Neighbours

As some of you know, it was my plan when we arrived at our new home to have Zoe bake some cookies that we could deliver to our neighbours and introduce ourselves.  Five weeks later we still had not done that. We had met no one besides employees at stores! And as nice as they all were, we wanted to know our neighbours.

So, Saturday morning we got up and started to bake, and bake, and bake. In fact we baked so much we ran out of time to deliver them! But Sunday, early afternoon off we went. The first house we chose to stop at has a horse that we had seen on many occasions out in their pasture. Zoe was very excited to meet these people and maybe even their horse! Here we met Ed originally hailing from Florida. His wife was not able to meet us at this time but Ed was friendly, gave us some great pointers on things to do in Nova Scotia and sent us onwards to another neighbour that he said was lovely and that we should meet. So off to the purple house and Kim. Yes, Kim was very nice, said she enjoyed aromatherapy and working with raw wools. Note to self: get sheep for the farm! Unfortunately, out of seven houses, those were the only two with people home today! Thats okay, we'll go out again another time.

Monday was very exciting for me! Ed's wife, Linda, came knocking on our door in the morning to introduce herself. Said she was sorry she had missed us the previous day. She brought some honey from their hives for us to enjoy and sat and chit chatted for a while. We started to talk about her horse and the horse community and she recommended contacting Jennifer and seeing if Zoe could visit her horses.

Early that same afternoon, Jennifer, in a fit of embarrassment, invited herself over to our house to chat about horses and 4-H. I absolutely loved that she came over and knew where we lived without being given the address!!! I was so happy to have two visitors in one day! She was so sweet and welcomed us over to meet her horses anytime. Not ones to refuse that offer, Zoe and I got up bright and early Tuesday morning and met Jennifer and her mother, Betty, at their barn where Zoe got to groom their three horses and lead them to and from the pasture. Zoe somehow managed to get out of mucking the stalls, but there is always next time! Jennifer and her mother were so kind, answered all our horse questions, gave us coffee and homemade salsa! I am very much loving this small town and am so happy that we finally broke away from our work and out of our shells and have started to meet our neighbours. I feel a tea/wine date coming up ladies!

These meetings made me start thinking about our marketplace. In the future we want to set up one of our outbuildings as a store. It looks like our neighbours all have wonderful farm made items (honey, salsa, woven goods) I think it may work for everyone if they also put items in our marketplace?

Work

Wow is there ever a lot of work to do here!! I spent a couple of days so overwhelmed by the amount of "stuff" to do that I shut down. I started to doubt myself and my choice. Then one morning I came across the going away card from Sandi Risi. The final line she wrote in that card was "Now...pull up your big girl panties, pull your hair back, straighten up your crown and go get 'em". When I finally dried my tears, I unpacked my saw and pulled out my 2x4's and started building a compost bin. Silly maybe, but to me it was a very important first step as I knew the vegetable gardens I had planned in the spring would need all the compost I could create!

The following day my parents arrived for a 10 day work-cation. These 10 days put me on a path of self confidence and belief that I could do it. I just had to remember everything would not happen "now". People who know me well, know I am not a patient person...I want everything done NOW! So its a hard lesson to learn, but a very important one.

Over those 10 days, I watched my Zoe go from hesitant when her grampa told her to try the lawn tractor, to not letting anyone else touch her tractor. We cleared an "island" (our nickname for the overgrown areas around and between trees) we harvested and processed apples, we got the barn door running smoothly, we discovered more of the 25 acres including streams, meadows, another orchard, and very dense forest. We started to bring in firewood, we took numerous loads to the dump and cleaned up the mess remaining from the previous owners. We got so much accomplished its hard to believe we had time to enjoy good food, Nova Scotian wine and beer, evening fires and star gazing as well as showing off the area surrounding our new home.

I had so many plans for this move. I still have all those dreams and plans but I have tried to relieve the pressure of the timeline I had set for myself. I want to enjoy the process and not feel like I'm letting myself down if I don't have a garden dug this fall and chickens in the spring and a pig by June and a cow next year. I have realized its going to be okay if I have to get a job to tide us over until we are able to achieve a sustainable farm. And in the meantime...I have to go burn the wild climbing roses I cut out of the tulip tree this morning!

10 Days in Beautiful Nova Scotia

We have loved our time in Barton, NS.  It is beautiful, more peaceful and it is slower paced, however, our zippy Ontario ways do not just disappear.

