Snow and Ice

I was out and about yesterday and actually remembered to take the camera with me. We had a lovely day of sunshine and temperatures made it up to about 40*. I took some interesting pics of the ice and snow.

1/21/09 taken from my upstairs window

1/22/09 this ice sheet is about 7ft tall

1/21/09 taken from my upstairs window

1/22/09 the ice columns in the back corner are about 7ft and 10 ft tall

lonely playground

kids playhouse cave!

Buried even deeper!

We got another 9 to 12 inches of snow last night. We now have about 2 feet of the white stuff on the ground and it is still snowing!!

Here are more pics I took today. The man shovelling my sidewalk is my brother Rob, and for reference regarding some of the snow piles, he is about 5 ft 6 inches tall. Compare the first photo in the gallery to the header photo (taken last week).

apple trees 1/18/09

backyard 1/18/09

No, that is not a sleeping snowman! It is my scooter buried under 2 feet of snow!

Snow piles in front of the neighbor’s house.

Still not seeing spring around that corner!

Rob barely visible!

My brother Rob being nice and shovelling my sidewalk.

Rob and the hedge piled with snow!

Rob versus the snow piles!

Digging out where the snow plow filled it in!

WooHoo! He’s through!

More snow!

We seem to be stuck in a snow cycle here! And so, here are some more snow pics to tease the envious, amuse the sadistic , and irritate the already snow-covered! Smile… spring is just around the corner!

Looking west

Looking east

MORE snow in the backyard!

Snow-laden pines

My house… there is at least a foot of snow on the hedges!

Looking “around the corner”!

Oops… guess spring must be around another corner! haha

Winter snow

I changed the header photo to show today’s view of the Urban Homestead. We have about 10″ of snow on the ground and are forecasted to get anywhere from 9 to 12 MORE inches of snow tonight. Wish I had my skis! It is a beautiful winter wonderland!

Here is the full photo…

2009!

Wow!  Here we are… January 1, 2009! 

For many of us, 2008 was a rough year, I am no exception.  But I am looking forward to a new year and a new beginning.  How about you?

I wish everyone a happy, healthy, and prosperous 2009.

Be blessings!  Be blessed!

Kitty

The “Homestead”

Well, here it is in all its glory!  Instead of over 7 acres, I now am homesteading on a 60′ x 180′ city lot.   Granted, it is a good sized lot, but I will have to scale back just a tad from last year’s 1 acre garden.  There are 2 mature apple trees that bear loads of delicious apples.  They are in desperate need of a proper pruning and I will do that in a month or so.  There is also a quince bush, doesn’t look like much without its leaves though!   Pic #1  is of my apple trees, the blue house is mine.  Pic #2 is baby irises already poking up through the ground!  Pic#3 is my garden! (Can you see it??!)  Pic #4 is the broken down compost bin.  Pic #5  is the quince bush.  Pic #6 is the view from the back door through the apple trees. 

The house is in disrepair, but I will get everything fixed up as time, energy and money permit.  The pics are all of just the back yard… there is also a decent sized side yard and front yard as well.

There you have it….. home sweet home!

Christmas dinner

We had a very pleasant Christmas dinner.    My youngest brother, Rob, came up for dinner and brought a bottle of wine.  The wine was called “Pink Truck”, the wine was pink, too!  It was pretty good.  It was just four of us, me, Ryan, Mom, and Rob; we had a good time!

I took some pics of the dinner table because it just looked so nice.  I even took pics of the “fireplace” where the stockings were hung.  It was a good day!

Church Christmas program

Last night was the church Christmas program… Ryan and the other teens had a few songs they sang.  Ryan is the handsome young man in the back row wearing the blue neck tie.   His dear friend, Christine, is on the far right.   They did good, but were upstaged by the little kids! 

We had a good time, there was a potluck dinner after the program.   A good time was had by all.

New home, new life

Sadly, I have left Paradise Canyon Farm and have moved back to Pennsylvania, so I have changed the blog name but kept the address the same.  We are still getting settled and adjusting to life in-town again.  I am currently custom baking my own cheesecake creations and selling to a growing number of patrons.  Ryan is attending the local high school and will start a course at the vo-tech school in January.  We have found a wonderful church!  The website is  http://titusvillelcc.com/ , there are live streamed services as well as archived services.

I have started scouring the seed catalogs to compile an order for this spring’s planting.  The back yard will once again become my garden paradise!   I can’t wait to get back to digging in the dirt again! I got the rorotiller in the separation agreement, so I will put it to good use!  Next month I will prune the apple trees and the quince bush. 

In the meantime, I have cheesecake orders to bake before Christmas; shopping to do; a house to organize; and a life to begin living!

Population explosion!! 5/6/08

We have had a population explosion at Paradise Canyon Farm!  So far this spring, we have added….

more than 20 chicks

triplet buckling goats

and a 2 day old Brown Swiss/Holstein bull calf

We still have 4 goats yet to kid within the next month!  Talk about a full house!!!