the Cheese Factory, which is under construction but they had a small building with cheese tasting, their restaurant, and how the cheese is made as well as the gift shop and ice cream. So we didn't miss out on too much. We purchased food for the weekend at the local Fred Meyer and headed to the house we'd rented.

It is a log house that was built in the early 1900's. We each found our room and beds, wrote for an hour and a half and then went out to dinner at a local restaurant on the beach. It was delicious food and a great view of the stormy weather.

view from the restaurant

Back at the house we wrote until everyone slowly headed to their beds. The wind was wild all night long and the rain pelted the windows. When we'd arrived there was a bucket in the main room where the roof had dripped. There was so much rain by morning that we had to find a pot and a bowl to capture rain from two more leaks. 

After writing a bit and seeing the weather wasn't going to let up, Kathy and I headed out for a walk on the beach. We were sand blasted from the wind blowing the sand and soaked clear through by the time we walked nearly a  mile and back to the house. But it was good to get out and give our brains more oxygen and talk through things we were stuck on.

blowing sand

 
We spent the rest of the morning writing and the afternoon working on keywords for advertising, until Kathy said there was a candy shop with fresh made truffles... We decided even thought it was pouring rain, we'd get truffles and go to dinner.

Trying to find a parking spot close to the candy store because were we trying to avoid getting too wet before going to the restaurant, we ran into a road so full of water we had to turn around. Finally, we parked and made a run for it, getting soaked. We purchased some very tasty truffles which we had when we returned to the house after dinner. We all also purchased candy for our husbands. It was fun to discover all of our husbands aren't fond of the coast and are more than happy to let us go on retreats and get our fill of the ocean.

We went on down to Pirate's Cove at Garibaldi for dinner. It is a bit pricey but the food is excellent. After that we went back to the house and everyone wrote for a while before we dived into the truffles. The weather started calming down that night.

Kathys taking a photo out the restaurant window.

Sunday morning Kathy and I were able to walk without rain and a bit of sunshine. We wrote until noon, cleaned up the house, and headed home.  We were detoured around Tillamook because the downtown streets were flooded from all the rain. After finding Highway 101, the plan was to have lunch in Lincoln City but somehow we ended up on the road to Hebo. So we continued on to Salem and had a quick lunch there before heading over Santiam Pass which was back to just rain and barely any sign that it had snowed on Friday.

The trip was short, but I managed to get my new project well on it's way toward the end and had a good time talking writing with my writer friends. I"m looking forward to April with we'll rend the house for a week.

A Day in the Life- #IndieAuthorDay

International Indie Author Day happened Saturday, October 14th. It was a day for Indie Authors around the world to get together.

I'm proud to say myself and poet Kate Marsh visited with our local Harney County Library and set up an author day at the library. We invited authors and writers from the area to join us for a two hour discussion of writing, publishing, and being creative.

We had nearly 20 people present, which I feel was a good number considering the small community of Burns, Oregon. Authors brought books to set up and sell.The books ranged from Children's, YA, Mystery, Sci-fi, Romance, Poems, and Nonfiction. 

We had refreshments of pumpkin and sugar cookies, coffee, tea, and juice.

The authors were asked in an email who would like to be part of a panel. We had Kate, myself, and four other authors as part of the panel. Most were Indie authors. Three had been published before going Indie. One had never published a book but wrote screenplays, and one was Indie all the way.

The event started with everyone present who considered themselves a writer to stand up, say their name and what they wrote.  It was fun to meet some people I'd only heard their names and see the passion in everyone of them for the story they were writing.

Good questions were asked and discussions were engaging and enlightening. Everyone was patient with those who took longer to tell their writing journey and when the event ended at 4, most people lingered to talk more. We were finally kicked out by the library staff because the library had been closed for half an hour!

Everyone who participated in the day had a good time and enjoyed talking with other writers and learning about the struggles and the triumphs.  It was wonderful to see young people as well as the geriatric set there to talk writing and learn from one another.

The one thing I came away with is the need to have a writing workshop of some kind at the library possibly every other month. I'll be headed into the library to talk with the director of the library and see what we can do.

If you are an author, did you participate in any events for Indie Author Day? If a reader, do you like to hear how an author struggles not only with getting words on paper but the business of writing, or do you just like reading the books for enjoyment without wondering about how the story went from a writer's  brain to the book page? 

