My blogging is so sporadic these days and I've learned that instead of trying to back track and "update" the blog, it's best if I just pick up where I am. I would have loved it if I would have blogged about Grand Marais but I will have to settle for my abbreviated Instagram posts. That being said, I feel like our time in Grand Marais has helped to re-energize me about life here at home. When we were up north we met a few herbalists who were so full of knowledge and passion about the plant world. I had been wondering what this beautiful tree was that I didn't recognize and learned from them that it was a Mountain Ash or Rowan tree (this was even more exciting because I had just finished this book, and really wanted to "meet" the Rowan tree). The herbalists told us that we could harvest the berries and make them into a syrup that would have benefits similar to the elderberry. So, I did and though I haven't made the syrup yet, somehow that meeting inspired me to go into my garden and pick some herbs to dry. So far I'm drying hyssop, lavender (leaves), sage, rosemary, and eucalyptus. I've been dreaming of the things I will make with them and until then, loving the look of them hanging above the fireplace.
Speaking of the garden, I did a "last harvest" and found so many treasures. Fingerling potatoes (that I planted from sprouting potatoes off my counter when I had to replace all the edamame sprouts that had been eaten by somebody), 4 more delicata squash, 2 pie pumpkins, some peppers, and a lot of funny shaped sweet potatoes. I also brought in a bunch of dried black beans and Iyla and Nora helped me "crack them" (as Iyla says) and save them. We also brought in some of Nora's beautiful zinnias to dry and save the seeds of. For the first time in 3 years I have been able to work on putting the garden to sleep. So far I've done 4 (out of 20) gardens and I hope to do more before the snow falls.
The leaves are still beautiful here and everyone has been enjoying raking and jumping in them. My favorite thing they do is make a giant "nest" out of them and then sit inside looking like little birds.
Ryan got a very nice buck bow hunting this year. He's had a lot of bad luck with bow hunting over the past few years so we were all so excited for him to have shot one on his first night hunting. It was also the first time he was able to harvest a deer from our land, which seemed really special. It was only his second time butchering the deer himself and processing all the meat which ended up involving all of us working hard over the last 3 days. At one point Jackson was grinding the meat, Nora and I were packaging it up, and Ryan was in the barn continuing to cut steaks (Grace was doing homework or we probably would have had her involved as well).
Iyla is growing as fast as ever. One of her newest things is that she loves to dress herself. On this particular day she put on pants, a dress, a backwards onsie, and two hats. Later she added one more shirt just for good measure.
