Posts Tagged ‘Wintervale Ranch’
New View
Not long ago, I posted a picture of what our planned hay shed might look like, situated by the barn, and with the new loop of driveway around it. Creating it had been a rather quick effort to find a shed that looks like what we have in mind, and paste it onto the existing image. A little while after that effort, I was walking down our driveway and experienced a moment of clarity. The hay shed in that image was in the wrong orientation.
We have been mulling over how it might look, and I suddenly realized that, when coming up our driveway, the view won’t be directly in at the stored hay, you will see the side of the shed. So, I spent some time last night doctoring up another photo image.
In trying to correct for the scale, I may have overdone it a bit, and made it too big this time, I’m not sure. I also darkened the new portion of driveway, to make it more visible. However, then I went and covered it up by adding some fence for the paddock that will be going in. Here’s a representation of the current plan we have in mind:
The fence line isn’t quite right, as we haven’t exactly determined where we will be putting gates, and what route it will ultimately follow, but it helps to see it there, to envision the impact it makes on the look of the new shed in that location.
I’m feeling encouraged that it might end up to be a logical and coordinated layout, and hopefully won’t look as disjointed as I originally feared it might. Now, if the weather would just cooperate, we could start making some actual physical progress on the project, not just image-manipulated simulations of progress (even though simulations are a lot easier and a heck of a lot cheaper).
Love it!
This is not to scale, but shows a hint of what we are contemplating for a hay shed beside the barn. Yesterday, I shoveled a mock driveway that you might be able to discern in front of the image of a shed that I have pasted into the photo I took.
There is no denying that this will impact the visuals of arriving to our place, but we think it will fit in the long run. There will be fencing of the paddock which will run on the near side of that new driveway loop, and often times, horses grazing in the pasture along the entrance. Just the addition of the fence alone is going to greatly alter the way things look in that area.
We don’t think having the hay shed right there, front and center –the first thing you come to when arriving– is ideal, but this is the way to make it most functional. Without having it physically in place to judge, we have to just guess how well it will fit. I fear the reality will be a bit shocking. I expect it to look larger than I am imagining it to be.
We are hoping to be able to adjust to it in a short amount of time, and let the activity surrounding it establish the justification, and the ultimate appropriateness, for the location. This is not the kind of thing that we can easily change our mind on after it is built. By that time, we will be putting our energy toward convincing ourselves how much we totally love it.
Embarrassingly Easy
I have now successfully edited my posts going all the way back to November 30, to fix the missing links that allow viewing the images in their full-size. I find it a bit embarrassing to admit that the solution was always available in the form of a button to click, which creates the link. I guess the link was previously a default situation when I uploaded my images, and became a selectable option when the software was updated.
I let myself think I was too busy to pay attention to this level of detail. Funny how the mind works when it comes to things like this.
Not as embarrassing, but unquestionably easy, was our decision to purchase a share in Walker Farms CSA yesterday. They are our neighbors, and represent many of the philosophies that appeal to us. We came home with eggs, chicken, ground beef, ground pork, ham, and even some lamb weenies, from free-range, grass-fed animals that are not fed systemic antibiotics or any type of hormone, and are raised in a sustainable environment. 
That isn’t all we came home with… They loaned us the book, “The Sheer Ecstasy of Being a Lunatic Farmer,” by Joel Salatin. I recognized having seen at least one of the documentary movies that are referenced on the back cover of the book, featuring Joel and his family farm. After reading just the introduction of the book, I am enthralled by it.
It immediately brought to my mind, the friend I consider a mentor, Ian Rowcliffe, in Portugal. Ian, you are so not alone in your visions and energies to improve our fates by altering the direction of so many aspects of the ways of the modern world. Visiting with our neighbors at Walker Farms, and discovering the writings of Joel Salatin from his Polyface Farms, has expanded my understanding of my own reasons this adventure that Cyndie and I are undertaking feels so right. Ian’s Forest Garden Estate fits right in with it all, and remains one of my primary inspirations.