A Day in the Life by Paty Jager

Yesterday, I woke and wrote posts for blogs I'm guesting on this month with Haunting Corpse. I guess I should back up and say, Monday I drove 5 hours to Wallowa County where I grew up. I visited with my dad who was in the hospital last week for a few hours getting an idea of what I needed to do to clean his house. Then I went on to my brother's house where I spent the night.

Tuesday I was back at my dad's by 9 am and started cleaning all of the downstairs of his 1880s vintage farm house. I stopped for a 15 minute lunch before getting back at it. I left his house at 4 o'clock. I was tired, dirty, and ready for chocolate chocolate ice cream. ;)

dogs and SIL

Wednesday, I woke, wrote guest posts for blogs I'm visiting this month to promote my latest Shandra Higheagle mystery, Haunting Corpse. Still in my pajamas I sat in the living room visiting with my sister-in-law and niece as we ate granola and yogurt. I dressed and my SIL asked if I wanted to go for a walk. I'm always up for a walk.

We put leashes on Dizzy and Maria and headed up the road. The view was gorgeous even if the clouds were hanging on the tops of the mountains.

My SIL suggested we walk to the Alder Slope Cemetery. Always ready for a jaunt through a historical cemetery I wasn't disappointed by this one.

Most of the tombstones were dated with births in the mid to later 1800s. As always when visiting the older cemeteries there are ones that make you sad. So many babies and children were buried during this time. I also enjoy finding great period names to use in my books. I found one for a character in a Silver Dollar Saloon book.

There was a good variety of types and I loved the granite posts that held up the cemetery fence.

granite posts

After our walk, I had lunch and headed to my dad's. I took him to his doctor's appointment and then back to his house.

I spent the evening writing this blog and visiting with my SIL and extended family. I'll be driving back home today as you read this post.  I'm looking forward to the author day happening at our local library on Saturday.

A Day in the Life by Paty Jager

Jammer in central Oregon

Monday morning I fed George and Apollo and walked up to start the water for the horses. I started the water and  noticed Jammer standing with one leg up off the ground. I went through the gate and spotted a gash/ deep scratch on her left back knee.  The other two, Bud and Lily, were farther away from the gate. So I opened it and let her out even though I didn't have a halter or rope with me. She walked out and went straight to the hay stacked outside the pen to feed this winter.

I hoofed it down to the tack room and grabbed her halter and lead rope. Back at the hay, I put the

her leg

halter on her and led her to the corral. I tied her up and assessed the wound. It wasn't very deep but was oozy. I washed it with an iodine solution and put an ointment on it to help it heal and keep flies off.

She didn't like the sting of the iodine but all she did was pick up her foot and squeeze the crook of her leg, making it harder for me to clean it.

iodine and salve

After Jammer was doctored, I had to move panels to give her more space in the corral and keep her away from the pony and burro. She isn't mean, but she is a tall horse and all she had to do is lay her ears back and the other two don't go near the hay. So to make it more tolerable for all of them, I penned Jammer off from the little boys.

I added water to the empty tank in the main corral and partitioned it so Jammer could drink from the smaller trough under the lean-to.

After the animals were all situated, I came back to the house, worked on edits and formatting and made lunch for hubby, son-in-law and neighbor who were putting up the rafters on hubby's shop. They left, I cleaned up and did some more writing related stuff. Late afternoon, I made cupcakes and started preparations for dinner.  It was mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, chicken fried steak.  Having our son-in-law here is like having the grandkids this summer. He eats as much as two people!

We watched The Voice and went to bed. That was my exciting Monday! How was your Monday? 

A Day in the Life by Paty Jager

This past Saturday, hubby and I went to an auction 30 miles from our house. It was a farm auction. The older couple couldn't keep up with their land and had sold out to move to a smaller place closer to family. There was 40 years worth of junk and some good stuff.

Hubby went with the idea of finding "treasures" to him, junk to me, but spare parts for our farm machinery. I hadn't planned on buying anything. I had finished one book and had uploaded the next to be released and needed a day away from the computer and to let my mind wander to anything but writing.

