Archive for November, 2005
November 13, 2005 – Sunday Dinner
We had a splendid dinner tonight.
Wende and Joe from Wholesome Harvest hosted a dinner with Katherine DiMatteo, keynote speaker for the Iowa Organic Conference and head of the Organic Trade Association (she’s holding the pork). We were also able to give Katherine a tour of our farm. Next to her is Robert Karp, director of Practical Farmers of Iowa, and Wende.
Fred Kirschenmann, now Distinguished Fellow and former director of the Leopold Center along with Linda and Mike and Joe from Wholesome Harvest.
It was an evening of transition for many of the people there – Fred being forced to resign from director of the Leopold Center, Robert in the process of leaving PFI to his next adventure, Katherine leaving the OTA, and even myself, leaving the board of Wholesome Harvest at the end of this year. As usual, we attempted to solve many of the world’s problems, but since many of us have been working on those problems for decades, we didn’t come away with all of them solved, but we were able to share some good ideas with each other for some new food for thought. And of course, the food was tremendous.
November 12, 2005 – Blowing in the Wind
Lots of weather in the neighborhood today. So far, we were spared the worst of it. Just very strong, persistent winds.
The girls leaning into the wind on the front porch, trying to see if the wind will keep them up as they fall forward.
Early this evening brought tornadoes to central Iowa. I’m not sure how long this link will last, but it is a link of a stupid guy filming a tornado as it rips through his town. The storm also forced the evacuation of the football stadium in Ames for the ISU-Colorado football game. Claire says it is a good omen to have the tornado whistles blowing for a cyclone home game. The game is still going at blogtime, so we won’t know for a while yet. That’s how football games should be played – out in the weather, tornadoes dancing around and incredible winds – all without a roof.
November 11, 2005 – Up on the Roof
Work continues up on the roof of the old machine shed. Although it’s not the best view from a roof on the property (the house and corn crib are pretty tough to beat), the scene from on top is at least another perspective.
I’m working on a series of pictures of the roofing job that will come when one side is completed.
November 10, 2005 – Another Warm Day
Today was a work day and choir concert for Claire. I’ll just leave with with an end of day shot (coming earlier each day now).
November 9, 2005 – A Turn in the Weather
The season’s first pot of beef stew is simmering in the cast iron pot and the wind is howling from the northwest. The weather in the 70′s has ended.
Another afternoon of tucking summer items away for the winter. Martin and I started shoveling dirt out of a stock tank. Hmmmm. What is soil doing in a stock tank? It’s one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time. We were digging out the soil early this spring where the playground would be, so we thought it would be good to save the soil and put it in some raised beds we were planning on building. Why not put it in the stock tank – it will be contained, there already was a home-made lid for it, as it was previously used as a swimming pool.
Well, here it is November and the raised beds are but a memory – so the soil is getting thrown out into an existing garden so the tank can be rescued before winter.
Last year I replaced all the windows in the coop with the vinyl sash windows. One of the 4 panes of glass in one of the windows broke this summer in a storm and today I was impressed how easy it was to put a new pane in by just unscrewing three screws and sliding everything back together – much easier than the glazing points and window glazing of old.
November 8, 2005 – Interesting Work
I ran across two interesting links today. First is a 20 minute interview with Bill Mollison, one of the forerunners of the modern Permaculture movement. I’ve wanted to go to one of the 12-day permaculture classes but have never made the commitment. I’d especially like to see examples of permaculture applied to the midwest united states.
Another interesting link was a field experiment using various assemblages of vegetable and fruit in a “polyculture” arrangement from Ohio State. More details and photos are also available. I think this would be well worth the time of any small or market gardener to ponder and experiment with on your own farm.
November 7, 2005 – Lulled Asleep?
It was another day 20 degrees above normal. Morning was work and errands and this afternoon could do some “farming” outside. The weather has lulled me, but the calendar says Nov 7, so I started getting the farmstead ready for winter – took in some of the electric netting fence and rigged up a hanging holder (to keep mice out of it in the winter), cleaned up gardens some.
