Another foot and a half of snow fell. Luckily the band of sleet and freezing rain south of us stayed south of us, a huge relief, because though it was again light, fluffy snow and so easy to shovel, it was co-old. By the time it stopped snowing and it was good to go out …
Category Archives: homestead
Wood and Apples
In the middle of October we had a warm spell, hovering around 70F for a week. Still, firewood was on my mind. Our friends Kath and Paul joined us in renting a log splitter and doing the work. First we worked at our place, splitting all those old rounds that had been cut last year …
Cold
Yesterday night it went down to 9 F (-12.7 C) and tonight they predict 5 F (-15 C), -1 F with windchill. That’s cold. The two inches of snow that remain creak and crunch under your boots. Speaking of which, I shelled out for a good set of boots: MuckBoots, with steel toes. I read …
A Tiny House
 Glue gun where have you been all my life?! Amie and I have been dreaming up a Tiny House. She would like a house of her own (she just skips the room of her own) and I am always looking for ways to populate the ole homestead in more comfortable ways. We often have lots …
The Day’s Gifts
This afternoon, taking advantage of the warmer weather and the abeyance of snow/rain, I spent a good three hours splitting, moving and stacking close to 1/4 cord of firewood. While I was at it I conversed with the chickens, whose coop is next to the woodpile and the chopping block (eek). Two friends happened by …
Adding to the Elements
The Life! It’s difficult to keep the whole in mind. Thinking in terms of elements helps. I wrote about elements here and here. In the latter post I listed the elements in place at the homestead, and here I’d like to add (underlined) the few that have been added since then, that are coming up in the …
The Goat Question
For a while now we’ve been considering adding milking goats to our menagerie, but it seems like such a step up from bees and chickens. Â Still, we got some encouragement recently. My friend from a neighboring town, Kath of This One Good Life, would love goats too, and promised to be a goat buddy if …
Of Axes and Goats and Sumac
The purple loosestrife and the goldenrod are blooming (*), and the sumac is on fire (**). Life is good. I’m researching axes. I am sorely lacking in axe skills, which I think are the perfect skills to have: good for fitness through meaningful physical work, good for the mind as an exercise in mindfulness and …
A Refuge not a Model
I often talk about making our own place into a model. At this year’s Earth Day, for instance, we’re doing Open Houses all over town, and ours is one of them. We’ll show the PV and solar hot water system (which they’re putting in as I write this), the compost, veg and perennial garden, bees, …
DATA! First Solar Hot Water Data
Is this neat or what? We have a SECUSOL system, manufactured by Wagner. The MassCEC sprang for the monitoring system. They get valuable data (which they use to determine rebates, etc.) and we get to look in. The chart above is today’s. It was grey throughout. The top of the water tank (green line at the top), …