Time Speeds Up

Each time that I finish a blog posting, I sort through the photos I’ve used and clean up my files ready for the next time. I always hope to become better organized. Whenever I think I have a new photo that might be interesting for the next posting, I try to file it in some sort of chronological order, jot down some notes, and then tell myself that I should be able to post a little more often, with shorter musings.

And yet somehow here I am in November, looking at my “Next Blog” photo directory, wondering where on earth the last 8 months went, and how to start making sense of dozens of folders, each containing endless numbers of photos.  It feels like just yesterday we were eager for spring to arrive, greeting the returning migrating birds, waiting to start gathering downed trees to turn into firewood, and planning a summer full of new projects.  Suddenly it is now fall, the birds have left again, and we preparing once again for  the upcoming winter.

I am left wondering whether there is any point in posting now about the April snow, the returning wood ducks, or the first spring flowers.  However, late this summer I began to slowly read through our blog from the very beginning. (It is rather lengthy and I am still reading it!)  I began to realize that if I continued writing and posting to this blog, it would be a great visual and verbal reminder for me in the years to come, as it certainly shows us how the years came to pass.  Even as I look at photos and notes from this spring and summer, I realize that many changes took place again this year. 

With that observation in mind, I will then start this post from back in April, when we were sure that spring was well on it's way, and we would soon be in the woods, pulling out downed trees, cutting and splitting them, and stacking them to dry for the winter's stash of firewood. (Note to anyone reading this  - keep this first photo in mind, as you will see changes to this landscape, later in the post!) 

Of course, as always, spring had not truly arrived. A good snowfall kept us indoors and away from outdoor projects for a little while longer.

I always feel bad for the robins when it snows.  They are almost the first birds to arrive each spring, and they always look so cold when the spring weather conditions change.  At least they are able to find some sumac seeds to eat, despite the cold snow!

Sometimes a bit more winter-like weather in the spring is a good thing.  It gave Rob time to do some more indoor work, and he decided to finish installing the rest of the pantry pull-out shelving units! We had been using some Ikea shelving from our old store under our stairs as our pantry. Rob had installed one test pull-out unit the year before, so it was great to have a chance to properly finish this area off.  Afterwards, while I filled the new units, Rob moved the Ikea shelving into his workshop where it would be put to a whole new use.

I like that we can access these  shelves from either side, and I'm still able to clean around them fairly easily.  They will of course eventually have some doors on them, and then I won't be able to simply glance over to see what items we are running out of, or just reach in and grab what I need.  But doors do keep out the light (and dust somewhat!) so I know I'll be glad when they get installed.

Every spring we keep a watch on the river activity , and we were happy to see male and female Wood Ducks and Mergansers were slowly arriving, and pairing up.  

The pretty woodland Hepatica flowers began to push through the forest floor. They are one of the first spring flowers, and it's always a treat to find them.

By early May, we were looking out for our annual sighting of a Snapping Turtle, and we were ecstatic to spot one near our creek area one day. What a beauty !

It was an amazing month for blossoms in the wild plum trees, and a great time to spot the early butterflies. 

In fact, we had more trees in blossom than I ever remember, including this one.  I have made a note to check this tree again next year (and hopefully will identify it, as I meant to check for fruit later in the summer to help with identification and I forgot!) 

The Northern Flickers arrived and checked out their usual nesting spot.  Their tree has been hit by lightning and may not be standing much longer, but for this year at least they were able to use it to raise their young again.  

Last year I vowed that we would begin gathering downed trees in May before black fly and mosquito season, and before the poison ivy sprang up.  We didn't quite manage to miss the black flies, but they weren't as bad as the previous year when we had a late start collecting firewood.  In all I think we worked about six days in various areas that we had scouted out, pulling out what we could find.  

There were a couple of areas that had some mighty fine looking trees lying on the forest floor, but we couldn't get in with the tractor to try and pull them out.  We tried to cut them up and hand carry them but even then they were too heavy to pick up.  There were a couple of trees that were dead but still standing or partially standing, and we took them down if we thought there was any chance of them coming down on our road or pathways (or on us as we walk!).  There were a few that we marked with tape, to take down later this fall.  As the birds were setting up nesting sites, we didn't want to take the chance that we would disturb any nests or eggs.  I think two of those dead trees fell down later this summer by themselves, so we will gather those next spring.

We had lots of rainy days in between, when we could rest up and catch up on some other tasks.  Although we were both eager to get "firewood" off of our list, we try to pace ourselves somewhat now! 

Slowly our pile grew.  By mid-May we figured we might have enough to start cutting and splitting and stacking.

