Welcome to A Victorian Year in Ontario

Greetings Ladies and Gentlemen, the year is 1865, Her Majesty Queen Victoria has reigned since 1837 and we are in the midst of a prosperous era. The purpose of this blog is to record the daily round of chores, tasks, trials and triumphs of our household in rural Upper Canada (now known as Ontario). We have embarked on an experiment to live a year as close to the way it was done in 1865 as we possibly can. We will post our remarks and await your comments, suggestions and critiques. So join us as we travel back in time.

Monday, September 10, 2012

Fall weather has arrived and Henry is leaving us

Our Grandson happily took home cabbage,egg plant, squash,tomatoes, zucchini, and an ever prized first pumpkin. He was indeed a happy little boy. When he arrived home he presented his Mother with a lovely savoy cabbage in its entire beautiful leafy brilliance.
The nights are cool and the woodstove now feels welcoming instead of smotheringly hot. Our trees are turning wonderful colours and I look forward to my favorite time of the year. A time to put down everything we can to enjoy for the winter months. A time to relish the smell of the wood stove as we stand outside in the cool weather.Smells wonderful to me .
I look forward to hand sewing and long stewed meals. As we prepare to hunker down for the winter. We have decided to add on to the chicken coops and runs this fall . In order to ensure lots of excercise space for our ever growning flock. Speaking of chickens , sadly we are losing our origional Henry. Our Beautiful Bard Rock rooster is old and dying . he follows me around like an old man and has lost his shine.I am sad that he will be leaving soon , but he has  had a wonderful long life . He is 4, has had his own personal harum and has lived an entirely free range healthy life. For a mistake he has done very well indeed. I say "mistake" because I had ordered this lot of chickens from the hardware store in town. I asked for a dozen chickens. When they arrived they were all a few day old chicks, I soon discovered that one of the "chickens" was indeed a rooster. jokingly my next trip into the hardware I said to the clerk. " I seem to have a problem with one of my chickens" He said "oh what is the problem?" I said "t has a penis"
He asked me if I wanted to return the bird and I declined. Henry has been a fantastic member of our chicken family and has been a wonderful protecter of his many ladies. I will miss him indeed.
Our runner ducks are turning beautiful colours, there heads are turning greens and purples. And they are developing lovely wing feathers of assorted colours ..we will have to take photos.
Well I will go for now , we are working on the cold cellar this week so wish us luck .
Until next time
Margaret