Cabin Crafted

Category: farm

  • How to spend a snow day.

    It started hours later than predicted, but the snow is quickly covering the ground and roads and the “Winterstorm Warning” is still saying at least 8″ maybe changing to sleet later today, with the heaviest bands yet to come.

    The woodstove is burning and will continue throughout the day and tonight if I can drag myself down to the basement to stoke it in the middle of the night.

    Though the house isn’t any cooler than usual, with the wind blowing outside, it seems colder and I am ensconced in my chair, wrapped in the wool shawl that I spun the yarn for a couple years ago for the Shave ’em 2 Save ’em event, then knit into the shawl, and draped in my Breed Blanket that I spun last year on my Jenkins Turkish spindles and knit for the year long challenge. A cup of hot tea, my spindles and wool, and I am set.

    The chili and stew will be saved for rewarming if the power goes out and homemade pizza was on the menu for lunch while there is power to cook it.

    An after lunch quick trip to dump compost and give the hens thawed water and scratch grains in their coop and gather eggs before they freeze, allowed me to see that the cover is now about 3″ and still falling fast, from an easterly direction so drifting into the coop through a drop window that doesn’t close fully.

    The wild birds are flocking to the feeders, Nuthatches, Titmice, Chickadees, Wrens, Finches, a couple of woodpeckers, and a pair of Eastern Bluebirds that should be much farther south by now. I took a short video, but can’t get it to load.

    So far we are warm, hope to stay that way. It is so quiet as it gets when snow mutes the outdoor sounds.

  • Almost a week. . .

    Since I posted the Olio post. It has been a cold one, but we have gotten in our walk each day. We got caught in a sprinkling rain one day that turned into real rain and snow showers after we got back to the car.

    The weather prognosticators are threatening us with a real winter storm starting tonight. The predictions have been all over the place from 8″ to 16″ of snow, maybe some ice, then more snow. We took heed, I brought in several loads of firewood for the wood stove and the fireplace. Our Sunday grocery run was moved up to Friday, a Farmer’s market run this morning with veggies, meats, and sourdough bread purchased, a large pot of chili made last night and stew tonight that can be heated on the wood stove or camp stove if we end up without power, and we will wait and see what it brings. More than about 6 inches and we won’t be going anywhere, our mountain roads aren’t priority for clearing.

    The January spinning challenge has a changing theme every few days, but all encouraging the continuation of the practice. I am working on the batts that hubby gave me for Christmas to make myself a large scarf and simultaneously spinning neutrals for a second blanket that will have some repeat breeds and some I never got to on the first one. I must like these colors.

    The base square is one that was too small for the first blanket and I am doing a log cabin pattern around it. It will be a small lap blanket when finished.

    It is getting dark, the hens are secured with food and water. Regardless of tomorrow’s weather, they will need thawed water once or twice during the day and probably won’t come out of their coop until they can see hay or grass on the ground. The coop will need cleaning again once they do leave the confines of their indoor shelter.

    The fall predictions for this winter were for warmer than average temperatures and wet. Instead it has been colder and white. I have concluded the way to tell the weather is to look outside and see what it is doing.

    I have two paperback books and one ebook, lots of yarn, fiber, spindles, spinning wheels, and knitting needles. There are both a two burner camp stove and an alcohol burner that can be used for heating water or cooking. This won’t be the biggest snow we have had and we have no where to go, so we will just enjoy it. Maybe some Senior Olympics can be had with sled runs.

  • Repeat

    The unusual weather is continuing. We get a few snows each winter, usually just a couple inches, occassionally more and my Facebook memory for today showed snow two years ago today, but not this cold. We had about 7 inches on the ground Monday morning from overnight and early morning accumulation. It was mostly gone by yesterday afternoon.

    When I walked up to get the mail late yesterday afternoon, it was beginning to snow flurry with a little bit of sleet in it, but it was still a few degrees above freezing. When the German Shepherd came in from her last outdoor run last night, she was coated in wet snow and I awoke to this:

    and 15 f with howling wind and a wind chill advisory. The snow finally stopped with only a couple inches on the ground and the wind is intermitent now, but still blowing strong at times. It has gotten to 19 f which is the expected high and a single digit low tonight. Tomorrow it will be sunny and warm back up to normal January temperatures for here and hopefully most of the snow on the roads will melt off. They did pretreat prior to this round, that should help.

    The hens got fresh thawed water and scratch in the coop, the wildbirds a supply of seed, and I don’t want to go back out again except to check to late eggs near dusk. I brought in 6 warm eggs before they could freeze.

