Early spring

I know we will get a few more storms and some more snow but when it's in the 60's you get as much done outside as you can. Before we know it the temperature will be in the 80's or more. Comparing photo's from last weekend to this, the snow amounts are down at least 50% so there is a lot of work that got exposed with the sun.

We are reloading the woodshed from whats under the tarp, we didn't make a big dent this year so we definitely will have to add an expansion. This will keep our total cordage, on site, at about 10. This year we will get a few loads of hardwood to offset all of the pinion. The softwood burns fine but it does require more chimney cleaning (in my opinions, others say no) and we want to keep a mix of 50/50 hard/soft.

I grabbed a rake after my afternoon run and have about 10 piles of pinecones and pine needles that we will back up tomorrow. I still probably have 2 more bags of just pinecones that will  be picked up. The can wreck a dogs paw and shoot out of the mower like missiles so we pick them up each spring. There are sprouts of clovers and grass coming up and the tree's are starting to but at both houses. The garden is ready to be put in but we know better, the plants are getting big and anxious.

We tightened a lot of screws down on the metal roof, the wind vibrations cause some of them to back out. A barn a few miles down the road lost almost exactly half of it's metal roofing sections. It's interesting to note that the screwed the metal down onto the rafters directly. While it certainly can work it seems to me that if you put plywood down and screw into that you can get 2x as many screws in and make it twice as secure. This is something I've been thinking about since we need to redo the woodshed roof (they screwed into the rafters directly and it's not holding up well). The barn was finished this past fall and it's either a sloppy Amish roofing job or a testament to how the winds have been so far.

Not much going on in the blogs, some have closed and some haven't been updated in ages. I'm trying to post a few times a month, it's a nice record of our lives for the last few years. It's pretty boring but just going back and seeing the pictures is enough reason to keep on posting up. All things end but we shall endure to keep this little journal going.

Rock and I have gotten in about 5 miles hiking today plus my run. There have been some nasty storm clouds around but most of the day it's been incredible. Some would even break out sunscreen.