Red Dirt Farm and Studio

 

*************Snow Snow Snow!****************

I’ve been on the fence about a LOT of stuff lately.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It came down, seemingly unending.  White and heavy, we surpassed the 3-6″ forecast, pretty quickly.  When it ended we had a good foot or more of snow.

It was such a lovely day, with the winter world beyond the windows.  We were cozy in the house with old movies on TV, tripod cat, the dogs, and the house chickens, Sassy and Poppie cuddled in our laps.  Snowball opted out of the photo shoot for the first time in her life.  The house chickens – what we haven’t talked about them yet?  That’s a story for another day.  A good story.

The power remained on, except for one brief outing during the night.  I got a pork roast out of the freezer ahead of the storm in anticipation that the power might go out.  The plan, to smoke it, which we did and oh it was yummy.  Nope, not the first photo, one because we gobbled it up all week and two because my old shoulder neck injury has reared its ugly head again, and I’m having trouble holding my camera so not so many photos these days.

 

A neighbor from down the road came and plowed our driveway.  Oh, thank you, so very much!

 Another neighbor came up and offered to help us clean up down at the farm stand.

We lost it – the stand collapsed under the weight of the snow.  We aren’t surprised, after having those tents up for three years they didn’t have much life left in them.  Still, the timing isn’t great, with both Mr. Cottage and I not at our physical best, the clean up will have to wait for a bit.

Back in the spring, we acquired Pearl – a vintage horse trailer.  It was my vision to trick out this trailer and make it our farm stand.  Lack of money, time and energy to move forward with the project has left Pearl parked up at the house, waiting. And, if I may be honest, this is one of the biggest things I’ve been on the fence about, these past several months.

  Closing down the farm stand permanently and ending our farming days.  It has been in my thoughts daily for quite a long time, there is a lot do it, and I’m not really going to go into all of it.  I think I’m just tired.  Really, physically and mentally tired, where everything just seems such an effort.  When the tents collapsed, I thought for certain it was a sign, this is the time to close everything down.

  But, instead, I set up a temporary stand in the trailer where it is parked until we can clean up the other stuff.  Funny thing, I doubt I’ll have any customers.  Three winters ago, I left a cooler of eggs on the front porch worried that the tents wouldn’t hold up in the snow, but people didn’t feel comfortable coming to the house and buying their eggs.  People are funny – I’ve not had any customers this week, which is not normal.  Go figure.

 

Goats and soap making, that’s been on my mind a long time too, this idea was only fueled A few years ago when Stampington (publication) came out with a new magazine (Willow and Sage) dedicated to soap making and other body care products.  I fell completely head over heels in love with the beautiful photography and a specific article about one of the soap makers who had goats.  Oh my, my wheels started spinning and I just HAD to have goats, so that I could make goat milk soap.  Oh and cheese, I’ve long wanted a cow to make my own cheese.  Mr. Cottage firmly planted his feet and said there would be no cow and no goats.  HMMM.  How to get around this?  I’m still working on that.

I’m thinking though, moving forward into the new year and new projects and getting my but off the fence and doing some of these things I’ve been thinking about.

 

Thanks for stopping in today.

xo, Kim