Driving in a Pumpkin

Despite cloudy weather, Phil and I headed down to the lower pasture with Joe and Isaiah. He drove the truck and I drove the tractor. I am not fond of driving the tractor. I don't have an innate appreciation for, nor understanding of, the mechanics of the thing.

But as I headed down the slope, I was amazed by the orangeness of my world. Orange leaves on the ground, in the trees that surrounded me. And because of the steep slope, there was orange, really, in every direction. Like driving in a pumpkin.

The surreal moment passed, and we proceeded to plant the 12 cherry trees that Phil and Isaiah had dug up yesterday afternoon. It took us about three hours, which, considering the size of the needed holes, was not much time. Phil dug a few of the more difficult holes (whether from location or large roots impeding progress), but Isaiah dug most of them, which left Phil free to shovel dirt back around the trees, and left me free to plant bulbs and get water from the creek to pour on the dirt when done.

I must say, it is much easier to plant bulbs (even in rocky soil) when the dirt has just been turned over.

When the trees were in the ground, it had been sprinkling for some time. I had begun to follow the truck up the slope when I needed to step on the brake. The seat of the tractor is permanently stuck a bit too far back for my comfort, so in order to get enough leverage to step on both brake and clutch while going uphill, I grabbed the steering wheel from the bottom.

And it came off in my hand!

The tractor immediately began rolling backwards down a slight incline, and I had no control at all. I shrieked to Phil for help, completely beside myself about what to do.

I don't know what I did, but I didn't do the most logical thing: turn the tractor off. It never even crossed my mind. Phil starts it up for me, so I don't even touch the ignition switch. It was like it didn't exist.

That's a pretty good story, though: small wife pulls steering wheel off tractor and rolls backwards down an incline out of control.

It's a more interesting story than the afternoon, when we went to dig up the rest of the cherry trees. About the fourth one, the hydraulic line suddenly sprung a leak, which ended our productivity for today. Phil will head to town tomorrow to buy another line, and hopefully the uprooted cherries will be happy enough overnight in their buckets.

Two Percent

The weather has been stunning, brilliant. Clear skies, upper sixties. An absolute joy and privilege to be alive and outside.

Phil and Jadon laid out the new contours for the peach orchard (Isaiah helped near the end). We get excited looking at the beautiful S-curves across the land. Phil has the vision for two little pocket ponds, and we know better how to manage access and potential parking for guests. The eagerness and expectation increases, I feel, daily, as we get new, exciting ideas for how to properly manage the land.

With the peach orchard laid out, it was time to dig up the cherry trees. After digging three by hand, Phil switched to the backhoe, and that went quickly and easily. As each comes out of the ground, the roots go into a five-gallon bucket, get covered with soil, and doused with water. Tomorrow the trees will move to their new home.

I had a great day, too. Shortly after noon I went out to plant daffodils (with faithful companion Joe). I calculated that, in order to get all the bulbs in the ground before Christmas that I'll need to get about 350 planted per day, which seems ambitious but possible.

I experimented with different planting tools. The shovel is, perhaps, the easiest, but it cuts such a large plane, I fear for my trees' roots. The Dibbler, a skinny shovel which my Dad used to plant chestnuts, went into the ground to the proper depth, but made such a slim trench that I couldn't get the bulbs in the ground.

And so I stuck with the Radius Bulb Planter. Sometimes it went into the ground very nicely, but most bulbs required about five jumps (or more) for me to get the tool in the ground. More often than not, I couldn't get it all the way down, either.

Phil came by to see what I was doing. He happened to come right as I started the smallest tree in the orchard. He planted all twelve bulbs around that tree in record time. He practically just had to stand on the tool and it sank into the ground. If he jumped twice, the tool was below ground level. It was uncanny.

So I ended the day with 17 new trees surrounded with rings of 12 bulbs each, nicely spaced about 6" apart, forming a lovely three foot circumference of tree protection. It's very satisfying, even if that used a mere two percent of the daffodil bulbs.

10,000 Daffodils Arrive

I went out this morning to weed the orchard. The daffodil bulbs finally shipped yesterday, so I knew I would soon have planting to begin.

