January 1 it was 70 f, yesterday it was 53 f and wet, this morning it was 31 f and this happened.
It was raining at 2 a.m., but changed at some point. We got about 4-5″ of wet, heavy snow, pretty to look at, but not to play in. The trees are heavy with it and the wind has kicked up, so fires are going in the wood stove and the fireplace, just in case it takes the power out.
I didn’t even bother to walk over to the coop. They have food and water inside and wouldn’t come out even if I did open the door.
Tonight is going down in the mid teens. Most nights this week are similar with single digit expected on Friday night. It is January, this is what winter is supposed to be, not the warmth we have had for the past several weeks. Today is a good day to stay in, watch the fire, spin or knit and enjoy the snow from the warmth of the house.
Yesterday afternoon we had a call from Son 2 that he and his family were on there way here for a few hours. We enjoyed having dinner together here, some snuggles and chats with them and some of the grands. They fled trying to beat the snow in the wee hours, but it caught up with them and took them longer to get home than they had planned, but they arrived safely. It was great having a visit with littles running around and loving on us and the pups.
This fella turns 10 today. Now 10 doesn’t sound very old, but he is an English Mastiff.
This past summer he reached the point where he could no longer manage the stairs and in the past couple of months it has gotten to where he needs help getting to his feet. We use a beach towel folded lengthwise to make a sling slipped under his belly to provide him some lift. It hurts our souls when he moves around after he is down as he pulls his back end around with his front legs. It doesn’t matter whether he is on the wood floor or the carpet, he just doesn’t have the strength in his hind quarters to get himself up. Each year, the pups get new beds for Christmas and we got this thick orthopaedic one for him this year. He will put his front half on it, but even if you get him to walk up on it and lie down, he will end up working his back legs off. You would think it would be so much more comfortable than the hard floor. He is still a very loveable old curmudgeon, demanding of attention if you sit down in the living room where he now lives.
We laugh at some of his quirky ways. For his entire life, he and the German Shepherd have been fed in the utility room with the tile floor. As he grew, we raised his food and water on a feeder stand and this year, bought a taller one so he doesn’t have to bend down as far. The German Shepherd inherited the shorter one as she too is approaching 10 years old this spring, but is still fairly spry though with much less energy than she used to have. When Ranger goes in to eat, he has plenty of room to turn around to walk back out, but has always backed out of the room until he is in the much narrower doorway then turns around. Of course, we provide the “beep, beep” sound of a backing truck when he does it.
When a Mastiff wants your attention, they will paw you. His paws are as large as my hands. As a young pup, we were told to do everything a child might do to him to aclimate him to pokes and prods. You can mess with his paws, ears, pull his tail, check his teeth, step over him and he patiently accepts it. He isn’t a fan of nail trims, but even that can generally be done without too much reaction. As a young dog, you would often find a grandchild laying on the floor with him with their head on his side. He travelled to Florida with us one year with his head in grandson’s lap most of the way. He considers the grands as his kids.
The March we picked him up from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, hubby was instantly in love. I was a bit more cautious, especially when the owner of the parents called up to his welding shop and told them they could let the dogs come down the hill to us. I saw two freight trains with flapping jowls barrelling down the hill and wondered what on earth we had just done. We couldn’t have asked for a better dog.
Today marked the last Farmer’s Market of the year, as the next two Saturday’s are holidays. It also means that some of the vendors are finished until spring and I will miss being able to do the bulk of our weekly groceries locally sourced, regeneratively and/or organically grown. There will be a few vendors through the winter when travel from their farms allow and some products still available, but it is always sad knowing this marks the beginning of real winter.
Today was also the last Holiday Market as well and this year I didn’t participate for several reasons. There are more and more vendors selling similar products, and competition is good unless your handspun, handknit hat is competing with bulky knit acrylic one. And the uncertainty of Covid sent me in a different direction last year, slowly spinning on spindles and knitting a blanket for us instead of product for sale, so my stock was low. And the cost of participating was too great for my stock availability. I limited my events to three at Wilderness Road Regional Museum, and one outdoor event at Montgomery Museum this past year and not until I was fully vaccinated. At times, I wonder if that adventure should cease and just donate my time spinning at the Museum or heritage craft events without vending. With this in mind, some of my equipment is being sold off and keeping only that which I love and use. Now with the new variant spreading like the wild fires of the midwest and western states, we are again wearing masks even in crowded outdoor venue, and I guess will stop going in restaurants again for a while, though that had only resumed occasionally.
