Solar Panel No. 3

Getting ready for the new (smaller) solar panel.

We thought today was going to be a washout with rain all day, so we slept in. (Well, yes, Mason always sleeps in ... But I stayed in bed, too, reading "The Tiger.") As it turned out, we slept through all of the rain and rolled out of bed to the slightest orb of sun trying to burn through the clouds that have been hanging over us for nearly two weeks now. So much for our lazy day.

After our usual leisurely breakfast (scrambled eggs with smoked turkey, celery, shallots, bell pepper and cheddar!) and dog walk, Mason launched into installing our third solar panel. Yup, a third one! But it's just a small one, and it's not about powering the house. This one's for juicing the battery on the propane generator. (When this "emergency standby residential generator" is installed under normal circumstances, the battery is kept fully charged by "utility power." So we needed a workaround ...)  

I managed to get all of the plants on the back porch into the ground, and found various other projects outside to kill the day, which topped out at 54 degrees. Not bad, considering the suffering of friends in sub-arctic Minnesota and family in icy Texas. (And speaking of killing, Nick unearthed a fat mole that was burrowing in near the house and sent it to mole heaven.  Good boy!)

Yes, that's right, we're feeling pretty good about Tennessee just about now.

Yet another Mason butt shot. Can you blame me?

Oops, she did it again.

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.

 

  

Fall in All Its Glory

The view out of our loft bedroom windows this morning.

We had a surprise day off today because we managed to finish an expected two-day landscape job in one long day for a super nice couple who have a beautiful yard out in Cleveland, Tenn. Despite our aching muscles and fierce leg cramps, we celebrated with our usual morning walk with Nick the Dog through the falling leaves of the season. The shot above was the view this morning out of our windows from the loft. (Sorry if the focus is lame; I shot through the filthy window.)

As you might imagine, there's no chance of trick-or-treaters out here tonight, but we do plan to carve a pumpkin. And also toast my mother, who celebrated a landmark birthday today. (Note: Everyone in my family was born on a holiday except for me. Yes, I am bitter.)

And we leave you with the colors of fall from today's walk:

Mostly maples, but also a sourwood, a hickory.

Hello? Beautiful!

A back corner of our property

My boys, up by the "lake."

The Busy Season

Some landscape designing, with the help of Mom's gifts of colored pencils and fancy pens.

Fall's the best time to plant here in Tennessee, and that means I've been blazin' busy. For the past month, I've added an extra day every week at the nursery job. Lots of folks have been coming in wanting major landscape designs, and of course then they want someone to come plant it for them. So Mason and I have picked up a little side work. (Lucky Mason: "These are supposed to be my golden years," he keeps saying. "You're killing me!") Then there's all the planting to be done around OUR house. ...

This was taken a week ago. It looks better now. And yes, the leaf  raking has begun.

So we got the last little patch of lawn seeded, and most of it is coming in great. And I'm dragging home plants from work (to Mason's dismay) to keep filling in the acre of dirt sourrounding our Home Sweet Hovel. Most of the plants have been perennials that are looking a bit haggard from a summer of sitting in little pots. I really need to invest in some major shrubs ... but all in due time.

What's Mason been up to, you ask? Fixing cars, generators and refrigerators. And brewing beer. And building out-of-control bonfires. And digging holes for me, poor man.

So I leave you with a gorgeous aster blooming at the corner of our well house. It was yet another gift from Craig, whose own garden is to die for.

My lovely aster.  Love the purple against the brown fence.

Home Sweet Hovel

The new lawn will start in the upper right corner of this photo.

After a three-week break from Flat Top, it sure is good to be home again. And I'm pretty sure not 24 hours had gone by before I launched into my fall lawn-seeding project. This will be the last patch of lawn we'll be putting in. (I kinda doubt that, sez Mason.) It will circle the so-called "tiki bar" area (which has no tiki theme, nor a bar yet, so we might should consider a new name). 

The new patch of lawn will lead out past the well house to the forthcoming veggie garden area, which is slated for spring 2014, but we'll need to build a deer fence around it, so it may not happen until the following year. It also will lead out to the guest cabin that I SWEAR is still on the project list.

As for fall, only the sumacs have turned red so far, but it's definitely in the air. The days are still warm, but the nights are cooling off. Last night we had a lovely bonfire, compliments of Mason and the massive pine tree he took down this summer.

That's the fire raging in the background, with Mason tending it.
In the foreground is a cool yellow sunflower given to me by my cool co-worker Craig.

Mesmerizing, isn't it? For scale, that firepit is about 8 feet wide.

As for those weeks away from Flat Top, they were a blast. Texas was all about eating all of Mason's favorite foods -- and a few of mine -- and seeing family. Then we trekked to Minnesota for the first time in three years and were feted with a fabulous bonfire party by former coworkers, helped spring a surprise 50th birthday party for a close friend and played tennis for the first time in eight years (a note to fellow players: the butt bruise is still six inches around and a lovely, through now fading, magenta.)

Me, Courtnay and gracious hostess Catherine
around the bonfire, sometime well after midnight.

Courtnay, Michiela and me, after much-needed girl time at the mall.
(And yes, I need to teach Mason how to focus the damn camera.)


Your friends from Flat Top.

We miss all those close friends and thank them all for their wonderful hospitality, and are amazed how many have already made the trip here to Flat Top, our home sweet home, aka our hovel sweet hovel ...

It's Summer Again

My Encore Azaleas make an encore performance (Notice Nick in background.
Also, my itty bitty plastic greenhouse way back there.)

Not much news, other than it hasn't rained in a whole week. Of course, now it's 90-plus degrees and sticky sweaty. Pick your poison, huh?

Tonight's sunset washed an incredible glow of gold over our yard. That happens here a lot. I've tried to capture it in photos, but the pics never reflect the magic of it. I need my photo queen Leslie to shoot it.

So, for lack of news, here are a few photos for you.

Beautiful despite its unfortunate name of "Toad Lily."

Love the color in the new growth on this "Dream Catcher" beautybush.

Mason and Nick, Sitting in a Tree ...

A kiss on command. 

Seriously, folks, I'm starting to get a bit concerned about all of the time Mason and Nick are spending together alone while I'm at work. Nick gives Mason a "kiss" on command these days. A serious daddy's boy. But kinda cute, huh?

August has brought even more $%#!#$! rain, and some record-low highs. As I type this, I'm wearing my winter slippers. This isn't right.

But today's cool afternoon was perfect for transplanting a small tree that needed more sun, and roto-tillering the final patches of dirt that I plan to seed with grass in a few weeks. Sound like a productive day? It gets better: It started with a home-cooked French-toast breakfast, followed by climbing back into bed to finally finish Robert Caro's fourth book in his LBJ biography, followed by an hour-long nap.

Yes, the mountain life is good to me. As for Mason, he's been busy cutting up and splitting a 90-foot pine tree we felled recently. We accidentally took out another tree in the process, but it's OK. At least it wasn't the house, and, by taking out that pine, we gained at least another hour or more of evening sunshine on the solar panel.

(Side note on Southerners: I've learned from talking to customers about the sunlight in their yards: When they say "in the evening," they mean anytime after 1 p.m.)

So, for the record, we reward our hard work here on Flat Top with an icy cold beer  -- but only in the evenings!!

Save the bees!

A fabulous rudbeckia that fabulous co-worker Craig gave me! 

FYI, when Craig came to visit Flat Top, he pointed out I had wild blueberry bushes. Huh. I had never noticed before, probably because when I was on walks, I was too busy scanning the ground for snakes and the air for huge spider webs to notice the blueberries, which were tiny but mighty delicious last month.