Cabin Crafted

Category: farm

  • Olio – May 31, 2026

    Olio: a miscellaneous collection of things

    The month is drawing to a close. It has been a good month, with a trip to see youngest son and family, a month long spinning challenge, a very heavy work day with local grandson making headway on cleaning up parts of the property, walks and wildlife, seeing more production from the pullets, some social time, some living history, and not enough gardening.

    We often see snakes, turtles, or today, a lizard on the paved trail. The morning was cool enough that it was warming on the dark pavement, and yet delightful for a brisk walk.

    We saw our first fawn of the season this week, crossing our gravel road into the woods. Tiny little one that quickly tucked itself between Mom’s back legs as we were approaching.

    Yesterday on my way to an annual spring spin in at a friend’s house, I saw another with it’s Mom in route, then yet another on our gravel road on my way home. The spin in is always enjoyable, the weather was a delight and the potluck ended up mostly salads, many Mediterrean in flavor. A good friend who I see only at this event and at an Arts and Fiber retreat once a year as she and her husband live a state away, gifted me a tiny spindle made by my favorite spindle maker, Ed Jenkins. Most of my spindles are on the smaller size, but this one is really tiny. Seen next to a US quarter for reference. Much to my surprise, it spins for an amazingly long time once a little fiber is added.

    For the spinning challenge, all done on Jenkin’s spindles, I spun 165 g of wool. Other spinning was done during the month on other types of spindles, some at living history groups at the museum, some on my own at home as I work toward enough to finish the other 3/4 of the blanket in progress. So in total, I probably spun about half a pound of wool this month. And I started lessons for one of my friends and fellow living history re-enactors. This month, I won’t participate in the challenge and there are no scheduled groups other than the weekly session with the local spinning group. I will likely meet up with my friend again for another lesson for her.

    The garden is growing, the raised beds are doing well and have been weeded a couple of times, but I never did get the rest of the garden set for corn and pumpkins, nor have I gotten the blueberry bed weeded. We did get almost a week of rain toward the end of the month.

    The pullets, I think are now all laying. The most I have gotten on any one day was today and there were 7 eggs (9 pullets). The Marans that I didn’t think had started, have given me 4 eggs in the past couple days and two of them today, so I know they are both laying. As I don’t know for sure what color the Mystic Onyx breed lays. The web says light brown and there are 3 Buff Orpingtons that also lay light brown. I did get 3 light brown eggs in the mix today, so at least 3 of the 5 light brown layers are providing.

    As they get the hang of production, we sometimes get an oddball one. This one on the left when cracked open, had 3+ yolks. The one on the right is a normal sized pullet egg.

    I have gotten doubles before, especially when they are young and soon after starting to lay again after molt, but three is a record for here.

    After our walk, a few quick stops, we managed to get the yard mowed, partly edged, and the fence around the young oak planted on our pup’s grave reinforced. It is now time to let the day fade, spin a little more, or maybe knit a few rows, and look forward to a new month beginning tomorrow with new adventures.

  • Strong as a bull

    The grandson (19 years old) drove over this morning and for the next 1.75 hours, we worked. I had brought the trailer down from the barn to the garden area and tried to get a headstart before he arrived by starting to back the long screws out of the rotting garden box. That box was 17′ long and 4′ wide. Many of the screws just stripped instead of backing out. To also expedite our destruction, I drove the tractor down from the barn and shifted the broken rubble from the destroyed chicken tractor that has sat under one of the apple trees with several years of grass growing up through it.

