The not-winter of 2019-2020 so far

This endless November is depressing.  We get snow, it stays for three days max and then comes rain and all white and light is gone again. At least now we had few bright nights with full moon, so no need for torch while on 'Sumawalk.

 Lack of snow means lack of light. I take torch to 'Sumawalks, if I go to forest or if it really is too dark to see. If there's some clouds, but not too much, I get my "streetlights" from neaby town:

Town center is about 5km ahead (little lights are our house). Talking about light pollution! This picture is taken 4.50pm on 4th Dec.

This one was taken 1st dec 10.45am. We have had some sun! And snow!

This was taken on Friday morning, when we walked to taxi stop with sys and 'Suma.

Friday morning, 1,5h later with ys and 'Suma on our way to taxi stop. Same moon, although you have to imagine to see anything. That light spot. And no snow.

A year ago. So much snow and frost.

Lack of frosts and deep freeze is beneficial to our wood stores. I have used only one pile of wood, storage behind garage is stayed untouched since October (I used some of it when everything else was too wet or hard to get, but then we had a brief spur of frosts and I managed to shelter dry-but-left-under-open-sky-pile and when rainwater was dried off it's now usable wood for our woodburners. It's been seasoning it's time already.)
There's been winters I have had to lit fire to three woodburnes every day (stove or sauna and fireplace in the old side of the house and woodburner on the extension), now I don't need to lit a fire every day at all!

If this endless November continues, I might not need to chop any excess of wood this spring, it would be enough just to cut damaged forest trees and fell those trees around the field left untouched last spring. Which would be a good thing because old man can't help this spring.
I need to buy a decent battery chainsaw and learn how to use it. We have electric chainsaw but it's basically a toy, can't use it to cut wood thicker than 15cm.

I have been using my woodburning stove, I roasted two hams (for Christmas and for New Year) and at least twice a week I have been cooking dinner with it (it has an oven and a stove).

Frying potatoes and pasta and boiling broccoli

 I knitted only three pairs of socks for Christmas presents:

My three boys got socks. Sys asked for sig-sag stripes.

These are crocheted:

Jolly rogers reflectors - can be used as tree decorations, too.

Our Christmas tree was beautiful:

From our back yard! But no skull decorations.

These were gift to myself:

New kitchen clothes in colours I like. White cotton was bought over 25 years ago, I was living in a big town.

But I wanted to knit socks, so I did:

Actually, there's three more pairs, but can't find pictures... These are children sized and female sized.

Found this one, but two more are missing. These are men size pair.

Os had 20th birthday, I baked him a cake like I have done every year.

I accidentally dropped some whipped cream on top. Who cares. Cake was eaten, two pieces for os and others had one. No leftovers.

Bunspiration

Easter break - can't say days off, because I'm working here at home. All the normal spring stuff: firewood, veggie path, greenhouse, polytunnel.
I finally got all branches off the trunks and managed to burn them on bonfire, just on time. Now there is danger of bush fires and I'm not taking risks with that. Our field has still a lot of snow, but as soon as it melts, exposed ground and dead grass starts to dry and in few days it'll be crisp and ready to combust.

This is the beginning. Now they are all gone - most of snow also.

Nearby pond is still frozen, but I do hope it'll be free after this weekend.

 Snow is finally gone around the polytunnel frame, so I pulled up the poly-part of it, I managed to do it on my own, last spring I needed OS's help. Experience I'll say, now I know how to do it so it's relatively easy to pull up. I stacked mulch bags around tunnel's hem, last summer it was a good strategy and prevented wind blowing it away. I do need buy several bags of mulch for raised beds and also for the polytunnel and glass greenhouse.
There's some herbs alive, thyme, sage and perhaps tarragon. Also oregano and majoram, but I can't tell them apart (not even by taste). Parsley seems to be gone, and rosemary is bone dry. No hope there.

Sage is already producing usable leaves, I'm really happily suprised!

Rhubarb is also alive, I was a bit worried because I moved it last spring and summer was so hot and dry, I feared I might had not watered it enough it to survive. Lovage hasn't sprouted yet, but it lost snow only three days ago, so there's still hope. As well as horse radish (which is in same bed as lovage).
Cold frames are also free from snow. I have found some garlic sprouts, but I should take off the leaves I put over them to protect from frost. There was some kale left, but after few really really cold night they are gone (or somebody ate them).

My cousing had her second daughter few weeks ago, and invited us to name revelation party. I was a bit loss what to give as a gift (not required actually), but sister told me to sew a book. But I thought a book is so small gift, so I wanted to make something more. And finally I got bunspiration - because I wanted to make something for the little big sister (she's 2,5), too.