We met our friends, another couple we do things with. She grabbed me and said, "They are also having a garage sale." So I wandered through the furniture, mostly refurbished from old crates and furniture and made into new things, like I watch on Flea Market Flip. In the garage were tables of Fall and Christmas decorations and lots of craft items. Only mostly crafts I don't dabble in. So I didn't find anything at the garage sale.

Hubby and I walked down to the equipment. We saw a couple of items that if they went for cheap, we'd try for. Then a neighbor called and asked hubby to bid on a van trailer for him.

They had started auctioning the items in the shop, so we wandered back. Hubby didn't see anything in there he wanted until he had his own shop to put it in. I had looked over the saddles and didn't care to bid on them. But when they got down to the saddle blankets there were two I wanted to make rugs out of.  When the first person won the bid at $20 and they picked the blankets they wanted and didn't take the two I liked, I was getting anxious. Then they bid again and someone took more blankets for $10. Still not the ones I wanted. Then the auctioneer said whoever wins the bid gets the round up. I didn't know what that meant but when I bid $5 and no one else bid, they said I won the round up. I started to pull out the two blankets I wanted and the auctioneer said, "It's all yours." So I packed off 3 full body blankets, that I'm cleaning and will have our friend sell. 2 pony bare back pads. Same thing.  The 2 blankets I wanted and 5 other pads. Which I will see what I want to keep and have our friend who sells used tack, sell the rest.

full body blanket

bareback pads

We put all the blankets in the pick up and drove down the road to the Narrows Cafe. Had lunch and went back to find them auctioning the farm equipment. They had told hubby they wouldn't get to it for a couple of hours. They'd changed their minds. We ended up with a three point hitch (brand new) for $5, a cultivator hubby plans to cut in half and make into two. One for me to use to dig up the packed dirt in the corral and one to sell, for $100. And we both fell in love with a small grain roller. We got that for $20. And he picked up the van the neighbor wanted for less than he'd expected to pay.

They went back up to the stuff on a flat bed trailer. It is getting to be later afternoon and people had been hanging around the trailer all day waiting for the boxes of stuff on it to sell. Hubby had his eye on a bunch of tips for the cultivator and I found two drawers from a wooden cabinet with slotted dividers that I could envision made into shelves for my pig collection.

They started the bidding to take your pick of the boxes on one section of the trailer. It didn't have anything we wanted. Then they moved to the section with the drawers I wanted. They started with Your pick for $20. No one took my drawers. The bid was at $10 to take what you wanted, but hubby held me back. Luckily no one went for the drawers and I got both for $5. And one had nuts in it hubby could use and the other had metal files. Then we moved to the section with the tips. A man stood with his foot up on the trailer right next to them, kind of hiding the bundle. We were behind him. Hubby heard the man tell his friend when they got to $12.50 he was going to take them. So hubby bid $15 and grabbed the bundle out from under the man's leg.

drawers I'll remake into shelves

We were home by six and unloaded the blankets and my boxes. The heavy stuff we unloaded the next day.

Now I have blankets to clean and boxes to transform. But those tales will be for another day.

A Day in the LIfe by Paty Jager

This week the post won't be very exciting and I have only a few photos.

The day is Wednesday, yesterday.

Hubby left when it was still dark to help a friend haul hay. I secretly like these days because the only creatures to interrupt me are the dogs, wanting in and out. But Wednesday it happened to rain off and on all day and so they remained curled up in their respective beds most of the day.

 
I arose, checked my phone for messages, ate breakfast while playing Candy Crush Saga. Yes, I play that game when I don't feel like reading or I'm waiting for hubby as we run errands.

After breakfast, I started the laundry and cleaned up my sewing mess because my younger brother and his wife will spend the night here on Friday night. I had stuff all over the dining room table and the guest bed.

I glanced out the window as three large coyotes were trotting through our alfalfa field. One not very far from the house. Mikey was outside. I stepped out and called to him. He didn't come, but the two coyotes farthest away took off at a lope. The other one kept hovering closer than I liked. I haven't shot my hubby's large caliber rifle so I grabbed my twenty-two. But the darn pivot was parked in front of the house and I wasn't positive I wouldn't wiggle and put a bullet through it, so I just shot in the air twice and the nearest coyote finally loped off.

