Our Land

We own 26 acres of land in the town where my parents live. It is a lovely piece of land mostly wooded, with a stream and a great view. We cleared a lot many years ago with the hopes of building a house and living there. Life changes, jobs change and life moves forward. We will probably never live there, at least not full time, but we love the land.

We get our firewood off the land and have gotten logs for lumber or to sell. It has paid for itself years ago. Did I mention we love this piece of land?

We were running low on our fireword, so Brian took advantage of the more moderate weather and took the truck over to get a load. My dad cuts all the logs and splits it all for us. He usually delivers it too, but when he had his heart attack in January, that sort of put a slow down on the operation. He is doing very well now, but we realize that we will have share the work from now on.

The wood pile. You can't see most of it,

but it goes from the truck to well past the bulldozer.

Our wonderful view
Look at that snow. Even after a week of above

freezing temps and rain there is still a lot of snow.

We only live about 30 miles from my parents, but they have so much snow and we have bare ground in most places. Around here elevation makes a huge difference in a marginal storm as to whether you get snow or snow/freezing rain.

Full Fall Day

A week ago Tuesday (10/30), Brain took the day off. He was getting ready to head out on another trip and wanted to get some things done around the house. It was a lovely day and we played and worked all day.

The kids had a great time raking and playing in the leaves. The amount of leaves had grown quite a bit as most of them are now off the trees.


Brian, Bessie and I finished closing up the pool. This is not a difficult job, but it does take a while as we draw the pool down below the skimmer, so we can prepare the pipes for winter. I was glad that the weather was nice to do this job.


Bessie also worked on a couple of other chores. She cleaned out her bunnies hutch. She has three dwarf rabbits and she takes very good care of them. All the animal manure goes on the garden.

Here is Bessie cutting down a Trumpet Creeper for me. This plant has lovely flowers, but totally takes over and is quite invasion. This was a tougher job and took quite a bit of hacking and hauling. Thanks, Bess!

Brian also brought in some wood and made sure the woodstove was all set. I am glad he did this job as we have needed it this week.

Dan very serious about rocks and sticks

At some point during the day, Gabe had the great idea of using the snow sleds to slide on the leaves. I was amazed at how well this worked. He and Dan had a great time. They slid and tumbled and rolled down the hill over and over.

It was a very full day; with a lot accomplished and some fun thrown in for good measure.

Fall Chores

Brian spent the afternoon doing miscellaneous chores around the house. Falls always brings extra jobs that need to be done.

He cleaned the woodstove this weekend and brought over some wood.

Today the weather was quite cool, but sunny, so he worked outside. He cleaned up put down all the storm windows. This can be a tough job as the old triple-tracks don't slide very well anymore. He left a few open in case the weather warms up again. We'll close them all soon as the chance of warmer days becomes slim.

Vacuuming out between the windowsAnother job that is quite overdue is closing up the pool. The last several months have been so busy and our weekends very full. Brian started vacuuming out the pool and we will finish the job in the next few days.

Bri and Gabe working on the pool

Falls brings full days as we prepare our house and yard for winter's long, cold visit.

We Love Having Bri Home

Brian took a day off today. He has been gone quite a bit over the last several weeks and he wanted a day at home. He was able to check off a few more things on his project list. The kids and I took a day off from schoolwork to enjoy dad being home.

Bri rotated the tired on the van and changed the oil on the car. Our poor old van is getting close to the end of its time. Brian manages to keep it going. He is hoping for one more year before we need to get a new one.

Next came his vegetable garden. He raked off all the old corn stalks and tilled it once through. He will get a couple loads of manure and then till it again before planting.

The silly chickens love it when Bri does this job. As he goes, they follow him around picking at bugs and worms and scratching in the fresh turned soil.

Dan sure likes pushing around the little wheelbarrow.

After dinner, we treated everyone by going out for ice cream...Yum! Bessie had a new flavor called Espresso Therapy. It is coffee ice cream with chocolate covered almonds. I have got to try that next time. She is so adventurous and loves trying new flavors.

We love to explore new roads that we haven't traveled and tonight we found a new one. It meandered through a series of small ponds. It was very lovely and there were quite a few people fishing. Brian took note of that for future fishing opportunities.

As we were driving, Gabe yelled, "look at that duck" and then Bessie said, "it's a swan". Bri pulled over and I was able to get a picture. It was a Mute Swan and we do see these occasionally around here but not often. It was so lovely watching it dip it's head under for some small morsel and then coming back up.