It’s so frosty this morning, it looks like it snowed. The eastern sun is slanting through the grass, and everything is very sparkly and crystalline. The cookstove feels especially delicious on a morning like this. DH just dragged the girls out of bed (they’d prefer to sleep until noon) with promises of hot chocolate, and now they’re huddled around the stove with sleepy eyes, clutching their mugs.

I spent yesterday rearranging furniture, which I do a whole lot of these days. The newly removed wall has created all sorts of logistical difficulties, such as where do you put the furniture? It really feels so much more bright and open in here, but DH is going to have to put in some shelves and cabinets of some kind, or we are going to be living out of cardboard boxes forever. Especially when the wall between the dining room and the living room comes out.

The sheep seem very content. We can let them out of the barn, and they go graze for a while and then put themselves back in the barn (remember, we have no fences!). I don’t think the goats have been content yet—contentment doesn’t seem to be in their range of emotions. It’s very nice to bring home a laid back animal!

The girls made some colorful felt beads and have been felting them into the ewes’ long forelock dreds. Hippy sheep, they call them, and they mean it as a compliment.

We are planning a fence-raising the second weekend of November, which will be the 13th—-a Sunday. We’re going to fence the pasture, and then eat, drink, and be merry. I think my dad may be manning the grill, and I’m hoping to get some of the local musicians to bring instruments. We’ll be gearing up in the morning—8:00? 9:00?—and going as late as anybody can stand it. If you’re not into the fencing aspect of things, but would like to come, you can be on the food committee! So y’all come, and remember to bring your PHD’s!

Found this at was it the pagan remark?

This Is My Life, Rated
Life:	6.9
Mind:	6.2
Body:	5.9
Spirit:	7.2
Friends/Family:	7.8
Love:	9.1
Finance:	3.4
Take the Rate My Life Quiz

Tending my poison ivy has taken up a lot of time and energy; however, there has been a lot going on that I just haven’t had time to post about!

Sunday we attended one of our favorite annual events: SAFF, or as we call it, the fiber fair. We thoroughly enjoyed checking out all the vendors, and getting some pointers in rug hooking and needle felting. But our family’s favorite part of the fair is the livestock barns. And once again we ended up driving home with a Subaru-load of animals. This time it was two big, gorgeous Cotswold ewes, both pregnant (well, one is for sure, the other is probably). They are so mellow and tame after our Shetlands! They really are pretty darn big, but the girls can lead them around with no problem—-if they were as crazy as the Shetlands we’d never stand a chance of moving them! Their wool is lovely, somewhat coarse, and falling in ringlets down their backs. The breeder suggested shearing them in December, which will be fun, as our friend and neighbor C* bought a spinning wheel at the fair.

So they’re living in the barn aisle for now , until we can get a stall cleaned out for them. Which should maybe be soonish, since one of the ewes is making a bag, which, according to the breeder, means she could go within the month. Lambs! How exciting!

The other big news is that DH has torn out the wall between the kitchen and the dining room (used to be the second bedroom) , making the house feel so much bigger and more open. Next is the wall between the living room and dining room. This is making it easier to heat with just the cookstove, and we got to test that with two dark, rainy, sleety, and snow flurrying days; they’re calling for more of the same tomorrow night and Wednesday.

What an idiot. Thursday I set out to do one thing, and as is typical of me, ended up doing something entirely different. I started out digging the bed for the strawberries, but ended up renovating the three old blueberry bushes that are next to the woodshed. The grass and weeds had grown all up in them, and they really didn’t bear very well this year. So ED and I pulled grass and a lot of strange, slightly hairy vines, and then gave them a good sprinkle of Holly Tone, and finally mulched them with half-rotted wood chips. Well, at some point during the pulling of the strange hairy vines, ED said, “Mom? Is this poison ivy?” We established that yes, indeed, it was. But I wasn’t terribly worried, as I’ve never really gotten poison ivy.

When we were done with that very satisfying job we each jumped in the shower and scrubbed with Bert’s Bees PI soap. I scrubbed really well, even using a scrub brush, and used some alcohol on my face.

Nevertheless, the next morning I started itching.

This morning, my right eye was swollen shut when I got up, my wrists are fat, red, and blistered, and it’s between my fingers! Actually, it’s everywhere, and I do mean everywhere, though I swear I was wearing clothes!

The only thing that really seems to be helping is running the itchy part under scalding hot water: both agonizing and delicious, and no itching for hours afterward.

The weather has taken a turn for the mild again; it’s so lovely this morning. I have the wood cookstove going (as we are out of propane, which I need to pick up this morning), and the window in the kitchen open. It’s kind of a nice combination, sort of like the people in hot climates who turn the AC colder so they can have a fire in the fireplace. Sort of like that, but not exactly.

Mousie is hale and hearty. I’ve gotten very attached to her, which is bad. We’ve had some close calls, and I really don’t want to cry over a field mouse! She is so cute—when I get up in the morning she’s so excited to see me, and she rolls over in my hand so I can scratch her very little belly and her even smaller chin, and she yawns and washes her face. A friend gave us some pictures that she took of ED and Mousie—I’m going to try to figure out a way to get them on here.

The Subaru is finally out of the shop—I’m a free woman again! In celebration I think I’ll go do a load of laundry. The best news, though, is that the mechanic has decided that I’m not the number one most annoying person he’s ever met—a great relief. I may be at number eleven or so.

On today’s list is digging a bed for the hundred strawberry plants that the D*’s so generously sent our way. I hope to pick up a few buckets of the very well composted goat manure that’s in a pile up at the old house this evening, and then tomorrow I can plant! I could also stand to dig up my garlic and get it back in the ground. Somebody remind me to take a shovel with me this evening…

DH was loading the woodbox, and I was making a pot of chicken and dumplings on the wood cookstove; the girls were playing with Mousie; and Buddy Holly’s Dearest—such a tender song!–was playing on the cd player, when ED pointed out the window to two whitetail does making their way elegantly up the hill against the blazing evening sky.

Yesterday the girls and I cleaned up out at the barn. I love working in the barn—love, love, love it. It’s my barn! I want to pat it and say sweet things to it, like it’s some great, hulking, gentle creature.

The barn was full of junk and firewood, and little by little we’re getting it all cleared out of there, so it’s feeling more open and gracious and welcoming and sheltering.

DH killed two of the three remaining (over a year old) meat chickens this morning. We couldn’t catch the last one. Usually they’re not our smartest chickens (and that’s saying something!), and are very easy to catch, especially with a handful of corn (or anything that looks like corn), but this gal has been living out in the woods, eating pokeberries, as is obvious by her bright purple rearend. She is a little smaller than the two we caught (who were both the size of small turkeys); I guess I’ll have to catch her at night

So I plucked the two hens, and they’re cooling in water right now. I’ll eviscerate them later when they’re all cooled, and them refrigerate them for a day or two before cooking or freezing.

We received in the mail the Oxford American’s music issue a few days ago, and the cd that comes with it, and the girls are crazy about it. Right now they’re memorizing Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb by The Pilgrim Travelers, which I can tell is about to lead to a history lesson. I’m already narrowing down the Christmas cd’s—The DeZurik Sisters for Bernard, and Dale Hawkins or Johnnie Lee Wills for ED.

Tomorrow is the Fall Festival at an elementary school in Asheville, put on by our friend DN. If we can figure out transportation (the car’s stil in the shop) we’re going to go letthe kids grind corn with a hand grinder, and pet some goats, and check out some teeny bantam chickens (though not as teeny as FC’s little baby bantams!).

So, not a whole lot going on, but I wouldn’t want y’all to miss a minute of it!