Phil headed out for the unpleasant task of looking at the tractor. He came over after a while. "I think we need a new tractor."

I must say that I was not surprised. I'm a pessimist, so the worst case scenario had already presented itself to me. I took the news rather well.

"No, actually, I fixed it." And he had. A connection had come loose, and though it was difficult to access it with the wrench, he simply needed to tighten it.

He tilled the garlic bed, then reconnected the backhoe. He dug out the oak stump that he started on yesterday.

Next he pulled a tulip poplar stump, with incredibly long laterals.

The third large stump took hours and made an enormous hole, but in the end, it was pulled.

While Phil was digging, a large FedEx truck arrived with a pallet shipment. More than half a ton (1090 pounds) of daffodil bulbs. Phil backed the truck up, and with the FedEx man handing boxes to me, and me handing boxes to Phil, we unloaded the 29 crates of bulbs in short order.

My friend Melanie was visiting, and she said she would be happy to help plant bulbs. Nicely for me, she has planted bulbs before, and had good suggestions on spacing around the trees. I wanted to plant them just inches from the trunk, but she suggested, and I agree, that it would be more prudent to put them a bit further out.

I had pulled a crate, hoping to get a good many in the ground. We have a bulb planter that supposedly helps people plants hundreds (thousands?) an hour. So it was with great chagrin that I hardly was able to plant eleven around the first apple tree. Branches in my hair. The gravel placed around the tree at planting stopped the planter at every step. The concern for the tree's roots to not be entirely cut off.

We headed down to Gracie Lou's grave to plant 100 or so. Amidst the roots and rocks, I think we got about 15 actually in the ground before night fell.

And then, reading the instructions that came with the bulbs, they needed to be unwrapped from their plastic bags and stored in a place where they will not freeze. Hmm.

We moved the 29 crates into Phil's office, and will trust that the bulbs will not freeze in there. It is frustrating ... I ordered these at the end of September, and if they had arrived in shorter order, we would have had the glorious month of October to plant, and not buried the entire office in bulbs. Ah, well, it can't be helped.

***

Isaiah's new shoes arrived today. (He was so pleased, he asked to sleep in them.) He stood on his tiptoes with his feet crossed, and put on my hat. "I'm a pencil," he said. Pointed black shoes as the lead, and fluffy eraser. Very creative!

Fern Moves to the Dry Lot

After several days of productive labor, Friday dawned cold and wet, and neither Phil nor I was terribly motivated to do much outside. And some days just don't quite roll well ... any time I'd try to get a project underway, an interruption would come quickly. Some days are like that.

Saturday I cleaned and vacuumed and sorted most of the day. Some days are like that.

On Saturday, Phil shot two bullets, dropped two piglets, and skinned and eviscerated them. He even had the energy to butcher one of them, but then his body (and the daylight) were done. We have one pig, Buttercup. We expect she'll eat her 350 pounds of food and then join her friends in the freezer.

Sunday came and went, and today we had visitors in the morning, while Phil butchered the second piglet.

He brought Fern down to the dry lot he'd created. She may be nursing her baby a bit yet, but he is getting supplemental milk from Catherine. And Fern looks emaciated. Way too many ribs showing, much too prominent hip bones. She's the only one, of the twelve, who looks like that. So we wanted to give her some TLC.

Phil walked her over, like a big puppy on a leash. But a bit later, after she had wandered her pen for a time, I heard him say, in an odd voice, "You almost got me that time."

I called, "Did she almost gore you?" It seemed unlikely, but Phil's voice had sounded so odd.

Yes, she had. Not just a head toss, like they do for flies, which he views as part of cow ownership ("If I'm annoying her, it makes sense"), but a toss and press, a dangerous, aggressive motion.

And, yes, Fern was the one who gored me and lifted me off my feet a few months back. That had been an intense situation, and seemed partially justified at the time. (And, as Phil admitted, I am not patient, nor any kind of an animal whisperer, so he wondered if it was just me. And callous as that sounds, it actually makes sense. I'm not as in tune with the animals.) But for Fern to behave like that towards Phil ... well, at some point we'll butcher her.