These bunnies are something I have made several over the years, all my kids have their own (they were a bit smaller, because I have become bolder during the years, I don't follow instructions so carefully anymore). I can't find the original pattern anymore, link is broken.

All washed and dried.

I didn't do a big shopping for the easter, I'm trying to get food eaten from freezer, and been quite successful so far. Tomorrow I'll smoke a ham I bought after christmas, it's been in the fridge for three days now. Our smoker is way too big to be practical, we usually eat only one salmon or one leg of lamb smoked, and inside smoker I can fit six big hams! It was there when we bought the place, and I can't see reason to tear it apart just because I think we could do with smaller one.

A bit of this and a bit of that

Hb's new shift schedule is making our lives if not miserable, at least complicated. He works long weeks (6days work and 1day off) or really confusing weeks (2nights and two evenings and then some). There is no rhythm, and being nearly 50 he really can't adapt well. He can't sleep when he should and then sleeps during his day/s off and can't keep doing anything really. So annoying. And of course we had to turn the clocks which caused havoc to my inner clock.

And of course we all should be keeping silent when he tries to sleep...

I have tried to keep 'Suma occupied in the mornings, so we have had some amazing morning walks. We saw more swans moving to north, one couple stayed in our village for a while. Our cranes are back, they are wonderful big animals with very loud voices.
And geese! Neverending stream of geese flying back and forth - I just don't get it why some of them fly to north and some to south - and then there are simultaneously flocks flying to east AND west in the sky. Very confusing to my tired brains.

Mornings sound very summery already with skylarks, blackbirds and lapwings and of course (wood)pigeons. But fear not, there's still almost 30cm snow in our field and lower yard. Herb bed is almost free of snow and ice - i did give it some help with tossing ashes over polytunnel beds. Polytunnel itself is still folded in my greenhouse, I can't put it over the frame until snow has gone around the frame. Aaaaand my sister just made a video call to show they have got 25cm of snow so far and more is coming. Can't wait to have it here. Not.

Hb managed to fell down some trees which were growing on the back end of the field (alders, willows, few aspens) (some=30ish). They grow there because we don't actually farm that field, only small part of it is used as my veg path and polytunnel. The whole field hasn't been plought and harrowed for a very long time. Old man did most of it few years ago, but couldn't get to very edges, and therefore trees. Hb felled them and I lopped them with billhook and dragged trunks into a pile. Or as many of the trunks I managed, some of them overpowered me even after cut them in two. So there's some half a dozen trunks left in the end of the field and a pile of trunks next to my veg path. Saturday was easy, snow was hard and it was easy to walk on, because I didn't sink. By Sunday snow had thawed a little, so it was heavier to walk on. Yesterday (I had a day off) snow was soft and sinking; I felt I was walking on a quick sand.

And now I'm hurting. my back is stiff and my hands are swollen (that's what you get if you're a delicate office worker and keep hitting branches with billhook all day). My legs are so tired I didn't even have restless legs at night!
Now if someone just cuts and splits those to make us some firewood...

But yesterday was a nice day off. I managed to deal all trunks I could (now we have a nice pile of branches to have a bonfire or maybe to chip some of them), made pizzas (I made the dough myself; it's suprisingly hard to knead the dough if your hands are boiled spaghetti), made paneer (next time I will make just "cottage cheese" by adding salt); it was the second time ever I have made any kind of cheese, first time I made egg cheese (basically cottage cheese but with added eggs and then it's baked in the oven), wrote minutes of the last two village comittee meetings (had to send them to old man to print because my printer doesn't work). and attended another meeting. Late in the evening I decided I had had enough and sat in front of telly and watched some mindless reality tv and knitted sock for a while.

Today I'll make something out of the paneer I made ( I don't have spinach so no saag/palak paneer). Kids have some leftover pizza so I can use as much ginger I want.

I finally made through ST Discovery first season (knitted rainbow socks for d, she is finally over that all-black teenage phase) and now I've catched up this new season. So I binge watched Night Flyer and once that was over I started on Firefly (I saw it in 2002/2003 but as with everything else in 2002 and 2003 I can't remember a single thing, even 2004 is a bit hazy). Soon that's done, Serenity (the film) is left and then I might have to return to Star Trek. Seen the original series, the animated series and Enterprise, and all the films. Now I "only" have Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and Voyager (which I have seen before)...

Signs of Spring and last weeks list...

Even though temperature was -5 this morning, we have had "warm" weather lately. Snow is melting (not only thawing), there's actually spots of ground to be seen. Catkins are here, and today is equinox. Days a really longer now, there's so much light already. But at 8pm it was pitch dark yesterday when I took 'Suma to walk. I had to use torch because snow at the forest is so dirty (full of pine and spruce needles and branches etc) so it doesn't reflect any light at the moment.

