Virginia Real : July 2017

Because we’ve had a sick cat for the past couple of weeks, I haven’t spent much time at the farm. However, Charming has continued to work on the renovation and (oddly enough) has gotten quite a bit of work done without me. I think he’s made such good progress because I’m not there to make him take regular breaks for meals and snacks. At this point, our cat can’t be left any longer than overnight so I only go over to be with Charming one night during each of his stints at the farm.

Charming’s progress includes removing the sliding glass doors at the back of the house and replacing them with a nice new 36-inch wide steel door. This will be much better in several ways. It will provide more security as the old glass door didn’t closer properly and could easily be broken into. Taking out the sliding glass door allows for more wall space at the end of the kitchen where I plan to put my antique sideboard. Last, but not least, the removal of the sliding glass doors virtually eliminates the possibility of me walking through the glass panel and getting hurt…If you know me, and how un-graceful I am, you know that would be a real possibility. (I once banged my head on a closed pass-through cashier’s window while paying a tuition bill at a college…very embarrassing, not to mention painful. Owwwwww!)

The drywall in the kitchen and woodstove area has also been hung. Charming has gotten the first “mudding” done. When he goes back this week, he will be able to sand the dried mud and put on the second coat. He usually does three coats of mud to make the nail holes and seams completely disappear. My Charming…I think I’ll keep him.

In making the kitchen area as functional as possible, we decided that we needed to enlarge the laundry closet in order to accommodate today’s larger washer/dryer combinations. The previous owners had simply removed the closet doors, presumably due to having the larger appliances. We also had to extend the wall by about a foot to allow room for the refrigerator, cabinets, and pantry. This actually worked out nicely as Charming used the extra wall length to create a nook on the living room side that will house a small table that I had no other place for and allows for a shelf higher up on the wall that will house network and telephone equipment. We’ve come to realize that when downsizing to a smaller house, it’s important for everything to have a dedicated space.

While Charming has been focusing on the renovation, I’ve been struggling to keep up with the garden. (Forgot to take pictures of my "awesome homemade hoe" that Charming made for me, but will include that next time.) Since I’m only at the farm about one night per week, it’s hard to keep the weeds at bay. Add to that the dry weather we’ve had, along with the resulting hard ground, the weeds may get ahead of me. However, I’m not ready to throw in the towel (or hoe) yet. Our tomato plants have small tomatoes on them, the bean vines are starting to bloom, the onions look great, and the potatoes are still green. My effort to control the potato bugs by hand-picking them from the vines is paying off. The first week I started my bug control program, I killed (uhhhhh, removed) over three hundred of those little buggy bugs. The second week, I removed almost two hundred. This past week, I removed eighty-four. In gardening, consistency is the key! Not shown in my photos here are my pumpkin and squash vines. They are growing near the edge of the garden to allow them plenty of room to grow. We also planted corn, but oddly enough that is the only thing the local varmints have eaten. I guess we should count ourselves lucky at losing only part of our planting. Of course, I think we can count on having to share at least some of our vegetables (when they start coming in) with the critters. Oh well, I guess that’s part of the deal when you aspire to be Old MacDonald!