Seasons change

Vermont snow. Here we go: November, December, January, February, March, and April. 180 days give or take.  180 days to feed out your herd or flock.  Now off pasture,  hay and sometimes grain is the feed for the the next few months. This is how I used to view the season.  In days of bucking hay. The winter is based on when the animals are off pasture and when they head back out.

I am missing the flock.  Shelby over at Green Top Farm said that  a set of lambs was dropped this week, not the merinos but  the polypays.  She said that she would call me when the merinos are about to drop.  I am most concerned with Tiny, who had a c-section last year due to ketosis.  She was not supposed to be bred, but Moses got to her.  Little black lambies in winter.  I love that. I haven’t seen the merinos for a couple of months now.

Thanksgiving is next week and I have ordered three birds from Winding Brook Farm just down the road.  One for the dinner and one for the freezer.  I think I might send one over to Sue and Judith’s.  Judith is not fond of leftover turkey, but  Sue can dress it up in tons of different ways.

Yesterday I was speaking with a staffer at work.  She was a bit bummed that funds for wellness are limited or non-existent.  The general feeling at work, and almost everywhere is that money is tight.  And folks seem to be girding up for a tough winter.  Sue and Judith are feeling a bit anxious with the onset of winter too.  Fixed incomes and higher costs mean cutting back all over the place.

The Stowe Community Church is also looking towards tight times and is conducting a new member drive.  I have been attending that church for 7 years without yielding to the call to join as a member.  My Unitarian roots are deep and simply don’t want to be dragged into anymore committee positions.  Church is  one place that I choose to be free about.  No stings attached. Come and meet GOD on your own.  I have supported the Church with tithing pretty regularly, but I am going to make a small change.

Turkey to neighbors, maybe even a roast beast ever once in a while.  Lamb too.   I think that while I have so very much, sharing my abundance with those that could use it is the way to go.

So here is the challenge to my readers.   Don’t make a big deal about it, but if you can give, locally.  Then do.

no place like home

Home from Kansas and glad about it.  These windmills are HUGE.  Taller then a football field is long and the blades travel at 200 mph at the tips.  Way out in the Flint Hills they are magnificent.  With the wind blowing across the plains the air is steady, much like the ocean breezes on the coast of New England.  The mills make a soft sound, like waves, until you are right up under one of them. Then you can hear distinct sounds unique to each one. I thought I heard the call of a hawk, but it turned out to be one of the windmills.

Now home there are some treats.  Green Top Market has just opened up in the old Morristown Corners Store.  Green Top is the farm that has my former flock and they have done a terrific job with the Market.

Best selection of meat around with fresh local lamb at $5.99 a pound.   ( About a $4.00 difference then at the supermarket, no joke. ) Also, there are pastries, local cheeses, Elmore Mt. Bread, Pete’s Greens, and good coffee.  ’bout time too.  Morristown corner store has been known to have the coldest beer coolers in the county.  The new owners kept the coolers.  Wise choice.

This weekend was the beginning of deer season, with a rifle.  You can hunt  from a little bit before dawn to a half hour past sunset.  Going to the local general store mid day to meet up, or catch up is the scene.   If you are hunting on your own land, you don’t need a license.  That is what Bub tells me.

His dad called around 3 in the afternoon on Saturday to tell us that he had bagged his buck already.  An 8 point 170 pounds.  He called again today to tell us that the meat smells sweet, meaning that the buck was young.  He went with Uncle Dicky and were heading back to the house to warm up, when he came down the hill to the truck and saw the deer.   The buck ran toward the tailgate of the truck after it was hit and dropped just shy, making it a bit easier on the old fuddy duddies.  I will hear this story at least 10 more times before the end of Thanksgiving dinner. I bet that by the time pie comes around, the buck would have jumped right into the back of the truck.

Bub is scouting our land and is hoping see a viable hit.  I have only seen itty bitty spike horns, does and fawns.  Good luck to ya.

On the way back from Wichita, I had the good fortune to sit with a young dairy farmer.  He has a average size farm of 120 milking that he operates with his father over in Farrisburg.  He milks 2x a day, 7 days a week and takes 5 days off a year.  He hunts.   There was a 11 point buck, field dressed and frozen traveling back with us, bagged in North Dakota.

Yup.  It is good to be home.  Kansas is nice and the people are friendly, but there is no place like home.

Wichita

Day 1:

It has been raining here in Wichita, so going out to explore is limited.   I did head out earlier today to a quick stop to pick up cereal cups, yogurt and milk.   The breakfasts here are pretty steep, $5.95 for a bowl of oatmeal and $3.50 for a starbucks. 

I am out here for the Natioanl Argability Workshop this week.  The project’s goal is to assist farmers with diabilities to continue to farm.  There are 22 states that have Argability projects, so a vast group of folks from all over the country.  Tonight was the welcome dinner wth our guest speaker Dr. Temple Grandin, a noted animal behaviorist . www.templegrandin.com   She has to be one of the funniest speakers I have heard.  A real treat.

