Archive for the ‘Family – Mark’ Category
January 28, 2011 – The “New” Office
Well, it’s finally ready for prime time and moving in. All the paper files, computer, desk and what not have been relocated from the back room behind the kitchen. As a bonus, it seems warmer and quieter.
It feels rather luxurious to have enough space to spread everything around.
one year ago…”Thingamajig Thursday #193″
January 5, 2011 – Happy Birthday to Mark!
OK, it’s not a milestone birthday, but it’s getting close!
Linda surprised me with a couple of great items. First she made the northern Minnesota wedding/funeral dish, gulumpkes (cabbage rolls). It was her first time, and they were great and it won’t take 20 years to make them again.
Following up the gulumpkes was a difficult task, but then she rolled out another item suitable for the northland waters – a graphite composite canoe paddle. This paddle is so light, it feels as though you are holding air. It will be a nice match to the black and wood trim canoe and should last as long as I do!
December 25, 2010 – Christmas Deck Rescue
What says Christmas like shoveling off a deck? The deck at Nana’s place needed to be shoveled off according to homeowner’s association rules. There were only a few problems. The door opened out to the deck and snow blocked it, the screen door did not have a removable window, and there are not stairs from the outside up to the deck.
Here Claire psychs up Martin to ready him for his journey out the kitchen window above the kitchen sink!
Martin gets the heave out the window.
The shovel shortly followed and Martin was able to get enough snow off the deck to open the door and get more help in shoveling the snow off the deck.
one year ago…”Merry Christmas 2009″
December 4, 2010 – Tree Sales
It was a cold, blustery day today at Wheatsfield selling trees and gift boxes.
We sold about half the trees we brought – like anything, it takes a while to get people used to buying them in a new place. Many people thought they’d be back next weekend.
A Christmas tree on top of a Subaru – perfect for bringing the tree home!
November 26, 2010 – Back to the Smoker
The turkey was so good, that we did the rest of it today and threw in some fish for good measure.
I’ll do this again. It’s a good thing to do while doing something else outside while putzing around the farm.
one year ago…”Thingamajig Thursday #186″
October 17, 2010 – In the News
My apologies to the residents of the Marshall County area to find a picture of me on the front page of the Sunday newspaper.
It was a nice piece and it was nice to spread the word to local residents.
one year ago…”World Food Prize Youth Institute”
October 5, 2010 – Time to Pick Squash
It’s time to bring in the winter’s worth of baked, cubed and roasted, cooked and mashed for pancakes, and many more winter-time recipes that use squash.
It was time to gather them all up – despite the wet weather and chance for wilt and fungus, the vines held up beautifully and the squash came through as a good producer this year.
one year ago…”More Front Page News”
September 20, 2010 – Honey Extraction Day
Today was a big day at high hopes – honey extraction day! It was a rough year for beekeeping. We have three hives. Two of the hives were new this spring, so first year’s don’t often produce to much as they have to get organized and numbers bred up. The other hive swarmed, so lost some worker bees as well. Then, with the wet weather, it was hard for the bees to get out.
I missed Linda retrieving the supers from the hive – but here they are in the back of Sube. The idea is to get the supers during the day when many of the bees are out foraging. Then, you need to protect the stolen supers from the hive as they will try to retrieve the honey and the supers will be surrounded by an angry swarm. So, they are locked in the back of the car.
Extracting is best done in a hot environment. The high today was 90 degrees, so the honey was warm and would flow easily. In addition, I turned on the propane heater in the garage to keep it warm after the sun went down. Since the garage is not bee proof, we wait until after dark and the bees are all back in the hive after sunset. Here Linda removes some frames from the supers. (No we are not on the payroll of the Ely, MN chamber as the car bumper sticker and Linda’s shirt may suggest.)
Here’s a blue-ribbon frame – full and robust.
Worth its weight in gold is the electric uncapping knife to slice off the wax caps from the comb.
Here’s a really angry-looking guy spinning the manual extractor. The spinning of the extractor slings the honey out of the frames. Spin for a bit and them turn the frames around and spin again. He must have known that the next morning would bring aches of muscles usually not used!
Martin guards the honey gate at the bottom of the extractor.
The honey filters through three filters – a coarse mesh filter and a finely-woven fabric supported by another metal filter.
Finally, the honey safely tucked in jars. We ended up with about 10 gallons in total! The honey this year was very amber. That color is not what is typically is commercially available, despite the fact that dark amber honey has up to 20 times the anti-oxidants of run-of-the-mill commercial light honey.
one year ago…”Inaugural Chicken Butchering”
July 16, 2010 – BWCA Day 2
The promised threat of rain held off overnight, so we remained dry.
