Things We’ve Done Lately on Blackberry Homestead

January 12, 2025

With the snow coming and trees ordered, it was time to do some sheet mulching to get ready for the pecan trees.

On Wednesday (January 8), I took two large cardboard boxes from the barn and flattened them. I carried them out to the front yard. I also brought some large rocks to keep the cardboard from blowing away.

I measured a little over forty feet from the pecan near the south fence and determined where I wanted my first new pecan tree. I laid down the cardboard and put four heavy rocks on it.

Off to the giant leaf pile with my wagon, I went. After dumping in several rake fulls of leaves, the wagon was full. I pulled it down to the flattened cardboard box and dumped the leaves onto the cardboard. I evenly spread the leaves over the cardboard.

I determined the placement of the second new pecan tree. It is forty feet from the first new pecan tree and forty feet from the second original pecan tree. I laid down the second flattened cardboard box and put rocks on it to keep it from blowing away.

As I headed up the hill, I realized we had a lot of sticks down. I played pick up sticks and filled the wagon with sticks. I pulled the wagon to the last large tall bed and dumped in the sticks.

Bruce, carrying Nox, came out into the cold to see what I was up to. He was expecting the sheet mulching, since I had told him that was what I was going to do. I explained what I was doing. Nox enjoyed walking around the beds and sniffing them. Bruce headed back inside with Nox when I headed over to the leaf pile.

I filled up the wagon with leaves and covered the second flattened cardboard box with them.

I added additional leaves to the large tall beds. The original leaves we added had settled. This all took a while and Bruce came back out to find out when I was coming inside since it was cold. “I have one more wagon load of leaves to dump and then I will be done.” I finished up and put the wagon and rake away and headed back inside; the house felt so warm.

While I was out working in the yard, Bruce had weathered stripped the front door. This had required him to move the striker plate for the deadbolt. No light was shining around the door when he was done. He also had been working on adding a door draft stopper for the screen door. (The space underneath it was large enough for a bird to fly into the house.) He wanted my thoughts on a couple of options. Once I expressed my opinions, he proceeded to install the door draft stopper. Birds will no longer be able to fly in under the door.

Bruce got a notification from Costco that his second pair of glasses was ready.

On Thursday (January 9), we made the trip to Madison, Alabama to pick up Bruce’s glasses at Costco. Before heading into Costco, we had lunch at a nearby restaurant with a friend who lives in the area.

At Costco, Bruce picked up his new glasses and discovered he liked some things about his progressive lens. However, after wearing them for a bit in Costco, he started feeling a little dizzy. He switched back to his original glasses. He has been wearing his new glasses a bit at a time to get used to them.

After we got home and put away the groceries, we headed over to the RV with Nox to make sure everything was working. We opened up the cabinets under the kitchen sink so the heat could get into the slide. Nox was happy to be in the RV. She settled right in while we tried to make sure the RV was cold and snow ready.

With the snow coming down on Friday (January 10), Bruce and I caramelized five pounds of onions. I set up the food processor and Bruce peeled and cut the onions in half. I used the food processor to slice the onions. This system worked really well.

I did the slow caramelization of the onions. The five pounds filled my large pot to the rim.

While I was watching the onions and stirring them once in a while, Bruce installed two of the fire alarms we had purchased after buying the house.

On Saturday (January 11), I made so many sourdough discard crackers. I weighed how much sourdough discard I had, 881 grams, and calculated how much of the other ingredients to add based on the amount of discard. It worked well.

The crackers have a nice toasted flavor and the Teff seeds add a nice texture.

The cracker making took hours since I had so many batches to bake. While I was baking crackers, Bruce installed the last two fire alarms.

Once I was done baking crackers, I made French onion soup using some of the caramelized onions. I used the sourdough bread I made to top the soup.

Nox didn’t like the 3 1/2 inch snow we had on Friday. On Saturday, the snow had melted to about an inch and Nox enjoyed playing in the snow.

After eating the soup, we made a trip down to the mailbox. A box of seeds had arrived. It had been crammed into the mailbox and Bruce had a fight to get it out.

It has been nice to have a few slower days.