    The wooden box was behind the black bed with the tomatoes in it. Once he arrived, he took the sledge hammer to it and broke the long sides off of the short sides and our day began. The short sides were loaded in the trailer, the long one brought over to the house where they could be cut in thirds with the circular saw, then they also were loaded. The trailer was then relocated closer to the rubble pile and we “Tetris” fit about a dozen cedar posts we had cut from young trees on the farm and stripped of branched to make up the base for the chicken tractor when we realized it could be breached and 9 chicks killed. The base was raised off the ground on large rocks, the cedar posts anchored together, a thick layer of soil on top, then the chicken tractor lifted on top and all spaces of potential access filled with large rocks. This worked for a while, then a strong windstorm toppled it and as the chicken tractor was made primarily of reclaimed wood, it was destroyed. The rocks were removed, the cedar posts stacked under the tree, and the plan to try to remove the hardware cloth. The task overwhelmed me each time I decided to tackle it and the grass started growing up through the mesh. It made mowing that area quite difficult and though it got weed whacked occassionally, it was an unsightly mess.

    We filled the trailer to the top with rotting wood, hardware cloth, and the metal top panels, lashed it down tight and drove it to the “convenience center,” where the dumpsters and dump trailers are placed for us to take our garbage, trash, and recyclables. We managed to get it done before the temperature got unbearable. It eventually reached 89 f today.

    The teen was well paid, fed lunch, and sent home. Daughter texted later and said I had worn the teen out. Wore his grandmom out as well.

    We waited until after dinner, when the thermometer dropped to 85 to go take our walk. Tommorrow is a repeat as far as the weather, but no heavy work is planned. The area where the box was removed and to the left of it still needs cleaning up to plant the three sisters mounds, hoping to get popcorn, some dried beans, gourds and pie pumpkins out of that otherwide unused part of the garden. And the area where the rubble was removed needs to be raked to make sure we didn’t leave any boards with staples, nails, or screws that might puncture a foot or mower tire. It will cool back down in a few days and those tasks can be tackled.

  • Virginia Springtime

    We again have had a series of near early summer type weather, but hang on, it is Virginia in the springtime. Yesterday 78 and warm at night. Today 81 and 39 at night. Thursday 43 and 28 at night. Then we have several days of typical spring weather followed by a couple days of deep freeze with nights in the teens. If you don’t like the weather, stick around for 24 hours, it will flip flop.

    The Forsythia is beginning to bloom, if it freezes, we will lose the pretty yellow blooms but no harm done. The plum is in full white bloom and a freeze will mean no plums this early summer. I may take a sheet out to cover it Thursday and next week when it is again cold and hope to salvage some fruit.

    The pullets have finally figured out the outdoors and going back in by themselves at night. I only had one night of catching all ten and one night of catching one. Yesterday, the cover of the tunnel was refastened. The end needs some work, but it should only take me an hour or so to finish the work and another few minutes to secure some areas that don’t quite reach the soil line, then they will be given access to more space.

    On our daily walk, we saw two woodchucks, aka ground hogs, aka whistle pigs that have burrows on the edge of the trail. Both were out sunning, of course darting back into the burrow as we approached.

    It is the season where a few flowers from the yard can be brought in to adorn the table. Now there are daffodils and forsythia. The bearded iris and daylilies are showing and the autumn joy is showing green. It needs to warm up a bit more before the wildflower, zinnea, marigold, and bachelor button seed can be sown.

  • The Weather is Fickle

    This time of year, it can be 60 one day and snowing the next. We have had three days of beautiful mostly clear weather with daytime temperatures around 60 f. Wonderful for outdoor walks along the river on the Bisset Park trail, across the road at Wildwood Park, or along the Huckleberry, the rails to trails paved path in in town, the county, and over to the next town. But tomorrow it will be in the low 30’s with rain, snow, and freezing rain. Fortunately this is only a one day event with no expected accumulation. Then a warm up occurs with a day in the 50’s then a series of days in the 70’s. It is March in Virginia. We can have late springtime weather and a killing frost. The trees are beginning to show the signs, buds forming causing the distant color to change from dull brown to coppers, red, and hints of green. My plum tree looks close to blooming which worries me as a frost could mean no plums this year.