I dressed, and the dogs and I walked down to the corral and fed George and Apollo. Of course, I had to throw the tennis ball there and back for Mikey.

Mikey waiting for me to kick the ball

I also took a photo of the flowering wild flower because it has two blooms now.

Back in the house, I started up the computer and listened to 4 chapters of Murderous Secrets my narrator had uploaded for my approval. After that I caught up on the social media things I'd put off the day before while traveling to a dental appointment. All the social media, promotion, and all that fun (not!) stuff took up the morning. And I vacuumed out all the wall heaters because I now need heat. Only a week ago we were still using fans to keep cool at night to sleep.

In the afternoon, I continued writing the next mystery.

After dinner, I fed Apollo and George, told the dogs to hop in the car, and headed to town for groceries and to pick up hubby who left his pickup to be worked on.

We arrived home to catch the last half of America's Got Talent. We're you surprised with who won?

And that was a day in the life.

A Day in the Life by Paty Jager

Oma cleaning windows

This past Sunday was a busy but productive day. My mother-in-law who we call Oma which is Dutch for Grandma was visiting for four days. She spent the first two days cleaning my house. Windows, floors, refrigerator... if it was dirty, she cleaned it. I call her the energizer bunny. She loves to clean and stay busy. Every time she's here cleaning she says it's fun. And means it!  So I let her clean. It makes her happy and I'm happy because I have a clean house for a while. ;)

Sunday started with having breakfast and feeding the horses. Then I spent the morning sewing a boho sling bag to give away on my Marvelous Monday Giveaway day on Contemporary Western Hearts Facebook page.  If you like contemporary western romance you might want to join the Facebook page. Not only do you discover authors and great books but we have the giveaway every Monday.

sewing the bag together

Me modeling the bag

I finished the bag  a little before noon. When I took it out to show Oma and hubby who were sitting on the porch talking, I discovered, I'd sewn the bottom on wrong. So I took that out and sewed it back in the correct way.

After lunch, I wrote and worked on writing related stuff until 3 PM.  Then Oma and I headed to town, a 45 minute drive,  to pick up the photos I'd entered in fair. We picked up the photos without a hitch- 4 with no ribbons, 3 with a white ribbons, 2 with a red ribbon and 4 with blue ribbons and one best of show.  I stood in line for a bit to get my $11 in premium money.

My Best of Show photo

From the fairgrounds we went to Safeway where I picked up a few items we needed. At home, Oma and I got to work making spaghetti for dinner. She was excited because it was one of her favorite foods.

Oma was leaving early Monday morning so we went down to the acre hubby planted in potatoes and dug her up a bucket's worth of potatoes to take home.

Spuds

As we walked up from feeding the horses, the sun was setting and we had a colorful sunset.
And that was a day in my life.

A day in the Life by Paty Jager

Ack!  Here is a day in the life...I just discovered I didn't get the post up for today or for last Monday!  Monday was supposed to be about selling books in Sumpter and today... well, I hadn't thought about.

Stephanie, Me, Mary

 So, Labor Day weekend was spent in Sumpter, Oregon at the Sumpter Flea Market with authors Stephanie Berget and Mary Vine.  Mary and I usually attend this even Memorial weekend and this weekend. Stephanie who lives closer to Sumpter than either Mary or I was invited to share our booth.

We arrived Thursday evening around 5 pm and set up the canopy for our booth. Then Stephanie and I drove up to Mary's cabin in Bourne. The cabin doesn't have electricity or running water. We use flashlights and an outhouse. We unloaded, visited, had dinner, and visited some more before going to sleep. We rose the next morning drove the 6 miles back to Sumpter and set up the tables and books. Mary arrived and set up her table and books. She and her husband were staying in a fifth wheel trailer on their property in Sumpter.

A bit of smoke and very few vendors

Friday morning, right off the bat, a man came long, looked at our books, and bought my whole set of Shandra Higheagle Mystery books. I'd covered my cost of the booth. ;)  There were only half the vendors that are usually at the flea market and very few people coming through. A friend of mine had asked me to let her know if I saw any unique oil lamps.

lamp I purchased for a friend

I spotted one right away in the booth next to us and sent her a photo. She asked me to by it. A woman came along and bought my Native American spirit trilogy.  Stephanie sold one of her Six Pack books and Mary sold a book. I wandered around and purchased a four carved, wooden balls to put in a burl wood bowl.

wooden balls

That day it was hot but we were under a tree and had a bit of breeze so we managed to survive the heat and the few customers. That day after we packed up, Stephanie and I went to the Mad Dog saloon for dinner. The food was edible but a bit high priced. We went back to Bourne and visited until reading our kindles and going to sleep.

