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?

An Avalanche of Blessings

Greenfield Mountain Farm

Afton, Virginia

Haven’t posted in the past 3 days.  We've been getting adjusted to the return, putting things away,  checking around the farm,

 and the rig, making lists longer than my arm of things to do, to do, to do.  But I'm glad we came back at a holiday so the change from life on the road to life at chore headquarters wasn't quite so drastic.

We spent nearly all of Tuesday taking things out of Winona and into the house and putting them away and getting things back to “normal”.  Temperatures are dropping here so we have Winona connected to the house and wood fires inside.   Here's Winona's current Campsite.  Not too bad! J  

We spent Wednesday just checking up on things.  It looks like one the maple trees in the yard has died and we aren’t sure at all how.  I'll take some pictures in to the agricultural extension agent next week.  But it will have to be taken down and turned into firewood.  Another thing to be added to the list.  I went  running down the familiar roads and went to Yoga which I have missed and must incorporate more regularly into life on the road.

Carrie came in the late afternoon.  As expected on a holiday, it took her about an hour longer than usual to get to the foothills of the Blue Ridge from Baltimore.  She was tired but we chatted and compared stories.  She of her new job and we of our new life.  It is an interesting juxtaposition that she is starting in on her career just as we are ending ours.  

And today, we had a fine Thanksgiving together.   Cooking in the morning, eating in the afternoon and play at night.

Here's the chief chef working on Candied Yams.  Everything from scratch of course.  Only the cranberries were from a can.

Not sure why he's wearing his Merry Christmas apron unless like most of the rest of the country he's getting a step up on the next holiday before this one is even finished.  I was appalled to find that the towns and cities we went through starting in early November were already putting up their December holiday decorations and some of the stores had those things up before Halloween was even over.  Can't figure out what the rush is.  Isn't life going by fast enough?

This year after checking out the cost of free range turkeys we decided as a group that we aren't THAT fond of turkey and would rather have a pork roast already in the freezer and so we did.  But we did still have the other traditions at least for our family......plain dressing, oyster dressing for yours truly, broccoli, candied yams.  So here is our farm kitchen table all decked out and we are ready to dig in.

And here we are about an hour later.   Notice who is STILL eating!  J 

 Where DOES he put it all?

After doing all the kitchen clean up, not sure why the cook didn't take a picture of the clean up crew, the father daughter duo set out to make the pie.  Now usually we have pumpkin like tradition says.  But this year since we were already bucking tradition and hadn't grown any pumpkins, we decided that since we'd driven two sets of our own hand grown and picked and then frozen cherries all over the southeast without making one pie, we would have cherry pie with the pumpkin's whipped cream as our Thanksgiving dessert.  We are VERY thankful for those cherry trees and their generosity.   And here is the fruits of their labors with freshly whipped cream no vacuum cans for this great pie!

Mmmm was that pie good.   We ate it and finished out the evening playing the games you see stacked beside Carrie.  Too busy playing to get pics of that.  Can't remember who won what but we sure had a good time.  

Stoked the fires and went off to bed giving thanks for a great day and this great year in which we have bought Winona, discovered RV-Dreams, went to the rally and as a result jumped off the cliff and retired early, went out on the shake down cruise, met wonderful people, reconnected with great RV friends and are back to get things squared away for life on the road.  We are grateful for it all as well as for our health, our happiness, our daughter's new career, her lovely house in PIkesville, her cute new kitties and so many other things that it is nearly an avalanche of Blessings.   We know your life is too!

Happy Thanksgiving from us to all of you!

Leaving Pocahontas for Charlottesville

We got what may be our earliest start ever and were out of the campground just after 9:00.   A MIRACLE!  J

It was foggy when we woke up and we set about having breakfast and getting packed up to leave.  Not much to do since we didn’t take the bikes or the kayaks off the car or the car off the dolly or the dolly off the RV.  But we did get some things out that had to be put away, David checked fluids, I brought in the slides and unleveled and we were off.  I got so busy I forgot to get a picture of Site 75 which was a paved pull through between the two campground roads.  A fine overnight spot but not some where I’d want to stay for a week or so.  I’m sure the campground has other much nice spots but this was an easy in and easy out even if it wasn’t so easy last night in the dark.  J

Uneventful drive back on roads we are familiar with.  We pulled in around noon and set out on the task of opening up the house and emptying Winona of the stuff we’ll need to use while we are off the road.   A sad task that I’ll admit I didn’t do with enough cheer.

Then it was off to the grocery store to get the fixings for Thanksgiving.  WOW are there a lot of people on the roads in town on a Monday.  Was it really like this before we left?  Why aren’t all these folks at work at 2:00 in the afternoon???  J  

Nothing else of interest to report.  Somehow tonight I’m more tired than on any night I can remember recently.  Not looking forward to the tasks at hand but the sooner we get started the sooner they’ll be finished. 

I imagine we’ll get the unpacking completed  tomorrow and perhaps even get a start on the list.  Think I’ll type it up to see how long it actually is and try to rustle up some enthusiasm for checking things off.  J

Our daughter Carrie is coming for Thanksgiving and will be in town Wednesday night so that’s definitely something to look forward to.  We are lucky enough to have her with us for the whole week-end.   

We all have lots of things to be thankful for this year.  She began her career life in a job she likes.  We ended our career lives and went on to a life we like better.  Short break here, we hope, and then back to the wonderful wandering life.

Thoughts are things.  Let’s all make them good ones!!