This week hasn’t felt much like winter, with warm daytime temperatures and mild nights, but tomorrow is supposed to be more seasonable. Today it is raining, yesterday too, but we squeezed in a walk only getting a light shower during part of it. I don’t think we will get one today. We won’t have a white Christmas this year, but it may be cold enough for a fire in the fireplace. We won’t be totally isolated from our family this year either, but still only a tiny gathering. We were so fortunate to be able to meet up with Son 2 and his family week before last and enjoy their children.
One of my hydroponic gardens has not been doing well, so this morning, I broke it down, totally cleaned it, reset the plants that were growing and started some new salad greens. The other one has gotten off schedule with maintenance power outage by the power company and power flickers due to wind. I may put both of them on an easy to control power bar with a timer as the internal timers on the units can only be reset by getting up very early and restarting them and they don’t run for the same number of hours.
I will end this not very positive missive with a holiday photo.
It is done. What a joyous ride this past year has been on this delightful project. I spun 26 breeds, used 25 of them, knit 43 squares but one was too small so finished it is 42 squares. It is spun entirely with my Jenkins Turks, plied entirely with them also, and put together with Jenkins spun yarn. It was a stress free goal, let me try wools I had never heard of or handled along with many I already loved. One huge thank you goes out to Lisa who started following my progress after I bought a Jenkins Finch spindle from her destash. She is in Sweden and sent me the spindle packed in Helsinge wool. When I posted about it in my blog, she sent me enough more to make two more squares with it, then when I mentioned in my blog I needed darker squares for the last two months, she sent me Jamtland and Gotland lamb. There are two Jamtland squares and one Gotland lamb square in the blanket with more to spin for another project, so she provided 1/7 of the fiber for the blanket. Now I need to find a new project. There are lots of small balls of left over yarn from this project that can be used.
As I knit the squares, I pinned tags of the breed on the squares. Tonight, hubby helped me make a chart in order by row and I removed the tags. A larger chart, perhaps a photo of the blanket with each square labelled on the picture will be made and taken with the blanket when I go to do demonstration spinning.
The last two squares were knit on Wednesday and Thursday in the car as we travelled part of the way across the state to meet up with Son 2 and most of his family for an evening at Busch Gardens Williamsburg Winter Wonderland. This gave us the opportunity to chat with the adults and their oldest daughter and get to know the younger ones better while also meeting the newest granddaughter. They have a beautiful family. The oldest wasn’t with them because he was near where we live at a multi day swim meet. Today we went by the aquatic center hoping to run into him, but there are 1000 swimmers so only the ones scheduled for time blocks are there. His mom sent us approximate times he will swim tomorrow and Sunday, so we will go back and watch him compete.
Daughter, GS 3, GD 2, hubby, and I drove to one of the local Christmas tree farms to hunt for and cut our trees. We took two cars so we didn’t have to untangle them here or retie theirs to her car. The kids typically walk much farther into the farm than we do when we go alone. Our goal was about a 6 foot tree and one was fairly near the entry, but we walked to the back of the farm, up and down the hills, searching for perfect tree for each house. They were looking for an 8 foot full tree. We both found trees way in the back, got ours cut with the bow saw and carried out to the tractor road to wait for the farm truck to come pick it up. It is in the 7.5-8 foot range. They took longer to pick one and by the time it was cut, the truck was gone. The truck came back by, but didn’t come down the hill. A young couple carried their’s to the cross road, so we took turns carrying DD’s tree up the hill to make it one pick up on the next round. On our walk out, we had some photo fun and got our walk in on the farm today.
DD took another photo here with the three of them and me too. The trees were already wrapped and tagged when we got back and ours had to be trimmed of lower branches and drilled for the stand we bought from the farm a few years ago. When we got home,the kids helped get the tree off the car while I retrieved the stand from the basement and then helped us get the tree into the stand in the place we wanted it placed.
The tree is watered, decorated, rug vacuumed and the stockings hung. An email notice was received that the last gift is due to be delivered tomorrow. One more wrapping session is on the schedule, some cookies baked for my spinning group gathering which due to the newest variant of Covid circulating, may be the last again for a while.
Then I am going to sit back and enjoy the decorations for the month and some family time as it is offered.
Today, I had the opportunity to set up my shop at the Wilderness Road Regional Museum Noel Nights Heritage Barn Bazaar. Dressed in my period outfit, with a spinning wheel for demonstrating spinning. The Bazaar was from 3 to 7 and I arrived about 2:15 to set up and was able to choose my spot. Outside the barn where we were set up was a trio of fiddle, banjo, and guitar, and inside the museum were other musical performers.