It really is about more than just the horses, even though that is the primary focus I have been referencing for our reason for moving here. We are trying to figure out fences right now, for the horses, but fences lead to, and are connected with, all aspects of our future operation here. Managing manure is leading to reasons we might want to have chickens. Testimony from the Walkers offered good evidence of the value of chickens, and the introduction of Joel’s book pretty much cements it for us.
There are an amazing number of things for us to discover related to accomplishing all the things we hope to achieve here. As difficult as that seems to be sometimes, it is also surprisingly easy. You could say, embarrassingly easy… because we tend to embarrass ourselves over and over with each lesson we encounter.
Unfortunately, none of them are as simple as finding out the solution is just a click of a button.
Amazing Change
This is an amazing time of change for us.
Amazing, beautiful, thrilling, intimidating, exhilarating, bucolic, inspiring, exhausting, all-encompassing change.
Uninvited Guests
It comes as no real surprise to us that we have mice in the log home we have purchased. However, the speed at which they have made their presence known has us a little vexed. In less than a week, with much of our stuff being placed for just a day or two, we have found items chewed, and sprinkled with urine and feces.
These guys are wasting no time. Maybe the threat of winter temperatures is chasing them indoors. It’s weird to think that just days ago we were in t-shirts and eating dinner out on the deck.
We need to get after the adding of pets: cats to chase the mice, and dogs to get after the pocket gophers. Then we have to figure out how to manage our time and expenses to support our new pets. Next, we will need to establish a way to manage the pet food to keep out the raccoons that are smart enough to foil many a plot to deter them.
Who’s going to have time to mend fences and work with our invited guests, the horses?
How long do you think it will be until we discover our first intruding bat?
I’ve been telling people that our new place resembles the lake home in Hayward, …right down to the mice.
Partial Progress
We have made a moderate amount of progress in establishing order in our new home. We have placed some furniture in the main living area:
However, most of the rooms look more like this right now:
We both survived our first day of commuting to the Twin Cities from Wisconsin, and thoroughly enjoyed the rush of returning to our driveway at the end of our respective days, regardless the lateness of the hour.
Comical Adversity
Yesterday dawned with us feeling a heightened anxiety, anticipating the accomplishment of finally signing closing documents. We had been in this position twice before. We were told that everything was in place and prepared to proceed. That was good to hear, but that’s also what they said the other times. It failed, now, to offer much in the way of comfort.
Both Cyndie and I had needed to negotiate additional time off work to be available for Tuesday’s signing. If it didn’t happen then, we would be in an extremely difficult situation, having pushed the graciousness of our employers as far as we were comfortable pushing.
Finally, around the ten-o’clock hour, we started receiving messages about the closing on the sale of our home in Eden Prairie. Our interests were being represented by our realtor, in our absence. Once that process was over, we just needed a document to be sent to the title company and lender for our Beldenville home.
We puttered with small chores, and then took our daily walk, under gray, misting skies. When we received word of the required documents being sent, it was beginning to feel as if this essential accomplishment was within reach. We gathered up everything we figured we could possibly need, including Cyndie’s laptop computer, to provide contingency for any issue arising to foil our plan, and headed to the town of Ellsworth with plenty of time to spare.
This was the culmination of a very long process, starting most tangibly with our decision to list our house for sale last winter. That triggered a need to hire some contractors to fix drywall, repaint, and install fresh carpeting. Then came a summer-long period of showing the house to potential buyers. We had a quick flurry of activity for a week of purchase agreements at the beginning of September, leading, ultimately, to an agreed upon closing date of October 18.
An insane last-minute batch of delays had pushed that closing to 5-days later than it was supposed to happen, and led to some major hassles in many people’s lives. Now we were just a few miles away from finally getting it done, once and for all.