It stinks, really. We paid a premium price for her genetics and her youth, and we had hoped to enjoy sixteen years with her.

After that, while I shoveled compost and spread minerals on the future garlic patch, glancing at Fern to grieve her eventual departure, Phil headed up to use the backhoe to dig out stumps from the peach orchard. We hope that will make the space more usable.

And on the first hole, the hydraulic line suddenly began to gush fluid.

The number of repairs needed are adding up: car windshield, car understory, bush hog, auger, tractor.

And all I really want to do is plant! It's frustrating. Not intensely discouraging, but more disappointing.

I'm not known for my patience.

Dry Lot Done

Before breakfast, Phil came in with quite a find: the most enormous night crawler I'd ever seen. It had been growing under the remains of our bag of potting soil, and apparently found the accommodations most invigorating.

Right after breakfast, Joe and I went to transplant five more hazelnuts. These five were thriving at the edge of the woods, but the cow's dry lot would have left them in danger of trampling, so we moved them up. Joe is now quite adept at finding buds, and he dug an entire hole or two all by himself.

Which is especially impressive because he uses a full-sized shovel, but is too small to step on it. So by sheer force of will, he plunges it into the ground and lifts out what he can.

After we planted those hazelnuts, I kept on weeding around the apple trees. The 10,000 daffodil bulbs have been delayed beyond imagination, but in order to be ready to plant whenever they arrive, I have grass and weeds to remove around the base of the trees.

I ended up finishing three rows, 82 trees cleared up and awaiting bulbs. And when Phil brought down a tractor bucket of pine wood chips, I mulched around the blueberries planted yesterday. I like the feeling of covering the plants with a moist blanket.

Phil again spent the day working on the cow's winter dry lot. He first had to take out some 60 feet or so of fence in order to make the uppermost garden bed more even in shape (it had ranged from 22 to 29 feet in width, but now is a wonderful 29 feet all the way).

Sadly, we had stacked all the T-posts and extra cattle panels along that section of fence, so he first had to move them out of the way, panel by panel and post by post. Then, because the posts weren't quite far enough over, he had to move them again.

All told, we figure he probably put up some 350 feet of fencing in the last two days, carrying many panels down and up the gully, weaving 16-foot panels between trees, pounding well over 60 posts eight inches or so into the ground. Each post needed three bits of wire cut and tightened.

And, finally, he put up the gates.

Since they realized that I have been watching Jeeves and Wooster movies while I do the dishes, the boys have been most solicitous of my kitchen habits. "Are you going to wash the dishes now, Mommy?" was a frequent question during the day.

In the meantime, Abraham went to dig holes.

And Isaiah armed himself with an arsenal of ball, bat, frisbee, and rock tied to a string.

I Love to Plant!

Yesterday I actually focused on the side of the door to the motor home and recognized that I had the remains of the 20 blueberry plants ordered in May that have been heeled in (badly) and somewhat neglected since then. So I went to set flags where the top bed of blueberries will go.

I laid out the first row yesterday, then pulled up the flags in order to work the other direction (Phil's suggestion: great advice). After laying out the four rows this morning with the boys, I asked Phil if he thought we'd be able to drive the riding mower next to the swale. It worked on paper (inches to spare!), but actually looking at the layout on the ground was a different matter. So I pulled the flags again, not with good grace, and Phil helped me lay out the entire space again.

Specifically designed for our equipment, keeping in mind weed control, future mowing, where the mulched strips will go, and what we'll plant in the swales.

We've been learning this year.

Joe had a great time helping me dig holes. He hefts a full-size shovel over his head like a weight-lifter, and cheerfully accepts compliments ("Yes, I strong. I big boy"). Due to my negligence, I had only 13 yet-living blueberry plants, but I also transplanted the two larger blueberries I had bought at Costco, and 15 bushes in the ground out of the projected 42 in that bed is a good start.

I love to plant.

