First Snow

We had our first snow this past week.  The kids were out of school and they enjoyed every bit of it.  As you can see, we didn't get a lot.  There was plenty of sledding on the grass, but it worked.

The ski swap, which always puts us in the mood for winter, was Saturday.  Luckily, we didn't need much and got out the door with a $20 pair of ski boots for Maren and some good deals on skis for Hannah and Maren.  We are all getting excited to get on the mountain.

Halloween

It was a good Halloween in Sandpoint.  No rain and unseasonably warm weather.  We enjoyed lots of trick-or-treating and some fun with friends and neighbors. 

 

 

Izzy continued tradition by wearing Paige's Island Princess costume (this might be the 3rd time it's seen Halloween).  Hannah went as a member of the Partridge Family and was quite hip in her go-go boots and velvet dress. Maren was one of a kind in her Tweedle Dee costume and Paige was perfect as Hermione from Harry Potter.

 

Trick-or-Treating with friends is always fun...

 And, of course, there is the aftermath...

I am not usually an advocate for Pumpkin Carving.  But since we grew so many of them this year on the farm, we couldn't let Halloween pass without making some jack-o-lanterns.  It wasn't as bad as I anticipated.  Maybe because most of the girls are finally old enough and willing enough to pull the gross goo out themselves.  Our fun neighbors, the Bingers, joined us.

Deer Proof

I do most of my gardening at home.  I love to have things close at hand.  But with the farm we have expanded our gardening.  This year we transplanted raspberries and put in a whole bunch of new blueberry plants.  We also planted fun things like pumpkins, potatoes and corn.  Now that we are growing things out at the farm, we are discovering the joys of local wildlife.  Like the deer that eat your newly transplanted raspberries down to the ground. So disappointing!

Because we haven't had enough building, fixing and cleaning up to do this past year, we decided to tackle one more project.  A deer fence.  Actually, it was my idea and I talked Kirk into helping me since it is not a project I could do by myself.  After looking at a lot of different options as well as a close look at our budget (which is minimal), here is what we came up with...

• 9' Railroad ties spaced every eight feet,
• 16' cow panels in between the railroad ties,
• 2 strands of double wire to make up the difference between the 4' of cow panel and the 7' of fencing we need to keep those pesky deer out of the garden.

The cost for all of this...

• $9 per railroad tie
• $22 per cow panel
• $0 for the wire (we used wire that was already on the farm)
• $0 for labor (Kirk and I did it ourselves)
• Total = $2.50 per linear foot of fencing

Luckily, we have a tractor with a post hole digger,

And a backhoe for the heavy lifting,

And a few good weather days before winter sets in.

Whew!  Building a fence is a lot of work! Let's hope it works and those deer find alternate food sources.