You never know what is going to be popular at an event. In the fall it was yarn and knits. I was sure the holiday soaps and Gnomes were going to be the popular items tonight but it was guest soaps and salves. Only two holiday soaps and 1 gnome, but also a scarf and fingerless mitts sold. It was a fun afternoon and other than holiday soaps and yarn, not too much stock left and I love setting up in this old barn. If Cabin Crafted is going to continue, some of that yarn will have to be woven or knit for next year and more wool spun.
Over the past week, Christmas gifts were wrapped except for a couple that have yet to arrive and a few small items for stockings. When I arrived home tonight and unloaded the car, the closet in which all of my stock and display items are stored was cleaned up and organized as most of the items were out giving me a clean start. Over the years, my set up has morphed and some early items no longer are used and removed. Some of them had already been sold.
Tomorrow, we will go with daughter and two grands to the Christmas tree farm. I guess our tree will go up a week or so earlier than most years. Later this week, we get to meet our newest granddaughter and see her siblings and their parents.
The holidays are coming. The house is decorated (except for the tree). I hope this will be a no stress holiday.
In the past week, our family celebrated three birthdays and Thanksgiving. One of the birthday’s was mine, entering me into the beginning of my 75th year. Unlike last year when we were all locked in and isolated, we were able to share. We are all vaccinated and the adults all boosted. Last year I took an outdoor hike with daughter and her kids, all of us masked because they hadn’t decided that outdoors was safe without a mask. We drove separate cars because of Covid. This year we took a couple walks with family here for Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday and the next night for a Mexican feast.
This year we even went into restaurants for two of the birthdays, but wore masks except to eat. Last year we had Thanksgiving alone, this year we had some of our family together to enjoy the fellowship of preparation and dining.
It is concerning that there is yet another variant to the virus, not knowing how it will impact. Travel is still out for us, except short car trips to visit family.
My focus has shifted from so much crafting to prepping for the holidays. Yesterday and today spent wrapping a birthday gift for Daughter and the Christmas gifts that have been accumulating for the past month or so. I like to have the shopping done, whether in person or online prior to the Black Friday, Cyber Monday and post Thanksgiving madness. Now that Daughter has had her birthday, we can begin to pull out some of the Christmas decorations. Fortunately I did a deep cleaning prior to Thanksgiving, so daily vacuuming and light dusting are all that is necessary.
There is still some spinning being done for the Breed Blanket and always having a small spindle in the car. I knit a couple of Christmas gifts, one I’ve shown here, one a fiddly knit, then discovered a pattern for Gnomes. They are quick and fun, so adorable that several have been knit for the Christmas Barn Bazaar this coming Saturday.
Time permitting, another one or two will be knit before Saturday, but I have another square for the blanket to knit so I’m not in a bind trying to finish it in December by the end of the month deadline.
I have been waiting for a warmer day to finish putting the garden to bed for winter. The asparagus tops need to be cut down and a bit of weeding done behind that bed. The tomato, pepper, and tomatillo vines never got chopped up to expedite their breaking down into compost and the greens didn’t get covered, but still seem to be hanging in there. The salad hydroponic was restarted with new salad greens during Thanksgiving weekend and the herb one is producing way more than I am using, so some are being cut and dried for later use.
While Son 1 was here, he and GS3 tackled a couple of big projects, repairing the basement ceiling where the failed dishwasher last winter damaged the drywall, rebuilt a section of the walled garden that had collapsed, and made significant progress on a stone patio off the back deck. Hubby and I had hauled 1500 pounds of sand, six 50 pound bags at a time over a couple of weeks. The rest will be delivered and dumped loose on a tarp to finish back there. Once the patio is done, a dump truck of topsoil will be added to the walled garden to bring the soil level up to the top of the wall and the edge of the patio. That will require digging up the perennials back there long enough to spread the soil as the garden will be 6 inches to 2 feet deeper. The chickens keep digging up the bulbs and scratching around the plants. I can’t keep them out of there and when the soil level is to the top of the wall, it will be worse. Today because the past 3 days, there have been fewer eggs, they were left penned up with a deep layer of hay in their run and a scoop of scratch to entertain them. I am trying to determine if I have one or two hiding eggs or if it is just attrition due to the shorter daylight hours.
