Awake, thou wintry earth –
Fling off thy sadness!
Fair vernal flowers, laugh forth
Your ancient gladness!
~Thomas Blackburn, “An Easter Hymn”
I was looking for Mother Teresa’s quote, to verify that I had the words right for the header,and came across this other quote (above). So all day yesterday I was marching about saying ‘Awake thou wintry earth!’ Waving my overdressed arms in the air trying to Charm the land to Thaw. Two pairs of gloves, three pairs of socks (grown thin from the winter washing), many many long sleeved tees and stolen (from afore mentioned teenagers) hoodies, long-johns, trousers, clown suit, jacket and Nanna Viv’s hat. Awake!, I would call. Dinner! Sheila would call back. It was cold but there was sun. Spring was in the sun. Winter was still in the earth.
Mother Teresa’s words popped into my head yesterday. I had become a little fraught, a little hemmed in bouncing my brain against the cold windows and needed the reminder to slow down and look about. Consolidate. This is no time to be distracted. Babies are coming.
Today the snow will begin to melt. Because I said so. There is spring in the sun and winter in the shade. Soon, soon.
Daisy changed shape yesterday. The belly she has been carrying so high has dropped and she is lumbering about in a dazed off kilter kind of fashion. No mucous yet though and her udder, though filling, is nowhere close to being full.
I have plenty of room in the barn so I am going to separate the cows to separate pens with separate doors to the outside but still able to hang over a gate and chat with each other. Daisy spends a lot of time shoving Queenie away from her food. Queenie needs the extra groceries now too. And Queenie is not an alpha cow! Plus I am going to start giving Daisy her homeopathic immune building remedy 9 days before her due date to try and ward off the dreaded mastitis. We do not want a recurrence of that. So feeding them apart makes sense.
As well as brushing the cows I brushed Sheila yesterday. Her bristly coat has caught a winters worth of itchy particles of straw so she got a good clean up. I even brushed the tassel at the end of her tail which is quite white and getting bushier and longer. I did stalk her with the camera trying to get an elegant shot of her tail but .. not today!
Marcel has grown out of his dog crate sleeping quarters, so the other day I transferred him and his crate into the Snug. The Snug is a small room with nothing but an old television (with no Cable) and a big leather couch left over from John’s single man days. A TV in the living area is anathema to me so we created a small room just for the television when there were teenagers in the house so they could watch their obscure Japanese movies. Now there are no teenagers, but sometimes if the wind is right and the moon is in the appropriate quarter John can get signal for a ball game on his ancient tele and he will recline on the deeply uncomfortable leather couch with a crossword, the remote, a beer and then, like a cat with his mouse, pretend not to care about the Game he is avidly watching from his eyes corners. At times he will leap up and throw all kinds of lowest common denominator words at the poor little men chasing a ball about on the screen. No-one can hear him.. not even the Ref. The snug is good for that. Nobody can see you. Though I did spy Marcel sleeping in a beanbag the other day while John shouted at the inert television.
Anyway for Marcel’s last few days in the house I put a gate across the Snug doorway and let him loose in there with his crate sitting in the corner open for bedtime.
Last night John came into the kitchen and said, Where is the lamb? In his room, I said, when do you want to eat? He is not there, said John. He is not in his box. I looked around the corner. His little dog gate was up. He had to be in there.
It was two hours before his next feed so (not wanting to wake the querulous endlessly hungry baby monster), we snuck up on the room and, poised with eyes open, I flicked the light on and then off. On the memory of our retinas; There was Marcel. Large as Life. Reclining on the Black Leather Couch. Nestled up against the remote. Legs tucked in, happy as a lark. For all the world like a middle aged bloke waiting for the game.
Hmm, I said. Walking back to the kitchen. Time that lamb went out to the barn with real animals. Our John snorted. Who are you calling an animal, he said, hopefully.
The Mosh Pit… Sometimes I wonder what goes on out in the barn when I am not looking.
All is well. And all is as it should be. I am still here and just the same. You and I together will get used to this new format. I kind of like it actually. I hope you do.
One more thing. Yesterday was the first sunny day since the Glass Room has been enclosed. We opened the door into the house while John was insulating in there and PILES of warm air flowed into the house. It was 12 degrees outside and 70 in the Glass Room.
I turned the heating off in the Coupe and let the fire die down as this little solar power house heated the living area of our home. I had hoped that this would happen. Don’t you love it when a plan comes together. It is always a slow process but that is good – I would not like to leave my guardian angel behind.
I do hope you all have a lovely, lovely day.
Your friend on the farmy,
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
103 responses to “Spring in the Sun”
I enjoy the new format! It’s good that the glass room has delivered the hoped-for warmth to your home. It makes up for the unhoped-for cold still outside. There is warmth in that sun, if we can get it apart from the wind!