Preparing for doing firewood is no small feat. I wear sunscreen as we are working in full sun for most of the day.  Bug spray to deter ticks and black flies.  An old white long sleeve shirt to deter black flies, protect my arms from the sun, and my wrists from wood splinters. Work gloves.  Long pants, tucked into socks to deter ticks. Safety shoes to protect my toes.  Hearing protectors for my ears, safety glasses for my eyes, and a hat to protect me a bit more from the sun.  If it gets too sunny and hot, I tuck some fabric up under the back of my hat to stop the sun from burning the back of my neck.   It is high fashion at it's finest!

We both actually quite enjoy the whole process.  It is wonderful spending time in the woods together, and the area where we split and store our wood is full of memories of camping, and planning for the log cabin many, many years ago.  We pause often to drink some water, snack on cookies, or simply enjoy the fresh air, and lovely spring weather.  As our wood pile grows, we are both also pretty pleased to know that come winter we will have lots of firewood to keep us warm.

In no time we find some kind of rhythm as we begin cutting up the logs, moving them over to the stacking area with help from the tractor, and then setting up the splitter and splitting and stacking our wood in long piles. 

As always in late May, some extra warm days arrived with highs of 28 degrees C, and that slowed us down a bit.  Then storms and tornado warnings arrived, so we stayed close to home.  Those storms brought down more trees, including one not far from our house, so we had to stop and haul it out.  With no way to get the tractor in, we had to resort to using a very long power cord to the house, and Rob's electric winch to pull the logs out.  

That was slow, slow work.

But it was worth it, as we got quite a bit of firewood from that tree!

By May 25th we were done.  Last year we were still working on firewood in June, so we were ahead of ourselves.  For which I was glad, as the poison ivy was up, and the mosquitoes were out !  The weathered wood on the left of the picture below is oak, purchased more than a few years ago, and we still use a bit of oak each winter when the nights get very cold as it will burn nicely overnight.  For the rest of the time though we will use the piles on the right.  This is all mostly poplar, spruce, and pine.  It burns more quickly, but it heats the house beautifully, and is well worth our hard labour!  It also dries more quickly, so by winter it will be ready to use.

All of our firewood efforts once again led us to thinking about building a permanent firewood shed closer to home.  Each fall we build a temporary shelter out of scaffolding and tarps and move our firewood from the top of our property down closer to the house.  We fill the shelter as much as we can, and sometimes refill it a bit more later in the season.  We've always wanted a more permanent and larger structure, so decided it was time to think seriously about it.  We tossed around a few ideas for placement, but all of our ideas meant clearing a few trees away from the house and workshop, and we are always reluctant to do that, especially during bird nesting season.  

At the same time one of our long term projects had finally risen to the top of the list.  It was time to add the "wing insulation" panels around the outside of the house, cover them with gravel, and bring the rest of the lot up to the proper grade.  As well, our septic field needed to be properly filled with more sand, and top soil.  We decided to work on those plans, which would also include the firewood shed placement, and wait to begin the physical task of bringing in gravel and sand and top soil until late summer when the young birds would have all left their nests.  I was delaying any thoughts of having a garden as I assumed my raised bed garden would have to go once we started bringing gravel trucks in, but it looked like I could safely plant a small garden to get us through most of the summer.

I just hoped it would stay intact for one more season, as the sides were slowly blowing out!  The chipmunk used this opportunity to dig a few more tunnels in between the side slats, but otherwise my garden began to come to life.

By mid June the phoebes first brood were almost ready to leave their nest at our front door.

The snowshoe hares had become quite comfortable with our presence and were hanging around the house a lot, munching away on whatever fresh greens were springing up everywhere.

Fields of corn were beginning to grow in the farmer's fields.

We turned some attention to the log cabin, as the washing machine there was not working properly, and I began getting the cabin clean and ready in case of summer guests.  

It felt like we had an entire summer stretching ahead of us that would enable us to catch up on some smaller jobs.  Every year for the past dozen years or so, our summers have been filled with rather major projects, and this year we felt like we could set a slower pace, and enjoy the summer a bit more.  One of the jobs we needed to do though, was to apply caulking all around the house and workshop, so Rob started on that task.  There is probably a reason we didn't do this job earlier as it looks super uncomfortable to be lying down and applying caulk!

We have had a lot of bird strikes on our windows over the years, and it's an awful thing to witness. In certain light, our windows just look like an extension of the forest to the birds so they try to fly through.  While some birds seem to survive hitting the window and fly away, some do not.  After much research,  Rob devised a prototype of plastic pipe and parachute cord and installed it to see if it would work.  We had no further bird strikes on this window, so we just need to make a few adjustments, and we can build more for our other windows. Hopefully that will take care of the problem.

