The Warmth Continues

All around this little place here, spring is evident.  Not just the early spring, but the full-blown green grass and blooming flowers and trees getting leaves part of spring.  We've had four days in the 80s this week, so about 40 degrees higher than normal for this time of year. 

I'm not complaining, it's been nice to wear shorts and run around barefoot.  Probably a first for me to do so in March in Michigan.  DH is even talking about taking the canoes out this weekend and going for a paddle.  Not sure I'm that brave, as I bet the water is still c-o-l-d!!

The forsythias and daffodils are in full bloom this week.  My hyacinth are all up and flowering, and the one tree in the fenceline that blooms white in early spring (someday I'm going to actually figure out what kind of tree it is) burst into bloom on Tuesday.

forsythia

daffodils

forsythia

the mystery tree

Supposedly we are having a 'cold' front move through this evening.  A big thunderstorm touched off around 5:00 p.m., with several more rounds of storms moving on through tonight and into tomorrow.  Currently we are between storms and the lighting is beautiful outside--bright colors against a black sky to the north and east.

Tomorrow's temperatures are supposed to 'only' be in the 60s.  Only 15-20 degrees hotter than normal.



Strut It

Ahh, Spring.  The air is warm, the sun is shining.  Flowers are blooming.  Love is in the air.    Frogs are singing.  Birds are pairing up and scouting out nest sites.

Turkeys are in the field, showing off what they got.

I was able to snap some pictures this morning of a couple of toms out courting near the North Corner of the field.  They were trying to get the attention of two nearby hens.

I like the beard on the one on the right.

"Hey, look, some hot girls!"

Tom #1:"Look at me!" 

Tom #2:  "No, look at me!"

Big man on campus

Frog Songs and Fire

With the warm weather, the spring peepers are out in abundance.  They serenade from the Marsh all day and all night.  I hear many different voices, making me wonder how big of a variety of frogs are out there with the peepers, singing away in their spring amorousness.  DD2 wants to try going out there with the camera and seeing if we can actually photograph any of them.  From past experience, I know frogs are pretty wily, so I think it will be quite the endeavor to get nice close-up pictures.  Not impossible, just time consuming.

Meanwhile, we had amassed quite a brush pile out in the field, near the woods, from our clean-up efforts.  The pile started on New Year's Day, when DH and both DDs went out to cut up the dead trees we'd felled last fall.  Anything too small to bother with for firewood went into a brush pile in the field, with the intent to later in the winter, drive the snowmobiles out and enjoy a campfire and hot dog roast.  Winter and abundant snow never really made it here this year, and so the pile still stood, now a nuisance for when the farmer who rents 18 acres off us would want to till the ground and ready it for spring planting. 

DH had added several thorn trees to the pile in recent weekends, doing trimming of the wild apples along the edge of the field.  The thorn trees had to go; until now we'd left them for any possible wildlife benefit they might provide.  But with us desiring to get to the apple trees to prune them, the thorn trees were a formidable barrier that were mastered with the loppers and the chain saw.

Our pile had become rather large, about as tall as DH, about six feet wide, and 20 feet long or so.  With the beautiful summer-like weather that rolled in Friday morning, and the field still bare, we decided it was time to remove the pile via fire.

After grilling our dinner, we loaded up lawn chairs into the bucket of the tractor, and headed out for a night of fire tending.

the pile

lighting the pile

Because most of the pile was green wood (tree tops, thorn trees, brush), it took awhile and some tinder to get it going.  But, once it caught, it went pretty quickly.

the pile ablaze

flame was about 12 foot high

DH had started the fire in the center of the pile, figuring the light wind (about 6-8 mph) we had would fan the flame toward the north end of the pile, and he would just fold the south end over that with the tractor once the center burned down.  What was really interesting, was that a vortex occurred, and the fire actually spread to the south, into the wind.  It was very cool to watch.

Once about half of the pile had been burned, DH used the tractor to push the two ends over the hot coals in the center.  Since it was totally dark by now, the branches were back lit by the fire inside of the pile.

All in all, it took about three hours to burn that entire pile down to a heap of coals about 6' long, 3' wide and 18" high.

On Saturday we did a little transplanting, moving two volunteer elms off the septic mound where we'd discovered them last summer, and into more appropriate locales.  I also dug up some lilac suckers from the bush closest to the house and put them into a row flanking the south side of the garden, as well as divided a chunk from the mock orange that grows near the base of the septic mound. 

DH did a little controlled burning of a section of the garden that got overrun with weeds last year.  He also burned the pile of cornstalks and sunflower stalks we'd made last October. 

After dinner, he went out into the field, scooped up the still warm pile of coals with the loader bucket of the tractor, and brought them up behind the Target Mound (a big hill of dirt he made several years ago for a shooting backstop where we sight in our guns).  Using those coals from the night before's fire, he started up a smaller campfire for Saturday evening.  Recycling at it's finest!

We roasted marshmallows, ate s'mores, and relaxed, loving the life at this little place here.

Like The Smell of Rain

Yesterday was a gorgeous June day. . . in March.  Literally, it felt like June.  Warm, sunny, some humidity. The birds were singing, the grass growing, thunderstorm watch in effect.