Saturday, we set up and waited for people. They were few and far between again. The day was slow. I sold two books while Mary and Stephanie each sold a couple as well. Without the crowds there were fewer people to visit with and watch. We did a lot of talking about writing and the business of writing. We closed up early Saturday night and Stephanie and I wandered around in the down town area vendors. I found some gourds that reminded me of my character Shandra Higheagle, so I bought them.

gourds

We were hot sticky and grumbly. So after arriving in Bourne that evening we had dinner, went for a walk and then took a dip in Cracker Creek which is right beside the cabin where we stayed. In our underwear we washed off and felt so much better!

Sunday was a very slow sale say, but my husband came up with the friend I bought the lantern for and my brother, his wife, and daughter and her family all came to visit. So while I think I sold one book on Sunday, it was worth visiting with my family.  Stephanie had to leave early due to the smoke rolling in. Mary and I closed up early and my husband and I had dinner with my family at the Elkhorn Saloon. It was good food for a good price.  Then Hubby and I drove home.

That was a weekend in my life!

A Day in the Life

This week has been a little slower but not much. I finished a book last week and am starting into a new one this week. I have it fleshed out, the pre-writing steps taken, and  started to put the story onto the document. Only struggling with the first 500 words, I realized I was telling the wrong story and now, my fingers are flying and I'm excited about the book. That is how the process works for me.

This installment of A Day in the Life happened last Thursday.

We awoke and were eating breakfast when I asked my usual question of my hubby. "What are your plans today?"

He said, "We're going to get some bluegrass hay."

George

That meant I wasn't going to get to my chores for a bit. We finished eating and while I cleaned up the dishes he made sure the back of his pickup was empty.  I walked down and fed the horses before we all (dogs included) climbed in the pickup. The hay was only about five miles from our house. we loaded the twenty bales onto the back of the pickup and brought it home. Then we had to re-stack a small hay stack that had started to tilt. After it was back in place, we unloaded and stacked the bluegrass. After all the problems with our daughter's pony, it was finally diagnosed as needing a low calorie, low carb diet which means we scrounge up bluegrass straw hay for him and it is doing George some good being on the same diet. ;)


When the hay was all stacked I asked, hubby if he needed me for anything else. He replied, no.  I spent the rest of the morning working on the book I finished until he arrived and said it was time to go to town.  I'd mentioned the day before I wanted to attend a meeting of the Historical Society. It was a luncheon. Hubby dropped me off. I attended the meeting. Some of it was interesting and some wasn't. I've found so far that these luncheons are never about what I thought they would be from the write up int he newspaper.

I also had an appointment with another writer and the head of the Harney County Library to set up an Indie Author Day at the Library in October. Between the luncheon and the meeting I had some time to kill and used it browsing through the local quilt shop that is closing and has their fabric for half off. I picked up some fun pieces and then headed to the library.  The meeting went well. We are sending out invitations to local writers to be on a panel to talk with the public. It should be a fun day!

We returned from town with a few groceries. I made dinner and hubby said, he needed my help after dinner. While in town he'd picked up new nozzles for one of the dairy irrigation pivots. He needed to change the nozzles and needed me to read the numbers and pick out the ones he asked for and hand them to him.  The dogs hopped in the work truck and we went out to the North Pivot.

Dogs hoping a rodent will be drowned out of its hole

Putting in the new nozzle

Hubby turned the water off and we walked through knee high wet alfalfa as we walked along the pivot changing out the nozzles. Mikey was racing around through the wet plants having fun cooling off.  Tink jumped back in the pickup. She is a diva and didn't like getting all wet.

Mikey all wet after his run through the alfalfa

When the nozzles were done, the sun was setting and the sky was turning a fire season orange.

The sprinkler ready to go.

We went home, took showers, and settled in for a couple hours of TV before going to bed. We live a laid back lifestyle and I like it!