sap moon :: a journal of days

3.1.17

The redwing blackbirds have been in the treetops for about a week now. I hear them: “Cup O’ TEA!, Cup O’ TEA!” - and it makes me smile outwardly. These seasonal gifts never cease to lift my spirits and bring a big smile to my face.

I talked to a very nice woman about Longwool Sheep. We will go and see her this week just to have a look, buy some roving, and talk.  

Plans are also being discussed for a pole barn in the back. Although making any change to the landscape is a tough decision - we do need a sturdy barn for hay, supplies and animals! 

It feels so good to be moving forward!

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3.2.17

Windy last night! The whole house was shaking - woke up to snow, but no trees down.

March is such a strange month - winter or spring depending on the day, and you never know what you’re going to get!

Roosters are fighting and poor Papa has been beaten. He stayed away from the flock all day yesterday and slept on a pile of hay in the corner of the coop. It’s not looking good for him. He has been with us a long time, and has always been a loyal protector. 

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3.3.17

Moving into and through this month of self-doubt and gloominess. The only way out is through. Also remembering words of wisdom from “The Artist’s Way”:: “There are always moments of rest, or even moving backward, from forward progression toward a goal.”  I feel the need to just let my intentions rest for the moment and stop striving.

A haze of worry rests over me - & I’m a little perplexed as to why it’s there? Fear for the state of the union? Fear for the planet and living things? Missing the mothering of my children? Dealing with the inevitable loss of a dear rooster? 

Or maybe it’s just March.

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3.4.17

Very cold. Papa Rooster left the coop yesterday on a frigid cold, blustery, and snowy day. We assume he’s gone, he never returned. 

Joy and sadness do walk hand in hand on this farm. My heart thanks him and appreciates him. I don’t think roosters care too much about those things. But it feels right to pay my respects.

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3.5.17

Papa is alive! 

I heard his majestic crow coming from the back fields after feeding the other chickens. He is badly frostbitten and is missing an eye, but he heartily ate the food I put out for him and stayed out in the sun all day long. 

At dusk, Tim lured him into a big cage and brought him back to the coop where he could rest under the heat lamp with food and water. I will make him molasses oatmeal today, and give him time to heal.

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3.10.17

Snow has been falling again - keep moving forward, keep moving forward toward plans with heart engaged.

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3.13.17

Grateful for my practice, the crows, the wind and the sun.

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3.15.17

Nor-Easter bringing wind and temps in the 20’s. We hunkered down and I did some spinning and felting in the studio. 

The full Sap Moon sets every year in front of the farm house. Every year I watch it as it disappears, pink and full, into the western horizon. This year was overcast, and I was unable to enjoy - but some years are like that.

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3.16.17

Snow days  - 2 in a row! Cozy - but at this time of year we are itching for a change. 

Papa rooster has been in his cage since Friday night, when I found him half frozen and huddled by the barn. We will keep him in there until the cold passes.

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3.18.17

Weather has not broken. Snow, cold and freezing rain. I am antsy to begin outdoor clean-up: pruning, cutting back grape vines and prickers, raking, picking up fallen branches, repairing toppled stones and bricks around the fire pit. 

We lost some chickens the other night. Mama included. This is why we always buy a dozen or so pullets every year - because of the inevitable loss to predators. It’s part of the deal; and as hard as it is I’ve made peace with it. 

We have some new babes coming up to take their places in the coop this spring! 

Isn’t that the way? Life always follows death. Out of the darkness, only light can come.

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~ j

snow moon :: a journal of days

The Snow Moon cycle brings the gifts of longer daylight, garden planning, and the beginnings of spring cleaning.  I'm moving again after the sedentary Wolf Moon cycle previous.

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We are still eating pork, venison, chicken and turkey we raised (with the exception of venison, which was brought home by Caleb).  We have beets left in the garden and squash in the root cellar - but we need to supplement veggies now from the market or from friends who own a farm.  (I miss my frozen peas harvested last year!)

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I've been skiing the back hill when weather permits.  Last week, after a 3 day lake-effect snow event, I was able to get out on a brilliantly sunny, balmy morning.  I went for a ski around the perimeter of Beiters field. Perfect. Brilliant blue sky. Immaculate sparkling snow. I should have brought my camera - it's not often we have a day like this up here in the winter, unaccompanied by wind!

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Some days bring snow, and others bring spring-like warmth and with it anticipation of what's to come! We have ordered our seeds: for veggies and my cut flower garden. Tim and I took a walk in the garden the other day and checked on the garlic (just sprouting under the straw).  He picked some thyme and sage and crushed the herbs in his hand so I could smell them.

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We have been getting outside on warmer days to walk the property to check the bees and make plans for fencing and housing for the next crop of pigs, chickens, turkeys and sheep (!) coming in the spring.  We lost a small hive of bees (the swarm Tim caught last year) - there was a mouse family living in the bee hive.  Our other hive is doing well - for now at least.  Bees are so vulnerable it seems, and they can be fine one day and gone the next.