I then cleaned up around the motor home. The compost in boxes where the blueberries have sat was filled with the most amazing worm castings. I gave handfuls to the blueberries, but that felt almost too generous. Those precious castings! And I gathered all the red wriggler worms I could find, and put them in a shoe-box shaped shipping container. I have no idea how long a cardboard box will last with moist tea leaves and apple cores inside, but I am eager for more worm castings and more worm babies. I want boxes and boxes of them!

We'll get there.

Joe and I then transplanted the only four living hazelnuts in the peach orchard, of the 117 I planted in May. That's not a good success rate, but I heeled them in late and badly (I've had almost 100% success with those I planted the day they arrived). I moved the four in between apple trees. The sheep have done well grazing between the rows, but in the rows, the weeds have grown thick and undisturbed. No longer. At some point, I will put hazelnuts between the trees, as a bushy weed deterrent. For now, the idea of weeding tough, two-year-old weeds around 300 trees is a huge project. I weeded around seven today.

After helping me, Phil worked on a winter dry lot for the cows. The dry lot in years past has rotated around the finger. This year, it will be just downslope from the motor home, across the driveway from the greenhouse. And rather than only in the opening, he's extending the cattle panels into the woods and to the property line. We hope the trees offer the cows some measure of protection from the elements.

Gramps (Phil's grandpa) found a nifty wire bender tool, and Phil figured out how to use it. It basically spins the wires around each other swiftly and perfectly, rather than the tedious twists with the pliers that he's been doing the last two years.

Phil didn't quite finish by dark, but the amount he accomplished was quite impressive.

All Saint's Day

Yesterday we went to town for a day of gut-wrenching horror for Phil. We first went to the passport office to get five passports. From there, we headed to the DMV for the sixth time (well, my second time). On the way, I had just finished asking the Lord for a bubble of protection around our car when Phil went to change lanes ... and was inches from being side-swiped by a vehicle that truly came from nowhere. (We have talked through every option about where the car may have been in the seconds before. Our best guess is that he had been behind us and, perhaps, cut over and accelerated through the intersection.) It was quite surreal.

And so we pulled into the DMV and came away less than 90 minutes later with car registration and two temporary licenses, with the real ones to follow by mail. It took some finagling.

Phil was exhausted enough from the ordeal that he went to bed at 8pm.

Today, the start of a new month, we talked through the tasks we need to accomplish. Phil keeps trying to fix the bush hog, but he has about exhausted his options and ingenuity. Hopefully we can get it to the shop soon.

We figured out where we intend to transplant the 25 cherry trees. That has been a mystery to us. You would think that, with almost 44 acres to play with, 25 cherries would fit almost anywhere. But since we have little cleared land, it was more of a mind-bender than you might expect. We figure we'll line the fencing of the lower pasture, and make sure to fence out the cows, so they won't eat the cherry leaves, with all the cyanide in them. (Very bad for cattle.)

And after some discussion, Phil ended up just butchering the piglet, rather than attempting a pig roast. We liked the roast in idea, but to rig a turnable spit, and sew the piglet onto the metal rod, to man the fire for the necessary hours, and then to eat the 80 pound (?) piglet before it went bad: too much effort! So he butchered, which took a good amount of time, but we have meat for multiple meals in the freezer.

We didn't keep the feet. I spent an hour or so this morning scalding and scraping Chunky's feet. I split them lengthwise, and then boiled them for hours. But when I opened the lid, I felt a bit ill on the amount of dirt and hairs showing. I took a little nibble of the gelatin, and it was tasty. But then I tried to imagine eating all eight half feet by myself, and I thought about the smell in the motor home. And I decided to be done. Bitsy or the chickens or the worms or the microorganisms in the compost pile will have to finish those feet for me.

In other news, Abraham, at age five, entered the world of crafts, as he designed and wove his first potholder. To say he was proud of this accomplishment would be an understatement.

With the colder weather, the cat leaps in the door as Phil comes in for bed. Isaiah snuck him up onto the upper bunk, and then called for photos.

And Jadon modeled my new warm winter hat. He looks like the Cossacks he's descended from!

And a special hello to all the saints!