    Several days ago, after the last rain, the pop door on the coop was freed to operate on the battery timer. So far, the pullets are reluctant to leave the “safety” of the coop. One evening, a Buff Orpington was sitting on the ramp and the door was half closed, it hadn’t operated properly. When I approached, she ducked under the door and went back inside. The next night, she was out on the ramp and when I approached, she dropped down into the run on the hay. Unfortunately, she had to be caught and returned to the coop before the door closed. Last night, the door didn’t close until I went over and closed it. Maybe new batteries are in order, or the track has debris in it. They do seem to know what the shaking yellow cup means now. When I open the coop door while shaking it, all attention is turned in my direction and as soon as the treats are dumped in the dish, several run straight to it, only a foot away from where I stand. Once I step back, the others rush over to get their share.

    This is the beginning of Museum season. It officially opens today with Founder’s Day activities from 1 to 3:30 then a dinner at 5. We won’t make the drive over for the activities, but have reserved two seats at the Bavarian style meal. This means that spring school groups will begin to schedule and days of dressing in my Colonial clothing and teaching elementary and middle school students about fiber growing, processing, spinning, and weaving to make the clothing, coverlets, sacks, and other needs their households would have required.

    Summer camp at the Museum this year will focus on those left at home during the Revolutionary War and I will have a part of one of the days to probably teach spindle spinning while discussing the same topics done with the classes. If Carol can’t come to do the women on the frontier, the topics may be expanded to cover other jobs of the women.

    Yesterday our favorite garden center reopened for the season and the seeds that were needed to round out what we had or had ordered were purchased.

    The hydroponic garden has 6 seedlings, three I can identify, but as I didn’t label the when planted, I need to wait for the other three to get larger to see what is in which cell.

    There is hope that the bitter part of winter is over and spring is pushing it way into the Virginia mountains.

  • It’s Been a While

    Not to anything dire, just not wanting to keep posting the same routine.

    It has been a hot, wet summer and the garden has suffered. Raccoons got every ear of corn and started on the tomatoes as they ripened. Green beans have been very prolific as were the cucumbers. The cucumber vines have now died off and were pulled from their trellis yesterday afternoon and the first planting of green beans also pulled as I had been away for 5 days and most of the ones on the plants were too large and soft to be desirable as we don’t like the “southern” way of cooking them with fat back until they are practically mush. The second planting has just begun to provide.

    We set about on Monday to get the lawn mowed after lunch. I sent DH out to get gas for a fill up, thinking there was enough to start while he was gone, but I backed the riding mower out of the garage and it sputtered to a stop. Instead of sitting idly by, the bed of flowers by the east side of the garage was a weedy mess and the grass was hanging over into it, so much bending, stooping, and sitting on a step stool that sent me into an unplanned hard landing on the grass, and all the grass and lambs quarters were pulled, a new edge dug. He began to mow while I was doing that so the line trimmer was used to go around the house and over to the vegetable garden that had lambs quarters, wild amaranth, and horse nettles as tall as me that the line trimmer couldn’t handle. This is the result of hand weeding all of it and the orchard grass growing in the paths.

    That pile is about 2.5 feet tall, what you see behind it is the same mess that is in the closed off chicken run that I can’t access until the fence is removed. I don’t know if it will compost as I had no means of chopping it up, so it is a stack of 5 to 6 feet long stalks mixed with mats of Creeping Charlie, Bermuda grass, Smart weed, and other unwanted greenery that had taken over the end of the garden not in use this summer. I’m thinking about trying to move the inner fence to cross just above the part of the garden in use and letting the chicken have at the rest. It will leave them unprotected from the hawks but that is a chance I am willing to take.

    Yesterday a very early venture over to the garden to harvest beans and tomatoes and finish weeding a small section I never got to Monday, found all of the Tithonia and Sunflowers full of sleeping wild bees.

    Yesterday afternoon, after a trip to the nursery, flats of spinach and Romaine lettuce seedling, a row of Little Gems lettuce seed, and three rows of turnips were planted in one of the empty raised beds. The one the first green beans were in will be reserved to plant garlic when it cools more.