First,the landscape is beautiful. Shannon’s 25 acres show such diversity. Night times display the stars with an intensity that we have not seen for years. The countryside is hilly and we can see water at nearly every turn. 

Second, we enjoyed the tourist things. We had some good meals in Digby and especially at Bistro East in Annapolis Royal. We also had great meals at home thanks to both Zoe and Shannon. Shopping was fun in Annapolis Royal particularly at bookstores. We saw some incredible asian items at Far Fetched and Japanese Gallery. All the stores were run by enthusiastic, interesting and friendly owners. My favourite tourist activity was stopping at a replica of the Maud Lewis house and talking to the man who built it as he talked about Maud. The real house is now in the Halifax Museum but the original was two kilometres down the road from Shannon’s house.

Finally the work was rewarding but we hardly made a dint. I originally thought that we could get a room done inside the house but the weather was beautiful and we focused on the outdoors. The mowable property was mowed by Zoe. We trimmed trees, weeded gardens, picked apples and made applesauce. We explored the property trying to identify the parameters; we identified as many plants as possible, sometimes via pictures to Nancy Christie. We had lots of brush burning fires. Bill and Shannon tried to keep her equipment in shape with limited success. We were using materials hard. The meadow has many “Islands” made of trees and bushes but not mowed between and thus an island of an apple tree, 5 hazels, a laurel bush, and a spirea joined with blackberries, wild roses, goldenrod and asters developed. Four of us took 5 hours to clean one of these islands, creating hours of fuel for the fire pit. Maybe next time we will go in the winter and focus on one room. 

If any one is interested in a work-cation in Nova  Scotia. I think it can be arranged.

Sandy

Happy Thanksgiving

As Thanksgiving weekend approached Zoe and I entered discussions on what to do for our first holiday alone in Nova Scotia. Do we ignore the holiday and pretend its any other day? Do we follow previous traditions with turkey and pumpkin pie? Do we develop our own traditions? Do we just have fun?

We decided have fun with some tradition thrown in. We love getting dressed up and cooking. We decided to have a pamper day where Zoe will do our nails and make up, we do our hair and wear fancy dresses! We bought a pumpkin, a ham, potatoes and still have lots of apples on our trees for a dessert. So...plan made.

We started the weekend of glam by getting blinged out as Zoe and I both got some sparkle in our noses!

Then came Sunday morning, we cut open a pumpkin, made pumpkin muffins, roasted pumpkin seeds and made pumpkin lattes! (If only we liked the taste of pumpkin!!)








Then we moved on to the beauty portion of the day. Nails done, dresses on, make up applied, hair styled.







Finally photo shoot time. We drove to Savary Park and then onto Gilbert's Cove Lighthouse and although it is cold and windy, we got some fantastic pictures of each other!

Back for dinner. This was the first full Thanksgiving dinner I have cooked myself and it turned out very yummy if I do say so.

Whether today was filled with traditions. Friends and family, good food, football and wine, or whether this was a year for new beginnings and new traditions, we hope you all enjoyed your day as much as we did.

Learning and Loving

Our first few weeks have been filled with learning moments, with laughing moments, and with we made the right choice moments.

I discussed in a previous post the ease of dealing with the internet provider to set up a new account. Well, unfortunately, the internet was not on by move day as promised. In the afternoon I made a phone call, a very pleasant tech person walked me through some troubleshooting but in the end suggested a service truck come to our house the next day. While disappointed I was at least happy that the problem would be resolved. About an hour later "Mike" called saying he was with Bell Aliant and had finished a service call in my area early, did I mind if he stopped by to resolve my internet issues now!?! Was he kidding, I said YES, hung up and got that super good Nova Scotia is awesome feeling! Mike came by, got us set up and told us to call him "directly" if we had any further issues!

Learning moment...we had been here 3 nights and had a scheduled 12 hour power outage while work was being done on the highway. No problem, we got out candles and used the barbecue, and wanted to read through some paperwork that we had found in the garage attic. (It was really interesting paperwork on the family that has lived previously in this house for three generations. We were hoping to find house history but in fact only found personal history.) Our learning moment came when Zoe decided she would have a shower. We are on a well system. Any flags going off? Not for me...what did I know? After Zoe drained the water tank and had to rinse off her soapy hair using our bottled water, I started to get concerned, but nothing I could do with the power still out. At 4:00am the next morning I was woken up to all the clunks and bangs and whirs of the power coming back on. I was happy but...what about the water. I got out of bed and opened a tap...NO WATER! Up to my computer I went and you tubed for 15 minutes until I understood priming the well pump and what we had done to the pump pressure by using it with no electricity! Like I said lesson learned, water back working and no more Zoe showers during a power failure!

