Have you ever asked a rhetorical question? It is a question that doesn’t require an answer. I have sat down to my keyboard so many times since my last post and felt like I was asking myself to write the answers to rhetorical questions in this journal. Time to move beyond the rhetoric and get down to some brass tacks.
The past few months has seen me getting the house ready for winter, which is a big deal around here. We air it out in the summer, but we also hit the relax mode as far as winter in the house goes. That just cannot be so when the snow hits the tops of the mountains, and that it has done. There is snow up there right now, looking down over the valley with its glare. The last couple of winters the snow has basically fallen in November and we have not see the grass again till March or April. The last frost comes around the first of June, leaving us little time to do outdoor growing to start the season off. So the goals this year are to ready ourselves for the winter now, and the spring when the snow settles in. If there is planting we can do indoors, then we are going to do it.
The cow is coming to his butchering date. I have only a few days to get him into the small pasture for graining before I start to miss the proper graining schedule. Grain puts a bit of fat in among the muscle, adding flavor to the meat. If I don’t do it, then the meat will be bland, so it is important if we want to reduce what gets tossed out at the end of a useful meal. No sense in wasting any of the cow if we can help it. Where I run into problems is getting the cow moved across the street without losing him into the neighbor’s yard or onto the road. I need help with it, but neither of the boys are prone to helping out with anything on the farm. I need a cattle prod, and not just for the cows.
I have learned from winters past that sitting indoors and staying warm induces laziness and an general ill feeling that is hard to get over in the spring. That has got to be avoided, not just this year, but every year. How can it be healthy? I am not an animal that hibernates! Yet, I find myself already sitting too much now trying to keep my youngest daughter occupied in things that suit her age and interest. We are going to have to be sure we are well invested in cold weather clothes!
We have picked up our first cord of firewood already, and have been using it, even though it has not been that cold out lately. This has concluded the warmest October I have experienced here yet. Maybe we will see the grass till December?
Today I have started a roast in the little roasting oven that sits on the worktop. I have got roast, a lot of potatoes, bell pepper, bacon, corn, green beans, and a stick of butter in there. It promises to be pretty good! But I had better go and stir it now!
Kelsey J Bacon