    The reason for my 5 day absence was to travel to Black Mountain, North Carolina for my favorite Art and Fiber Retreat. We meet at the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly. It was rejuvenating and a bit heartbreaking. The group is a wonderful mix of ladies that spin, knit, crochet, weave, and do other paper arts. The heartbreak was to see the damage caused by Helene and know that though they have worked hard to recover, only 40% occupancy is available still as they lost a couple of buildings and had damage to many others. The motel style lodge where we stay and where meals are prepared and served by the staff was the first to be repaired and reopened. Helene took out every power pole leading up to the buildings except for 3. It took them 4 weeks to get any power back. The creek that became a river down the west side, that damaged the old gym so badly it had to be torn down is now a gully 16 feet deep and washed through the woods taking out trees and rhododendron to now look like a dry river bed.

    This is an area above the retreat that is up the mountain. All of their hiking trails in that area are impassable still and a lower priority than restoring the rest of the buildings.

    Part of the repair is placing 14 foot arches where roads were to divert the flow, instead of smaller culverts that had always handled the creeks in the past. Also where two landslides sent mud into buildings, have new reinforced walls at the top and the slides seeded as they are now open meadows.

    In addition to visiting with friends I see seldom, I finished a skein of yarn I had been spindle spinning, took a needle felting class and made two little pumpkins, and started wheel spinning 8 ounces of Coopworth and Alpaca roving purchased from a friend that raises the animals and dyes the wool before the mill processes it into roving. Also some knitting on a pair of fingerless mitts was done with the wool I purchased in Alaska in May, spun on spindles and plyed on spindles.

    Now back home, my food consumption is focusing on smaller portions and healthier choices as we always have a snack table with too much sugar and fat on it, and though I did take a walk up as far as I could go up hill above the retreat one day, I consumed too much not so healthy snacks in addition to the three meals a day they provide. Now home, I have resumed my daily walks with DH of 2-2.5 miles. It has been so humid though, it feels like you are breathing fog.

    We have a cooler week of so ahead, it should help make the walks more enjoyable. We see early Autumn in the air as the early turning leaves are coloring and some are already falling. Until I have something new, stay safe.

  • Chores and Crafts

    Yes, I am a senior in the upper half of my 70’s, but I can still work when needed. We have a couple of days of thaw and temperatures in the mid 40’s and we have about 25 fireplace logs unsplit from dead Ash trees that our south neighbor took down when he was fencing along the south border between our farms. A lot of smaller branches were cut by him and stacked for us, but the logs were in 10 foot lengths. Our young hay guy, a great and helpful man, came to remove an oak blow down that was in one of the fields he hays. While he was here, he cut the Ash into fireplace lengths and stacked them where they had been laid. We have some brutal cold expected Monday through Wednesday or Thursday of next week with single digit daytime temperatures. To be prepared to assist the heat pump and hopefully just be a supplemental heat (as long as the power stays on), I tackled the stack today and managed to get about 6 of the logs split, hauled down to the house and stacked on the front porch. The rolling wood rack was filled with older wood from the wood stack and also moved to the porch. This was an additional workout as there is still snow and ice from the past couple weeks of nastiness which makes doing anything a bit of a hazard.

    This pile is about twice as large as when the photo was taken and the rolling wood rack is on the other side of the doorway.

    All of this effort was followed with a coop clean out. They spent about 10 days without ever even peeking outside. Every day has required carrying a 3 gallon bucket of water over to them and bringing the frozen one back to thaw. The coop is a few feet higher than the garage with a several foot dip between so it was trekking up the hill without slipping on the ice. As that is the east side of the house and the house blocks the hill in the afternoon, the ice lingered.

    The driveway is finally thawing and more ground and gravel is seen every day. With today’s slightly warmer temperatures and sunshine, the ice is becoming mud. Tomorrow evening we have rain then a couple inches of snow, but hopefully warm enough to not turn to ice.

    The cold icy weather has allowed a lot of crafting time. The December “Fibre Snack” scarf has been the primary knitting project and is now about 2/3 finished. The base color is running out, it is wheel spun and there is more unspun that I will have to tackle it soon to finish the scarf. It is going to be generous, warm, and colorful when finished as I have used the daily December snack in the order they were spun.

