Plan A, plan B, plan C

 Our trips to the land to work have been fewer recently as the heat and humidity have kept us at bay. Woodchuck works in the heat already 6 days a week, and I am not tolerating the heat well this year after working in it last year in a couple of my jobs. But on a trip out there recently, we were able to knock out a lot of different projects!

We started another burn pile up! We kept it smaller than usual this time because we weren't going to spend the whole day out here. The forecast repeatedly calls for rain, but we aren't getting it most of the time, and trying to burn on the days where they are calling for rain later (to help put out the hot ashes) is proving futile. (Don't worry, we dump water the pile before we leave.) While that burned, Woodchuck needed to get down in the ditch by the culvert because the metal he placed over the hole fell down. We had a strong storm a couple of weeks ago with high winds, and with the vegetation exploding as well, the metal didn't stand a chance. We are trying to keep as much water as possible in the pond, and I can see from the current on the other side of the culvert that this metal isn't blocking the water off completely. Unfortunately, he rolled up his sleeves and ended up coming into contact with something that caused some contact dermatitis on his forearm. I'm thinking it might have been the water hemlock, which thankfully he always wears eye protection! I have some Technu that I keep in the shower so that we can wash down when we get home from the land, but I might also need to keep a bottle of it out there by the hand water pump for situations like this. That stuff is the bomb!

He was going to try and just go down the bank like usual, but with the overgrowth, we couldn't see as well where he was stepping. I convinced him to put on the safety harness, and he hooked that to the tractor. 62 and still doing these things! 💚

Once that was done, and all of the equipment put back where he got it from (that will not last long!), we moved on to the back ditch drainage pipe. If you remember from previous posts, our first plan of action was to the cap the pipe (plan A). That didn't work, water was still running from under the pipe cap. So we propped up the end of the pipe with some fencing. On a recent trip out there, I wondered why I was hearing a small waterfall when we got closer to the ditch, and found water coming from several holes. Has it always been this way? Or is this new? We have been so busy and overwhelmed with our jobs, that we can't remember. And of course, I can't get any of my videos to load 😶 But we tried wrapping the pipe with Flex-tape, Plan B, and that immediately failed because there was so much water still pouring out of the holes. So then we went to plan C, which was Woodchuck's idea and one that I was completely against because I don't want to do anything permanent right away. Quick-set cement. 

As far as we can tell, this didn't work either. We aren't sure yet what plan D would be, other than him wanting to get another bag of cement. I cringe and fret.

On our way to our next land project, I spied a large mushie in the forest! While I was sad that I missed it at its peak, I was SO geeked out to have seen it at all! The head was bigger than my hand, and it was a stark white standing out on the forest floor against all of the browns. 

We had some trees that we needed to take down, one of which was a black cherry that was leaning over the barn. The previous owner of the land, who planted all of the trees, did a row of alternating black cherry and poplar, and none of the black cherries did well! Our idea was to attach a thin string on to an arrow and have me shoot the arrow over a low branch of the cherry, but Woodchuck got too heavy and thick of a rope and it would instantly drop the arrow. So I ran to my work cart and grabbed a spool of survey string (I call it plumb line), attached that, shot the arrow, and good to go! We pulled that string down, detached the arrow and attached the thicker rope to the string, pulled that up over the branch and we were ready to cut. Woodchuck cut while I held the rope taught and pulled as the tree fell so that it didn't hit the barn.

We also cut down a black locust that was growing just inside of the white pine edge of the front CRP. We have several more, in various sizes, to take down all in the same area. Woodchucks gas chainsaw ended up not working out because it was dull, so he ended up using my electric one for all of the tree cutting that day. I love that thing! Then we moved on to a poplar sucker branch that was overhanging the driveway (and again, there are a few more of those). The worst part of the day was identifying another Tree of Heaven on the land. This is the second one, in another totally random spot, that I have found out there. Thankfully I am finding them while they are young and controllable. 

We ended the day with a trip to the fair! I was able to treat us with the trip by using some of my tip money I made from work. I bought Woodchuck a ring as well, as he's always on the lookout for them! I think this stainless steel and tigers eye ring looks great with his hand tattoos!!!

I also really liked this idea for a picnic table, though I would need the seats slightly lower in order for me to able to get on them, lol. Maybe we can do something like this at the land in various spots?

I also managed to finish another dream catcher! The frame was made by us from our grapevines, then I used synthetic sinew and glass beads to make the web, and finished it off with some metal feathers and jingles. As of today, I am approx. 21 weeks away from getting out of the workforce. My leg will be very happy!!! I am SO excited to spend more time at home, resting/healing, getting the house ready for market, and working on art. Please visit my shop to see some of the things that I have for sale 💜 www.soapwoodartstudio.etsy.com