One of the many things that currently occupies my time once everyone has gone to bed is online surveys. I've gotten myself hooked up with a company called Opinion Outpost. It didn't take all that long to get my account set up and start receiving surveys. It did take a little while to (and I'm still not done) set up my profile responses. These are essentially dozens of questions in different categories (Personal Health, Vehicles, Shopping, Travel, etc. The theory is that the more information you provide here - the more likely you are to receive surveys that you'll qualify for. If I were to guess I'd say that I qualify for maybe 50% of the surveys at most. I just qualified for a video survey Saturday but I didn't have the time to complete it. It was to watch a 15 minute video segment (I think from a movie) and then I was going to be asked questions about it. It was for 60 points. Points on this site can be turned into cash anytime you accumulate 50. 10 points equals $1.00. The image here is of the first check I received and I just hit 55 points again and requested another check. I requested the first one on 2/14/2009. They sent it on 3/5/2009 and I just received it today, 3/9/2009. Also, I must say that many times I don't respond to the survey in time and it has already been closed. So I could potentially be making more $$$.

Well, I made my third attempt at making maple syrup yesterday. The weather was decent.....the kids were sick (we had planned to go skiing at Jack Frost)....I had the ambition. I was able to coax JT outside to go up to the campsite with me. I knew I had some cinderblock up there so we hopped on the 4-wheeler with some rope and headed up. We found 5 blocks so we made two trips. The winter wheat is starting to turn green so I didn't want to do too much damage (too much weight might cause the wheels to dig in more than normal?). We decided to set up by the wood piles so that while it was boiling I could so some splitting. As we started laying it out on the ground we realized we were going to need some more blocks. A quick phone call to Bubba and we had a few more and were in good shape! The following pic was taken at around 1:30pm and shows what we came up with.



As I was standing there, taking in the scenery, I decided to take the following shot which shows the make-shift fire pit, the 4-wheeler, the remaining sap and in the distance, my truck full of wood.



Here's how much sap we started with (plus what was in the pot). I actually had another bucket full that I had to dump out because I never got to boiling it. What a shame!



So I kept myself busy by splitting wood and feeding the fire.....splitting wood and feeding the fire. JT, Dylan and Malcolm came over at one point and wanted to go for a ride on the 4-wheeler and of course I oblidged. Time passed and before you knew it - it was time to go to Nana and PopPops house. It was actually perfect timing because the rain started moving in. It was just a very fine drizzle but I started shutting down the operation. I actually had about 9 quarts of raw sap left in the bucket at the time but since it was a week old I decided to dump it. I carried the pot in the house and set it on the stove. I'd get back to it after our visit.

So once we got home and got the kids in bed, I resumed the operation. The shot below was taken just before 10pm. This is what was left of just about 11 quarts of sap.

The thermometer I bought seems like a nice one (lots of labels at various temps) but when I get down to as little syrup as I have it doesn't register correctly.  It's because there is a mark part way up the stem which is where it registers the temp.  I dipped a spoon in when I thought it was getting close and when it started to kind of stick on the spoon I figured it was ready.  

I initially filtered it using coffee filters as can be seen below -- taken at around 11:10pm.

With Christl's help I had it all done except what was left in the last filter.  I tried squeezing what was left with a spoon as you'd do to a tea bag.  Well I pushed a little too hard and GUSH!  The filter ripped and a bunch of gunk dropped into the jar.

So I dumped the syrup back into the pan, warmed it up again and this time I just used cheese cloth.  The finished result - as seen below @ 11:47pm.