Since we had time, I pulled into a gas station to fuel up the vehicle. There was no display on the pump, so I searched and searched for the trick to bring it to life. Then a clerk came out of the store and reported that they couldn’t provide any fuel because the power just went out. A woman at the pump in front of us said she had just come from the grocery store and they were out of power. I looked around and noticed the stoplights were out. Someone hollered that the whole town was without power.
Really. The entire town of Ellsworth has lost power, just minutes before we were to finally close on our new property after a 5-day delay. Really?
Another practical joke from the universe? All we could do was laugh, but we wanted to cry. I had to make an effort not to cry.
Not knowing the extent of the problem, we headed to the title company office down the street. We were prepared to sit there, in the dark, no matter how long it took. Luckily, that small-town pluckiness forged ahead regardless. They moved us to someone’s desk near a window, and sent an employee home, where she would be able to print the one critical document we needed from her email, and then return before we were done signing all the other paperwork.
We have officially bought the farm, and we are calling it, Wintervale Ranch, with a nod to the farm in my family history by the name of Intervale Ranch, and our love for all things winter related, including our dogsled expedition to Wintergreen Lodge.
Believe it or not, we were almost done in by a squirrel. That’s the report that surfaced in a post by the Pierce County Herald [edited to break link to article because the online page expired. A squirrel was killed when it got into some electrical power station equipment, which cause the power outage].
Looping Loops
Cyndie and I are growing loopy over the topsy-turvy world of uncertainty we find ourselves trapped in lately.
None of our possessions have a known location, and we can’t keep straight where we have put anything down at any given moment.
Yesterday was supposed to be the day Cyndie started her new job, but we have been forced to push back our plans by two business days to finally accomplish the second step in our 3-step plan to transition from old house to new.
We have already finished the third step, which was to get our possessions moved into the new house. Now we need to go back and complete the second step: signing closing documents, finally making this all legal and proper.
Yesterday, we set out on our half-hour therapeutic walk, and just up the road, met our first neighbor as she was headed to put something in her mailbox. Her husband eventually wandered out and there we stood, on the side of the road, getting up to speed on all the neighborhood tales. It was one of those wonderful conversations that seems to have no end. A little bit like some of my posts… So, no sooner than we had shared one last parting ‘nice-to-meet-you’ to set off on our walk, we found ourselves back in the depths of neighborly gab. It was a treat!
We learned there had been a tornado that moved through the area two years ago, just behind our property, which took out one of their sheds from behind the barn. They said it was 30-years, to the day, after an earlier tornado took the same path.
Later in the day, Cyndie and I heard our first rumbles of thunder here. It sounded GREAT! I’m gonna love watching the weather from our new perch.
It took half the day to determine any signing of closing documents wasn’t going to happen until Tuesday (today!!), so by the time we knew we were free to run errands, it was getting late. We made it to our new bank to make some deposits and get cash, then made a run to hardware and home improvement stores for things piling up on our shopping list.
This really got me spinning. There is so much for us to do, it is hard to figure out where to start. Of course, I like to start at a beginning, (any beginning!) , and proceed in a sequence. Cyndie likes to start everything at once and proceed in every direction, simultaneously. Shopping with her is a real trip for me.
I ended up bringing home things I was considering should probably be on my ‘future wants’ list, but hadn’t even begun shopping for. At the same time, we knocked off a few valuable items that we can put into service immediately, like a set-back thermostat, new shower head, push brooms, boot mats for our entry ways, and anti-fatigue pads for the kitchen floor.
To Cyndie’s credit, I was able to forestall a couple other uncertain decisions until we are able to spend a bit more time to be sure what we want. I do wield some calming influence on the shopping front.
By the time we headed home, it was dark, and I almost got us stuck in a looping round-about. Then I entered a turn lane, one turn too soon, and quickly ran out of pavement, making a last minute correction with too much speed. It was past dinner hour and I was loopy from too much shopping and too many days of disorientation.
We hope to get the last (previously, second), most critical step, wrapped up today. That will give me a solid beginning to plot my next step(s) toward our new orientation on our “Wintervale Ranch.”
Relative Something 