Day 2: Still raining early, but it seems that it is clearing up.

Here is what is up for today:

8:30 Livestock Behavior, presenter Temple Grandin. 

10:00 Introduction to new National Agrability Project Team,

12:00 Lunch with USDA Project Leader.

then it gets interesting..  there are only 30 spots on the Livestock Handling at the Wichita farm Show trip.  I am the first on the waiting list, and so far, no one had dropped off, so I am going to hang by the bus and hope someone is late.    If I can’t make the farm show, then I will do Assistive Technology to Reduce Slips, Trips, Bumps and Falls.  whooo-hooo.

Dinner on our own.   

I lost a knitting needle on the plane. There is a big surprize.  But I found a knitting store, called TWIST  I might try and escape the workshop and get there today to pick up a “few things” he he he.

Day 3:  I didn’t make the bus for the farm show, and I couldn’t say inside after a lonnnnnnnng speaker lunch, so I headed out to the yarn store and found a really wonderful yarn haven full of beautiful yarns and really nice people.  

 Afer my little outting I was able to head back inside for a while and settle back down in workshop sessions.  Dinner was in the hotel with my room mate and early to bed. 

Day 4:  JOHN DEERE TRAINING CENTER.  ( need I say more)

We had such a great time.  Classes and focus groups back in the hotel for the second half of the day.  Dinner with a great bunch of folks in a pricy steakhouse.  George, my boss picked up my tab, which was a good thing given I had tenderloin.   Lousy sleep.  I am hoteled out and can’t wait to head home.  Today is all field trips out and about.  ARGO manufacturing plant: Massey Ferguson , TerraGator, ect. this morning and Elk River Wind Farm & 4L Ranch this afternoon.  Bus leaves at 7:45 Kansas time.  I have been up since 4:00 ugh.

I hope it is good.

Daily blog

“Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets, so love the people who treat you right, forget about the ones that don’t, and believe that everything happens for a reason.. If you get a chance, take it. If it changes your life, let it. Nobody said life would be easy, they just promised it would be worth it.” Harvey Mackay

Lili sent this to me today and what a great way to see the world.   Today’s new blog is a new page called Dyslexia, up on the top bar.  I was poked about my spelling by a reader the other day, so I put out the page as a constant reminder on the blog.

Lili is the best speller I know, and the page is dedicated to her and to my daughter Emilie, who is also dyslexic.  go tookie go.  Lulu, also my daugter is not dyslexic.  Their father is.  His parents are not, nor were mine, however my Grandmother was and so is my sister.  Go figure.

So enjoy the day and check out the new page.

Out of the Box

I couldn’t stay up long enough to hear his speech, but I bet it was good.  Vermont was the first state to report 3 electoral votes for our new President Barack Obama.  Not surprising.  This state is very liberal and Vermont republicans are basically everyone else’s democrat.   That doesn’t bother us because we tend to be ticket splitters here.  We vote for the person over the party most of the time and very rarely do Vermonters vote a straight party line ticket.

I voted when I was able by absentee ballot, thinking I would be away this week. I was not alone.  Monday night I heard that over 800 ballots had been turned in already.   We have a voting base just around 3200, and generally you can expect about 1/3 of the population to vote in any given election.  However, yesterday was historic. It will be interesting to see what the actual turnout was.

My daughter voted for the first time.  I think She is the fifth generation of women voters in my family.  My great grandmother was perhaps the first women to vote in my line.  I remember going to the poles with my grandmother as a child and my mother has never missed an election.  Neither have I.  I hope Emilie  and soon Elizabeth follows the trend.

It irritates me that some folks just don’t care to take the time to vote.  The cashier at the market told me that she did not register in time.  How to you miss a fixed date?  She had a good long time to register and simply didn’t take the time to sign up.  UGH.   If you don’t vote, then you really shouldn’t complain, should you.

When president George Bush was elected, much of the country felt as if the election had been stolen.  Sour grapes that followed him though out his presidency.  He was never able to beat that wrap and was highly unpopular.  It amazed me that he got in a second time with all of the negative buzz.

This election was a tough choice.  I consider myself a moderate republican and was not too impressed with McCain at the primary.  Then I lost interest in Obama in the debates.   I voted early, then changed my mind again.  If I had voted yesterday, I don’t know who I would have picked.

I felt that in this election, it was really important that Americans were excited about the candidate. People certainly are with Obama.   If McCain had won, then folks would have had sour grapes and I doubt that he would have gotten any traction to get things done.

Both men were qualified, and although I didn’t vote for Obama, he is now my President and I wish him well.

My friend Jo Anne was in Washington DC earlier this year.  I collect bobble heads and she called me asking which one I wanted, McCain or Obama.  I wanted a Palin one, but there weren’t any, so I asked her to pick for me.  I got a Barack bobble head and have left him in the packaging.

Now with the election over, it is time to take Barack out of the box.