    Soup for lunch, soup for dinner tonight, different ones, both homemade. A pot of decaf coffee made, lots of hot tea available, a woodstove and a fireplace if I feel the need. I’m dressed in extra layers and longjohns today, the heatpump doesn’t like it this cold. I have spindles, fiber, yarn, knitting needles, books and no need to go out in this weather.

    I spent the morning cleaning a closet and filling a donation box that will go down tomorrow if the roads clear. I want to make it to the first winter Farmer’s Market tomorrow, but again, only if the roads clear. And I hope it has cleared and dried by late tomorrow night when hubby will have to drive back up the mountain roads in the dark in our old car.

  • A different routine

    It isn’t often that I am solo at home and when it happens, the routine is so very different. I am an early to bed, early to rise soul, dear hubby stays up until the wee hours of morning and sleeps until late morning. There are certain chores I won’t do while he is still sleeping, anything that makes loud noise, like the vacuuming. The laundry room is far enough away that if I can gather the dirty clothes in the dark room, I can start laundry, but bed and bath linens must wait arising. I rarely leave home when he is not here, quite content to be the hermitess on the mountain.

    And meals are quite different also. He is a born Texan, beef and starch, pork and starch are the preferences which I will usually eat so as not to prepare two different meals. I enjoy beans, bean or legume soups, potato soup with cheddar cheese, or one of the Asian inspired creations of late. In cold weather, I can eat soups twice a day and be very content, add a slice of good bread and it is even better. When together, we often go to get a newspaper (delivery is sporadic at best), run errands if there are any, and pick up lunch out, usually eaten in the car.

    Because too many large doggie landmines were discovered by visiting grands under the snow and since much of the snow has melted and another round is due this afternoon and overnight, I went out and cleaned up dozens from the front and side of the house. I also brought in another load of logs as we went through most of the rack on Monday. It is supposed to be cold tonight, cold tomorrow, and frigid tomorrow night, so I want to be prepared if the heat is needed.

    Linens are laundered, vacuuming is done, bathrooms are cleaned, landmines disarmed, and I even made a very quick trip to the big box hardware store to pick up inside of the exterior door mats and a long non-skid runner for the utility room as the old guy is having more and more difficulty on the tile floor where his food and water are placed. The inside the door non-skid mats are to slow the tracking of water and sand onto the hardwood floors.

    When the grands were here playing in the snow, the big old guy was isolated in the utility room so as not to get stepped or fallen on by toddlers and he would park hard up against the door to the garage so coming and going had to be through front or back doors, both entering onto the hardwood. I have a boot park inside the utility room, but you couldn’t get to it.

    The chickens finally came out of their coop late yesterday and this morning, but I’m guessing that they won’t tomorrow again for a day or two.

    I’ll hunker down with my book, spinning, knitting, a cup of coffee or tea and watch it snow again. I think I’ll go pick greens first.

  • Hello Winter, finally

    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.

  • Begin Anew

    The first day of a new year. A positive attitude, or at least an attempt to make each day positive. A new calendar on the refrigerator. Before breakfast was ready, the Christmas decorations were all packed up. The shelves dusted, the floors vacuumed.

    It is both sad and cathartic to remove the decorations after nearly a month of cleaning around them, and giving the shelves and floors a good clean up finally.

    We begin the new year each year we are home, with Huevos Rancheros. Then after breakfast settled, we took a walk. Today is reaching for 70f (21c), cloudy, it rained last night and will again later, but we got a walk under broken clouds. We enjoyed being outdoors without heavy coats, hats, and gloves. Monday the high might reach freezing with very cold nights. Our goal has been to try to get a brisk walk of at least 2.25 miles each day and we have begun the new year with that.

    The coop was nasty, 13 hens in a coop not designed for that many hens fouls quickly. The usual deep litter method doesn’t work with that many birds, so after the walk, it got a good cleaning and deep straw added back in. They are starting anew as well.

    They are so nosey, they have to see what is going on.

    Because of their scratching and the recent rain, the exposed soil just inside the gate and just outside the front of the coop was quite slick, so fresh hay was forked down as well. And since I was out and about with the hay fork, the wet leaves were cleared from the uphill side of the culvert and I realized that the road gravel has the culvert filled about 2/3 full again. I either have to try to shovel it out or put in another work order to VDOT, but the last two I have submitted have been ignored, maybe three’s the charm.

    While I was working outside, the garden was checked. The winter greens bed is thriving. I harvested radishes, spinach, komatsu. There are healthy kohlrabi greens, and kale too. I will cover them, but I need to purchased another sheet of plastic tomorrow to make that happen.

