January Rain

This morning we awoke to sound of the sump pump alarming in the basement.  Fortunately, it was a simple case of the sensor getting wet from the splashing water and not the basement flooding again!  Recent discussions on my self-sufficiency forums have gravitated towards disaster preparedness, and it's caused me to ponder what we would do if, for instance, the power went out here for more than a day or two.  We are so reliant on electricity!  I've stashed away candles, matches and flashlights, but the consequences would be so much more far-reaching than the inconvenience of not being able to turn on a lamp!  We have a gas oven, but the ignition is electric, so cooking in the kitchen would be out.  Same with the water heater - no hot showers or baths!  What worries me more is that there is no auxillary manual pump for the well, so there would  literally be no water to the house or barn and no way to access it other than by dipping buckets in the spring on the hill.  And of course, the sump pump would be inoperational, so the ultimate irony would be that the basement would flood.

Bob and I took the ride out to Marcola this afternoon to pick up a gallon of fresh raw milk from the Malabys at Thorn and Thistle Farm.  We cut back last week from 2 gallons a week to one because the kids don't seem  to be drinking as much these days.  We buy our hay down the road from there and can never seem to marry the two trips for some reason.  On the way home we stopped at Wilco to buy chicken scratch and look at livestock panels for fencing again.  There are so many projects I'm determined to get done between now and the start of Spring!  I'm going to divide the pasture again into smaller paddocks so I can rotate the horses through them every few weeks for grazing.  That should allow the grass to grow and cut back on the hay bill substantially.  Then I'm going to build a huge pen for the goats that incorporates some of the trees and vegetation on the hillside.  They will either have to have free access to the barn or I'll have to let them out and bring them into the barn at night, and I'm still mulling this over as the idea is to make it as easy (on me) as possible.  Another urgent plan I've made is to get the deadfall cut up for firewood and thin out some of the saplings on the hill.  This will require getting both chainsaws tuned up and sharpened.  Some of those panels I intend to buy will become the fencing for my orchard and vegetable garden, and I'm going to plant tons of fruit trees and veggies this spring that will be totally pet-proof this time around.  Britt and Robby have promised to finish the second chicken house in the next few days.  They got the intact building free off Craigslist, dismantled it, and reassembled it (for the most part) once they got it back here.  It's inside the barn and adjacent to the original built-in coop, so the entire flock of chickens, ducks and geese should fit in one house or the other quite cozily.  I've promised myself not to buy any more baby chicks or hatching eggs to incubate in 2011!

Bob and I had several days off together this week, which is somewhat of a rarity.  The other day we were out for a drive in the rain and decided to go wine tasting on the spur of the moment.  It's the first time we've done it since moving here, and it was so much fun that we went again yesterday!  We only visited 2 wineries each day and still have several more in the area to check out before we start over again lol.  My favorites consistently at each place were the pinot gris and the dessert wines (which differed from one another significantly but were all fabulous).  Amazingly, Bob agreed with me 100%, and that is just mind boggling because we never agree on ANYTHING!