The world is in chaos. I get that. But a friend posted a comment today "...our wisdom spans a decent length of a lifetime. And someone needs to hold the threads together, and mind the hearth." Folks may wonder at my posts, all about gardens and trees, birds and beasts, spinning and knitting and sewing …
Tried to make metaphoric hay today and did indeed get *some* stuff done. But as those of you who farm or homestead know, I am sure, there are days when its two (or more...) steps back for every one that might go forward or at least sideways (which is not backwards! LOL) My intention for …
Continue reading Two steps back, one in another direction entirely.
May 31, 2020 The chickens may be playing tricks on me. You probably have read about our black Langshan hen who I declared to be broody on April 24 and who has been attempting, with some success, some help and some failures, to hatch a clutch of her and other hens' eggs since offering up …
I am feeling very thankful this morning for the weather gods offering of relief from the oppressive heat which hit us much, much earlier than usual here in the northlands. May, between the recognized Memorial Day holiday and the traditional May 30th date may be the commercially touted "beginning of summer" but it has never, …
I promised pix and observations and here we go! This is our newest baby forest, a grouping of volunteer pine trees of various sizes/ages. We have no idea why, or how they started growing there, in this bit of poor soil to the back of the land. In the background, you can see the mostly …
Continue reading What’s up now with the crazy farmer-artist?
Tuesday, May 26 - Chores done, I am biding time until K calls me to help dig Artie's summer tires out of the garage to take to the mechanic for swap with the winter tires. Yes, I am way late, but with the relaxation of rules of late, it was easy to forget. K noticed …
We have scary numbers for the high temperatures the rest of the week, especially since it is still MAY here in the northlands, so I spent much of the day knocking out a project that has been waiting for some time: weed whacking around the fruit trees to allow me to renew mulch. The project …
It was windy and cool enough today that I was able to work in 3/4 sleeves, keeping the worst of my sunburn under wraps. Yay! It is not a bad one, but adding more sun at this point would not be helpful, especially as we have multiple kittens in explorer mode. They are learning to …
I did not get started on the trees yesterday as I had planned -- the "gang of three" tools that I use for the job refused to gather. I had a spading fork, a D-handle shovel but the mattock was nowhere to be found...until it was too late to be of use yesterday. LOL K …
Time for me to get into the mindset of no rain/time to water. AARGH! I have been enjoying using the division between rainy, or potentially rainy days as indoor work days and days with better weather as outdoor work days, but with a forecast that includes nothing more threatening than partially cloudy ( which is …
