Blizzard of 2013 ...

Friday afternoon we were hit with a blizzard here in New England. 

With hurricane force winds and snow fall rates at 2-3" per hour, we ended up with over 24" of snow by Saturday afternoon. Some towns here in Connecticut received record levels of snow at over 40"! The strong wind gusts created 4' snow drifts at our back door and around the cars in the driveway and it took us 2 days to completely shovel out.

During the storm it was hard for me to relax. I always feel like I need to be doing something and it was difficult to just sit and enjoy the quiet and marvel at nature's beauty. It is truly amazing how quiet it gets when the power goes out. You don't realize the constant noises and buzzing that occur in day to day life!

We lost power Friday night at 6:30 pm. until Sunday morning around 10:30 am.

Luckily we have a wood stove that kept the house toasty warm, especially since the nighttime lows were  around 6 degrees! 

We were able to heat water for tea, cook soup, heat leftovers and make grilled cheese sandwiches on the top of the stove and even roast potatoes inside! Those were delicious potatoes!!

Potatoes roasting in the wood stove.

During the storm we talked about how we have been getting hit with an awful lot of strong storms lately, and how important it is to have more food on hand at all times. Growing up our grandparents always had canned or preserved food in their pantry. They never had to run to the store before a storm to stock up because they were always prepared. It was just the way it was, they gardened, they preserved their food and they always had more than enough on hand.

We decided to add pantry cabinets to our kitchen renovation plan, (hopefully the renovation will be happening soon) and stock up on items like dried beans, grains, lentils, rice, and nuts. We are also going to purchase a dehydrator so we can preserve some of our garden harvest as well as do canning and freezing. We want to always have a stocked pantry so we never have to worry about having enough food when the next storm hits.

~Rob~

Following my path ...

 "If you are facing in the right direction, 
all you need to do is keep on walking" 
- Buddhist saying

It's getting close to that time when I like to reflect back on these past 12 months and look ahead to what I would like to accomplish in the upcoming year. It seems a little early to start thinking about this, but for some reason it has been on my mind a lot lately. I think it's because over these past few months I have been participating in several blog hops and have "met" some really inspiring people. It has really made me take a good look at where I am in my life and see just how happy I am doing what I am presently doing.

I am a self-employed architectural designer. I design high-end complex stair systems and cabinetry for multi-million dollar homes. I have worked with a client developing and designing a telescoping temporary stair system. I have created a successful business and have built a good reputation for myself. I absolutely love being self-employed and can't ever imagine working for someone else again. It is very enjoyable work, most days, but it doesn’t satisfy my soul. I do love to design, and I will probably always do it to some degree, but I yearn to be out in nature doing something more fulfilling with a greater purpose.

I love gardening and have a passion for growing healthy food. Being a part of this movement to take back control of our food supply is exciting and very important to me. I have been attempting to grow organically on my 1/4 acre suburban lot for some time now, each year learning and expanding my crops, but this isn't satisfying or who I really am. I see myself on a 5+ acre farm, living in an old farmhouse with a barn, a greenhouse and an orchard. I envision a  pond with ducks and chickens roaming the yard, an antique farmall tractor, and a roadside stand where we sell our organically grown produce and fresh baked pies. I have dreamed about buying another piece of property to start a small organic farm for some time now, but that dream always seems to get lost in the day to day bustle of my life.

There have been several events these past few months, some good and some bad, that seem to have sparked a new fire inside, motivating me to start taking steps to get my life where I want it to be. New opportunities seem to be popping up and I have opened my eyes wide enough to realize that I need to follow this path that is rising up in front of me.

I have a couple big projects that I am going to start working on immediately. The first is to attempt to sustainably and organically grow as much of our own food as possible on our 1/4 acre lot for our family of four. I will be blogging about this from planning to harvest and keeping a "journal" of the progress. The next big project is to redesign my website to include as much information as I can about growing, in a seed to seed layout (from planting seeds to saving seeds and everything in between) with an emphasis on heirloom varieties. I will be going through all my blog posts and garden journals to organizing the information into an easy to use online format so others can benefit and hopefully be inspired. I don't consider myself and expert on growing, but I have been keeping garden journals for some time, experimenting with several different techniques and I would be happy to pass along the information of what worked, or didn't work for me.

There are some other things I will be working on as well, like improving my photography skills, especially with nature and plants, to hopefully be able to someday make something of it, expanding my greenhouse so I can start selling seedlings and flowers in the spring, attending more NOFA workshops to better educate myself, creating a better blog format to include more gardening tips, healthy recipes, garden project plans, book reviews and resources, and become more involved in writing about organic gardening. 

"Happiness is not a goal ... it's a by-product of a life well lived."
- Eleanor Roosevelt

I am going to start taking these quantum steps to get to where I see myself in life and work towards living a more sustainable, earth friendly and fulfilling life.

I am not sure where this path will lead, but I hope you will follow me along this journey and I hope I inspire you to also follow your dreams!

~Rob~

"The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the upmost, 
to reach out eagerly and without fear of newer and richer experience."
- Eleanor Roosevelt