My Day

(The sunset November 5th.)

We cut firewood today. We almost doubled the size of our wood pile! There is a large fallen oak tree part way down our hill that we are working on transforming into winter warmth. Today Dad was cutting with the chainsaw, and the boys and I were loading the wood into the utility trailer.

There is something very satisfying about loading your arms with wood. I realized today that I'm a tree hugger. I just love hugging arm loads of wood and thinking about toasting my toes in front of the wood stove.

Growing up, there was a saying I heard so many times from a friend of my dad's that it has permanently etched itself into my mind. It goes like this:
"Do you know how many times wood warms you?" (pause...) "Three times! Once when you cut it, once when you split it, and once more when it burns!"

When the utility trailer got full, which it did twice, we'd drive the suburban up the hill and unload the trailer by the wood pile. Then we stacked it. The first time, dad stayed down to split some of the larger logs, so I drove the suburban up. When it was parked, I began to toss the wood from the trailer out into a pile.

The boys stacked it, with teasing yells of "You're trying to kill me!" Then I checked the stack before we went back down the hill. I still have to look at their stacking job, but they're getting the hang of it pretty quickly and doing much better at creating a neat stack that won't fall over or roll down the hill.

After we unloaded the trailer, I took the Suburban back down and parked it so that we could load the trailer again. When it was almost full, we went up for lunch. After lunch mom and I and the boys needed to run some errands, including going to play music and sing with another family from our church in preparation to go sing and play for a local assisted living home.

First on our town list was taking the recycle in. Unfortunately they were already closed. Next we went to the Post Office. I shipped my camera off to the Canon Factory Repair to have them fix the lens cover since it wasn't opening all the way. Fortunately it is still covered under warranty, and they think it will be back in two weeks. So then we visited the tiny music store just off the town square. Mom bought two guitar strings while a brother and I explored the dented can type grocery store next door. It looked interesting, and was. I found a box of chai tea powder packs. Yum. Also a good deal on tall white candles. Those will be nice for the Christmas season. Next we went to the grocery store, then we went to the family's house. They had been in town at the same time, and we saw them and exchanged greetings as they left the grocery. We got there and unloaded the guitar, cello, violin, and kids. After we had visited a bit, and practiced, it was time to go. This was about 5:45 pm, I think. I drove home.

As we pulled up the hill and into the drive, I noticed an unfamiliar light over by the tree by the white barn. Mom said, "What's happening with the lawn tractor?" As we got closer we saw what was happening. Dad was hauling ropes attached to a deer so that the deer would hang properly in the tree. Instant hubbub and excitement!

"Dad shot a deer!" exclaimed seven excited voices. So he had! He told us that he had been sitting quietly and the deer began to cross our land in front of him. She was a big doe, and we are all looking forward to some good meat! It has been a while since we had venison in the freezer. The heart is already in the fridge... I believe it is destined to be ground up, fried and put in chili.

So that was our day. A busy day, a great day, and full day.