Time to start getting ready for winter folks!

Last night it rained! We woke up and both giggled a little. Oh how we didn’t want it to stop. It cooled things down beautifully!
We might just be the middle of the hottest driest summer I’ve ever experienced in Oklahoma since I’ve moved here, but there is one thing for certain, winter is a coming. This means in spite of the heat it’s time to go out into the woods and mark dead trees and trees that need to be thinned for the health of the forest. We won’t cut them down till September, but one day soon I’ll go out with florescent red/orange ribbon and mark what will become our sole heat source come this winter.

A group of us, my closest friends who I call my family will fell, cut and split hickory, black jack oaks and some others whom I haven’t yet learned the names of. It will probably take us a week or more to gather all we need, I alone will go through five or six ricks this winter, and the rest of the family probably the same, maybe a little more but that’s the average. It will be a little difficult getting to some of these trees but the woods will benefit greatly. There is too much competition for sun and moisture. Forest management, good for the land and good for us. It takes a lot of work but its important work that needs to be done.

Being prepared is the key to this life. So we have to think far ahead. Creature comforts are a warm yurt, plenty of dry kindling, you can’t fall short on these things or you suffer. We’ve chosen to live as close to nature as we can, our philosophy our life style, our choices mean a lot to us but it also means we work for these things. We don’t pay for our heat we earn it. We don’t pay for our food we earn it. We pay for motor fuel and the extras that go into the pantry like olive oil and flour and salt and some normal things. I trade what I can, for some vet services, beef when we want it, some produce that we don’t grow. There’s a beauty I’ve discovered in all this it makes the fire seem warmer and the food more delicious. I can’t explain it as well as I would like to but it’s a feeling that comes inside the wave of gratitude.

It’ll be a nice break from field work to wander through the woods marking trees. I’m sure we’ll get our share of ticks and chiggers but it will be nice to be in the shaded coolness just for a spell.