Summer Vacation

Designing Fort Snrub

A few weeks back a neighbor was throwing out an old privacy fence and their trampoline.  Now mind you, they considered this garbage.  As soon as the kids were aware of what was happening, they considered it finding gold and exactly what they needed for a new fort in the woods.

 

They carefully loaded all of the panels onto a trailer and drove them back to their “work” area.

They cleared the perfect area for their fort by driving 4-wheelers and doing donuts in a small area to break down the brush.  Then it was time to drag the trampoline with the 4-wheelers into place.  This is the roof of the fort which is underneath.  The top will be used to place a pop up tent when they want to sleep out there.

They collected old materials from our farm and our neighbors and laid them out so they knew what they had to work with.  They could hardly contain themselves on the eve of our trash night and rode the golf cart down our street to collect more treasures.  They found a few balls, an old hose reel that has been rigged to raise and lower a flag, chairs, old tires and most recently they picked a huge deck umbrella.

It was time to begin construction.  They nailed some boards around the frame.  This is holding the tarp in place which covers the trampoline.  Even the little ones were helping clear brush and design the area.

Some bamboo flooring and old throw rugs have been collected and added as a floor until they can garbage pick another tarp.  The tires are perfect as extra seating!

The name was chosen for the fort using the name of the family who donated the fencing and trampoline spelled backwards.  I thought that was a great choice and very imaginative.

This picture was Sunday night as they were driving the two and a half miles down our street looking for more treasures for their fort before garbage day. They wear their bathing suits as it’s been so hot here and they can work on the fort, drive up and jump in the pool and head right back out.

These kids have had very little television or computer time as they are up and out the door to work on the fort, swim, and play in the woods!  It’s hard to force them to work on mandatory book reports for the upcoming school year as they are so busy planning, building and having fun.

This is what summer vacation is all about in our world!! 🙂

Good Ole Days

I keep this vintage milk bottle holder on our porch.  It makes me happy to see it, even in the deep snow.

There’s something about this that brings me back to a place in time that I wish to have been a part of.

Long Beach

We spent this past week at Long Beach in Canada.  You can see by this picture taken our first early evening there EXACTLY why we love this place.

I am playing catch up but will post more about our stay with fun pictures, the wonderful book I finished reading (which could not have been more appropriate for this vacation) and the historical house that captivates me!

Niagara Falls, New York

The power of the water rushing over the falls is mesmerizing

Winter winds down

The winter is giving way to spring.  Slowly the snow melts and adds to the little streams which run to the creek.

The creek is already bursting at the seams and taking over the lowlands of the woods.  Mud on the trails begins to peer through.

Beautiful old farming equipment is exposed once more still holding onto the secret of how they ended up so far back in the woods and abandoned so many years ago.  These pieces are about 1/2 mile away in an area that is not cleared and is wooded.  I’ve often thought about pulling them out to display at the house but they are a piece of history, our property history, so I leave them to remain in their final resting place and enjoy my walks past them in all seasons.

Is this the luck of the Irish on display for me today or rather just a gold mylar balloon that somehow passed through the taller trees and ended it’s flight on our trail?

And on the way back to the house the ice pond is a gentle reminder that Old Man Winter has lost his battle with the newborn spring and is going down slowly.

On this day…

On this day in 1935 the first canned beer went on sale from a company called Krueger’s.

You can read about it here:  First Canned beer sales

I am not a beer drinker but do like my beer can chicken!!

It’s a family affair

Loading wood before the storm

Recently I read a fellow bloggers post explaining how to balance working full time and homesteading.  This is a question I hear often also.  How do you do it with work, school, sports, animals, gardening, property to upkeep, etc.?

Teamwork stacking

Homesteading is a choice in this day and age and the definition has changed over the years.  It used to be referred to as Pioneering (finding land, building your home, hunting, gardening, sewing, total self sufficiency).  Unless you live in the remotest areas of the world, that is no longer possible.  Even the remote areas are starting to lose their ability to stay “remote” and you are not able to hunt the food you need to survive because of laws.

So what does it mean today to be pioneering or homesteading?  Basically it’s a lifestyle choice trying to be as self sufficient as is allowed in this world, living simply, passing on the traditions of our ancestors to try and keep the history of our world relevant in today’s world.  This is where I created my tag line “Pioneer Living the New World Way”.

Pioneer living the new world way is actually a time balancing act.  It also includes sacrifice.  Sacrifice in the way of missing out on a friend gathering as the gardens need to be planted, weeded, land worked up, watered, trees moved off trails, fruit plants pruned and so on.  When you work full time these chores may take you into the late hours during the week but you do it because it’s the choice you made when you decided to homestead.  But the rewards of growing your own vegetables to carry you well into the winter months, canning your goods to provide your family food that is clean and simple with no chemicals, making food from scratch because it’s healthier and fresh, make every sacrifice worth it.

