Stonehouse Journalings, The First

We had our first snow yesterday. In other words, winter is almost upon us. I commented to Jolynn while we were loading our groceries that the Walmart parking lot is the coldest place on earth! (I should have written about the little blizzard that happened in Hayward yesterday morning and the five or six fender benders that ensued, but it’s not in my journal.)

It had started to flurry on our way home from the cabin as we passed Solon Springs Monday evening. Solon Springs is our snowy place. Evidently, it is poised in the perfect spot to catch any and all “lake effect” snowing. So flurries on the 30th of October are to be expected.

Anyway, yesterday’s snow changed our fall into winter. I felt triumphant though, because the boys had showed up to blow away the last of the oak leaves the evening before. All things happening in proper order gives a certain satisfaction to my mind. I’m ready for anything now.

Well, almost ready. The garden needs to be mowed and tilled under, the tiller stored for the season, and four potted plants need to come down from their hooks and be emptied-the pots cleaned and tucked away.

Oh, and our firewood is still out there somewhere. We made sure of our firewood last spring, and have waited all summer for it to be hauled to our own back yard as had been arranged. Thankfully we can keep warm with the gas furnace, but there’s nothing as toasty and ambient and cheap as hardwood firewood for our stove. When the load comes; it will warm us twice, for sure.

It came today. Jesse’s log truck pulled in with a beautiful pile of dry hardwood logs. Such a lovely heap it is-not big wood either, so that Elv and I can work together at the cutting, splitting, and stacking of it.

We, the girls and I, processed 3 1/2 bushels of apples from Miller’s orchard into applesauce today. Both varieties we had were crisp and so sweet that we used no added sugar whatsoever. For mine, there are 34 yellow pints of sauce being water bathed this evening.

My sister, April, bought Mary Jane’s Farm magazine for me for my birthday this fall- a year’s subscription. The first one came today during our apple-ing. Right now it is on top the china closet calling to me very loudly, but I’m not going to cave in. I’m holding out to do my piece of writing for today as per Shilah’s little writing challenge for the month of November. This is the first of hopefully daily posts. I have christened them The Stonehouse Journalings, because that’s what I do write everyday. I use a blue BIC pen and a leather bound book for journaling, so for this month I will need to transfer the entry to my blog with the laptop. My phone’s hotspot has to connect my device to the “interwebs” . It’s a three step process, but I’m gonna try. Mary Jane’s Farm will have to wait for a few more minutes.