January

The world always seems to slow after the holidays. January provides a welcome rest.  It's the still season.  We've had below zero temperatures, snow, January thaw, fog, ice and even a violent thunderstorm with hail.  Weather on the prairie is never boring.

The house feels big after the Christmas decorations are taken down.  We've spent many an evening on the sofas in front of the wood burning stove.  The cat turns into a furry puddle next to the warmth.

Winter is the season of books and reading.  I read all year long but in winter I read compulsively.  

Those are just a few of the recent reads (I've been reading lots of ebooks, too) and my TBR (to be read) pile is tall and tempting.  

The seed catalogs also demand quite a bit of time and I'm finally getting down to the delicious task of starting my list of seeds. This year we are going to try a new system for the garden.  I'm getting too old to wage the constant war on weeds so we're implementing mini-beds on plastic (see thisagrarianlife on YouTube).  I've been researching extensively, ordered the plastic and that was already delivered.  Pete will make the wooden frames I need.  January is the season of dreams, organizing and planning. There's a seed exchange at the county extension office on Saturday and I can't wait to go! 

The hens are laying well and have been happy to have a few warmer days to get outdoors.

Yes, repairing that barn door is on the jobs list for summer.  For now it keeps the cold out.  

I'm also planning for some major planting of conservation plants in the windbreak on the west of the pasture.  The spruces we planted there have NOT done well and I'm going to widen and fill in the space with some hardwood trees and lots of bird friendly shrubs.  It needs to be wilder and much less regimented.  Sumac, wafer ash, hazelnut, Hill's oak, shingle oak, Jack pine, elderberry, red-twig dogwood, pyracanthus, prairie crab.  There.  That should be wild enough.

We've had a Cooper's hawk visiting the bird feeders quite frequently, not to eat the grains but in search of birds to feed on.  Our seed and suet feeders certainly attract the smaller birds.  I'd love to get a photo of the hawk as it lands right outside the living room window.  Unfortunately with the large windows it can see me move and flies off.  

Time to get back to reading and making seed lists.