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We had a quiet Christmas holiday, with just the three of us and Jen’s parents. Sarah ably performed her elfly duties, and Daisy found a soup bone in her stocking. Sarah gave Jen these beautiful pressed ginkgo leaves from Strasbourg. She gave her grandfather a pen and notebook, where he can record his inner thoughts. […]

Our fields remain unmowed, even at this late date. Herb Stickle dropped off this tractor yesterday, presumably to get me to stop calling him to ask when he plans to mow our fields.

On Sunday we had a “microburst” — a/k/a a personal tornado — which set down on our farm and laid waste to our population of elderly trees. Poor Jen was out picking berries at the time. The storm came very suddenly and was over in just a few minutes. We tried to return to New […]

We had despaired of having any hay this year, given how rainy it’s been — but lo, here is some late October hay. A pair of bluebirds presided over the tedder. The round bales are handsome in the afternoon sun.

Sarah, who benefits from a Montessori education as well as a preternatural grasp of spatial relations inherited from her mother’s side of the family, neatly packs the family car to head off to Colgate this afternoon. A+ work here.

We had a quiet Independence Day weekend. On July 4, Sarah shucked corn while Daisy enjoyed a post-prandial stick. Sarah has been feeling rather independent herself, after the initial surprise of her graduation present. She has named it Stella.

Mid-October is quite late to make hay, but we’ve had a very wet season. Herb Stickle and his fleet of Ford tractors (seen here with bailer, tedder and mower attached) cleared out our hayfields this week. Herb said he made about eighty round bales. Here is a rare image of our interior swamp, in the […]

After a year’s hiatus, Rhinebeck resumed its Memorial Day parade. It featured its usual assortment of hard-ass veterans, volunteer firefighters, and vintage cars, but it lacked the leavening presence of the children: soccer teams, tae kwon-do studios, cub scout troops, and the like — presumably because they are not yet vaccinated. Still, it was a […]

This was my mother’s car, which my father drove here from Arizona after she died. Its quick, light steering made it fun to drive. I hope someone will take better care of it than I did.

It is very late in the season to be making hay. I was starting to get more than a little nervous that Herb Stickle wouldn’t show up this year, leaving me to mow umpteen acres of high grass. But Jen and I heard the roar of the mower over the hill while out walking. It […]