Hello friends, it’s been awhile. I never intend to go so long without posting but it so often just feels like I’m writing into a void, I recently read that blogs have completely died and that was a bit of a discouragement! January is usually a quiet time here and so much of what is done is inside work, though this year it’s been warm so a lot of Woodland work has been done. While the warmish temperatures feel nice, we need the cold weather to help break the pest cycle, give the trees and plants a nice long rest, and achieve required cold hours for bulbs, etc. We’ve been hoping for snow but so far, no luck.

At the beginning of January, I celebrated my 50th birthday! Bryce and Grace made me a beautiful cake and I was very blessed to celebrate in different ways with different loved ones in my life!

I was also fortunate to put together flower arrangements for another friend’s 50th! We used all grocery store flowers and I was really thrilled with how they turned out. I made three arrangement to go down the table and one tall arrangement for the drinks table. As an aside, I love how Trader Joe’s sells such a large variety of greens (flowers are great too). I so enjoyed spending the afternoon playing with flowers and it definitely got me ready for spring flowers!

Speaking of flowers, the snowdrops have appeared! There aren’t many now but each year I’m planting more and more with the hope that someday the woods will be covered in them. They make me happy every time I round the corner and see them!

Due to emerald ash borer, we are losing hundreds of Ash trees on our property. It’s heartbreaking. We’ve been taking Ash down that would potentially be harmful to humans, animals or other trees. This means that we have an unbelievable amount of wood! Bryce has been working on splitting the wood all month. The amount we have is extraordinary and we will sell some after it’s had time to season. I do love the round stacks he makes.

We’ve also been in the woods pulling invasives and vines (the twisted tree below is an example of what vines can do left to their own ends). I do love to see the moss growing!

Of course, I’ve also been planning for this years flowers and vegetables. I’ve organized my seeds, ordered what I need for next year and planned the beds and field! I’m glad to have gotten all my orders in and gotten what I wanted before things were out of stock. Plus, I find I do much better with a plan in the garden instead of making it up as I go along. We’ve also made some exciting decisions about the field! More on that to come.

The guinea hens continue to delight us though we have had some heartbreak in the form of frostbite. We had a day where it was warmish and raining and then the temperature dropped to single digits within a couple of hours. It seems that a few guineas suffered frostbite on their toes. We have felt so guilty about this though they do not seem to be in pain, but they have lost their claws. The new chickens are also continuing to grow and we cannot wait for them to start laying eggs!

As we are moving into the new year ahead, I’m curious your thoughts about what you would like to read about here? The nitty gritty? Garden? Home? Celebrations? Flowers? I’m open to all suggestions!