farm « Robin Writes

No, I’m not getting more horses, but I am getting the two, a mare/foal pair, from South Dakota sometime next week. Which means another project.

And it also means I’m taking a crash course in “All the Things I Used to Know About Horses but Feel Like I Can’t Quite Remember All of Them.”

Last night, I got an email from a Fleet of Angels transporter who said, and I quote, “These are some of the wildest horses I’ve ever seen.” Consequently, I did not sleep well. My brain kept jumping from adoption and hauling issues to arrival to pasture to shed to feeding . . . you get the picture.

At 6:00 a.m., I got a text from another hauler offering to bring mine down here next week. Nothing like an early text to make you jump out of bed—sadly, I’d really just fallen asleep. But at least now I can rest easy on that topic and know that I have about a week to finish getting ready.

Finish, you ask? Why, yes. There’s a lot to do:

My husband is making arrangements for hay delivery and picking up the last few pieces of lumber for the run-in shed—which we’ll be building tomorrow, the walls at least. Then we’ll haul it to the pasture for assembly. On Friday, we’ll pick up the sheet metal on order for the siding and attach that and the roof over the weekend.

Side note: Apparently the cat IS good for something. He just ran up on the front porch with a tiny mouse—or something—in his mouth. No, he is NOT coming inside with that!

I still have a few horsey items to pick up, like feed buckets and a second water trough. I have halters and ropes on order. But we do have to double-check the pastures for holes and any old wood or metal laying around. Wish I’d gotten to that yesterday when the temps were close to 60, but my husband had the Mule tied up with an outside water pump repair and I was working on the fence and putting up a few things for winter.

Guess I’ll have to put on my classy black looks-like-I’m-robbing-a-bank face mask and go outside after all. Which reminds me, I need to order more long underwear . . .

And that brings me to this morning’s conversation of “we need to bring more wood inside for the furnace.”

See, told you my brain is all over the place!

Argh, I’m so tired of this—already! I can deal with cold. Wind, not so much. Cloudy days one right after the other, not at all! Yes, I know it’s only November . . .

Super hard to get motivated to do much of anything.

This makes me think of the pioneers and the isolated farmers back in the day. What did they do all winter?

Well, they still had chores of course. Around here, we start up the fire first thing in the morning and heat water for coffee, then feed the animals. Not so different, really.

Of course, we have meals to cook and clean up, and housework and laundry don’t stop in the winter. The biggest difference now is that we have it a lot easier—electric ovens and propane stoves and a hot water heater. Now, when SHTF, we’ll be using other methods; think about it, when you go camping, how much time it takes to build a fire and cook and clean up afterwards.

We do have to make sure we have a good supply of firewood; most of that was done earlier in the fall, but since this is our first year heating with wood, we’re still in the trial-and-error stage as to quantity. Just like the pioneers, though, we generally let it burn down overnight and start with coals in the morning. It sure helps to have a nice, thick comforter on the bed!

Back in the old days, besides all this, winter was also a time to relax and do indoor activities like playing games, craft projects, making music, and so forth. I’m sure we all remember Pa Ingalls and his fiddle, amiright? Well, I don’t have a fiddle, but I do have a guitar, an organ, and a drum . . . and books. And leather working tools and one of these days I’ll get beyond the second stitch on those damn knitting needles that I’ve carted around for 20 years . . .

Of course, the old folks didn’t have TV and Internet, either. 😉

Winter is a good time to plan your garden, or work in the greenhouse, or start projects, and you don’t have to feel guilty about slowing down during this time. After all, when you’re homesteading or farming, you more than make up for that during the rest of the year!