I know what you mean Bev, and the spring winds will be coming here soon.. c
You are my morning treat before I start writing each day, thanks! This morning, for reasons that I will not explain here, I read the blog on the phone and it looked quite good, as if the entire thing had been slimmed down into a rectangle, but the background and pictures intact.
oh very good charlotte, thank you .. I hope you have a good writing day.. I am going to have a good scrubbing in the barn day.. c
Yay, Farmy blog looks really good today 🙂 Hmm .. maybe I should invest in a real live lamby for cuddling during our upcoming winter. My luck the dog and the lamb will probably cuddle each other and leave me out in the cold. I am really hoping the sun is returning to you – let the spring in. Laura
no sun again today, but maybe it will come back soon.. c
I am calling for spring, too! Internally, externally, eternally!? I like the new format.
Morning marla.. c
I am starting to like this too. Also like the light blue colour; very gentle and calming. You and I both have the same dislike of TV. Ours is in the library here in Van and I swear is turned on a handfull of times/yr. In E, I’m trying to evict the lathe from a small room and put the TV in there, but since R and I spend so much time apart, he has different TV habits in E and so my chances of success are slim. Hooray for the glass house; now if you could just surround the whole of the farmy with glasshouses, we’d be in business. 😀
Thank goodness, I am getting used to the new format too though I cannot load and launch a post in an hour anymore! I have not watched TV for .. oh.. probably 4 or 5 years, except when i am visiting my son in california then i watch the cooking channels! It is easily the least important gadget in this house.. have a great day veronica.. c
As always, your descriptive storytelling takes me directly to the farm. Do not pass GO.
Do not collect 100 dollars!! morning audrey.. c
Laughing. That is what we must do sometimes, correct? Good morning to you, too, C.
The position of the sun says that spring is almost here but still not strong enough to melt our mountains of snow. I really like your new look.
Precious little Marcel has certainly made himself at home. I wonder how he will take to living outside. I have visions of him waiting at the back door to be let inside at bedtime. C, I am going to do a little Spring dance for you. Your weather HAS to start warming.
Have a beautiful day.
🙂 Mandy xo
He will find out today, I need him to be in the barn running about and making a mess out there, and he is big enough and strong enough to live out there now.. c
Thank you for this wonderful blog post! I feel transported to your sunny farm. We had about three more new inches of powdery, fluffy snow last night. It is not sunny. Spring seems VERY far away here in Wisconsin…
I know what you mean .. we had a hint of warm sun yesterday.. hope you get some soon.. c
Very smart new format…which makes your pictures look even better. Very envious of your little solar powered Coupe…our house was 14C this morning. I’m being very mean with fire wood and not lighting it until the afternoon…about now:)
I will chant for spring and warmth as well, miss c. With the new format, side by side pictures are so tiny I can’t make them out since I use my phone to read your lovely blog, as I am always (it seems) on my way to work. Just wanted you to know.
Hey! Everything is new here! Black and gray for the posting and it all looks like you’ve renovated! So much going on! You have so much to do and how could you ever get bored this winter!
Sure hope the winter goes out like a lamb because the bear part of it is bone weary besides bone chilling….
Love your quote! Photos are wonderful as usual!
Today it is supposed to be 17 degrees and Summer and I are so psyched! Finally we can go out and take a walk. Well, she loves the snow so I walk and she finds places to play in and roll in! She looks like a polar bear! LOL
No wind chill today and that is glorious! Oh do I miss warm weather even if it means lots of work and long days again…it sure beats being locked in by snow and -45 wind chill. Change is a comin’!
It is light when we get up in the morning and that I love! Nothing worse than getting up in the dark.
Have been feeling like a mole! Yikes!
Can’t wait for the babies to be born! Hope all goes well! My friend in PA has cattle and they are calving now. Losses due to the terrible storms. Heart breaking for her….sigh…
Take care my wonderful writer friend! Always fun to read what you are up to!!!!
Love Ya! Muah! Mere
p.s. Training a puppy is very time consuming so this is what I have been up to! Skipping the beginning classes because I have been working with her. March 9th is our first intermediate class!!! Yay!
I’m just so surprised that Boo wasn’t hanging out in the man cave on the sofa with Marcel! It’s nice to see your pics so large and lovely, and I see you worked out the colors, too! 😉 Isn’t that fun to play with…if you have the time. I, too, noticed that the header was chopped off on my iPhone 5s. That latest iPhone seems the hardest to resolve responsive on, for some reason. We had a 77 degree day on Sunday, then dropped into the 20’s last night, but a warming trend later in the week that I hope you will share. Have a great day, Celi.
Maybe I should just drop the header? It seems like it is a little defunct with this new format. I will take it off and see if it make a difference tomorrow morning.. c
Love the new format on my iPad. Can’t wait to hear about Marcel meeting Sheila. 🙂 Here in Eastern Ontario winter shows no signs of letting up. Oh well, the sun is lovely and the kids will be able to ski during March break for a change.
My son is up in Canmore and they have had so little snow this winter, just the terrible cold.. Have you seen a commenter called Peter, he has a woodfired sourdough bakery somewhere in ontario, his name will take you to his site, wouldn’t it be wild if you were close by.. c
Desperate to banish wicked winter I hunkered down in my atelier and began producing cards that would welcome spring. I am sending them to my dear friends and family who are suffering from the most extreme winter ever. Love, love love this new blog format Celi. V/