Where did winter go?

All summer long, I planned for December through March. Four glorious, long months of chilly, lovely rain with nothing to do but read the pile of books I’d accumulated, make plans for the 2018 farm, handle some business filings and personal to-do’s, apply for a couple of grants, harvest produce from our hoop houses, complete some creative projects around the house and generally laze about the fireplace.

All I can remember now of December is that it disappeared in a Holiday blur. You see, while we had been here for almost a year, we were basically under the radar, working daily on the barn and understanding our property during our first summer. The fall was spent finalizing the kitchen, working on the vineyard install and beginning our boots-on-the-ground marketing efforts. And then came December! By then, due to networking and marketing, we’d become ‘known’. This is a great thing but wow, were we busy accepting party invites! As I said to a friend “we are the ‘it girls’ right now and you only get that chance once.” One five day period, we had seven events to attend! Work wise, we did our first official event, a Pick-up Party for Wildhurst, which was good for fun and business and catered prime rib + all the fixings delivered and take-home feasts for Christmas Day. Loved it all but while we were partying and working away, my pile of books continued to collect dust.

January was quieter and I did get quite a few projects done. I read and digested all my farming notes from the year, made my spreadsheet lists, put in my seed orders and basically organized the 2018 farm plan to a tee. (This is amusing because the plan is usually good only until about 10 minutes into the season and then, well, let’s just say, whatever happens is, at best, a loose interpretation of the lovely, tidy rows in the spreadsheet.) I read the Sunday paper almost every Sunday, while tending the fireplace and watching football. I did a couple of fun creative projects, got the business and personal paperwork stuff done and studied up to become a Lake County Certified Tourism Ambassador. We did tastings for some of the wineries, introduced ourselves to a few more and finally completed the full build permit on the barn. In the middle of all this, we saw neighbors and friends and invited people we’d wanted to know better around as often as possible. It was a fun a busy month but my pile of books was still sitting there, calling to me!

Now, it’s the beginning of February and I’d love to think I have even a month to devour that book pile. However, it doesn’t look promising. For one thing the weather indicates zero rain for the next two weeks, at least, and crazy-for-winter warm temps. While this is grand for humans to enjoy, it’s horrid for our snow pack, water supply and fire danger. I know it’s too soon to call winter done but it sure feels like it and I’m afraid our orchard trees will feel the same and bud early. It appears the drought may be back and I might seriously consider a rain dance in the field! In addition, the phone is ringing. Now don’t get me wrong, everything we’ve done has been to make that phone to ring, so there are no complaints here. I’m just a little stunned at how quickly it happened. Great calls from wineries for parties, companies for luncheons and people for all kinds of wonderful events. I also seem to have raised my hand to head one of the major committees for a premier local benefit event, our classes begin next week and we seem to have an inordinate number of regularly scheduled doctor, dentist, hair and other appointments this month! “Oh me, oh my, I’m lonely” says my piles of books!

First thing in March will be to finish harvesting everything in our winter hoop houses and plant the summer crop under the plastic. In addition, we’ll do the first and second batches of farm seedlings. In addition, we’ll be catering the next Wildhurst Pick-up Party. We are keeping the menu under wraps but let’s just say it’s very near St Pats Day, so ponder a made-to-order spin on that!

In all this, one of the most amazing things is that everything we do here returns to us a hundredfold. We love this place, the people and our life here. It’s truly remarkable every day.

Who knows, maybe before everything buds for spring there will be at least a couple more weeks of deep cold and rain. Let’s hope it’s soon to kick the drought return and put my butt in the chair by the fire to read a book or two. I’ll keep you posted!