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As a child we spent a week every summer in the Virginia mountains having travelled from the coast. It was a big “family” reunion, family being both biological and folks we saw but once a year, every year in the same cottage.

When we had children of our own, there were a few visits to the same location and other visits to Big Meadows on the Skyline Drive in the mountains of Virginia on the opposite side of the Shenandoah Valley.

Before children, I backpacked in the mountains with a Trail Club and then both sons became Scouts and I took up backpacking again, going as one of the troop adults on many weekend trips, a couple bringing us near where we currently live.

As our children became old enough to leave home or stay home alone, hubby and I began taking one weekend a year with my Dad and Stepmom to a B&B somewhere away from both of our homes near the coast, usually to the Piedmont of Virginia, they would plan one year and we would plan the next.

As retirement approached, we began looking for a place to build a retirement home and I wanted to move to the mountains. I was most familiar with the Shenandoah Valley areas, but land was so expensive there. Son 1 had hiked the Appalachian Trail and then rode his bicycle from New Orleans and both times coming though the south western part of Virginia. He suggested we look here for land and we found our farm in the Virginia Mountains, a few short miles from the Appalachian Trail, near the West Virginia line, in the county that was the birth place of my maternal grandfather. We built our home here.

I have learned old homestead skills, canning, spinning, raising chickens, making soaps, some herbal medicine knowledge to make healing salves. Along the way, got involved in the history of the area and began to do some 18th century re-enactment using my spinning and fiber history.

We have a lovely small University town only 15 miles away, trails to walk, ponds and lakes to visit, ever changing flora and fauna. I feel like I’m always on vacation in the mountains now.

Still too chilly to want to work in the garden, though the sun is out, if the wind would die down some, I would go start clearing beds and laying cardboard to begin the new beds. Next week is supposed to be warmer. More vendors are back at the Farmer’s Market, and it is starting to look like a real market again, though there was a fool who planted a chair on the sidewalk just outside the market entry gate with a megaphone, yelling an anti-abortion spiel (I think). Between his accent, the market noise, and the wind, I wasn’t sure what his message was, just that he was annoying. The market manager called the police and when I left, they were talking to him, or trying to as he continued to stand on his chair and shout into his megaphone. We left before there was any resolution. I believe in free speech, but I don’t want to have to try to talk to vendors or hear them when we are masked, over some fool shouting through a megaphone.

The local nursery opened for the season, yesterday, and though I don’t want to plant shrubs or pansies, we did go by to get me a planting flat. Once home with the week’s goodies from the market and the new flat, I moved two chairs that aren’t used at the dining table except when we need more than 4, set up a small table I use for craft shows, and started the flat with mesclun mix, spinach, kale, and several herbs. The flat is on the heat mat with the old grow light over it. That light is two small fluorescent bulbs and is fine for starting greens and herbs, but not so good for the tomatoes, thus the new LED hydroponic unit. The kitchen and dining area look like the green house we don’t have, with every available surface growing herbs or starting vegetables for the spring and summer gardens. I ordered some Thai basil and Cilantro seed yesterday, I probably could have gotten them locally as both the nursery and the natural foods store sell the seed I buy from the Virginia supplier.

On a fibery note, early in the week, I caught an update on my favorite spindle maker’s shop and purchased a spindle much larger and heavier than my others to use for plying. Most Turkish spindles have down turned arms. This one has upturned arms and every one made had a Road Runner etched into one arm. These spindles are named Road Runners. It arrived yesterday and I played with it some last night, trying to get used to the size and weight. Since the fiber that came with it, they always send a few grams of some fiber with their spindles, is organic Pohlworth. Since Pohlworth is one of the breeds I selected for my Breed Blanket Project and since what I had on hand is also white, I seem to have started three different breeds for the month. I’m about 1/3 done with the minimum of the one with silk in it, I will get enough of that done to count for the challenge and focus my attention on the three breeds for the blanket for most of my spinning.

I now have 6 Jenkins Turkish spindles in different sizes to serve all fibers and purposes. My poor wheels are totally neglected this year. But they look pretty sitting there.

Well, the chicks that are a week and a half old are getting wing feathers and beginning to try to test them out. I guess I should get on the project of making a lid for the box before they learn they can gain altitude by jumping on top of the water or feeder.