On Saturday i heard first sounds of trumepts - swans are back! On Sunday I saw several swans fying above our village, and this morning there were three swans circling around the village fields - they were most likely trying to figure out what's happened - after last autunm storm it's a bit different now.

And last weeks list, all done!
-finish a present for sister's partner (he reached the big 30 last week) tomorrow I'll work at home, so I can use washing machine during the day and see what happens; Made it! Knitted him a pair of mittens and felted them in washing machine, perfect for ice-fishing, because they'll be warm even if they are wet. Had to felt them twice to get the right size.
-try to get sister a present (I have ordered it, but have no idea whether it's going to make it before Saturday; her bd is this week) Arrived on Tuesday and I was able to pick it from parchel machine on Tue while shopping shoes for ys. She wanted the book and I got it for her.
-fix sister's skirt before saturday (she's lost a few pounds since she was 15; I made that skirt for her 15 years ago!) should be done today evening, because I have to get out of the house with two youngest so hb can get some sleep because he works few night shifts this week. Done, took 5 mins including changing the tread on sewing machine - I still had the original thread I used for sewing that skirt!
-try to figure out what to wear in their birthday party on Saturday decided on Sat morning to wear the same jeans I wore when she was 15. Still fits!
-take ys to town to get indoors sport shoes and a small present for bdparty he's been invited to - party will be in ys's birthday, but he said it's ok he wants to go to his friend's party (March is awful, last thursday my cousind had her second child, and this child is about tenth in my expanded family who's bd is in March! and among kids friends there is more than a half a dozen who have bds in March, too) maybe tomorrow, because hb still needs to sleep, so I'll take kids to town; yep, done in Tue, actually got four pairs of shoes, two for ys and two for d, paid 75€ 'cause every pair they needed was on sale.
-prepare paperwork for Sundays village committee meeting done,  but now I need to buy new printer, this one quitted for good
-attend to sister's and her partner's joint bd party on Saturday Oh holy cripping maggots I did it, I'm way too old for this  s... There was a punk band and a rock band, and I still don't get punk. Just don't.
-attend to Sundays village committee meeting done

And for this week? Bdparty for d and ys: grandparents, relatives but no shcool friends. So:
-bake a cake or two (maybe even mudcake)
-bake a quiche or two (broccoli and feta; maybe ham and tomatoes)
-clean the house (not going to happen...)
So much easier! 

Oh, there's snow now?

It's been snowing.
Like most of Europe, I think.

This happy fellow greets us in our forest every day (or night, like when I took this picture). Don't have to wonder where Norwegian artists took their inspiration for trolls...

Sys skiing - we have to go buy him new skiis and ski shoes today, because he needs them tomorrow at school. Oh the joys of dragging them in school bus!

'Suma got bored with me taking troll pictures.

My long socks finally! finished and tested. Snow was deeper than I thought...

A bit overcooked lasaga - nevermind it's so good! Grated carrots and a beet added to bolognese makes it even darker.

Majestetic views - unfortunately those trees will snap at some point and may cause danger, but now they are pretty.

Had to add some length to sys's hat, thats Red Heart's reflective yarn, i have knitted three in different colours to d, sys and ys.

More snow during the evening and even maybe tomorrow. Haven't decided yet days I'll work from home. Depends how's traffic.

226 g

That's the weight of brothers's and F's socks. I managed to knit F'S socks from the yarn that was saved from 'Suma's teeths, few more ends than I would have liked.
I was taking care of all the loose ends while cooking red wine. I boiled it from 6dl (almost whole bottle) to maybe a cup? Whole house reeks of red wine and I feel queasy -  I can't drink red wine without getting greally really sick (and that's from few sips). Some time ago I realized I can't drink glögg (alcohol free version) if it's made from juice of red grapes. Even the smell gets me - but it really smells delicious.
I got a bottle of nice red wine from old man's sister, it is intended as tannin primer for my experiments (I have made wood stain from acetic acid soaked rebar bars, pine and spruce needs tannin priming, oak should colour without it). I have still few dls left and I'll try that soon.
But I was actually reducing wine because I was making red wine salt for Christmas hampers! I have been thinking making hampers ready, but thinking doesn't do things.
So far I have: spruce salt, red wine salt, socks, mulled wine, strawberry liquor, choclate, jaffa cakes and stearine soaked pine cones for kindling. I still need the actual hamper (box or something) and a card.

Sorry for rambling - I actually boiled red wine to syrup and it may have had some effect on me.