A Blur of Spring

Siberian Iris, my all-time favorite for spring.

A blur of springtime activity has sprung on Flat Top. Most important, everything’s green! Two days ago, I woke up and it was as if someone had popped open an umbrella of a million leaves overhead.  Gorgeous. And we’ve been graced with baptisia, iris and hardy geranium blooms, and my favorite: new plumes of needles on all of the conifers! Love me some conifers …

The former maple 5 feet from our cabin. I have an art project planned for that stump.

Mason woke up with a burst of energy that same day, and we launched into the last tree harvest for the season. We saved the hardest, or at least the most nerve-racking, for last: a 65-foot maple that was leaning over the cabin.

But first the 70-foot pine tree blocking its path to the ground had to go. And the pine’s first limb was way, way up there. So Mason tried to slingshot a golfball, tied to a “Twisted Mason Line,” aka string, over that lowest limb. But it wasn’t powerful enough to launch the ball high enough, so he just went with his manly brute strength: He flung it up there; it took a few throws (maybe 11). We use the string to tie to a stronger rope, which attaches to a steel cable, and then the Jeep (used to be the truck, but she died last month) puts tension on the cable, so that -- hopefully -- the tree falls away from the house.(They did.)

Before lunch, we had the pine down and cut up. By dinner time, the maple was down and sectioned, too. Phew. Several trees are still within striking distance of the cabin, but at least they aren’t leaning toward the place. And so ends the Winter 2016/17 firewood harvest.

Things are also hopping in the vegetable garden, with spinach, lettuce and arugula already on the dinner table. Each day starts with a list of my garden chores; I rarely get to all of them. One recent task was planting a ton of annual flower seeds, the frugal gardener’s best friend. Zinnias and cosmos, make my summer!

  

My pal Terry gave me all these irises. Above them is my wisteria.

 

A hardy geranium, called Espresso.

I've got columbine coming out of my ears.

Why We're Sore

One red oak plus two white oaks equal warmth next winter.

If you wonder how Mason stays so thin, the answer is genetics. But the photo above also explains it all, too. Yup, it's firewood season. And we're hurting for it.

Yesterday Mason took down three oak trees; the last one was pushing 70 feet tall, with a trunk at least 18 inches in diameter -- all the way toward the top. It came down with a serious earth-shaking thud.

Just getting the tree ready to come down is a chore: clearing small trees and brush so Mason has a clear path to flee once the tree starts falling, and getting a cable rigged high up so we can use Mason's trusty old truck to pull it in the direction we want it to fall. Once a tree is down, we have to clear off all the little branches and pile them up for backyard burning once they've dried a bit.

Then Mason hauls out two chainsaws and slices the trunks into 16-inch-long pieces. We stack them in a pile, so that when we've recovered from taking them down, we can then split and stack them all. When we're all done, we strip down and do the tick check: four on me yesterday, just two on Mason. Then we collapse with cold beers.

Oh, did I mention I did all that on a black-and-blue ankle? (No, not a drinking accident; just a spill off the front stairs while trying to hoist an inherited antique bookcase into the house.)

Yesterday's 6-hour haul should bring us close to what we need for next winter. We think. So the question is, as soon as we're done, what will be the next project?

Two of the trees we took down will give us more morning sunshine on the veggie garden, and make room for maybe four more fruit trees. That's my nectarine tree, above.

Apple blossoms!!! My espalier tree survived a winter attack by a root-chewing creature. Bunnies wiped out my first batch of spinach, and the deer are fat on all my blueberry blossoms.

Highway to Heaven

This stretch used to resemble the craters on Mars. Sweet, sweet gravel.

The one and only thing we wish we could change about living in the backwoods of Flat Top Mountain is the 2.5-mile-long dirt road leading to our house. Well, this week 0.75 miles of our wish list came true, and we are celebrating beyond belief. Just look at that photo above!! Spectacular.

Here's the story. We've been writing every government official possible for the past several months. We knew we were tilting at windmills, and indeed, the two officials who bothered to get back to us both let us know it was considered a private road and we were on our own. (Whatever happened to "No taxation without representation"?) It was up to the landowners on either side of the private road to fix it. At this point we should mention that one stretch had gotten so bad, that we took to dumping bags of quick-set concrete into potholes that were swallowing up our Jeep's front end.

For several weeks, we pursued an alleged process to request that the county take over the road. But after three weeks of un-returned phone calls, we had basically given up.