    I have never since I started gardening, havested this late in the season.

    So the new year begins with a clean house, clean coop, a positive attitude, and about 20 pounds less than I began last year.

    Happy New Year to you all.

  • Winter Fresh

    Though the past week hasn’t felt much like winter, the garden is gone with the exception of a couple of spinach plants and a few komatso plants. The komasto in the salad hydroponic and some of the lettuce there have suddenly decided to issue forth with greens. The herbs are thriving. This week the menu has included several harvests from both.

    The night that hubby got a steak and fries, I made another bowl of Asian inspired soup with quinoa for my protein. The chives, oregano, and komatsu adding the greens, red carrot, garlic, fresh ginger, Szechuan pepper corns, and gochunjang in broth to make it soup. There was enough komatsu that some was sauteed as hubby’s green vegetable.

    Post komatsu harvest.

    Tonight, the lettuce and herbs were harvested for a salad. I think as the 6 young lettuces that are just getting a start begin to mature, there will be greens and salads for the winter when other fresh food is scarce. These two units take up little counter space on a part of the counter that I rarely use and having fresh herbs and greens is a bonus.

    As we enjoy the fresh produce, the seed catalogs have started filling the mailbox and they can provide a wish list for the spring garden. I need to get the soil tested this winter and supplement the beds for the spring. The garlic never got planted this past autumn and some of the crops grown last year, won’t be repeated while others will be added. In the meantime, I really need to cook down several 2 gallon sacks of frozen paste tomatoes.

  • Another year is closing

    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.

  • WIND!!

    Sometimes a front brings a breeze, sometimes a wind, last night it was WIND. Wake you from a deep sleep wind. Being awakened by hubby who thought the roof was coming off (it wasn’t, no damage there).

    This morning, it is again calm, the sun is bright, the temperature fell 40 degrees f from yesterday and will remain cold through today and tomorrow, but the damage is evident. Fortunately, nothing signicant. The back deck has a round glass topped table that I had yet to fold and store for winter and it blew off the deck and landed folded on it’s face on the rock patio under construction. Somehow it didn’t break. The huge gas grill which had blown over once before causing some cosmetic damage, blew down the hill a bit and the rusting burners destroyed, the grill plates scattered.

    I haven’t gotten it back upright and up the hill, the wheels are mostly non functional and it is too heavy for me to carry alone especially since several of the frame pieces have rusted through. I removed the gas tank from it. The table is folded and tucked behind the chairs on the deck, but will be moved to the basement utility area before our first snow is expected (not counting tomorrow’s flurries).

    The most damage occurred to Huck’s coop, the chicken tractor that we had placed on a cedar log raft off the ground many years ago. In a prior storm, the lift half of the top had blown off and was leaning against the side. Much of the wood is rotten, the cedar raft caved in and I had removed most of the hardware from it last summer with the idea of either replacing the rotting wood or totally dismantling it, saving the hardware cloth and buring the wood if there is a calm wet day. Last night made the decision for me. It will have to be dismantled now.

    In walking around the house in the cold this morning, that seems to be the only issues. I don’t see any trees down in the edges of the fields, but I haven’t walked the woods to see if any came down there. It definitely was a strong front that blew through. It had begun when we were taking our walk yesterday, but nothing like last night.

    P.S. I remade the Cranberry Orange Shortbread, this time pressed in the 8″ pan and it came out perfectly.

  • Another Sunday on the farm

    This week’s 24 seconds from the front door is gray, gloomy, bare trees. The weather prognosticators are warning of snow flurries and wind tonight and tomorrow morning. I guess it is that time of year. I’ll lay the two fires in case we lose power.

    It has been a fairly productive week getting ready for the Heritage Craft Barn Bazaar on December 4th and finishing this month’s official square for the Breed Blanket Project. A cowl was knit, soaps and salves finished, photographed and put on the website, a square of Jamtland wool from Sweden was combed, spun, and knit into a beautiful, soft, dark chocolate colored square. More of that fiber is being combed for another square and while I am prepping it, I am spinning Zwartbles, a Norwegian wool that is also dark chocolate to become a single square.

    A very Christmasy skein of wool was plied yesterday and wound off this morning. It is BFL, an extremely soft wool, spun to fingering weight and about 267 yards of yarn.

    With the onset of “winter” here this weekend, I will lay low, spin, try to finish a knitted gift, cook a nice hot meal for dinner and perhaps sit by a fire with a cup of tea.