The bed along that back garage wall above needs to be redefined, weeded, and mulched, but again, the chickens just scratch it off into the grass, so a means of keeping them out is necessary.
A few nights ago when I went to lock the hens up, I brought their feed bucket back to the garage and filled it, returned it to the coop and turned around to find this.
Pepe Le Pew was between me and the house and headed for the open side garage door. Fortunately he changed his mind and scurried off across the front yard to the cedar thicket. I was amazed at how fast they can move and thankful that spraying only happens when you really harrass them. Though I have smelled them near the house before, that is the first one I have seen.
This was really just a checking in for those of you who keep up with our goings on here. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving.
November is birthday month in our family, two grands, stepmom, nephew, daughter, and me, plus Thanksgiving. November and early December are the months that various Holiday Craft Markets occur, ones I participate in and ones I visit looking for gifts. I hate to shop, maybe abhor is a better word and some years I have a genius idea for the grands, not this year. They range in age now from 16 to less than a month. I have done fleece blankets in favored themes with books, hoodies and books, hand knit hats and books, but I’m out of ideas. I don’t know interests of them all and I’m trying to match age to known interests and still keep a reasonable budget. I am at an age where I don’t want more stuff in the house and have been making regular donation runs, and a shared yard sale with daughter, so I’m no help in answering the “what do you want” question to me. I want my family around me. I want visits to and from them, I want to know they are all healthy and successful, that they are achieving to their abilities.
In the spirit of the holidays, I will have two of our children and two of our grands for Thanksgiving dinner, right in the middle of the birthday week. And I am preparing for the only Holiday Market in which I am participating this year. My soap supply was basically depleted and to make some more holiday festive, I made three batches this week, actually 4, but one was a nightmare failure that set up too quickly and the colorant did weird things to the round bars. There are squares of goat milk, oatmeal, and honey soap with a “frosting” layer of finely ground roasted cacao blended in to a little, round bars of rosemary scented soap with a bit of green colorant blended unevenly (on purpose), and traditional shaped bars of peppermint scented soap with red colorant marbled in. I am working on a buttoned cowl in light mint green Merino handspun wool, and over the past week infused comfrey I grew into Avocado oil and made tins of salve to add to the other salves available. There will be hats, fingerless mitts, a couple cowls, some mittens, and a couple shawls and scarves available for people to purchase as gifts.
Along with these efforts, I am knitting a little stuffed frog to go with a book, spinning wool for my Breed Blanket Challenge, and actually cooking and prepping in the kitchen, not just making products. At Farmer’s Market last week, I purchased 3 good sized Daikon radishes, a white, a red, and a purple and they are fermenting on the counter for kimchi, my favorite kind of kimchi.
The peppers tented with heavy plastic did not survive the three nights in the mid 20’s, the greens are hanging in there, maybe they should be tented later this week when the temps are again going to plunge. It is nice to be able to pick some fresh goods still from the garden and salad and herbs from the hydroponics. Some of the lettuce is beginning to get bitter, so I should restart those cells with a new batch of seed. Winter is coming, life moves on, I am glad to be able to still preorder some produce from the Farmer’s Market at least until the middle of December, and get meats, breads, some cheese year round. Projects need to be done, so back to work.
The heat finally broke today! I don’t think it got to 80 or just barely. We even took a walk. The past few weeks we have had Grandson 1 in residence, beginning with a basketball camp for a weekend, followed by having him here to visit and help out a bit. During his stay, we took a rail to trails 17+ mile bike ride on the Virginia Creeper Trail and took his almost 10 year old female cousin too. Another day we went to a very dry Falls of Dismal for a swim, there were still a couple pools deep enough for him to squat and immerse. Friday night, his Dad arrived for the weekend and toted down 3 kayaks on the top of his little car. Those kayaks were ours when we lived in Virginia Beach and often went kayaking, then they moved to the mountains with us and visited Claytor Lake and the New River a few times. Later those kayaks which weren’t getting much use here were driven to Son 1’s house as he could access the Shenandoah River and have gotten much use. Yesterday, those three kayaks, daughter’s two tandem sit on top kayaks and 7 of us ranging in age from 9 to 78 years old launched on the New River and floated a 5 mile section with a class 1 rapids. It was hot even on the water unless the breeze blew, but it was a great time. I enjoyed being back in the yellow boat with the yellow paddle I used to use.
The kayaks were loaded back up in the late afternoon for the trip back north today.
