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| Double pumpkin. Twice as good! |
Happy Thanksgiving! Today is the last day of Seed Fall. It's a very cold day here (17 degrees) and snowing. We celebrated our harvest already, so today we're not making any special meal.
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| Bob chopping fruits |
We are preparing our Yuletide goodies: lebkuchen and fruitcake. These will need a month to "ripen", so have to be made now.
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| The creek on Thanksgiving morning |
Lunette got to go for a cold walk by the creek this morning.
The root crops are in the root cellar, Bob's gathered walnuts from a friend's property and wood has been chopped.
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| Nice carrots this year! |
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| Plenty of English walnuts |
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| Lumberjack Bob again |
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| The garden eleven inches under |
Now the garden is all "put to bed" and resting under a blanket of snow.
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| Wild rice pilaf on a bed of winter squash and spicy green beans |
We celebrated the completion of our harvest on the tenth of the month. We enjoyed a nice lunch and relaxed.
Our fall chores have been halted by an early snowstorm. In the predawn hours of the 16th, we got a fast eleven inches of snow.
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| This is what 11" looks like |
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| See Lunette peeking from under the right bushes? |
Bob was totally unprepared for the snow: leaves not raked, snowblower not on, log splitter sitting out and three loads of split logs not stacked. The logs have now been stacked and the snow blower is operational. The leaves will have to rest until spring.
On the day before the big snow, Bob did get the horse radish roots dug.
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| Cold digging this year |
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| Horse radish ready to go to the root cellar |
I cleaned, ground and packed the roots up a couple of days later. Eight quarts this year. Hopefully this amount will see us through. We were a little short last year with six quarts.
Unfortunately, the snow came before Bob got the sunchokes dug. Unless there's enough snow melt to get to them, we'll be without them this year. Oh well, life goes on.
Our autumn, and most of the summer was wet, cool and cloudy. Looking at our solar panel report is almost as depressing as listening to the national news. Almost. However, we've "run the numbers" and are encouraged by our energy production/use findings. When we had our panels installed, they were sized to meet 100% of our electrical use. At that time, we had neither the electric car nor the induction stove. Because of their addition, we've been paying about $30 a month for electricity. (This would be less with normal sunshine.) With the elimination of all propane, and gasoline for our our primary car, we have saved $80 a month. Offset this with the $30 monthly increase in our electric bill, and our net savings is $50 a month! This doesn't include the less tangible savings in health of the planet, etc. We're very pleased. Not only do our efforts make sense morally, but the numbers prove their monetary value as well. Something to think about.
Now is our season for reading, resting and thinking, and doing home improvement work. Our books are at the ready. Put on the tea, light the fire and let's begin!
To all of you, a happy season of peace and rest.
Till next time,
Kathleen, Bob and Lunette
