Winter Storm

Hello dear friends,

As predicted, we have had another period of  warm temperatures and record breaking rainfall this weekend followed by an ice storm.  Fortunately for us the storms seem to take place on the weekends when we can hunker down and stay safe....although we did have plans to have dinner with friends.  After watching the weather forecasts, and then the storm watches, and then the storm warnings we decided to stay home instead.  The fur-children were very happy about this decision.

All told we received just over 90 mm of rain from Saturday morning until Saturday evening.  The total amount would actually be higher as the rain started Friday night but we had already stored our rain gauges for the winter and had to take one out again!

The farm lane has been filling up with water.  The ground is already waterlogged and has a limited ability to absorb the melting snow and rain.

The fields are partially under water as well.

By late afternoon almost all of the snow had melted.

Then by early evening (also according to forecast!) the temperatures dropped and the rain turned to freezing rain.  I tried to take a photo of the ice on the large maple at the barn using my phone.  The photos on the camera were too blurry to share.

Freezing rain continued through the night but then we had some sunshine this morning.  This was the view before coffee!

We had icy views everywhere.  The wind started to pick up this morning and the air was filled with the tinkling sounds of ice falling off of the trees.

For anyone interested in techie bits, we have a Generac generator that will power our farm in the event of a power outage.  This is 17 kw residential generator and was a priority for us after having survived 5 days without power as a result of another ice storm in 2015.  We have had many power outages over the years but this one convinced us a generator would be a worthwhile investment.  Heating an old stone house using a fireplace and breaking holes in the ice of Lake Ophelia to drag buckets of water to the barn for the animals only seems romantic!

I dont know why Abby feels it necessary to remove our driveway markers!

Horatio is enjoying the sunshine on a bedroom windowsill.

Meanwhile Henry is enjoying sunshine elsewhere!

Now I will be going back to work packing up Christmas decorations while my husband investigates damage from falling tree limbs.

~Thank you for visiting!~

A Weekend At The Farm

Hello dear friends, here is a quick post courtesy of Google!  It seems like Google is a master at curating photos into albums and when it put this one together I thought I would share it with you.  These photos were from just before Christmas.

This is a super snowy pin oak tree in our front garden.  We planted it a long time ago...perhaps 20 years ago?...but at that time we had 2 pet pygmy goats.  Bob and Bert were escape artists and when they managed a prison break-which was often-no plant, tree or shrub was safe.  So this oak tree should have been much taller than the 30 feet it is right now because Bob and Bert ate it.

This is our Autumn Ash at the koi pond.  Everything looks so different without leaves.  It has burgundy leaves but as with all ashes in Ontario it is just a matter of time before it succumbs to the Emerald Ash Borer.  We haven't decided what we should do to replace it.

Here we have Horatio and Henry.  We are so incredibly lucky that Horatio (the poor little guy that is underneath Henry) has accepted his new brother so well.  In the past we had  2 male cats and they literally couldn't stand each other.  We ended up referring them to our upstairs and downstairs cats as they would not even stay on the same floor together.

Regular visitors will recognize the chicken coop which is dressed for the holidays.  Christmas lights, a wreath and large snow flakes complete the decorations.  This fall we poured a concrete floor for the coop to help guard against predators.  2019 was a terrible year for our flock.  Between a skunk, a weasel and a fox our hens were all killed off.  We now have a new flock of hens that are much safer.

This is our breakfast deck tree.  In much nicer temperatures we like to sit here in the morning having coffee and breakfast in the Adirondack chairs.  From this location we have a view over the part of our garden we call The Grove towards the sheep pastures.

These two trees flank our front door.  I have been adding little red, white and gold balls as ornaments.  For next year I think it should have some little garlands.

This little tree was a last minute purchase a couple of years ago.  It has a matching wreath that also has little lights in it.  We keep this little tree on our Portico deck.

This is such a great picture of Henry.  He was a smash hit at the vet clinic this week.  He is definitely personality plus!  Very friendly, cuddly and constantly chirps like a bird.  Henry is the 8th cat (Henry the Eighth!!)  to call our farm home.  All of the cats were strays and of course we made sure to have all of them spayed or neutered.

Passing through this gate will take you to an area that we call The Secret Garden.  It is really only a garden in our imagination right now, we have an idea of what we want to do with this secluded area but have not yet finished it.

This entire section of our house was built about 5 years ago.  The main floor of this addition has an entry way, bathroom with shower, large dining room, kitchen and breakfast area.  The second floor has a master bedroom and bath with a balcony and a second guest room.  The contractor that did the work has experience working with old stone homes and we were very happy with the work although it took much longer than expected.  As we are doing most of the interior work ourselves we are also taking so much longer than expected.  Note to self-when planning a project we need to anticipate the timeline for completion and then add 10 years.  😞

We have a Christmas tree in our bedroom which has been terrorized by the cats. A branch went missing, I have noticed hangers that dont have ornaments, a piece of a deer ornament was on the carpet and a broken decoration was in our bed.  The good news is that the cats have not toppled any of the trees over.

A lived in living room that needed a little tidying!

The same garden gate but this time from The Secret Garden looking towards the greenhouse.

I hope you enjoyed this quick collection of photos!  Thank you for visiting and wishing everyone a great weekend.

A Winter Christmas At The Farm

Hello dear friends, the Christmas season is over for another year.  It feels like I put so much thought and effort into the holidays and then poof! it is over.  Sadly we missed our family Christmas dinner as a flu had been doing the rounds.  In the end we had a quiet Christmas at the farm with my mother and we spent time making some Christmas ornaments.   

This is the pergola that we built last year.  It was not on our to-do list but once we came up with the idea it was full steam ahead.  This area is just off of our dining room and we were able to get quite a bit of use of it last year.  The little lights lend a very nice touch.  Anyone with an Instagram and Pinterest addiction knows what it is like to be suddenly inspired by something and then needing to have it!  The internet is far too distracting.

Another one of my favourite views of our garden gate and fence.  Parts of this fence have been re-purposed and were part of another fence in this general area that had to be dismantled when our addition was built.

This outdoor tree replaces one that looked the same but broke during a wind storm.  It looks great against the stone wall of our old farmhouse.

It was a bit of a job trying to recover the ornaments that had rolled across the deck and landed in the gardens.  I am sure to find more in the spring.

This picture was taken one morning recently while we were enjoying a cup of coffee.  

The chicken coop has a light dusting of snow.  The Christmas lights that we had put up a couple of years ago did not work properly this year so we have added new ones.  This view is taken from our breakfast deck.

Here is our broken tree stuffed into an iron urn.  It looks lovely painted with frost.

We have had quite the weather week with some record breaking warm temperatures, an ice storm and snow squalls.

Willow took advantage of a nice day to lounge outside on a piece of furniture that didn't quite make it inside for the winter.  She is quite a senior dog but loves life on the farm.  She will turn 14 this year and has been living with us for about 5 years.  She is a very gentle soul.

Another view of the chicken coop nestled in snow.  Even in slightly freezing temperatures the hens will venture out through the trap door to get some fresh air and sunshine.  Once the temperatures really drop we lock them inside the chicken coop.  In very cold temperatures we will use a heat lamp to keep the temperature inside above freezing.

The garden privy is always one of my favourite little structures.

Our frosty cedar hedge.

Ice storms are the scariest part of our winter and it seems that as our winters get milder we get more and more of these "ice events".  Fortunately this one was short lived and we quickly moved into record breaking high temperatures so the ice was gone within a day.  It can look so pretty though!

I am sorting through some photos of our guest room and woodland themed tree and will have photos to share soon!

~Thank you for visiting!~