Springing Into Action

Maple Buds

The winter that wasn't is over, it seems. With temperatures in the seventies for the last few days, we are itching to plant the garden. I threw in some peas and salad greens, but much more than that in March might be a bit premature. Instead, we must content ourselves with yard work.

 

Raise the Roof

Pinch Me, I'm Dreaming

Sprouts!

Sprouts are a delicious, nutritious, and fun way to pretend you are gardening when it is winter. I get a yummy sprout seed mix from the food co-op in Albany. Radish sprouts are my favorite because they are spicy. You can order seeds from seed companies or get them from your favorite hippie food store. 

My Fancy Sprouting Device

First, soak your seeds overnight. I do this in a wide-mouth jar covered with butter muslin, which is like fine-gauge cheesecloth. I fasten the cloth on top with the jar band. In the morning, drain and rinse the seeds. I am an incurable kitchen gadget collector, so I have this special seed-sprouting setup. It has slotted trays for the sprouts and a solid one on the bottom to catch the runoff from rinsing. You can get one too, or you can just flip over that cheesecloth-covered jar onto a plate or something. Just make sure the sprouts are getting good air circulation.

The Home Stretch

First, let me apologize to the skiers and schoolchildren of the Northeast who have been praying for snow for the last couple months. It's been a pretty lackluster winter as far as all that goes, and I'm sorry. It seems I've out-hoped all you snow lovers out there with my fervent and selfish desire to get the roof on the barn before this winter's first big blizzard. You can have all the snowdays and fresh powder you want as soon as that roof is on there, I swear. Fortunately, we are almost there.

Fin Lifts the Second-to-Last Purlin into Place

Brian Nails It

Last One!

New Year's Day = New Barn Day

With the help of two Brians and Mother Nature, we got a lot done over the holiday weekend. On New Year's Eve, Fin, Architect Brian, and Neighbor Brian got the purlins in on the southeast and southwest sections of the roof. We spent that evening developing a strategy to get the middle section purlins up. We also made a delicious dinner and made some noise at midnight, of course.

The middle section presented a few challenges: the beams are longer, they had to be lifted from the ground, not the deck of the hayloft, and attaching them would require two people to be 24 feet off the ground with nothing but concrete beneath them. Pretty scary stuff! We devised a system to pull up the beams with ropes. Happily, it worked.

Happy Holidays!

It's the second-to-last day of December and we still have no snow on the ground. I harvested this salad from beneath the row cover a couple weeks ago - delicious, nutritious, and a surprisingly successful experiment in winter gardening.

Christmas on the farm was lovely once again; good company, good food, and presents more than made up for the lack of snow. I want to leave the tree up all winter.

The goats enjoyed a delicious Christmas dinner of spent grains from neighbor Justin's last brewing.

Barn Progress

Last week it snowed again. It was quite dramatic there for a few hours, but ultimately unremarkable. We are incredibly grateful for this, and for the generous help of friends. Brian and Kasia came up from NYC last weekend to help us get the floor joists up. Fin and I had spent a frustrating day the previous weekend trying to do this without help, to no avail, but with a few extra hands it went smoothly.

Hoist Those Joists!