It’s crunchy outside. There is a layer of ice, then slush, then ice and then snow. More photos of the ice are on Flickr to the right.

I heard back from a vineyard/nursery. They say they still have some Foch left. We are thinking of starting with just 50 vines. Hope that’s a good plan.

Found this Surge milking equipment in the barn. Was very dirty. Don’t want to specify what I found inside and encrusted on the various pieces. Spent a fair amount of time cleaning it up. People are selling this stuff on ebay. I don’t yet have any idea what we could get out of it. It looks cool but takes up a lot of space. If we kept it I don’t know where we’d put it. But it is a relic from the old dairy farm. Alan found a slab of concrete in the barn with the date of 1912 scratched into it. That’s old for these parts.

The lights are up. They are festive and yes, they are a little lame. Oh, I had all kinds of great plans. I even started creating the frame for a giant wreath. It was going to be awesome. A rope system was devised to hoist the giant wreath near the top of the barn. But it was too cold. I was too cold. And I didn’t have enough rope. And the structure was too rough — parts held together with duct tape. So, I settled for something much easier. Happy holidays. Next year will be even happier.

…tuppence a bag. Counting for inflation, and converting to US Dollars, how much is a tuppence worth today? That’s what goes through my mind as I watch the activity around the muffin pan this morning. Now, if only we could find our bird book. I know that’s a blue jay, and according to google images the other is a red-bellied woodpecker. But there are others I need to learn.

Here’s a photo of the house with the old shutters repainted and reattached. Makes it look cute and cottagy. You would never know from this photo that there is a wild and crazy planting of roses, hollyhocks, cleomes, annuals and perennials in various shades of pink, red, purple and blue that obscure the bottom half of the house in summer.

With the winter setting in, it’s a great time to return to all those half-finished jobs around the house. Like window trim. Nothing too fancy. Just some aspen cut at 45 degrees with the miter saw. Don’t look too close, or you will see the imperfections. Perfection is for losers.

Next steps: sand them lightly and stain ‘em.

This is another one of those posts that shows how dedicated and insane Anne has become. But in a good way. Last thursday, she drove to Marshalltown and bought a pickup truck load of compost. The city sells this for about $30 a load. Good price for rich compost.

She managed to unload a good portion on Thursday in an area next to the old chicken coop that we are preparing for a winter sowing of poppies, shasta daisies and blue cornflowers and maybe some other good winter seeders.  Cleverly, she parked the truck in the barn that evening to keep the compost from freezing.

Saturday, the entire state of Iowa was watching for a massive ice/snow/winter storm. But nothing other than cold wind was really happening at 7:30am. So, Anne rushed outside to unload more compost in the biting gales. The ice started to fall about 8am and didn’t really stop all day. Anne came back inside around 8:20am. Awesome job, Anne!

In the evening, the news reported several thousands of households in Iowa were without power, but we were thankfully unaffected. Phew!

Pictured are young cabbage plants that have sprouted in rather cold temps from stalks that previously produced substantially-sized cabbage heads. The green cabbages sprouted from a stalk thrown into our compost that rooted laterally. I stuck the purple cabbage in the front flower bed since it’s so ornamental and just let the heads rot because we had way too much cabbage in the veggie garden. One of the heads split and instead of rotting like the others produced a kale-like rosette (not pictured). The constant change and surprises are what I love so much about gardening.

Hope everyone’s Thanksgiving is super yummy and tons-o-fun! Here is a little picture challenge for you. There are 23 wild turkeys in the neighbors field. Circle all the turkeys you see on your computer screen. It works best if you use a sharpie or a crayon. Happy hunting. Gobble-gobble-gobble!

I was walking around the hillside again. With all the grasses and weeds drying up there are places we couldn’t reach in the Summer that are accessible once again.

We have heard and seen quite a few pheasants in these tall grasses. Heard more than seen. There have also been plenty of hunters in the hills lately. Jake doesn’t like the noise, but he hasn’t taken to slinking off the way he used to. Now he just makes his way to the porch or under a car or nussles up if we are crouched near the ground planting or pulling weeds or working on the mower. Seems like we are crouching near the ground quite a bit.