Friday, September 28, 2007

Rainy season is upon us!

I wonder what Stella thinks of her prettied-up little barn...She sure did her share of taste-testing the wet paint! Not much left to do but get the 2nd coat finished and add gutters. And not a moment too soon, as it seems we won't get an Indian summer after all. A wet & wild storm front is forecast to move in this weekend, and my weather sense tells me this is it for summer.
Not much exciting going on at Seven Trees. Just the nitty gritty of winter prep and buttoning up the garden. We are looking forward to sitting down with the current year's garden list and evaluating what worked and what didn't. With the climate being so variable these days, only the real survivors are going to get garden space next season.
We'll be doing fun things this weekend like putting away the rain barrels, picking all the veggies that won't get any riper in the cold, rounding up the outdoor furniture, covering under-house vents, checking the heat lamps & timers for the chicken coop, and so on. The peppers are still mostly green, and the plastic tent I put over them is only helpful if we have enough sun. So they will all be picked and dried. The last of the dry beans will have to finish drying on the hearth. I usually pull the vines to hang in the greenhouse for drying, but now it's just too damp and they start mildewing. So our woodstove is surrounded by trays of beans. Same with herbs. The beets will get pulled and stored, a few late onions too.
We do have a nice German Alt beer bubbling away, but it won't be ready for a month or so. And we'll be starting the pumpkin porter this weekend.

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