Cedar Writes

Tag: stonycroft

  • One Piece at a Time

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    cedarlili
    in

    We are buidling a barn one piece at a time. Both in the sense of pieces of lumber, and bays of the barn. Eventually, the barn will be 50×12. maybe even 60×12. We are building it in 10×12 bays because that’s all we can afford at a time! The first bay, currently under construction, is…

  • Herb Garden

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    cedarlili
    in

    I have been wanting to put in a raised bed herb garden for a long time. This year I finally got the opportunity, partly because I’d been able to get 12 landscape timbers for free. Determining where I was going to build the bed was to longest part of the whole process, as I knew…

  • Planting the Garden and Distractions

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    cedarlili
    in ,

    I’ve been working on getting the garden planted. I had a ton of melon and squash starts to get in, finished those today. I planted cucumbers, golden and blue Hubbard squash, watermelon sugar baby, Melons Jenny Lind, Crenshaw, Sweet Granite, Pixie, Charentais, and one that Johann lost the label to. I put in butternut squash…

  • Gardening

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    cedarlili
    in

    Dad and I bought a contractor’s underlayment day before yesterday. 20’x100′ of black plastic, 6 mil thick. That was the foundation of my garden. Today I unrolled the plastic, realizing in the process that before today I had no concept of how long 100′ really is. I used the area the pigs have been “tractoring”…

  • Bees and Bunnies

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    by

    cedarlili
    in

    Because it is still rainy – although not cool, at the moment it’s like a sauna out there! I have been feeding the bees sugar water. We use quail waterers to give the hives a solution of one-to-one sugar and water. I did notice that the bees were flying today, which is a good thing,…

  • The Villain of the Piece

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    cedarlili
    in

    Black bears may look fluffy and cuddly, but they are still wild animals. They can move much faster than you would think, and are amazingly powerful. The bear in the pictures is a second year cub that has been appearing regularly at my grandparent’s bird feeders since his mother brought him as a bouncing ball…

  • Planting trees

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    cedarlili
    in

    This week I have been planting a lot of things. Yesterday it was raining and I was hurting, so I didn’t do much. Dad and Uncle Mike came down and walked around the garden and farm with Mica and I. Uncle Mike hasn’t seen it in years, as he lives in Wisconsin and visits rarely.…

  • Fast Food and Hard Labor

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    cedarlili
    in ,

    It’s been a busy day. I’d intended to make dinner and put it in the crockpot this morning and slept in instead, so I left for work without doing it. And then I found a craigslist offer of free railroad ties and set it up to pick them up after work. And finally, my other…

  • Happenings on and Off the Farm

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    cedarlili
    in

    It’s been a while since I updated, because my attention was elsewhere. Life here goes on, chores have to be done and spring sweeps onward too quickly. But my father, the Farmer, went in to have a kidney removed this last week, and that held my attention much more than the farm. He won’t be…

  • Popovers and Chicks

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    cedarlili
    in

    My popovers didn’t “pop” but they still tasted awesome, especially with the blueberry jam that we put up last summer on it. I think next time I will use a metal pan, the silicone muffin tins didn’t work well for this! The little golden ones are Golden-Pencilled Hamburgs, and the black and white ones are…

  • Pig Tractor

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    cedarlili
    in ,

    We have about an acre of land we’d like to regain from having gone fallow for almost ten years. And, this being New Hampshire, we have rocks. Lots of big, hidden rocks. So hiring a guy to come on in and till isn’t really an option. That, and we are veering toward a no-till, low-till…

  • Spring Floods

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    cedarlili
    in

    Every spring the rains come, and the snow melts, and the low places flood and the brooks and streams rise… It was amazing to see it this week as the waters rose by 18 inches literally overnight. The other phenomenon I saw was the midday fog that comes over the snow on a warm spring…