More does came over to visit Billy goat today. After school, Emma helped me put pound the 2×4′s on the roof of the old machine shed. I like to string the 2×4′s across the roof before putting the steel roofing on. It gives the steel something firm and reliable to attach to and it offers me safer footing on the roof. I’m using giant spikes to get through the asphalt and old cedar shingles to find the rafters. It’s about 50-50 whether I hit a rafter and it’s helpful to have a pair of eyes in the building to see if the nail was off right or left.
Emma did that with great cheer, despite having stuff falling from inside the building – including something she caught in her eye. She did have a good day, as her new flute arrived today.
November 6, 2005 – Corn Crib Done Until Spring
I’ve completed the goal to get one side of the corn crib sealed from the elements so I have a place to store lumber instead of boards scattered about in nearly every building. It looks kind of silly this way, but now it is on to roofing part of the old machine shed. I also have some work inside the crib, getting the other interior half to have usable space by removing some of the cross-members that were used to hold the walls in when there was corn pushing against the sides. These buildings were solidly built and it is the squarest of any of the outbuildings.
Doing the partial side (and the opposite side as well) took much longer than the entire west side. Lots of cutting and ladder work on these sides. I’m not sure my ladder will reach to the top of the building – we’ll find out next spring. I’m now looking for a solar-powered light. It will be dark in there after it gets all wrapped up and I don’t envision ever needing a lot of power in there, so small solar panel and battery may be perfect for lighting instead of an overhead or underground electrical supply.
November 5, 2005 – Date Night at High Hopes
Today we went to fetch Billy. He and Blaze “hit it off” right away. Blaze’s tail was wiggling and happy to see Billy. We’ll have Billy for about a month before he moves on. Hopefully Paullina’s time will come as well. We can sure tell there is a Billy here – it really stinks in the barn now.
Today Maizie entered the stinking dog sisterhood by finding and rolling in something disgusting. The girls gave her a couple of baths to try to remove the smell.
It was probably a good thing after coming home from the shelter – she is reported to be much more fluffy now.
November 4, 2005 – Peach Wrap
Today, nothing was “urgent” so lots of smaller things got some attention. I wrapped tree wrap around the peach and nectarine trees – hopefully that will help with sunscald and winter heat/cold damage.
I also put permanent metal tags on a number of trees, worked some more on the siding on the corn crib, but have reached the height that I can do solo, started sizing up the roofing on the old machine shed, put some summer furniture away for winter. It was another gorgeous day.
November 3, 2005 – Bricks for Tots
Out behind the barn are all the bricks from the old chimney we destroyed in one phase of house remodeling. (ok, so there’s still about five feet left in the basement). It was an ugly dusty job, but we gained another two feet of counter space in the kitchen. The bad part was that it required four rooms to lose part of their walls and hauling them down two flights of stairs from the attic. The good news was two of the rooms were being reconfigured anyways.
Martin has discovered the pile and is “building” structures. He has the floor built and is starting on the walls.
He will spend an hour or more there under the right conditions – arranging and planning. He has even moved a Tonka truck down to help with the moving!
November 2, 2005 – Obiligatory Fall Photo
The new camera arrived very quickly. So pictures can once again be part of the Blog. Here’s the obligatory fall photo of one of the maples I planted in the front yard. It’s not felt like November to date – highs in the mid-70s.
When we moved in there was a definite gap in tree sizes. The trees were all mature. There were not any trees that had been planted in the last 40 years or so. As the old saying goes, the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, the 2nd best time is today. So each year, we’ve been planting anywhere between 10-200 trees. Some of them have been in long enough that when I approach the house on the blacktop, I can start to see some of them a mile or so away.
November 1, 2005 – Wapsipinicon Almanac
Ever seen the Wapsipinicon Almanac? It is a wonderful publication hard to describe – perhaps the offspring of a marriage between the New Yorker and Farmer’s Almanac. It contains fiction, reviews, wit, poetry and local color.
The Wapsipinicon Almanac has been edited and published Anamosa and part of its charm is the simple black and white layout produced on a 60-year-old Linotype machine, and printed on a ’50s-vintage, two-color cylinder press. The cover is printed on a German press from the 1930s. It has the feel of a publication well-crafted and personal, a real difference from traditional publications.