In the pic below you can see a close up of how the reflections appear to be changed by the parachute cord, and that may be key to what prevents the birds from hitting the window.  You can also see the bits of broken window pane from where a grouse once hit the window. That is still on our "to fix" list.

From the inside, we almost don't notice the hanging cord, which is great.  I worried that it would obscure our views or make our views out of our windows quite awful, but in no time we got used to the thin lines of cord, and soon became fairly unaware of it. Rob is trying to make it so we can easily pull the cords up if we need to clean the windows.  We have been tending to not clean the windows during the summer in the somewhat futile hope that the dirty windows would prevent more bird strikes.  I still don't know if that is a solid theory or not. 

I finally had some time to start adding a few whimsical pieces to our woodland  and lot outside, and planted some native woodland sunflowers in the hope that they will spread over time. I picked up this black rabbit at an auction for pennies. It's one scary looking rabbit I think, and still makes me jump when I see it! The snowshoe hares however don't seem to be the least bit bothered by it, which is good.

Despite my worries about drought and forest fires in March, we had some record rainfalls during the summer, so didn't worry quite as much about nearby forest fires. But the rainfall amounts resulted in the river levels staying much higher than normal for most of the summer.  After a brief dry spell however, the levels did drop somewhat, and for a short time I could venture out safely into one of my favourite spots.  I love this spit of rocks, and usually spend quite a bit of time there, photographing frogs, snails, fish, and other aquatic life. But my time there was cut short by heavy rains and rising river levels again not long after I took the photo below.

My garden was producing lots of herbs, lettuce, kale, and cherry tomatoes.  Unfortunately the chipmunk once again was raiding my garden this summer and enjoying the volume of tomatoes.  It was in no hurry to scamper off when I caught it in the act either!

At other times, I would find evidence of it's work on the ground outside of the garden.

After a brief discussion about "sharing", we seemed to come to some kind of agreement. I learned to pick the tomatoes just before they were entirely ripe, and put them on a shelf in the kitchen to ripen, and that way we both seemed to get our "fair" share.

The excessive rains seemed to slow the growth of my tomatillos down this year, and although I still managed to pick quite a few, and now have about a dozen tomatillo salsas prepared and stored away in the freezer, I didn't harvest nearly as many tomatillos as previous years.  I did manage to pick and dry lots of oregano, some thyme, and some rosemary, but my basil struggled, and I only ended up with a small container of dried basil.  I was at least able to pick some fresh basil from my plants during the summer for some of our dinner meals.

I began to feel like the busy little squirrels, as I started to stash away some of my winter food stores!

When some second hand side tables, and a coffee table of sorts came up at a great price at our local second hand furniture store, we made a quick decision to buy them.  For years now we've used a Rubbermaid bin and make shift table top as our coffee table, and over time we simply became used to it!  So while not perfect, these will do.  (And are certainly better than the plastic bin, although it was kind of handy as a storage unit!) Rob thought the metal bases were solid enough, and he would like to make new tops for them eventually. That job however, is not currently high on our to-do list.

As August arrived, so did our final plans for the lot grading.  We booked our gravel, sand and top soil deliveries for the end of the month, along with a bulldozer to do some of the heavy work that couldn't be done with the tractor.  We began to clear a small area next to the workshop for our future firewood shed, had a long debate about a stand of sickly cedar trees that were in the middle of the driveway, and began to measure levels around the house.

We never like to take healthy trees down, but we had to remove a few.  Anything that we can use for firewood will be cut and split in the spring.  The few cedars that we had to take down will be sawn and used for building the wood shed, or other structures.

Trimming all of the branches from the trees that we took down, took some time and effort. Luckily Rob was able to move all of the branches and brush with the tractor. We decided start a new brush pile in a different location.  Over time it will settle and slowly compost.  I offered it to a wildlife sanctuary in the hopes they could use it as they were looking for some, but we no longer have a working truck and trailer and had no way to get it to them. It will provide shelter and food for some wild creatures here though, I know.

Before the gravel arrived, we needed to apply a fresh coat of sealer to the base of the workshop and house. I think Rob is always grateful for good knee pads!

I tried to remember to get some "before" pictures of the area before we began.  I know I will miss my scruffy little garden but eventually we will have more permanent raised beds in place.  I loved the wild area of tangled raspberry plants, and pretty wildflowers, but we will culture more.  I probably won't miss the sumac that pushes up too close to the septic field and needs to be removed every year, and can only hope those don't return! They are really hard to pull out.

