June – Looking Old

June 14, 2017 Jeanne at No Rhyme or Reason Farm After, Before, Chester County, Uncategorized, Wood Shed

Not me! The farm! Well, probably me too… but it’s more fun making the farm look old. A while back we added a wood shed to the farm. It was new construction; stained wood with a weather vane on top. But over the course of the last winter, it settled a bit into the ground. Chris decided to use his farm jack to hoist it up and level it. And it looked great, but then… we decided it would look even better if it looked like it had always been there — with a stone foundation. Since there is no lack of stones around here, and since I’m the self-proclaimed stone mason of No Rhyme or Reason Farm (given all the stone walls I’ve built since we moved here) — I figured this would be no big deal.

Apparently I was wrong. A few hours later we finally finished wedging the last rock in to place. Piling rocks up to make a rock wall is one thing — fitting them precisely into the space under a wood shed was another! I think I’ll just stick to my free-form rock walls from now on. I’m eyeing the hillside at the back of the house. I think it needs a rock wall along the ridge line. I bet that won’t take as long as this did.

dscn7492 — It’s level — but it looks like it just got delivered and plopped here off the back of a trailer.

DSCN7898 — An amazing “old” stone foundation — now it looks like it’s always been here.

June – Using the trailer

June 6, 2017 Jeanne at No Rhyme or Reason Farm After, Before, Chester County, Farm, Farm Truck, Trailer, Uncategorized, Wood Shed

Remember that new toy/tool — the trailer? I wasn’t sure why we needed it — but as it turns out — it’s VERY useful!

“How?” you ask.

It’s useful for bringing home more toys/tools! Why didn’t I see that coming?

“What new tool?” you ask.

A wood splitter, of course. Every farm needs one. We did go through a lot of fire wood last winter; and we do have an inexhaustible supply of dead trees around the property. Chris already has a chain saw, so the wood splitter was inevitable, I suppose. And then he got to use the trailer too! It’s a great day on the farm!

log splitter on trailer — Loaded and ready for the trip home.

DSCN7873 — It was still on the trailer when it got to our driveway.

September – Which way does the Wind Blow?

September 16, 2016September 16, 2016 Jeanne at No Rhyme or Reason Farm Chester County, Farm, Homestead, Renovations, Wood Shed

Chris has been going through new chains for his chain saw about once a week – that’s how many trees he’s been cutting down. We are trying to reclaim the meadow and open up space where we want to start our orchard. Cutting down the trees is just the beginning. Then he slices them into fireplace-size logs. Then he splits them with an axe. He’s turning into a regular Paul Bunyon! After all, we do have two fireplaces to feed, and the wood pile is growing.

So, Chris decided we need a woodshed for all the split wood he has been stacking up. And I decided we need a woodshed because I saw a really cute one with a weather vane on top.

We went back to Pop’s Barns, where we got the run-in shed for the horses, and ordered a 4×8 Quaker model woodshed with a chicken weather vane on top. That was the easy part.

Then the space needed to be readied for the woodshed. The pile of split wood needed to be moved, the land needed to be cleared, tilled and leveled. Then we waited – six impatient weeks for the shed to be delivered before we could stack the firewood into the appropriate compartments of the woodshed.

And now I know which way the wind is blowing.