What a nice place for a mother and child to sit and watch the world wake up.
Of course, a cup of coffee in the morning helps. It was refreshing to wear a sweatshirt when back home the weather was in the upper 90′s!
Martin at the scene of his first catch with his new fishing pole.
Dad with the largest catch of the week – a catch and release largemouth bass – a bit of a rarity in this neck of the woods as smallmouth bass dominate the rocky shorelines.
The road home turned first blustery, then rainy, they thunderstorm.
By the time we arrived at the portage between Lakes One and Two, the raindrops got bigger.
They finally gave us a good soaking. We ended up huddled at the end of the portage for about an hour while the electrical storm passed by. Of course, you could have easily predicted the only lightning storm of the week would pass by when we were out far away from the cabin.
one year ago…”International Wolf Center”
July 6, 2010 – Hauling Garlic
Today’s news flash is that all the garlic is curing up in the barn. I didn’t get photos of the entire process, just the getting it up in the hayloft portion. With a rare break in the weather, it was time to get it out before the next rains waterlogged the soil even more.
Looks good!
Here’s a bit less than 1/3 of the crop freshly pulled out of the ground.
One of the loads was picked right in the tractor loader and the bucket lifted up to the 2nd story loft door of the barn.
Unloading the loader bucket and ready to haul to the drying screens.
Martin, the ever-cheerful worker!
Here he is again, about to lay down a big load on the drying racks. It’s a good feeling and even better smell to get all the garlic up in the loft, harvested, and ready to cure.
June 22, 2010 – Father’s Day
For father’s day, everybody helped with garage deconstruction for a few hours. Although it’s not a traditional gift, it beats sweaters, socks, or a tie!
Great progress was made – the trailer was filled with shingles -we almost got the whole roof stripped and started ripping off the siding as well. Soon the eyesore will be gone. Another day with rain – hard to keep berries and the like from molding.
June 14, 2010 – Putting Martin to Work
Martin put in about three hours working pretty consistently tearing shingles off the roof. It was about as long and hard as he’s worked on a project with me.
He was a bit fascinated with the pattern and arrangement of the shingles. Unfortunately, there are two layers – I had hoped for just one.
It’s been hard to get much done lately. It’s been an exceptionally rainy June to date – it’s rained 12 of the 14 days this month – and many of those heavy thunderstorms. The garden is really starting to get out of hand with weeds.
June 6, 2010 – Devils Lake State Park
You could ask for a nicer day, but might not ever get one! Today, we roamed Devils Lake State Park.
I’ll lead with what may very well be one of the world’s most scenic lunch spots. A nice rock ledge shaped like a chair, an awesome overlook, a light breeze, interesting clouds, and temperatures in the low 70′s! The featured rock formation is known as the Devils Doorway. The lake’s name was thought to derive from a mis-translation (or marketing gimmick) of the native American names roughly translated as Spirit Lake, Sacred Lake, or Holy Lake.
A look at the same spot, only facing away from the lake.
The lake is a clear with a sandy or rocky shore that fills the remnants of an old glacial valley with bluffs reaching 500 feet above the water.
After hiking up from the lake along the West Bluff Trail, we pause for a break in the lushness of the spring vegetation. Since there’s hardly ever photos of me on the blog, Linda took the opportunity to take some of the man behind the camera.
Yet another promontory on the West Bluff Trail.
One of my favorite pastimes is hanging over the edge of precipices, one thing I don’t get much of a chance to do much anymore.
This stretch of steep trail is on the Potholes Trail – which leads to a geological formation called kettles, which are round holes where rocks have circulated in soft rocks in a river and dig out round holes. I’ve seen them often in Minnesota, but here they were near the top of the hill in 1.6 billion year old rock.
Here’s a view from the end of the lake looking east out of the glacial valley. It was truly a spectacular view in all directions with rolling hills as far as the eye can see.
Finally, much later in the day, another panoramic shot from the East Bluff Trail.
May 8, 2010 – Ecoheartland Film Features High Hopes Gardens!
Today we received a surprise in the mail – our own copy of an Ecoheartland DVD! Back in June, 2008, a couple of filmmakers stopped by – you can see the original blog post and a photo of the filmmaking brother duo on the June 23, 2008 blog entry. We’re in good company among Iowans in the film – Paul Willis from Niman Ranch, Mike Coon from PowerFilm, Inc. in Ames, and Fred Kirschenmann from the Leopold Center. A film trailer follows:
I’d like to thank Nick and Max for their project and for representing us accurately and professionally. They indeed did produce what they set out to do!
one year ago…”Preview of Maine Trip”