About four p.m., the thunderstorms started rolling in.  The sky was pretty light though, so I didn't worry much about the weather.  It was too whitish gray to worry about anything severe (compared to the eerie yellow before last May's huge storm that toppled trees all over the neighborhood and destroyed several barns in the township).

That's probably why I was so surprised when out of the sky came pea-sized to nickel-sized hail!  Not just a few hailstones, but many of them, for fifteen minutes or more!

As the storm passed, and the hail lessened, DD2 and I couldn't resist going out on the back deck and collecting a few for examination.  We took a couple of pictures for documentation, to show DH later when he got home from work.

some of the hail on the deck

hailstones, with my thumb for size reference

a really big one

About the time it stopped hailing, DD2 asked if she could eat a piece of hail, wondering what it would taste like.  I figured why not, it was probably not harmful, being frozen.  Like eating snowflakes, right?  I said it would probably taste like an ice cube.

So she popped one in her mouth.  When it had dissolved, she told me it didn't taste like ice, it tasted like the smell of rain.

Tastes like the smell of rain.  Wow, what a description!  Now I wish I had tasted a hailstone before they all melted.  I want to taste the smell of rain.

I Don't Have Pet Chickens

But I do have a few that are special to me due to their personalities.  Those few have names.  The rest are either "the girls" or "chickas"  for my laying flock, or "turd birds" for the meat chickens (if you've ever raised  broilers, you'll understand).

This is one of the ones who has a name.  She was part of my 2011 order from McMurray, she is an Ameracauna and lays mint-green colored eggs.  She earned the right to a name because she is uncommonly friendly, will even fly up and attempt to sit on my shoulder when I'm out distributing feed or gathering eggs.

Her name is "Blue" because of her coloring. 

Warm Wednesday Morning

It is a beautiful morning at this little place here.  Temperatures were in the sixties yesterday after thunderstorms on Monday night.  Things are turning green; plants pushing up through the soil.

I grabbed the camera and headed out for a lap around the house to see what's growing.

Behind the house, which would be the east side:

tulips pushing up near the sidewalk

buds on the lilac bush swelling and showing the green beginnings of leaves

chives

 (Note to self: those baked potatoes on the menu for later this week?  Use fresh chives on them.)

garlic planted last fall is looking good

daffodils

rhubarb just beginning to sprout

spearmint

iris

On the south side of the house:

daffodils are ready to bloom

The front of the house (west side):

dandelion!! 

Tasty when young and nutritious, will sneak this into the menu somehow.

(When life gives you lemons, and all that. . .)

crocus that will probably be wide open this afternoon

patch of tulips near front walkway



Cleanup, Aisle Four. . .

Actually, cleanup was on the north 'road' in our woods, not in the grocery store as the title might lead you to think.

We've had some windy weather here lately.  Let me amend that.  "Windy" is normal.  We've had some ferociously windy weather here lately.  Like sustained 40-50 mile an hour wind for an entire day, not just the usual 15-20 mile an hour variety we often get.  (When we were building the house at this little place here, DH asked me one windy day "Does the wind ever stop?"  To which I answered, "Yes, for a few days in July when the humidity is 90% and the temperature is near 100 degrees.")

That recent ferociously windy weather knocked some trees down in the woods.  Which, in itself isn't all that big of a deal, it happens.  However, the strong winds we've had lately had snapped some trees off, and they were leaning over the North Road in the woods, hung up in the tops of other trees, yet capable of falling on us should we pass underneath on another windy day.  So, they needed to be taken care of.

This past weekend we had glorious unseasonably warm weather.  And, also unseasonably, the field was dry enough to get the tractor through easily.  So, DH and I loaded up the chainsaw bucket (bar & chain oil, brush, sharpener, extra chains for the saw, nippers, loppers, hatchet, etc), grabbed the chain saw, the axe, the small gas can, and our two long chains, tossed them into the loader bucket of the tractor, and headed for the North Road to take care of those hanging trees.

Making the first cuts.

The trees didn't want to fall, just march the cut ends 5' closer to the road.

Two cuts each, still hung up and standing much closer to the North Road.

DH pondering best place to cut the now vertical stubborn second tree.

He makes a decision,

makes his move, and. . . tiiiiiimmmmmbbbbbeeerrrr!  Success.

Small pile from first (littler) tree.

Larger pile from larger tree.

We stacked the wood along the edge of the North Road for retrieval with the wood hauler trailer at a later date.  No hurry, some of our piles from the cleaning up of downed trees have been back there for years, just aging nicely.  

It was such a nice day, and we were having so much fun with the chainsaw, we decided to move back out of the woods and do a little clean-up along the North Corner of the field, in the fence line.  There are many downed trees there, some hung up, some just laying on the ground.  I got to be the tractor driver and drag several of them out into the field using the chains and the tractor.  We moved them to the field so that we could cut them up without dodging briers and poison ivy vines.

Two trees at once!  How awesome am I! (Shh, I know they're fairly small, but they're trees.)

More of my tree relocation handiwork with the tractor.

 After I had drug about 5 trees out into the field, I got my turn at wielding the chainsaw.  Somebody who shall remain nameless failed to take pictures of me in my lumberjack glory.  Chainsaw wielding: a skill every woman should have, LOL.