Winter Solstice

Today was the winter solstice.  That means that we have passed the longest night of the year (at fifteen hours) now!  From here on out we get more and more daylight each day. That’s a happy thought!

Wood-splitting update

Well, after going back to it, I figured out the log that had me despairing was a particularly difficult one.  As long as I stick with logs under 10″ diameter, I can get them split reasonably quickly, so I’m not quite as much of a wimp as I thought I was.  However, even though it [...]

Jumping Back In

Well, obviously trying to catch up with everything that’s happened since I last posted is hopeless, so I guess I will just skip all that and pick up where we are.  The perfectionist in me hates to do that, but on the other hand it seems better than just giving up, which is the other [...]

Cherry harvest

Pitting the cherries:

Cherry muffins:

Yummy!

Bumblebees

So “they” have been saying in the news lately that the bees seem to be dying off, and nobody has yet figured out why. I’m afraid we’ve been contributing to this die-off in a small way since we’ve moved here – but only towards the invasive ones. Bumblebees have been invading our house, [...]

Headlines of the day

Stocking Up For Winter:

Based on the size of the trailer J. used to haul it, it looks like about half a cord of wood.
Discovery of the Day:

These are a few bushes in our backyard with berries that have been getting ripe over the last few weeks.  The kids have been begging to know if they [...]

Getting started on gardening

One of the nice things about moving from Florida to Wyoming in June is that we got to finish out the gardening season down South before we moved, and yet we still have a whole season of gardening ahead of us here!
We will have to start out pretty small this year, though, since we still [...]

Wildfire!

There is an enormous wildfire near our house (as in thirteen miles away).  It is apparently right along the route that J. always took to work.  Last night it smelled as though there was a bonfire in our back yard, and we could see the smoke in the sky and occasionally little bits of falling [...]

Attack of the Killer Mosquitoes

Down here in Southern Florida there are mosquito-fighting aircraft that are hired to regularly fly over cities and spray out pesticides to reduce the number of mosquitoes roaming around. It seems to work pretty well; in the two years we’ve been here I haven’t seen as many mosquitoes down here as I used to [...]

Last Harvest From the Garden