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Tim brought an old drafting table out into my studio this week, so now my workspace is taking shape! I started a felting project last night in the warmth of my studio. My new addiction. My heart was full at having a beautiful work table and supplies galore (gifted by a friend). 

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~ j

Wabi-sabi ::

 The art of finding beauty in imperfection and profundity in earthiness, 

of revering authenticity above all.

Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, roughness or irregularity, simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes.

If an object or expression can bring about, within us, a sense of serene melancholy and a spiritual longing, then that object could be said to be wabi-sabi.

Wabi-sabi nurtures all that is authentic by acknowledging three simple realities: nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect.

Wabi originally referred to the loneliness of living in nature, remote from society, rustic simplicity, freshness or quietness, and can be applied to both natural and human-made objects.

Sabi meant "chill", "lean" or "withered".  It is beauty or serenity that comes with age, when the life of the object and its impermanence are evidenced in its patina and wear, or in any visible repairs.

"Wabi-sabi is everything that today’s sleek, mass-produced, technology-saturated culture isn’t. 

It’s flea markets, not shopping malls; aged wood, not swank floor coverings; one single morning glory, not a dozen red roses. 

Wabi-sabi understands the tender, raw beauty of a gray December landscape and the aching elegance of an abandoned building or shed. It celebrates cracks and crevices and rot and all the other marks that time and weather and use leave behind. 

To discover wabi-sabi is to see the singular beauty
 in something that may first look imperfect"

~Robyn Griggs Lawrence

~j

Today was a good day.

A warmish day outside for February, with a bright sun.

But on my morning walk, as I trudged through knee-deep slushy snow,

 I decided that it would be a good day to spend inside

with this:

The alpaca fleece that M. (the woman who purchased our goats last December) gave me, 

with the trust that I would indeed track her down and return it cleaned, carded and spun.

Little does she know, that she has inspired me to finally buy the hand carders I've always needed, and to investigate (via You Tube tutorials of course) how to clean and card the 2 bags of raw alpaca fleece she put so faithfully into my hands.

"I find conversation and talk isn't real.

But in cooking, gardening, baking bread, there is something real. 

A visceral experience."

 Inspired by the quote above over my morning coffee,  and a newly formed vision for a life well lived, I sat down in my sunny kitchen and spent the day playing with fiber.

"Be present in your life - just do whatever your heart tells you. 

Don't be stuck in your mind"

I feel a pull in a new direction - new intentions coming to life - 

and as always, I am being led.

All of this insight from a bag of alpaca fleece and a day well spent 

behind a spinning wheel.

~j

All quotes from Tara Jensen.

  

People always tell me how lucky I am to have goats.

Goats are inquisitive, and kind, and cheerful (with that perpetual smile on their faces!)

They are also inherent mischief makers.

Which is why, after 1 1/2 years of tending to my girls,
I sat down at my computer and placed an ad:

"Saanan goats for sale: serious inquires only."

By the end of the day, we had payment in full.

In the end, it came down to a fence.
Our make-shift fence did the job for awhile, but
those girls eventually figured a way out and after that there
was no stopping them!

They feasted on the remains of our garden,
they ate the bark off of our 2 year old apple trees,
they nibbled away at my wild rose bush.
They decided that the best place to hang out was the 
front porch, so they could peer in at us through the windows.
I know that they were only doing what any respectable goat would do...

....so in the dark of the night, less than 24 hours after placing my ad, 
our recuse came in the form of a woman in a pick up truck hauling
a large horse trailer.

M. owns a 100 acre farm and is a seasoned farmer.

Ethel and Ruth were taken away to live in a big old dairy barn.

I will always have fond memories of my time spent in the barn with the girls.

I enjoyed the routine.

I enjoyed their company.

And even on the most brisk mornings, when I was forced away 

from my warm place next to the fire, I would smile with gratitude.

After all, how else would I have seen that flock of geese fly by in perfect formation?

Or listened the sound of an owl echoing up from the valley ?

Or have witnessed the light just so on the field as the sun was rising?

Thank you girls.

~ j

The full strawberry moon is just days away. June! 

The last time the moon showed her full face we were just beginning to taste the sun and feel warm grass under our toes.  

It was under that moon that we had our first bonfire fueled by the sticks and leaves we cleaned out of the muddy yard after the winds and snow of winter had littered them. We tilled and planted our garden.

The full moon this week shines on a much different landscape :: lush green trees, fields of buttercups and timothy grass full and swimming in the wind. Fireflies are just beginning to spark in the fields at dusk. 

The lilacs, plum tree, and apple blossoms have already come and gone. 

For this moment (brief!) the peonies and roses are showing their pink faces.

  I lean into each cycle of the moon welcoming new landscapes - new stories. The stories with each turning are always a bit different, yet the changing landscape comfortingly familiar.  

I know that by the next moon the roses and peonies will have faded - but then wildflowers of summer will appear, followed in time by purple asters and goldenrod. 

I don't look away, distracted - I may miss something delightful.

"There's always a sunrise and always a sunset and it's up to you to choose to be there for it," said my mother. "Put yourself in the way of beauty."

~ unknown

~j