Sunday, Oct. 11th... Our first frost of the season...the brisk chill of autumn...

We awoke this morning to a brisk chill of 29 degrees and white spots all over the yard, but a beautiful puffy pink clouded sky. I snapped the pictures from the rear deck before donning my jacket and trekking to the local Stewart's quick shopper for milk for my morning coffee. As I sat in the car, letting it warm up and allowing the frost to melt off the windshield, I thought about how lovely these early morning sunrises are.

Vick has most of the big barn closed in, with the exception of the outside entry screened door on the back side of the barn, leading into the chicken coop area. I also need to close off the alpaca door with the heavy Indian blanket we bought for the task from the horseshoe guy on route 32. I plan to allow the top half of the Dutch type door to remain closed and cover the bottom opening with the heavy horse blanket, slit in the center for the alpacas to walk through, thus allowing them complete access to the outside all winter long... 24/7. We'll probably do that today. We also need to winterize the other chicken and duck house. Maybe we'll do that today too. Our friend Laura is scheduled to bring us the other dozen guinea fowl today. She offered them to us in a trade for one of our first bred angora rabbits next spring. We already have the first dozen out there in the brooding house. (Which needs cleaned...bad)

I just got done building the first fire of the fall in the pellet stove. We'll burn it a little in the mornings to take the chill off and turn it off if it warms up enough during the daytime hours. We might just have to burn it overnight soon too, depending on the chill in the evenings.

Yesterday, we went to the area sawmill and picked up our lumber for the hospice gift shop. Now if that wasn't a real exciting experience to behold. We brought the twenty pieces of eighteen foot long rafters' home in the twelve foot utility trailer we own! We laid them on the trailer with one end against the end gate of the trailer and let them lay across the front of the trailer and into the bed of the truck, (which has a cap on it) with the tailgate down. After closing the door to the cap, we had approximately four feet of the pile in the truck. It looked extremely weird to passing motorists, but rode home quite well. I wonder what the state police would have said had they spotted us on route?

Last evening, after leaving Stanley's art viewing at Rensselaerville's Guggenheim Pavilion, we traveled to Oak Hill and had dinner at the Wayside Inn, a quaint little tavern type restaurant that has been there serving food since the late 1700's. We're told it was actually a stage coach stop along the way to Schoharie, Utica, and then Syracuse. We had a terrific shrimp and fries platter with coleslaw and drinks. We enjoyed a good meal and left there with a very reasonable twenty-five dollar check. When we returned home, we put the animals away just at dusk and retired for the evening...... tired and happy