Growing challenge update

Alas I don't really have anything new to report on the growing challenge front. We are deep in the throws of winter here and I have all I can do to keep the house warm and the pipes not frozen. It's snowing here again today, and my garden area is currently under glaciated snowpack.

I'm looking into getting the plastic I need to get my greenhouse frame up and running. I got the frame from the disposal crew who were cleaning out the neighbor's house before the new people moved in and it snowed before I had a chance to get the plastic. In retrospect it was a good thing too 'cause we've had a record snowfall this year and that's where a lot of the snowpiles from my neighbors' pro-bono plowing job ended up (very kind of them too I might add since the snow blower is officially dead), not to mention the fact that I have seen many of these kinds of frames (usually as garages and not greenhouses) get flattened this year and I'm kind of thankful things turned out the way they did. It has put a slight hamper on my winter garden attempts though.

I once had a gloriously huge garden with a wattle fence which sustained us quite nicely through the warm months, but I got a full time job and it went to pot, then I got some sheep and the wattle didn't hold up to my 200lb babies and they ate the garden. To add insult to gardening injury the year I decided to move my garden I got pregnant (surprize!), and was all consumed with fatigue, so much so I didn't even knit (and for those of you who know me well know that is a major big thing). My fatigue didn't end there, the following year I barely had the energy to keep up with 2 squarefoot beds, and the year after that my newly mobile one year old hardly let me spend the time I would have liked, so I just managed some tomatoes. But I'm back, and this year the baby will be 2, and except for really liking to run into the road, which I'm hoping she'll get over by spring, she's pretty self reliant and I should be able to get the big garden I so desperately crave.

These are my geese. I use them primarily as pest control for the sheep, but they also act as an alarm for the sheep as well in that they don't like anything coming into their yard and will squak really loud which sends the sheep running in the other direction. Works fantastic. I have a bit of a problem with the sheep beating the geese up in the winter though and so I keep them out front in the winter time, but as my neighbor accross the street has more sun, ergo more grass at this point in the year, quite often the geese are in the road and I think it's irritating oncoming traffic 'cause they are doing an awful lot of honking (the cars, not the geese) lately, and I'm not really sure how to resolve this dilemma - I'll have to think of something before next winter, because this is obviously not working.

So I'll leave you all with the bucolic view from my office window, very Currier and Ives isn't it? It's an even nicer view when the horses are out, but like my sheep they're hiding in the barn from all the snow.