    It has gotten too large to take to hubby’s appointments, so it is an at home only project. Spindles and fiber travel to entertain me while I wait. And it often entertains many others in the waiting rooms as well.

    Tomorrow before the rain begins, more wood will be split and covered to keep it dry in case it is needed next week.

    Stay safe, stay warm. Take care.

  • Winter Hit Hard

    Fortunately it isn’t going to last long and has been dry except for snow flurries, often with the sun shining.

    We had a wedding and reception here last weekend with about 45 guests. The bride, groom, their sons, and her parents stayed here for 4 nights a few extra guests for dinner the night before and lunch the day after and it was cold, but not as cold as it became a couple of days later. We haven’t gotten up to freezing for several days and a few mid teens nights. It is supposed to temper back to more normal for this time of year weather for the next week.

    I have mentioned that the deer population seems to be extremely high this year and they must have figured out that they can’t get shot if they are on our farm.

    As I was preparing dinner a day or two ago, I looked down the hill to our lower hay field and there were at least 20 deer grazing down there. The hunting around here doesn’t seem to be reducing the impact. With chronic wasting disease and hemorrhagic disease in deer both spreading across Virginia, it will reduce the load, but will make it more dangerous to take the meat through hunting. So far there is no evidence that the prions from chronic wasting disease has or can be spread to humans, but if it does, it would produce the same type of brain deterioration that Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease does. Wisdom would require that deer taken for meat should be checked and if infected, not eaten.

    The monthly Jenkins challenge is two fold. Those of us who wanted to participate, sent 4 ounces of fiber to one of two “Elves” who spent a couple of days together preparing small 5 gram packages labelled with the first 25 days of December and returned them to the participants. Alternatively you could just spin for 15 minutes per day. I elected to participate in the Fibre Sample group and have enjoyed the surprise and pleasure of opening the little package each morning, spinning, plying, and skeining it into a mini skein. At the end of the month, I will need to find a plan for the 25 mini skeins of yarn from different breeds, different breeds, and a variety of colors.

    Along with the daily spinning, a couple of Christmas gifts are being made.

    This afternoon, Christmas cards were written and prepared to be mailed tomorrow. The house is finally decorated except for the tree which I still need to set up and decorate. Most of the gifts have been purchased or made, but a couple still are undecided. The ones that had to be mailed have been. Christmas is coming up too fast.

  • Another Month gone by

    This month brought cataract surgery for hubby. He can now see better than he ever has in his life and no longer needs glasses, except low strength readers in some instances.

    It took me to the podiatrist regarding my summer long foot discomfort and those two visits were unproductive as I had already done the elevated resting, ice, better supportive shoes, good arch supporting insoles, so she really didn’t know what to say except my 76+ year old feet have arthritis, some bony overgrowth that comes with age, bone spurs on my heels, and to keep doing what I have been doing.

    Helene was kinder to us than so many millions of people. We got a lot of rain, wind gusts to 60 MPH that took down trees in the region, but none on our farm that we have seen so far. The ones on our road and the road leading down the mountain have at least been cut back, though many trunks are still leaning over the roadway. Our state maintained gravel road has a 12 to 14″ deep rut that runs from the neighbor above us beyond the one across and down from us. It ran gullies down our driveway that slopes down about 200′ elevation from the top to the house, but I have already regraded with the tractor and blade and improved it, not repaired it. We did lose power for 56 hours. The refrigerator freezer was not opened and the meat in the bottom bin with blue ice blocks remained frozen. Some of the bagged veggies and fruit higher in the freezer thawed and was thrown out. The bags of tomatoes were beginning to thaw so the skins were slipped off, the tomatoes put in a large pot and today I have finally tackled the job of canning 9 pints of them. A bucket of apples was picked, sliced and cooked down for applesauce. The large pot to the right of the tomatoes ended up 6.5 pints of applesauce. The half will be served with tonight’s homecooked meal, the first since Thursday night. The two quart bags of chili paste used as an enchilada sauce base were cooked down and put in half pint jars that will go in the freezer as I don’t have a pressure canner.