We drew some lines around the lot, trying to mark out where things should go.  Rob began to gather up more large stones to build up around the edge of the lot, and started to measure levels and slopes.  We wanted there to be a gentle grade sloping away from the house for proper drainage, but not sloping too much.  We had to consider the winter months, and snow falls.   Think about where the snow slides off of the roof.  And consider where we plow, and how to keep everything level enough so Rob can plow easily.  We always need easy access to clear our solar panels of snow and ice throughout the winter as well.  It's always hard to think about snow in August though!

As Rob worked he was careful to leave my garden in place for as long as possible.

Our gravel and dirt were due to arrive at the end of August, but the rainy weather had delayed many of the quarry's other commitments  so we found ourselves with an additional two weeks before it would arrive.  I kept coaxing my tomatillos to grow, grow, grow !!  But eventually I had to call it quits, to give Rob time to pull the unit apart, and remove all the boards.  We stashed the soil from it away in an area where we can retrieve it and re-use it again next year. I salvaged what I could of my herbs and made notes of what I need to plant again next year.

On September 10th I woke up early to find a bulldozer in my yard.  They wasted no time in moving all of the rocks and roots out of the way and prepared the area ready for the trucks to arrive.

In an effort to keep delivery trucks off of the septic field we put up some caution tape temporarily. But they had no problem backing up into the exact area and dumping loads where we needed them.

The bulldozer had no issues with maneuvering around either.

Somehow though the area where Rob is standing in the pic below was supposed to be all sand and topsoil, but quite a lot of gravel ended up getting placed there instead.  So that took some work for us to adjust later on!

It all worked out in the end though.  As the bulldozer was unable to do the areas around the back and sides of the house, we already knew we had a lot of gravel to move ourselves. They left us another load of gravel to work with.  It wasn't enough so we had to order more, as well as more sand, and more topsoil. Rob says I don't seem overly enthusiastic about gravel, sand and top soil.  I may have to agree, although I can't argue that this job had to be done.  And of course both of us were pleased to finally have this job underway, as well as the end results.

We all expected the bulldozing and gravel delivery to run over two days, but they were able to complete it all in one rather long day. Which was great, as the following day was our wedding anniversary, so Rob and I were more than pleased to take a day off and run out for a nice taco lunch in Pembroke (thank you Nomada Tacos!) and enjoyed a nice pasta carbonara for dinner.  (Thank you Rob!).  And then we somewhat reluctantly got back to work.

We had to begin by hauling a lot of gravel and spreading it all around the far front of the house, and in between the house and workshop and at the back of the workshop.  We ran out of "wing insulation" but we were very glad that we had bought most of it in preparation for this job years ago. The price has more than doubled, and we thankfully only needed a few more sheets.  

Rob had to spend some time finessing the area behind the workshop so he could get the tractor back there and spread more gravel.  That meant shoring up the gravel with more stones as he went along.  The tractor isn't always the perfect tool for that job but he did his best.

Seeing the tractor go by one of the living room windows made me jump!

But the tractor sure helped to get the gravel all in place behind the house.  I had visions of having to use a wheelbarrow to haul it all there!

Ah yes, those two boards in the pic above did not get stained last year !! Oops.

When we moved here some 12+ years ago, we brought with us some interlock stones that we had bought on sale, and hadn't used.  We piled them on a pallet in a field, hoping to put them to good use here, and there they sat, gathering moss, with small trees growing up around them.

We pulled them out, cleaned them off, and brought them down to the house.

Once we knew how much we had to work with, we were able to design a nice little walkway to the front door.  

I worked on filling the gaps with a special interlock sand, which for some reason I totally enjoyed.  It was slow work, but there is nothing nicer than working outside, listening to the river, and seeing some progress in the job.  The kneeling pad made the whole task much more comfortable as well.

Rob got setup to fix the area where the dirt met the gravel. We had to pull a wide swath of gravel back out as we didn't want that much gravel in front of the house.  Then we took the extra sand and top soil we ordered and filled that area in.  

It took a while to get everything in place, and we planned on having some kind of a divider to separate the two.  Our initial idea was to use some red brick as a divider.  We had stacks of bricks that the previous owner of our property had left behind over 35 years ago!  But unfortunately it turned out that bricks become quite fragile over time and they were beginning to crumble.  So we had to go source some concrete stones to use instead. 

