Last frost and dogwoods

We finally know for sure that the last frost for the mountain has occured. This is because the dogwoods on the mountain are usually in bloom even before things start to green up, and they won't bloom here until the last frost has passed. This morning, the dogwoods were in full, glorious bloom all down the mountain road. Most of them are kind of thin and scraggly little things, but no matter what the calendar says, the blooms mean spring is officially here.

This also means it's my least favorite time of the year - tax time. Got home from work, went outside and vented my frustration at having to do the things. We're getting a little bit back from the State but because I can't have federal withholding come out of my paycheck till that garnishments done, or we wouldn't have had enough to live on till hubby got back to work ... so we owe a chunk to the IRS. Ugh. Still haven't paid off LAST year yet! This is not kosher, folks. I hate owing money to anybody. Of course, we'd owe the IRS less for last year than we do if not  for all the stuff last month involving fixing the van. Double Ugh. Oh well, at least March is over with and April's starting out good. March ended well, too, so that's a happy note.

Though I am sooo sore again. Cutting and piling a gazillion logs, even small ones, is really hard work, no matter what you think. It is a lot of fun but not easy on the body when you are middle-aged like us. Thankfully, the battery on the chainsaw gave out before I had to call it quits due to me being done in, lol! A lot of small wood got cut, but it's good anyhow. It's stove length and size, and means Quentin (or I, in a pinch) don't have to split it before it can be used. The saying is that wood warms you twice - once when you cut it, and once when you burn it. It warms you more than that. There's also felling the trees, hauling the trees to the place you cut it up, limbing, salvaging burnable logs off the limbing, piling up the scrap brush, burning the scrap brush, splitting the logs that need it, stacking it all up, hauling it into the house, feeding the stove ... and THEN you get to enjoy the fruits of all that labor as you take a load off your feet and relax near that fire you just built.

I've gotten Quentin in the habit of limbing as much as possible before he fells anything anymore. That way, I can haul off and salvage on the limbs or put them in the burn pit and get it all out of the way, while he determines where the tree is going to land when it's felled and then gets to cut it up once it's down. It saves a lot of time to trim first if you can, especially on smaller trees. I do it even on the ones I take down, because if it's really small scrap, we don't bother hauling it anywhere, we just leave it where it falls more or less, to provide a home for wildlife and rot down to eventually make more compost on the "forest" floor. Though the forest here is slowly becoming more of a parklike look, with primarily mature trees left to stand and all the damaged, dead, and deformed stuff, as well as the deadwood and scrub and really little stuff all getting cut down and turned into firewood. This leaves the ground cover more open for wildlife, and for plant life. With more sunlight hitting the ground, more browsing plants can grow. More browsing plants means more food for the local wildlife, so maybe if I get a garden in, they'll eat THAT instead of my garden. (Not that I'm holding my breath on that one - lots of marigolds are getting planted, too. Along with me making up and using deer scram.)

Anyhow, that's been my day, other than finding out it's going to be another couple weeks before I hear on my shift transfer and get a date. Crossing fingers it's sooner rather than later ... the extra money will come in awful handy!

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