outdoors

Slow and Steady

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131016 Moonrise

I arrived late to Rowe on Wednesday to see that the shed was being worked on.  Most of the paint was removed and there was a window in the west wall.  The opening has always been there – there was a screen in that spot in need of repair.  A hinged shutter, a door of sorts, covered the hole year round and has been there as long as I can remember.  It’s always interesting to walk into an interior space where there is light that has never been there before, you feel like you’ve been missing something.

It was still light out as I unloaded my car but fairly clouded over.  I started cooking a little supper on the stove and walked into the living room where the light coming into the east windows was this amazing color, and bright for sunset.  I looked out, grabbed a camera and this is what I saw.  The light reflecting off of the clouds from the west with the moon rising in the east.  It was stunning and there for less that 10 minutes.  Of course Mr. Photobomb was in every shot.

I woke up out of a half sleep Thursday morning to Chester growling – softly (he’s kind of chicken).  I got up to see Mike , my brother-in-law and Jim, his work partner working on the shed wall.  The dogs went out to happily greet them and we took a walk to the back forty.  When I returned Mike and I talked about the condition of the clapboards and where we were going to go with this.  He also told me Jim had found the window at the dump.  Jim works at the dump part-time which gives him access to the good stuff.  He’s always thinking ahead to where he might recycle something.  A bonus for both of us.  I left them to their work and assume that it will look wonderful in the next week or so.  They do really good work.

131017 Paint

Exterior painting is not something Bill and I are interested in doing.  We have done it at the house in Enfield but the house in Rowe is just too tall.  Mike has been painting for years.  When he paints you know he will do whatever he can to get the paint to stay on for years to come.  He repairs, replaces and caulks where needed then primes and paints.  He is meticulous.

We haven’t been able to do more than a side a year because of the size of the job and the expense.  It will be another two years probably before the house it completely painted so for the time being I just photograph the good sides.  They finished the front a few weeks ago and I have to say the house is looking quite beautiful. I am hoping to build a new storm door before winter.  The strap hinges and thumb latch were made at Williamsburg Blacksmith quite some time ago and that aluminum door really needs to go.

131013 Front of House

Of course when you look at the photographs there are more things to add to the to do list.  Antennas and dishes have to be removed, lightning rods reattached.  Every once in a while I look at a photograph like this and in my head just pretend it’s all done.

Days of Grace

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131013 Wood (4)We are into what many people refer to as “days of grace”.  This, for us, is after the gardens are done, the canning is finished (for the most part) and we are seriously thinking about winter.  It’s the time between the leaves falling and the snow flying.

With that in mind we brought wood in over the weekend with the help of Amanda and Yusuf.  We had to move most of what was left from last year out of the way because it is very dry and bring in what we have been cutting and splitting over the past few months.  This is when the tractor really comes in handy.  The bucket can be loaded and driven right into the shed.  The wood is unloaded and stacked at waist height, it cuts down on the bending over which can really save your back.

131013 Wood (3)

The project lasted through the weekend, we figure we put in about 4 and a half cord with a little over a cord left from last season.  I can’t tell you what a relief it is when that project is over.  It’s one of those never-ending things.  The seasons are dictated by cutting, splitting and stacking wood.  Trees will come down this winter with the brush stacked for burning.  The burn season starts in January and runs until May.  We usually cut and split throughout the year when the weather permits – it’s not something you want to do in summer heat.  With any luck it spends the summer drying out a bit.  In the fall it comes in.  It will continue to dry until it gets burned.

Other projects on our list are re-glazing windows.  Tightening things up in the house.  We are considering a small wood stove for the kitchen in the ell but we will have to see what the next few weeks bring.  A little more insulation in the attic over the kitchen would probably go a long way toward keeping it warmer.

131013 Wood (2)The one other vital thing to do is put the electric blankets on the beds upstairs.  There has never been any heat up there (except the bathroom) so if we don’t want to sleep under 10 pounds of quilts electricity must be used.  There is nothing better than getting into a nice warm bed in the dead of winter.

This time of year always has an anticipatory air to it.  There’s pressure put on whatever time you have.  Once the temperature plummets, the snow is on the ground and the wind is blowing the mood changes.  We are doing things indoors.  We spend more down time.  This is when my time is spent on handwork.  There are so many crafts that I do in cooler weather because they are just too hot to do any other time of the year.  I will be finishing up a couple of hooking projects and I will be weaving.  Yes . . . lots and lots of weaving.

 

 

Planning that Garden Years in Advance

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131013 Garlic Planting

 

Sunday morning I was able to till the soil on the south side of the garage and plant my garlic. This was pretty much my entire crop from this year. It’s a hard necked variety called Music that performed very well. When all was said and done I planted 70 bulbs. Next year we should have enough to eat for the winter and spring plus the same amount to plant the following year.

Gardening is such a long term process. You always have to think years down the line and plan, plan, plan. “The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray” is every farmer’s adage so we plan for the unexpected as well.

