Tap Dancing and more!

Hello again dear friends. My, it's been three weeks already since my last post. Time sure flies when you're having fun! As my post title implies, I've been busy tap dancing. But not the "Lawrence Welk" kind that involves fancy footwork. On Feb. 10, Colvin and I tapped several maple trees around our acre of paradise and have 8 1/2 gallons of sap in our refrigerator just waiting to be boiled this Saturday. This week the temperatures will be PERFECT for more sap running, so our gallon total will be closer to 10 or 11 by the end of the week. On Friday night, we'll build a small cinder block fire pit in our driveway and start the LONG boiling process Saturday morning. In the end, we should be left with a quart (plus some) of heavenly sweet pure Pennsylvania maple syrup. It's a lot of work, but SO worth it!

This picture was taken 2 years ago in 2011. We didn't have a sugar season last year as the weather was MUCH TOO WARM for the trees to do the necessary freeze and thaw that makes the sap run.

Besides keeping the sap company, I've been stitching up a storm. Once again, I've been invited to have a sampler appear in the special Halloween issue of Just Cross Stitch magazine. I finished it in record time and am now waiting for the frame to arrive. I'll share a sneak peek in a future post. Now, I'm making fabulous progress on a sampler that will be a future release this year. I haven't named it yet, but I think you'll like it. It has lions on it and that's all I'm going to tell you!

CHICKEN UPDATE: In a previous post, I wrote about putting light in the girls coop to help get them laying again. My experiment worked! Two weeks after installing the rope light, we were blessed with an egg! On a good day, we get 2 eggs, which isn't great, but better than nothing! At least I won't have to lower my standards and succumb to BUYING eggs. It's humiliating when you know you have 5 hens in your backyard!

Well, I think I've bored you enough with my country life activities! Thanks for stopping by!

Diane