Getting ready for winter....

Good morning everyone...we got our first cord of firewood, and apples are now starting to be harvested, so will need to get my boxes (box of eating..box of cooking) of them and winter is well in the way of being taken care of in ways. They had an excellent run on brocolli yesterday at 39 cents an pound. Got to finish off my little booklet and its ready for this short report to be sent to POE with an donation check also. I wonder how long it takes to get there. Does England have the opposite seasons that we do, or not?....do you people do winter chores exclusive each year,,,what is it you do?...Do you sweep the chimney and stack up the firewood for use also? Buy up the items to make some "pasties" all winter long? I still have to go back and get the 100 pounds of potatoes yet...if I get that much this year,,I think they are also selling in 20 pound bags...were out of the big bags of carrots. yesterday but did get in 20 pounds of onions. We tend to hardly have no one here, or like yesterday, we had 17 of us again...there is something about us being in the yard with so many , the neighbors start coming by, or stopping by also. It reminds me of when we first moved in and there was 23 little kids in the block amoung all the new houses. But I think the sound of firewood being chopped(defineately the smell of pine in the iar) .. kids playing, and little puppies and dogs feeling their outside "Oats"..,cats leaping from post to post.. and it makes for an enlightening nieghborhood at times...especially by the time the huge pizza's arrive. People coming, people going. We had Steve yesterday also, his grandmother is passing...she had an stroke yesterday, his dad was with his mother, and Steve came over here. Times change you know. Life goes on. My thoughts on this is at 69 years old she's to young pass on, bu tagain, she signed paapers not to save her if she didn't make an full recovery. Sometimes things can't be stopped I guess. One of our old neighbors moved out yesterday, to an senior assisted home...said my good-byes to her also. Seasons come, seasons go. What are you people doing to prepare for winter?.....Knitting doggie boots/sweaters for the puppies and kitties..and kids?I still have my grandson's PJ's to make on the sewing machine. Quick an easy, I'm buying the long sleeved tops...hoping to find some thermal fabric tops. Need to make small pancakes to freeze for this week's school breakfast's also today...busy day..busy week.

Fall sailing is great, but it's slowly coming to an end. Boat is going to be hauled out on 22 October; that's right around the corner. Time to winterize it soon.

But, Disney World for Christmas week, then the Caribbean frst two weeks of February, and before you know it, my launch date will be here...10 May!

Cheers,

Bob

Hi Shirley, lots of questions there which I will answer another time if you don't mind, unless others answer before of course! My brief answer is that we obviously don't have it as tough as you guys.

And Bob.........talk about how the other half live or what? Such a hard life for you eh? Lol

Fall and Winter--Yay! My two favorite seasons. Sadly, I won't be chopping wood for the woodstove this season (my  therapy!) because we just moved into a house with a gas fireplace. True, its a lot more convenient, but I'll miss that old woodstove (not the chimney cleaning, however). That baby really cranked out the heat--our dog Gracie would lay in front of it to bake for a while and then go lay by the front door for a cool-off!

I live in Michigan and that means that I will have to bite the bullet and buy a snowblower for the much longer driveway that we have acquired (we lived in town before this and our driveway was quite short), especially if we have a winter like last year--we had four feet of snowfall just in December alone! We now live in a place surounded by forest, so Fall should be spectacular this year!

Rob, you get those lake affect snows don't you? I love fall and winter too!! I'm in New Jersey so we never know what kind of winter we will have!!

I love the autumn, and here on the Northshore the leaves have already started to change. In just a few short weeks New England will be blanketed in a carpet of many colors. I also love the holiday season and for me the autumn is a herald of that time. I don't mind the winter except when it's really bitter, usually January and February here.

I don't have to do much to prepare. Just make sure my coats are dry cleaned and ready to go. I also like to get my car serviced just before winter sets in. And of course, I have to make sure the shovels are in working order!

Krissy, We live in Central Michigan, so lake phenomenon doesn't always affect us. We are in a weather no-man's land in the winter in this region of Michigan, in-between two prevailing weather patterns. Sometimes we fall in the southern Michigan pattern, which often means more snow, sometimes in the northern Michigan pattern, which includes a lot of snow and often much colder temps, or sometimes it will snow like crazy both north and south of our region and we won't see a flake--weird.

My son and daughter both live in the Cleveland, Ohio area. My son lives about 20 miles west of Cleveland and tends to get a lot less snow than my daughter who lives about 10 miles east of Cleveland--the weird Lake Erie lake effect snow pattern.

Just good, tight budgeting, Ron.

Our son lives in Jacksonville, FL, so we meet at Disney World for Christmas week. Donna's birthday is Feb 6th and the caribbean cruise is my birthday present to her.

As far as sailing goes, it's cheap to do. We don't spend tons of money on fuel (hey, it's a sailboat!) so all we have are club dues, mooring fees, and haulout/storage/launch fees. To help pay for our sailing habit, we take out a few folks a season for sunset sails.

We live a very frugal life to do this, but it's worth it.

Cheers,

Bob