My garden has begun to expand with more permanent plantings. Raspberries and asparagus are the newest members. Blueberries, rhubarb and pears have been there awhile. I still have another year before I will be eating the asparagus but once the patch comes in it will be amazing. My raspberries have had two years of not doing so well and I am beginning to think I should move them to another spot, maybe in the back forty. They will have just as much sun but the soil won’t dry out as much. It’s worth a shot, they certainly aren’t happy where they are.

Growing your own food is both wonderful and anxiety producing. You worry about your plants. You wonder if your timing is right for planting, for harvesting.  Every year is different. I used to think that once I had 10 years under my belt I would be able to relax but that is not the case. Too warm, too cold, too wet, too dry, sheesh. I keep records from year to year – garden layout, planting time, harvest time. I review it during the winter and try to plan but you never know. So all we can do is hope for the best.

Weekly Photo Challenge – Good Morning

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100918 Birds (5)

Little Gifts

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131007 Mill Pond

 

The leaves this year are spectacular.  The past few years have been less so, a muddled brown mess, a disappointment to the people who travel hours to gawk at them.

Yesterday was a rainy, cold day.  I looked out the window often, the color in the back forty at its peak.  The grasses have all turned a golden brown with the rust colored ferns mixed in.  The maples are wearing their scarlet jackets now, more brilliant with each passing day.  The birches a bright yellow.  Another week and it will all be gone for the most part, especially if the rain keeps up.

I have seen the leaves change every year for my entire life.  Many years ago I was working as a photographer in North Carolina during foliage season and I flew home for a weekend so I wouldn’t miss it.

I have to tell you that I rarely photograph the foliage as it changes.  I observe it, soak it in but I’ve found that photographs I’ve taken just blend in year after year.  As I left the house in Rowe last evening I drove right past this.  The pond is right in the center of town (of course the center of town is just a few buildings).  There is a gazebo just to the left out of the photograph.  The light was going fast, there was a heavy mist and the fog was pretty dense.  I notice the tree right away and thought wow, how beautiful.  I kept on driving but the tree was stuck in my head.  As I continued down the road I first thought “I’ll take it during the week, next time up.”  I then realized this was it – the only moment this would look like this.  If it was still in my head a mile down the road I had to turn back.  I did.

As I walked around the green I thought about the house that was once in this spot, abutting the road.  I thought about learning to fish in that pond and doing it often from the shore with other friends all having ridden our bikes with our poles.  I remembered Helen and Ray, creators and guardians of the the Rowe Historical Society spending their retirement years in the house on the pond.

Walking back to my car, my feet completely soaked, I wondered why I never really noticed that maple before.  I think it’s just a little gift you get every once in a while.  That tree flagged me down, told me to look at the exquisite beauty all around me, stop taking it for granted.

Little gifts, you just have to slow down long enough to accept them.  The bonus is I got back into my car, scrolled through the images I had just taken and thought “Yes, that’s exactly what I wanted.”  A rare feeling indeed.

Fall is Here

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130915 (1)See that weed infested mess in the foreground – it’s gone!  We pulled up the stakes and mowed it with the lawnmower.  Yes, that is how weedy it was.  As a matter of fact it looks like the rest of the lawn.  I’m sad that garden season is over but I’m not sad to see that garden gone.   Bill started building a fire pit in the middle of it for the upcoming Harvest party.  I figure if nothing else the center of the garden will be weed free next year.

Chester Swims

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Chester swimming –

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln25i3bAA8A

Percy’s Point is one of our favorite spots right now.  It’s quiet, peaceful and the perfect spot for Chester to getting his swimming in.  He’s come a long way since his first swim in June.  I was afraid my water dog would be a panic swimmer forever.  Not so, he LOVES it.

Dragonflies in My Garden

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dragonfly

From Vikusik on Flickr

Sunday was a sunny, beautiful day.  I sat in a chair at the edge of my garden husking my popcorn when a huge dragonfly landed on the front of my t-shirt.  It’s rather startling when an insect of this size lands on you – especially when you hear it coming in for a landing.  It was stunningly beautiful.  It sat in a spot that allowed me close inspection.  At first I was wondering why it had little red legs under it’s chin then realized (due to the crunching) that it was eating another insect recently caught.

The property has a lot of wetlands and I look forward to seeing dragonflies every year.  There is usually a yearly swarm which is a sight to behold.  We have flying ants that take off from nests in the stone patio and it seems like the dragonflies are ready and waiting for this event.  A few years ago it looked like a dragonfly cyclone over the patio as hundreds of dragonflies swarmed over the emerging ants for dinner.  They must have been tasty.

Last spring the New York Times did an article with a few videos about dragonflies, thought I would share – Nature’s Drone, Pretty and Deadly.

I’m just glad I’m not a flying ant or mosquito.

End of Year Garden Assessment

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130915 (1)I took this photograph yesterday morning overlooking the best garden of weeds I have ever had.  I have had a vegetable garden for a good ten years now and this has to be the worst one yet. Fortunately the rest of the view is pretty nice.