Because it’s no longer a necessity to live this way, you have to include the new world into your life.  Our ancestors did not have this fine line to walk to live their life.  Every homesteading family does this in their own way.  There are no books in history to help you figure out an equation of old world versus new world.  So each day you try to factor in what you can accomplish on your own contributing to your self sufficiency while enjoying all the conveniences available today.

Skies before the storm

Another huge factor in homesteading is if you have a spouse, they have to want to live that life also.  When I met the man of the house he was a hard working professional living in the city, driving a state of the art car, traveling, and enjoying the finer things in life.  I also was/am a hard working professional living in a 100+ year old farmhouse.  Together we made the choice to homestead, keeping my childhood house I was fixing up to sell for my parents, and building barns, gardens, trails, and fruit orchards.

Living the homesteading life in the new world way allows us to enjoy boating, traveling, sporting events, County Fairs, fabulous restaurants and many other luxuries while keeping up with farm work using modern machines (tractors, chain saws).

Storm rolling in and dad moving truck to shovel driveway

Today, watching my family work together load wood before a storm hit, I was smiling at them thinking how blessed and thankful I am to be living the life we are living and hoping they will choose this lifestyle when they have families.

All cozy in the house after chores when the storm rolled in

The Special Room

Since 1972 I have celebrated Christmas with a tree in this room.  The room has changed slightly over the years with a hardwood floor we put in, a bay window, new ceiling, and narrowing of the entrance, but the structure is the same.  I could not imagine a Christmas without this room.

This was in the early 1980’s with my siblings.  My dad always handed out the gifts while my mother directed him who it belonged to.

Our trees have always been decorated with many handmade ornaments.  As kids we painted wooden ornaments or made pasta ornaments in school to hang on our trees.  My children have carried on that tradition and most of the decorations on our tree are made by them and some from our friends and family.

This picture was from 1990 after my sister married and I had moved out.  That is my niece enjoying the tradition of my dad playing guitar with my mom singing Christmas carols in front of the tree.  This is how we celebrated Christmas every year until adulthood.

This room has a special place in my memory and I love that my children will have the memory of their childhood in this room with their special trees.

And the aftermath of opening their gifts just as I did

And at night when all is calm and everyone is asleep, I get to enjoy our beautiful tree with the simple ornaments in the special room filled with memories.

Little Red Farmhouse

This is our home. I took this picture last evening.  I love our house in the snow!!

Some people long for the big, modern, majestic homes, but I am not one of them.  I can drive through a modern neighborhood and not notice a single thing about a house.  I feel nothing.  Put me on a country road with 100+ year old homes and I can tell you the character I feel from each house.  These houses have a history, they are a part of a different time; a time I wish to have known.

We have kept the cedar shake shingles on our home as true to the country red it was when it was first painted.  I could never picture any other color on this house.  The red is a statement to me boasting of the farming homestead it was created for so long ago. (You can see pictures of updates to our home here:  Little Red House)

We planted a burm of blue spruce trees in front of our property.  When they are snow covered they make the house even more beautiful!  It’s like a Christmas card scene to me.

Here are some of the other pictures I took Thursday before the snow came and again last night while we were getting a nice dusting of snow.

We place 6 fake Christmas trees throughout the property and enjoy looking out at night at the sparkling lights in the open.  Thursday was the day to set them up as the ground was not frozen and the temperatures were moderate.  The night picture is 4 of the trees in the back.

And last night the snow came and the trees were beautifully lit.

We had a nice amount of snow falling throughout the day and night yesterday.  After barn chores were done, I decided to pay a visit to the cute little snow bunnies all cozy in their house for the night.

This is our home.

Generation to Generation

This picture speaks volumes to the lifestyle we are trying to lead and the traditions we hope to pass on.

During my childhood I spent time collecting wood and helping stack it for my family.  This is my daughter working with her 2nd cousin (my nephews son), Rohan.  Rohan is 3 and spends as much time as we can have him at our house.  He came over the other day and saw I had let the fire burn out as it was warmer outside and I wanted to clean the stove. We also needed to restock the wood storage on the porch from the woodshed.  The first thing he did after coming into the house was ask where the fire was. For all of his 3 little years he has become accustomed to the wood heat like the rest of us and it’s expected.  I told him I was cleaning the stove and we needed wood.

The tween queen said she would load the 4 -wheeler and start bringing up the wood.  She too has been doing this all of her childhood with us (helping her dad this fall stock the porch).

 

Rohan could not get his boots and coat back on fast enough!!  He knew exactly what needed to be done as he has helped in the process since he was old enough to walk and hold a small piece of wood.  So they set off to the woodshed

It was not long before they were back with the logs and kindling and Rohan was happily helping stock the porch.

The first load was finished

And after a few more loads a fire was started and the world was right again.

Someday he will share the stories of helping his cousins and great aunt and uncle at their farm!