An Early Resolution

Leaves, leaves everywhere.

Now, you may not celebrate this news, but I’m making a New Year’s resolution to more frequently post accounts of our life in the Tennessee mountains. I know, I may have said this before. But hey, sometimes change starts with a sputter.  Just ask President Obama. And yes, I know it’s still 2013, but I’m trying to get a head start.

I don’t want to bore you, but then I started to think about how I check my friend Leslie’s daily photo blog every day. Now, granted, she posts a stunning photo every day and a hip-happening urban lifestyle to tell us about. And I’m not going to aim for a daily update, but maybe at least weekly.

This week we’re rejoicing over my return to the mountain. I’ve finally dropped down to a three-day workweek, which means I get to spend more days puttering in our yard than I do helping other people with their yards. During the fall I dragged home a bunch of plants once they hit the clearance rack, but for weeks they sat on the back porch because my free time was minimal. But now I’m down to just four more to nestle into the soil before the cold of late December and January come.

Bottling the latest batch.

 Mason just finished installing a second solar panel, which we won’t need in the summer -- but in the winter months, when the sun drops low in the sky, it should keep us better juiced. Of course, as soon as he got her up, the skies clouded over and we've hardly seen the sun for the past week.

Now he can return to building the second storage shed, which has a shiny red floor but no walls yet. And when he’s not building something, he’s brewing or bottling. Our latest favorite homebrew is Midwest Supplies’ “Ferocious,” which mimics Surly Brewing Co.’s super hoppy Furious ale. Good stuff.

In between all that excitement, I reveled in my first buck sighting since moving on the mountain. We see does and fawns all the time; they ate just about every leaf off my mountain laurels last week. I'd be mad if they weren't so cute. But this buck? Gorgeous! I spied him running across a foggy field on the morning after Thanksgiving as I was driving off the mountain to go to work. Almost made the workday worth it.