For some reason in my mind it is the first week of October (I even tore off the September page of the calendar on Saturday and didn’t realize it until Sunday).  It may be the weeds or my confused state but I decided to dismantle most of the garden this past weekend.  I had Cherry Belle radishes the size of beets – over 5 feet tall and gone to seed (which was interesting since I had never done that).  I had a total of two beets the size of radishes.

130915 (2)I really began by pulling up all of my popcorn.  It had been raining the past week a good deal and I thought I should probably get it out of the ground.  I laid all of the stalks in my garden wagon thinking I would keep the ears on the stalks to dry further.  This was Tom Thumb popcorn, an heirloom variety developed in New Hampshire.  It was bred to do well in a short season.  It only grows 3 feet tall and is quite cute.  It did well.  Sunday I decided to pull all of the ears off of the stocks, peel back the husks and let them dry further.  They are supposed to dry to a 14% moisture content.  I’m not sure how you’re supposed to figure that out but most people just try popping a few kernels every so often during the drying period to see when they pop.  Works for me.  Did I mention that none of these ears is more than 4 inches long?  Most are in the 3 inch category – hence the name Tom Thumb. 

130915 (3)I then pulled what carrots I had.  I had planted two varieties – the old standby Danvers and Atomic Red.  Another rather disappointing harvest.  This is all I had – a total of 6 pints when it was all said and done.  When I saw them scrubbed up in the bowl I was glad I had planted both, they look great together.  I canned them with a brown sugar glaze.  I had heard a review from my sister that this was the only way to go.  Well, when you only have 6 pints you have to make a choice,  I went with sweet.

The rest of the potatoes were dug on Saturday and left out in the sun until yesterday afternoon.  Not a particularly good year for them either.  We had a lot of rain and the earth really compacted around them.  The potatoes are delicious, the yield was just not there (that and the fact that we ate fully half of them as new potatoes).

130915 (4)Then there is the matter of tomatoes.  The vines in the garden have been brown without leaves for a couple of weeks.  The yellow cherries just kept coming – we are at a loss to understand why.  This tomato is extremely prolific.  The bonus is it takes them a long, long time to rot.  Another interesting thing is they drop off of the vine as soon as they begin to turn yellow so rather than pick them off of the plant you end up picking them off of the ground.  I was pulling the stakes up that were holding the plants and these tomatoes were everywhere.  Not being one to let good food go to waste I picked them up and canned them with 4 red tomatoes that were the only ones left.  I ended the tomato season with an additional 6 pints of beautiful golden sauce.

I planted a total of seven eggplants – they produced 4 fruit.  They were delicious but I’m not sure if it was this particular year’s weather or my growing season is just too short.  The plants are blossoming like crazy right now but I know there won’t be enough time before we have a frost.  I feel a little bad pulling them up but I’m not going to weed around them.

The asparagus looks great. The bed will be cleaned out, mulched and  some edging will be put in this fall.  The rutabagas are just okay this year, they will stay in the ground until a couple of frosts hit, then I will pull them.  They are smaller than usual.  The rest of the garden will be tilled in the next week or so (because I can’t look at the crabgrass any more).

We have scoped out a new area for the garden.  This will involve outside help for excavation and some fill but it holds the promise of being a better location long term.  We have some mature maples along the south end of where the garden presently is and that is the one tree we are loathe to cut down.  I figure the way the crabgrass grew in this year it would take about a month to turn the present garden into lawn since most of the lawn is crabgrass anyway.

 

 

 

 

Little Gifts

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130913 Grapes (2)I ran out of the grape jelly I made two years ago from grapes grown on a friend’s property in Rowe.  I was lamenting the fact that she wasn’t around to ask and I didn’t want to wander around on her land without permission.  I had just come to the sad conclusion that I would have another year without it.  Yesterday, at the shop, I walked over to get some information on a car and looked up at the fence that is in between our lot and the next.  Grapes – loads of them.  I brought out a box this morning and picked away.  They are small, they are wild and they are tart.  With the amount of sugar that is used in jelly making this is the perfect fruit.

130913 Grapes (1)This is a classic case of finding food in unexpected places.  This is on a fence in a parking lot.  There is maybe a 4 foot wide span of earth in between the lots and that is where they grow.  They have been growing there for years judging by the size of the vines.  With all my whining about not having any grapes I’m surprised that Bill didn’t say anything about these.  After I said I was going to pick them today he told me that he had a customer that used to come in and pick them every year.  I guess I’m not really that surprised.  He, like me, never thinks we are going to see wild food growing anywhere down here.  It always seems so  . . . urban.  Too much asphalt and concrete.  Then again we have an old Italian body shop owner 3 doors down from us that cut a 3′ x 6′ patch out of the parking lot and grows tomatoes and peppers there every year – right up against the building.  They are spectacular but I always looked at that as the Italian gift, they seem to be able to grow tomatoes anywhere.

I think the lesson here is to open your eyes and expect the unexpected.  Then be brave enough to pick what you see and use it.

Now I’m just dreaming about those PBJs.