Then came last Monday. HOLY HEAVY EQUIPMENT!!! Apparently the wealthy landowner who owns both sides of the first stretch owned up that he was responsible for it. A dozer, a grader and truckloads of gravel later, WE COULD NOT BE HAPPIER!

Now, warning to all those considering a visit, you'll still do some rock-climbing to get here. But man, that first 0.75 mile is lovely.

Nick the Dog, loving the spring sunshine.

Mr. Daffodil says it's spring.

 

Waking Up to Spring

Signs of spring, until the deer ate every last one.

We are slowly shaking off our winter coma and coming to life again here on Flat Top. After two months of daily afternoon naps and long stints reading, it was almost hard to break the habit. But our first 70-degree days have helped.

Mason's first burst of spring energy was spent in the bedroom. Get your mind out of the gutter -- and into our closet! Finally, after five years of hanging our clothes on a piece of electrical conduit, Mason installed honest-to-god closet rods. Soon we'll have the whole closet area walled off with curtains, so our unmentionables will no longer have to be mentioned on our home tours.

My energy was spent in the garden, of course. The cold-weather seeds (carrots, greens and peas) are already in, as are the onion sets, and just today the arugula pushed out of the ground! Next winter I vow to get a cold frame set up so I can have fresh greens throughout the winter. Supermarket greens are officially appalling; I thought I'd have spinach this winter, but the bunnies living under our shed had other ideas.

Speaking of wildlife, we've become a deer haven. No plant has been left untouched, and the lawn may not need mowing for quite a while.  They come just as the sun sets. Front yard. Back yard. They're adorable, but ... One day we had 11 visit us at once!

Somewhere in there I also found time to do some painting. The kitchen chairs are now a muted yellow (Mason said, "It doesn't look nearly as horrendous as I thought it would"), and the ceiling of the guest room is white, in a bid to lighten up that room a bit. And while not returning to the three-day grind at the garden nursery, I've picked up a few landscape design jobs and hope to pick up a few more.

I wish I had more secrets of the woods to share. Spotted a whippoorwill today; Mason threatened to shoot it (he REALLY hates those things). Luckily it should be at least another month or so before they start their mating song.

  

Just Us and the Deer

This night, 11 deer came into our yard at dusk after we put out beer grains for them.

At the start of this coldest season, Mason and I were pretty restless. You may have noticed, but we aren't too good at doing nothing. I feel guilty if I'm not getting something constructive done. So I painted the stairs. I cleaned out my "closet" (which is really just hangers on an electrical pipe). I tried new recipes. I mended torn clothes. Cleaned the shower. I even started to workout, just a little.

Well, that was the start of the season. Now, after a good stretch when the high for the day never broke above freezing, we've become expert slackers. Most days we manage to get out of the cabin twice for Nick's daily walks, but in between? The warm cozy loft has lured us to no end. There have been novels upon novels. (Thank you, my incredible book fairy, you spoil us so!!)

A new batch from our book fairy, who we cannot thank enough!

Beer-making duties have been our only chore, and Mason handles all of that. I just help him drink it. And Nick and the neighborhood deer also score: Nick gets homemade dog treats and the deer have taken a liking to the leftover grains.

So, in summary: We are well-read, well-fed and occasionally slightly tipsy lazy asses.

But it's supposed to push 50 degrees in the coming days, so the question is: Will we be able to reverse this lazy trend? 

Making dog treats for Nick. A friend gave me some bone-shaped cookie cutters, so they're extra cute now!

Deer Update

Remember that lone camellia bud that the deer left for me? Yup, it's gone, along with the last few leaves left on the plant.

Forced Inside

Our lake,  on a really still recent day.

Winter finally turned cold on Flat Top, forcing us to slow down a bit and find things to do inside the cabin. I won't lie: There have been naps. And days when the bed never got made. And books have been finished, and others started. (For the record, 40 degrees and above and I must work outside. In the 30s? No can do.)

Sparging. Don't ask. But isn't all that natural light divine?

After several days of such egregious behavior, Mason finally found some energy today and launched into brewing some beer using the more time-consuming all-grain process (which heated up the cabin quite nicely, I might add.) Beer, yummm.

The view from my chair. I'm working on perspective.

After hitting the wall on reading, I picked up a pen and paper and started testing my drawing skills. I know, still pretty cartoony. I'm working on it.

Oh, and remember that gorgeous camilla from last week? A hungry deer (or four?) ate nearly every single leaf off the damn plant. I nearly cried. They were kind enough to leave me with one bud. Bastards! Good thing they're cute, or they'd have killing coming to 'em.

 The deer are on my shit list.