Hooray! and Oh No!

Good and bad: we got the land bush hogged and we killed the neighbor's dog.

We got to the land yesterday and experienced a true Virginia downpour. I thought I was in the shower--I could wring water from my hair, my clothes. We couldn't even see the other end of the property. I made eggs in the rain and they were very watery! Good thing rain is good water.

We went to the County Fair in the evening, and although they had prices posted, it was free. I'm guessing because of the rain, they wanted people to come by any means possible. We met Master Naturalists and the local Beekeepers, which was VERY cool. I am excited to start, hopefully next winter. We saw the few animals and the few vegetables, and had a really fun time. A real high--the boys talked about what they would do next year, and Isaiah asked the beekeeper three good questions. Good for him!

I am 30 1/2 today. I was up many hours in the night, praying and thinking. I don't think it was terribly productive, and I was grumpy in the morning.

We met our nice neighbor Butch, who we asked to bush hog the land. In about four hours, he took out all the large brambles, the 20 foot trees, and everything else. (Note the way the land looks after he's cut a swath compared to the growth he had to wrestle through!)


We can see clearly the contours of the land, which is very exciting, as we never have before. It is fairly hilly, but Phil said no more so than Joel Salatin's land. And wonderful that Butch was able to come today--he had considered either today or Saturday, which wouldn't have been as helpful for us.

When the bush hog man stopped to talk to Phil at the end and get paid (he had popped three hydraulic lines as he worked--bummer), the neighbor's free-running dog crawled under the bush hog for shade. Sadly, none of us realized he was still under there when the bush hog started again. It snapped the dog's back, so he wasn't in pain, but he died within a half hour. What do you say to the neighbor you've just met. "Hi, nice to meet you, sorry it's under such crummy circumstances"? Ugh.

Now we are at the Bush seniors for a little R&R. If we didn't have this, I don't know what we'd do.