Around the house

I just thought I would post some pictures from around the house today. We have nearly 18" of snow on the ground. I've been trying to figure out how to deal with the ice dams and related water problems. As you can see the green house is buried and all looks frozen but looks can be deceiving. Under that snow and ice is our winter garden.

(sorry about the flash) Inside our green house we have row covers (left over plastic from the greenhouse) and those two layers of plastic have kept our lettuce protected. I know you cannot tell, but those droplets on the top of the plastic are not frozen and we use no source of heat. These pictures were taken yesterday morning at 20 degrees F. Today Kristi picked us a wonderful salad to go along with our dinner. The ideas and plans for this green house are taken from the books "Four Season Harvest" and "The Winter Harvest Handbook" by Eliott Coleman.

In an upstairs window Kristi has started the first of our garden's seedlings. They are mostly different herbs and some flowers. We are trying to grow all of our own veggies for the year and have a 6000 sqft garden planned. Besides the garden, we are going to try our hand at maple syrup again this year. We will try to get 10 gallons of finished syrup. That will require 400 gallons of sap to be boiled down! More on that later though.

The kids have been outside every day playing until they are so tired staying awake can be a problem in the evenings. The bushes heavy with snow have become favorite hiding places and the large piles of snow, forts to be defended. The snow has been too powdery to build anything but the world is a whole new adventure when the snow is above your knees. The kids are not the only one having fun, Bree runs and runs the whole time she is outside. Her fur becomes matted with snow and when she comes inside she leaves a puddle on the floor wherever she lays down.

This weekend is the boys big award banquet for scouts--the "Blue and Gold". Noah will get his WEBLOS badge and several achievement pins and Luke his Bobcat patch and several achievement belt loops. Look for our next posting to see pictures of the boys.

Thanks for checking in! I'll do my best to keep this up to date with new post of current activities. Josh