Home on the Hill

Chop Wood Carry Water , the title of a spiritual book I read some time ago that stressed simplicity. But we use a lot of wood and that's a lot of chopping so we went out and bought an electric wood splitter. Woo Hoo! It was just a little 4 ton capacity one, but it's not having any trouble reducing the big 14 and 16 inch pine rounds we have to fire and furnace wood. It handles anything up to about 20 inches long, which is good for our furnace. We could use two foot rounds but they get quite heavy when they are off the 16 inch butt of a house building log. A fellow was commenting to me that if the wood's good it's just as quick to chop it with a maul. Maybe. And if you have a lot more energy than I do. I came home the other day and Jo had cut up half a cord of wood for the shop. And she sure can't handle the large splitting maul, or wedge and sledge hammer. Anyway it's sure made splitting the wood a lot easier. And we have another three or four cords to sp...

Actually I think fall happened around mid August with the day time temperatures of around 10c. Night time now its falling to 4c, with reports of frost in the valley a couple of days ago. The fall colours start at the ground level with the rose and berry bushes turning yellow. The grass in the fields is losing it's summertime green and starting to brown up. The hummingbirds are gone and we see ducks and geese using Pond, James Pond as a stop over. The Sandhill cranes are still here. I think they are late stayers. We have seen a lot of coyotes fattening up on grasshoppers and field mice and Saskatoon berry bear poop is all over our roads and paths. Mushrooms are every where, all different sizes and shapes. Jo-Ann has been taking some great pictures of them with her digital camera. Were putting away the winter's wood. I am going to go up to the Pond where we have about 30 acres of now bug-killed pine that is pretty much perfectly dried out and try a trailer load or so this winter....