Friday at the Farm

Greenfield Mountain Farm

Afton, Virginia

We had a slow and leisurely morning.  I was down first sitting in my little rocking chair reading in front of the bay window watching the birds just after sun up when this fellow flew in and worked over the Paulownia trees in the backyard.

 Carrie came down and joined me and we both enjoyed the quiet reading atmosphere of the living room in the early morning.

After David came down it was time to get some fires stoked to take off the overnight chill.   I must admit that the wood stoves make it toasty and cozy inside. And there is absolutely nothing that will warm you to the bones like a wood stove. But someone has to tend them.  Cut the wood down, haul it up, split it, stack it, carry it to the porch and then bring it in the house, build the fires and tend them.  We’ve gotten it all down to a system, have seldom used the furnace over the years and might not replace it except it’s rather a necessity if you want to sell a house or be gone for any period of time that includes winter. And boy do I!  J

We have two wood stoves, one to heat the original back portion of the house which is now the farmhouse kitchen, pantry, main downstairs bath and an enclosed west porch.  And another in the front portion of the house which is a two over two old virginia farmhouse design. 

SO I emptied the ashes out of the stove in the living room where Carrie and I were.  The ashes, apparently left from the last fire last year were so deep the air intakes were covered. 

And brought in wood from the porch to get fires going in both stoves.

 
 Meanwhile, the chef was at it again.  More pastry .

but this time flaky biscuits.  Eat your heart out Betty Crocker even you couldn't  do that with spelt flour.

 and a BIG farm breakfast

How does he stay so thin?  And his daughter too?  If he keeps this up I’ll be waddling around. And Winona will far exceed a safe weight! 

The cleanup crew again did the dishes, dried, put them away and nobody took any pics of that.   Guess it just isn’t as attractive as Fritatas and home made fluffy biscuits.

Then the chef donned his handyman outfit and went to work repairing the apple picker so that the last of the fall apples could be harvested. 

While that work was going on, Carrie and I started a game of Canasta.  I’d played it a lot as a child but not in years.  So we got out the card game rule book and started out. 

Then the apple picker was ready and they went out to get those apples for yet more pies. J.   We planted a Granny Smith apple tree for Carrie when she was in elementary school as it was her favorite apple and it has been providing apples for years, this one included.  They also picked the Macintosh tree but we got back just a tad too late for that one to be good eating out of hand.  They are beyond prime but sauce sounds good too.  J

Carrie got them out of the tree

And emptied the picker into the bucket.

When the apples were in the bucket they divided them so Carrie could take some home with her for a pie or eating out of hand.  We finished up the card game and then Carrie had to go in order to meet some friends for dinner.  I had no desire for dinner after yesterday and the brunch we’d had around noon so I just had another piece of that great cherry pie.  J

Curling up with a good book.  Now that’s my idea of how to spend a fall evening.  Not sure what’s up for tomorrow but we are laying off “most” of the work until after the week-end so that we can spend time together as a family.  Just another day of blessings.  How lucky are we?