    The power was out for 56 hours. With no power, we have no water as we are on a well. We do have a gravity fed yard hydrant down near the bottom field, fed from a water catchment system near the house that contains the rain water from the roof. Though that water is not potable, 5 gallon buckets were filled and hauled up to the house to use for handwashing and toilet flushing. Our daughter, 25 minutes away didn’t lose power and she fed us Saturday night, though now since they are are town water, they have a boil notice. Today, we had an appointment in the county seat and the parking lot of the little shopping center had about 25 power company trucks, all from Oklahoma. We made sure to go by and thank the guys standing in the lot, probably awaiting their next assignment as some left while we were there. They seemed surprised that we were thanking them and not yelling at them. That has to be a tough job, working 16 hour shifts in the rain only to be yelled at by people who didn’t get their power back first.

    As I said, we were lucky. Several communities in our county and adjacent counties along the New River were flooded and roads blocked off. There are a number of semi permanent campgrounds and people lost their campers, some vehicles, and houses close to the river. It crested as much as 17 feet above flood plain. The news said it is the second highest since records have been kept, the highest was in the 1940’s. The creek at the bottom of our mountain flooded, but didn’t breach the bridge. When will people realize that climate change is fueling these more intense storms. I have friends in western North Carolina that are totally cut off due to washed out bridges and roads. Long lines at grocery stores, taking only cash, and no fuel for generators. We all need to be thankful if we are safe and send good thoughts, goods, and money to help those who have lost it all.

    On to a new month tomorrow. Hopefully no more severe storms aimed at the areas already suffering.

  • Another Week Passes Us By

    The week has been a teaser of autumn to come. The week plus in the sturdier shoes and insoles has allowed me to walk a couple miles about half the days this past week. Two of the days wearing long pants and a light sweater. I’m sure we will have more hot weather before it settles into autumn, but I’ll take last week and the upcoming week for now.

    We managed to get to the Farmer’s Market yesterday in spite of it being a home football game day. Every parking lot near campus is closed to public parking and reserved for paid football day parking and tailgating. That makes the market a challenge.

    The week has been used making 9 batches of cold process soap. If you have never made soap, cold process soap is still hot, the lye solution is hot, the oils and plant butters have to be melted, so it seems a misnomer, but the processes are different. Nine batches makes more than 80 bars of soap, and no we don’t personally use that many a year. A big boxful goes to Son 1 for gift giving and their use. He gets me large containers of some of the oils in exchange. A batch goes to a friend in town, a batch for SIL, and some for our annual use.

    The 4 boards cover 4 molds just prior to being covered with the towels to saponify overnight. Beyond them are 5 batches already cut and curing from yesterday and earlier in the week. They have to cure for about a month before they are hard enough to not just dissolve with use. The longer they cure, the harder they become. The next couple of weeks will be used making the labels for most of them.

    Last night when the kitchen scraps were taken out to the chickens, I realized that the day lilies leaves have all been eaten to the ground by the deer. The day lily bed is right up against the east wall of the garage. This morning, I saw these two and another doe just a few feet behind the house devouring the Tithonia that used to be where they are.

    Periodically, the doe would pounce toward the fawn who would then do zoomies around the back yard before returning to the doe.

    Also out there was a large groundhog. It was a frequent visitor during the spring, but has been absent since the hay was mowed in July. The hay is tall again and it was back.

    The tomatoes are reaching the last few. This basket has been bagged and put in the freezer, the Ghost peppers are infusing in olive oil with garlic and sage. And the cayennes and remaining Ghost peppers strung to dry. Some day soon, all the bags will be hauled out of the freezer, the tomatoes peeled, and a big pot of sauce made. Probably left plain so that it can become chili with peppers added, pasta sauce with onion, garlic, and herbs, or cooked down for pizza sauce.