Before we left yesterday, Grandson helped me finish picking the peaches from our tree. We brought in a plastic tub full, most in decent shape to put in the fruit bowl, sent more than a dozen home with them, but the rest were very ripe, bruised, or had some damage. After they left, I began processing peaches. Excited that we finally got real fruit from the peach tree.
Three different peach jams were in the plan. I got the Peach Sriracha jam done and a second batch peeled and cut and realized it was time to prepare dinner for Daughter and her two kiddos who came over this evening, so that batch was doused in a bit of lemon juice and stashed in the refrigerator. After they left, the second batch became Ginger Peach jam and while it was processing, the last batch was peeled and cut and a batch of chunky peach jam was cooked and processed. The jars are all sitting on a towel on the kitchen counter until tomorrow and all the sticky peach juice has been wiped up. All three batches are low sugar jams and each tasted wonderful from the warm samples.
We will never eat that much, so I’m sure some of them will find their way to other homes. If the forecast holds true, we have several more milder days and a bit more rain that we finally got this evening, so I will tackle the two bags of tomatoes in the freezer and the bag of tomatillos and see what they become. The tomatillos will likely become Tomatillo/Jalapeno Jam and Tomatillo simmer sauce. The tomatoes may just be canned as plain tomatoes that can be later turned into pasta or pizza sauce or added to chili. I’m sure there are more tomatoes, tomatillos, and ground cherries ready for me to pick as I haven’t harvested in a few days.
Very soon it will be time to harvest the apples and Asian pears, before the wild critters get them all. Though canning has gotten a late start this year, it will be nice to fill up the shelves for winter.
At 8 a.m., Grandson 1 was put on a bus home to get ready for his next adventure, his first away from home camp. He and his Dad messaged me when he arrived. That means readjusting to meal prep for two seniors instead of two seniors and a 16 year old boy that eats more than the two of us combined. It means our walks are a bit slower as we aren’t trying to keep up with his long legs and teenaged energy. It means doing the mowing and other chores on my own again. We do enjoy having him here, for his companionship and certainly for any labor he provides. It means hubby doesn’t have his Ping Pong competitor to harrass him into games twice a day.
He got our lawns mowed twice, on the “go cart” as he calls our riding mower, did Daughter’s twice with her AWD mower (while her teenager was visiting his other grandparents), helped me refill the huge hole that was dug to get the septic pumped, toting the 40+ pound bags of soil, mulch, and the animal feeds that were purchased during his visit. That area is now reseeded and grass growing except in the edged bed filled with large pots of blooming perennials to mark where to dig next time. He helped me make prestaining repairs to the chicken coop. We didn’t get the staining done or the deteriorated chicken tractor totally dismantled, but some fun had to be tossed in to his visit. There were a few walks and hikes, a bike ride, some basketball time, a pool visit, and a couple of cookouts at Daughter’s house, one with fireworks and S’mores. And lots of beating Granddad at Ping Pong.
In spite of activities with him, I managed to fulfill one of my spindle challenges and I’m working on the other. The “July” challenge actually coincides with the 18 days of Tour de France, so began in late June and ends in mid July. My challenge was to learn to ply on the fly (Ply at the same time you are spinning), instead of creating turtles or balls that are wrapped together then plied in a second effort. With that yarn, then create a finished project. I could have spun it and used it for blanket squares, but wanted to further challenge myself to get both done. The TdF yarn was thicker than I normally spin on spindles and it became a hat.
It ended up being about 56 g of yarn spun and 43 g of it went into the hat. I made two stripes of yarn left from blanket squares as I wasn’t sure I would have enough of the other.
Toward the end of May, I purchased a small spindle from a gal in Sweden. She mailed it promptly, but it sat in customs in the US for the month of June, arriving here finally on July 1. She packed the spindle in enough Havre wool for me to make a blanket square, which was such a nice surprise and wonderful gesture. She had seen a blog post where I mentioned the Breed Blanket. She had washed the fleece herself.
When I finished the hat, I began combing and carding the box of wool, making rolags to spin. In the past two days, I have continued the Ply on the Fly with the Havre, getting it fine enough for a blanket square and have spun 11 g of it on the tiny 9g Finch spindle in which it was packed.
As soon as there is enough spun, I will wash the yarn and knit a special square for the blanket. Thank you, Lisa. With much of the month of July remaining, all of that wool will be spun and knit, then I will move on to a second breed of Navajo Churro that arrived in a trade for some wool that I had too much of. I love these groups. They are great social contacts, enablers to keep spinning, and provide challenges to keep me active in that skill.
Cabin Crafted 