What!!!! What do you do?

This is the response we heard when we told a fellow Rotarian that we do not have a television ...we then proceeded to explain our little year long experiment and he became almost appoplectic...was amusing to say the least.
We thought we should clarify what we do do without tv or radio or electric lights especially in the evening. Wait for it ..........we light candles. fairly simple folks. Candles placed properly will give you plenty of light. Not as strong as electric light (you won't see dirt in corners until the daytime) but good light to do whatever by. We play board games especially scrabble.We talk.(novel idea I know). I write handwritten letters with real ink and exchange letters with a lady in Arkansas who also enjoys Victorian letter writing. She is much better at beautiful letter writing than I am .And I look forward to hearing from her.In fact she puts my letter in a larger envelope , my letter is in actual Victorian wrapping and she even draws the post mark in according to what it would have looked like in 1865. She is very cool to do this. So that is what we do in our spare time
Actually the only appliance I miss is the radio.
But we really don't have time to watch tv. We keep ourselves busy puttering around. Our meals are enjoyed at a table with much conversation and generally(but not always) in the formal dining room. We are trying as best as we can, to while we are home here live as close to Victorian as we can. So regardless of the meal we do it as full service as we can. We linger over our meals when we have time to. And try to enjoy all the pleasures involved with good food and quiet conversation. People seem so rushed today and we are enjoying the calm. It is lovely when our Grandchildren come to visit how they also enjoy what we are doing and they insist that we eat in the formal dining room. They set the table and take great care to include knife rests and bread plates. It is very cool indeed. But I think they love the candle light the most in the dining room. It gives a peaceful glow and ambiance to the meal.Our Grandchildren have also learned they need a "traveller " to go into dark rooms with. A "traveller" being a candle holder with a handle. And it is funny to hear Zoe say" where is the traveller I need to go to ....." so she has learned to art of the "traveller" So in a nutshell that is some of the things we do without television, radio, lights...and it is lovely and quiet in our home ...see you soon.

Farmers Almanac says....

Farmers Almanac is predicting a long snowy winter this year. Given the amount of snow dumped on the Eastern United States over the past couple of days we should perhaps take heed. We are gathering starter wood today for the kitchen stove and will be bringing in the larger wood for the furnace in the basement. The furnace has been chugging out heat all week for us, as it has been quite cold. So the house is beautifully warm with the furnace and the kitchen stove. All summer I was lamenting the heat in the kitchen , now I am loving it. As are our inside kittens, they vie for the closest seat to the stove. Ken redid the chicken coop floor and has dig it out ,laid crushed stone, and patio stones followed by copious amounts of beautiful fresh straw in the laying boxes and beyond.. We are picking the last of the beautiful pears from the trees out back and I will need to figure out more recipes to preserve them.We will be back later on and talk some more about our winter plans...Dont want to waste the day , it is beautiful outside...M&K

It has been a while ....

We have had a small family crisis that has kept us busy . We apologise for being away so long and not posting our progress. But things are getting back to normal and so here we are again.

We have been very busy preparing for what we hear is going to be a harsh Canadian winter this year.
Our gardens have produced some beautiful gifts to last the winter ...hopefully.
We did not get as much squash this season as we thought we would. And our zucchini did not produce as well either. According to gardening expert Ed Lawrence  this years way too much rain in the spring and not enought rain in late summer hurt crops such as squash,turnips,zucchini and garlic. One organic farmer lost over 2/3 of their crop this summer ...wow
We have been very busy trying to fit canning of apples ,pears, tomatoes and whatever else we can get our hands on .I think we might have enough beautiful apple jelly to keep our grandchildren coming back for more for a while.
Ken has been fixing the shop/shed in order to set up his forge. he has added a second floor for storage , and it looks fantastic.He has worked hard.
We managed to buy another wood stove at an auction to put in the shop. Although I am sure the forge will warm the shop too.
We will need to get in more wood and build up our kindling supply. Between the wood cook stove and the wood furnace we use quite a bit of wood. Add to that the shop and well you get the picture.
I have been thinking about what this all would mean in the year 1865 and again I come back to how we would have survived given the loss of some of our crops. For instance our tomatoes. We today can say oh well, and then when we need tomatoes or tomato sauce pick some up at the local store. that would not have been the case here in 1865. Gardening would have been a pretty serious business. This is an area I can say we have failed in during this project and hopefully can improve on next year. We need to fence some of the gardens to keep the chickens from having access to the veggies. They really enjoyed the cucumbers this year, and the watermelon...they loved the watermelon.  Not sure what we can do about the racoons , they seem to be able to get into anything .
Speaking of chickens, our new breeds are doing well and are now producing eggs , wonderful green and blue eggs. Small but lovely.
We still have not purchased our quails , and I am thinking that will have to wait until the spring. We will be lining the outside of the chickens coop with straw bales this year for warmth and will let you know how that works. Until next time , I will say the wood stove in the kitchen is keeping us warm for now and the earth smells of fall. Thank you for being patient with us ...Margaret & Ken