    This week, the tomato vines will be pulled down and chopped for compost, that bed weeded and covered with hay for winter. That leaves the sweet potatoes that went in so late there may be none to harvest before the first frost. It is about time to chop the corn and sunflower stalks down and call it a year unless I can get some winter greens in a bed that can be covered for the early frosts.

    And this week, I can get back to some crafting. Some knitting and some spinning have been done. A lot of reading, trying to finish The Rose Code before it is due back to the library. It is an interesting historical fiction, I recommend it.

    Have a good week.

  • All Good Things Must End

    Yesterday was the beginning of meteorological autumn, not the autumn marked on your wall calendar if you still have one. And right on cue, we started seeing the trees beginning to show their color, or at least we noticed it. The first to turn are the Tulip Poplars and the Locust trees. This Poplar acts like a Ginkgo and turns yellow all at once in a matter of a couple of days.

    And loses it’s leaves first.

    After being away for two weekends and hobbling around for 7 weeks, I finally got out into the garden this week. The heat and time of year ended the cucumbers and bush beans, but the tomatoes and peppers are producing wildly.

    Every day a basket like this is brought in and frozen. Once they are all ripe, I will make a pot of sauce. Two pounds of peppers were cut and put in the fermenting crock to make into hot sauce in about 5 or 6 weeks.

    Yesterday afternoon, the popcorn was harvested, shucked in place and brought in. It is now in two crisscrossed layers in two large baskets to finish drying for about 2 or 3 weeks, then we will have more than a year’s worth of popcorn. It is fun to put a cob in a brown paper lunch bag and pop it in the microwave for a couple of minutes. Then you have a bag full of air popped corn.

    Fall is also the time to make soap. Soap for gift giving, soap for a friend who loves my soap, soap for us for a year. There will be 8 or 9 batches made over the next week and cut to cure in a guest room. The first two batches were made yesterday, cut today, and set to cure. I am awaiting an order of essential oils and shea butter to continue the process, but the first two batches are unscented.

    Today it much milder outdoors and as my foot still isn’t allowing exercise walks and since I did have my physical training session this morning, I tackled some garden chores. The cucumber and bean plants were pulled, given to the chickens, the bed that grew the peas in the spring and has been idle was weeded and the weeds put in a large tub to die off before being added back to that bed as compost. That bed also got a wheel barrow of chicken coop cleanings a month or so ago and it was spread out over the surface. There are now two and a half idle beds. One will likely have some fall veggies, the others covered in straw unless I can get a cover crop in quickly. The corn stalks won’t be cut until the Tithonia and sunflowers planted in a row up the middle of them finish blooming. There are so many hot peppers already canned that the rest will be allowed to turn red. The Ghost peppers will be infused in olive oil with sage and garlic, the jalapenos and cayennes will be crushed once dried for crushed red pepper. There are two tiny ornamental Thai pepper that are full of red peppers but they are very hard to harvest, though hot if you can get some.

    The chicken tunnel has been mostly a success. There are a few plants that grow into the tunnel they won’t eat, but do keep mostly scratched down, and the creeping charlie and smartweed that are reachable through the wire, they ignore so another day will have to be spent clearing the blueberry bed. The raspberry and blackberry half barrels were mostly a failure, though I see some volunteers outside the barrels. With all the wineberries and wild blackberries that are on the property, I should just not bother with the barrels. There are also several you pick berry farms around here.

    Not much spinning was done last month. Reading, a little travel to visit Son 1 and then to a retreat where I did spin both on my wheel and spindles, knit, and took both a wet felting class to make a small bowl and a project bag sewing class occupied my time with visiting friends I see only rarely. If I ever finish the knitting project, I will finish spinning the fiber I have worked on for two months slowly. I got a lovely braid to spin as a door prize at the retreat and a bag of felting wool from the gift exchange game.

    So you see from this, I am alive and well, not posting much here, on Facebook, or Instagram, but still here. Take care, enjoy the fall colors if you live where they occur, and get ready for another winter.