Whereas the winter time is a more hunker-down and hibernate sort of season in Maine, spring and summer usher in the more social season in Maine--prompting most people out to do what I refer to as 'toodling'--or just toodlin' for short. This could either be toodlin' around town or in antique shops or in the garden or out on the lakes or down by the sea shore or at the plethora of fairs and festivals that start cranking up in earnest--which, by the way, Small Farm Field Day will be this Sat.--woohoo!
Needless to say, we've been out doin' our fair share of toodlin' around ourselves over the past week or so. We were over with Jennifer and her family lendin' a hand with the major renovation of their new house. As we 3 women (Jen, her mom, and I) scraped 5 inches of multitudinous layers of embedded wallpaper off the kitchen walls, we just chit-chatted and girl-talked up a storm--and still managed to get alot done! While the men folk, far removed from the chit-chat realm, hoisted out old carpet and scoped out the plumbing problems--along with other very inhospitable projects.
We've also been toodlin' over to our land, and got it all burned--finally--the GRASS that is! And have also managed to get the final lifting pole up and 3 logs on in just the past couple of weeks--YAY!! I told you, my husband's gonna pulley-rig this thing to fruition--just stand back--he's on the loose!
We just got our tax return yesterday and have enough to get all the timbers for the roof, so we were out toodlin' around looking at logs--there happen to be lots of those up here! All I have to say is--bring on the thermal mass, baby!
From our land, we toodled on over to our friend's place to see all their springtime activity. Karyn has created this wonderful idea of a kitchen-like garden in a series of raised beds--right outside the door. She's been rather stumped as to how to get more green in this area to grow--so she hit upon the notion of raised beds--I say perfect solution! I can't wait to see these once they're all filled in with luscious vegetables and berries!
They also plan to build up a low stone wall against the house to use as a bed for tomatoes. This little family is full-tilt, full-steam-ahead with this whole homestead thing and have so many wonderful ideas and ventures they're tackling with their 40 acres along the lake. Just sit tight 'cause I'll be sharing a whole lot more of what these modern homesteaders are up to very soon!