Ralph's Room

I have extracted from "Draft"--the purgatory of blog entries--these photos Chris took of our current house before we moved in. They are some of the only documentation of the state of the house before we got our hands on it, but they are pretty representative.

This is the room that is now Gib's Room/The Library, back when it was Ralph's room, and Barbara, his wife, wasn't even allowed to go in there. Yikes. We found false teeth, mouse nests of pumpkin seeds and candy bar wrappers, and probably one hundred empty cat food tins, "for painting my model planes," he said, while we were helping him pack up and move out.







This is more or less what the room looks like now--except we've filled it up with many many more books and now it has a permanent occupant!

Opaque Windows, See-Through Floor

Elsie, hero of the scrub brush, paint brush, pastry brush--and many other brushes, I'm sure--working her magic 3 weeks ago on the house.

Another of my heroes in life, Todd SQ, cinderellaing the storm windows.

I wasn't there at the time, but here we see Gib competing in some kind of barrel-chucking competition--or maybe diving away from a feed barrel falling out of the sky. We received our first delivery of feed grain at the farm last week and have been poisoning rodents ever since.

Sadie Rose in the background and her daughter Ella Rose front and center, looking fat and happy but maybe a little perplexed in their first day on the farm.

And a less cute sight: the white patches in the floor are actually holes through which you can see the joists supporting it. You can also see how Ralph and Barbara laid down thicker boards so they could drive the hay-unloading tractor into the barn. Very sketchy. Not a good place to go walking in the dark.

Porta-Farm

Adventure of the day: moving Dolly and Riley, our Haflinger draft ponies, a chicken tractor, and twelve Rhode Island Reds stuffed in cardboard boxes from the old farm to North Branch Farm using our new beasty truck. Seth seen modeling the season's fashions.

Oh yes, a House! And Music!

Here you may enjoy a glimpse of our living room and our library-guest-room-phone nook.

Last we spoke, the barn was full of cars, the yard full of camper-trailers and more cars, and the house was full of old stuff. In the intervening weeks, we have helped the former owners move to a new home and put in a whole lot of time on the house--deep cleaning, painting, making runs to the dump, and more. More than half the cars have flown the coop, and we are mostly left with the big heavy trucks that have trees growing up through them. We are now safely--happily--and slightly coldly--moved in at our new house. We got approval from the fire chief to re-use an old chimney and I expect that by the time I return to Maine from a brief Massachusetts sojourn (wouldn't want to have to attend Seth and Tyler's CD release party, would I?) we will have a wood cookstove hooked up and throwin' off heat, as they say.

Homeownership proves to come with many good and not-so-good surprises that we might have foreseen had we put much thought to it. As it is, we roll with the punches and are doing mighty fine. Lead in the pipes? Asbestos in the floor? Nitrates in the spring? We're still alive and kicking so far.

On another note--a musical one, at that--Seth and Tyler are probably warming up for the concert to celebrate the release of their debut album as Whiffletree at this very moment. The CD is as beautiful as its cover, with artwork by the acclaimed Elsie Gawler. Purchase yours for only $15! http://www.myspace.com/whiffletreemusic