As always, we began to feel the passage of time, and it was becoming clear that the seasons were changing.  The geese were beginning to gather and fly south.

We kept working away when weather permitted, and suddenly it started to look like it was coming together.

We had some top soil leftover, so we decided to spread some on the log cabin septic field, as it was badly in need of soil as well and we hoped it wasn't too late in the season to add some grass seed.  Now some of you know that neither of us are fans of grass or lawns, but it is a good idea to plant it on septic fields, in an attempt to at least stop deep rooted plants from taking over!  So we acquiesced on that decision.

We studied up on how to seed grass, and were struggling to get the soil nicely smoothed, level and even before we planted the seed. Which is where this little gizmo came in. Rather than purchasing yet another one-time use gadget, Rob made a soil leveling rake using part of an old plastic pallet, and our magnetic nail sweeper. When we discovered it needed a bit more weight we placed one of those crumbling red bricks on it.  So one brick came in useful after all!

On a nice warm sunny day I simply dragged this gizmo back and forth, diagonally and somewhat randomly until the area was nicely smoothed.  It also seemed to gather up any loose stones that were in the soil, into one common area which made it easier for me to pick up and toss aside too!

When we read that we would need a roller to press the grass seed into the soil we tried to think of a way to make our own gizmo for that too.  But fortunately when we mentioned rolling the soil, our friend Joe piped up that he had an old roller from a previous tenant, sitting out in his back yard that he wanted to get rid of!  As we wanted to visit Joe, it gave us a good excuse to drive down to see him, bring some lunch, have a nice visit, and then maneuver the roller into the back seat of the car before heading back home.

On the way back  we could see that we were driving into a rather ominous looking storm, but the clouds in the sky were breath taking ! Although I've seen different spellings online, apparently they were Undulatus asperitas clouds, and they were so amazing that they made the evening news as well!

So, with our "new" roller we were able to finish seeding and rolling our "lawn" and then we just waited for the promised rain to help it all grow.  Unfortunately, every day we were promised rain, but after two or three weeks of rather dry weather, we began to worry that it was too late in the season, and that we would have to plant grass seed again in the spring.  At the end of October though we had some heavy rainfalls, and some tufts of grass appeared!  I guess we will see how it all looks next year.

We also needed some rain to settle the gravel in place, which it did.  We still need to work on some areas as we didn't get all the levels right, and some areas close to the house need to be tamped down more, but we are hoping things will settle over the winter and we can get back at it in the spring.

Warm weather in October gave us some incentive to get at more of our pre-winter tasks, so we turned our attention next to bringing down our firewood.  In the past we have been able to use our old truck, but it is no longer running, so we dug out a second hand trailer we bought years ago, and hooked it up to the tractor.  We were surprised to find that it actually made loading the wood easier and in no time we had moved quite a bit!

We are still trying to figure out the exact placement of a permanent firewood shed, and are out of time to build one this year. So once again this year we have built a temporary one out of scaffolding.  This year we made it a bit bigger than previous years, and will use this winter to see what we think of this location.  Then next year we can start working on a permanent structure.  Apparently it will be another timber frame, but a small one of course.  At the same time I'm hoping we can make a very small tool shed as well.

Moving firewood is a job we both enjoy.  I think perhaps it helps that the more we fill, the more wood we have close by to help keep us warm through the winter!  This year though it was 22 degrees and unusually warm when we moved the firewood.  So we took our time and enjoyed the process.  Usually it's quite chilly with promises of a first snow so we hustle a little more !

We still have a bit more to move down.  We will put this last load on the workshop porch, closer to the house.  

Already we have quite a stack of logs ready to become firewood next spring.  We've had a few storms this fall that knocked some trees down, so we were able to gather them up and move them to where we can cut them up next year.

We have drained the pipes at the cabin and closed it up for the winter.  The tractor and snowblower are serviced and ready, snow tires are on the car, and we are almost ready to settle in for the winter.  We've been gifted some rather stunning weather this fall, so were able to work in quite pleasant conditions.  We haven't always been that lucky in previous years!  But, we have had a tiny sprinkle of snow one morning, some rather heavy frosts at night, and the day light hours are getting shorter and shorter. We all realize that winter is surely due to arrive soon. There are still a few geese flying overhead, as they navigate their flights south.  We look forward to their return next year.

And with that, I think I shall start sorting through my photos, make a few notes, and most likely not write another blog posting until 2025.  I had lots more to write about, but I think this post is long enough already.  I always hope I will manage a Christmas posting, and I may, but in case I don't,  I would like to wish everyone Peace, Love and Joy, and all the best in the upcoming year.