Archive for May, 2005

May 6, 2005 – Loaded for Bear

We’re off (mostly) for a weekend in a cabin at Pine Lake State Park. The kids and I are heading out after school, but Linda has commencement and a speaking engagement tomorrow morning, so she won’t be joining us until then.

It seems like you need the same stuff whether you go for a weekend or a week. Here we are, all ready to go! Packing is always such a delight (but you’d never know it from these smiling faces).

May 5, 2005 – Ye Olde Trailer

I’ve had this old trailer in a corner of the farm for the last 7 years or so. It collects srap metal until I have enough to go to the dump. It literally has not moved for 7 years until this week.

I’ve started to disassemble it for possible retro-fitting as a new trailer. We need a canoe trailer to haul canoe and “stuff” on vacation. The plan is to take all the old wood sides off this trailer and bring it into a welding shop to see if we can add a longer tongue and removable racks for the canoe (perhaps even a removable long tongue so the long tongue is only on when hauling the canoe).

This trailer is a hand-me down trailer from my Dad. I used to hate this trailer because it meant more work! It was the wood hauling trailer and Dad would cut up the trees in lengths as long as my brother and I could drag out of the woods, then we’d load them up and bring them home. Having the trailer meant we weren’t done when the pickup was full. I guess I’ve adopted some of his practices as the girls now groan when I say we need to go get more free wood chips.

I’m hoping this is the first of many pictures of the trailer on the road to re-use!

May 4, 2005 – Busy as a Bee!

Mother-in-law Joanne has picked up the beekeeping torch. It was one of those things we always wanted to do – and had much of the equipment – but never had the time and thought energy to do it. She is ready to set up 4 hives, with the bees coming any day now. Today and the last few days was a flurry of painting, constructing, etc. before the bees arrive.

We greatly look forward to the honey and the pollination.

The upper 60′s seemed like a heatwave today. Lots of little things got done – tore apart an old gate made of wood and hog panel, finished watering the hardwoods for the first time, picked up the rest of the mulch that was dying for bedding, mowed the sheep pasture to keep the grass tender for the sheep who have yet to arrive, replaced one of the peach trees that died over the winter, started tearing apart the old trailer for refurbishing, got a row of beans planted and some gourds over this arch made out of a cattle panel that spans an unused portion of the garden where the poles are that will be used to construct grape trellises some day.

May 3, 2005 – The Coldest May Day Ever

This is beginning to sound like a broken record. This morning when I woke up it was 23 degrees in Marshalltown. Most points in the state recorded the lowest temperature ever recorded in the merry merry month of May (22 at Mason City and 24 at the home of Radar O’Reilly in Ottumwa). Tonight is another freeze warning, but what’s the use? If something didn’t get damaged at 23, a 30 degree night isn’t gonna hurt any more.

May 2, 2005 – Another Frigid May Day

Today was just as ugly as yesterday. At least when I washed the van this am, the water didn’t freeze on the vehicle as it was 33 degrees.

The seeds we started really want to go outside, but that would be cold-blooded murder on days like today. This weekend we put some of the broccoli and cauliflower out to get hardened off (used to real sunlight) but the wind really made them look bad, but not as bad as they did after they were put into the mud room for shelter and a dog/cat/child stepped/dropped something on them.

Let’s think happy thoughts, shall we? We are trying to incubate our first eggs. These are Guinea Hen eggs and are expensive through the hatcheries (about $5.00 each) and guineas are notorious for wanderlust and never coming back. We have two we think are a pair of the right combination, (although we haven’t seen them being amorous).

Guineas love insects, so we hope to employ some natural insect control in the garden.

May 1, 2005 – Bark & Lichen

Here’s all I’m going to say about today from the weather forecast:

“Isolated light rain showers and light snow showers in the afternoon. Breezy. High in the upper 40s. West wind 10 to 20 mph increasing to 20 to 25 mph in the afternoon. Gusts up to 40 mph.” Enough about today!

I’ve been thinking about this bark on an apple tree at the farm.
The bark is starting to get old. There are lichens growing on it. I associate lichens with old places – for example all lichen growing on exposed bedrock in northern Minnesota.

This was one of the first apple trees I planted when we moved to the farm. It was part of a pasture that went to within 75 feet of the house. It makes me think of the consequences of our actions and the understanding that can only come with time and watching life unfold. Anybody can look at a tree, but until you’ve planted one, watched it grow up and get old, you may not really “know” that tree. The time from sapling to maturity gives a deeper perspective. In the past few months, I’ve seen and cut up some trees that were probably planted by some of the first settlers of this farm and I’ve planted some new ones. I haven’t and probably won’t be around to see those trees mature, but seeing the lichen on this tree gives me some sense of the passage of time.

Likewise, I’m aware of the part of life I’m now in – I’ve seen a parent die and watched children be born into the world. There’s a lot more to see – like seeing the children grow to fruition, whatever that may be. There’s something from this passage of time and long-term awareness that seems to be lacking in our disposable and short-attention span culture. I’m grateful that the lichen on a tree can remind me that delayed gratification can indeed be sweeter and richer than a quick fix. Somehow the apple from the tree planted, watered, and pruned by my hand is no contest in satisfaction to the bag of apples I can instantly buy that have been stored in ethelyne-controlled warehouses for months. That’s one reason I like the farm – there are so many of those things in place – and more on the way.