People continue to be a source of joy for me. We did return to Nothin' Fancy in Yarmouth as I said I would when we needed furniture. When Zoe and I walked in, a staff member greeted us and directed us to the mattresses when we asked. He finished with his customer then joined us welcoming us back, asking where we found the house, how my son was, and if we had any animals yet on our property. He had remembered almost everything we talked about over two months ago!

There is both plumbing and electrical work that I need to hire out to a local professional. I had someone in whose company does both electrical and plumbing to give me some quotes. When I had finished going over the list of my wants and needs, he continued to walk around the property and point things out to me, explain how things worked and what I would need. Like under coating my truck, and not running if any bears should approach me out of the woods at the back of our property. He then gave me his business card and suggested I call his office and talk to his secretary (who also happened to be our realtors mom!) and ask her for names and numbers of any tradespeople I may need. She could find me good, honest, local people. The mechanic who performed the Nova Scotian safety check on my truck said the same thing, to call him or his wife if we need any names of people to do work for us. He also is trying to find a good rescue dog for us!! People are so warm and inviting and generous. I really can no longer understand why I was told so often that I would not be accepted being from Ontario. I have met only kind, generous, super friendly people who have gone well out of their way for Zoe and I.

First Impressions

This is a blog entry from Shannon’s Mom about my first impressions of her new abode.

The setting is beautiful. As we were driving to the house we were travelling along the coast of St Mary’s Bay. Shannon's house sits on a height of land across the Evangeline Trail from the bay. We could see the bay from several vantage points on her property and I think the visibility of the water will be even greater when the trees lose their leaves.

The property is wonderful. There are many trees - fruit trees, flowering trees, evergreens and deciduous. There is a large central area of meadow. The fire pit is 4’ by 8’ and can host some great fires. We also examined the pond and surrounding marsh. I marvelled at how lovely her property was and then on day 2 she brought out the property map and I realized I had seen less than half of her land. Zoe has luckily found a new passion- driving the riding mower. 

There are three out buildings which they have named the barn, the marketplace and the garage (which is not for parking a vehicle).  None of these buildings are pristine but they all have their own unique aspects. Unfortunately the last owners left great quantities of their stuff behind so Bill and Shan have spent lots of work time just clearing out junk.

The 180 year old house has lots to offer. It is completely livable but every room needs renovations to bring it up to Shannon and Zoe’s standards. When I asked Zoe what great features the house had to offer, she said doorknobs and hinges. There is more than that- lots of space, a lovely newel post and bannister, a nice wood burning stove but there is potential and room for them to express their own ideas.

I hope they are really happy here and that Shannon’s dad and I have lots of visiting opportunities.   

Week One

Wow!! We spent Friday and Saturday cleaning. Unfortunately the house was very dirty. The previous owners also left a lot of "stuff". We have four large spaces to sort through and decide if we are going to yard sale or garbage.

I'm still not quite sure on garbage yet. That's going to be another thing I have to learn about.  It looks like you can put out one bag every other week. But there are also recycling depots to take your tins and glass to in exchange for money. That however does not solve the actual garbage issue! Zoe and I have formed a burn pile and have appreciated the hhuuggee fire pit that sits in the middle of the back yard! It is heaven after five years of using a 24 inch metal pot! This new fire pit takes care of a lot of the garbage.

I got sidetracked...due to the cleaning, and cleaning, we were unable to unpack much yet. Therefore we got creative and used the shower by hanging the travel, plastic, mattress protector as a shower curtain and the towels we had used for cushioning artwork during transport for drying ourselves! We laid a mattress and a futon on the living room floor where the three of us slept during this cleaning process. Zoe did manage to clean and set up the kitchen! However we have no stove, no oven and no microwave! Early Saturday morning Zoe and I drove an hour and a half to a Home Depot where we purchased a washer and dryer and a barbecue. The barbecue was a Mother's Day gift from my children...thank you!! So with no stove, oven or microwave, I have learned that you can cook almost anything on a barbecue. We cooked the typical potatoes, carrots, chicken, peameal bacon (thanks Laura and Martin at Naked Acres Farmstead) and eggs but also ventured into soup, lasagne, and even put a Hungry Man TV dinner on the barbecue for Brandon!

Sunday we drove to Halifax and dropped Brandon off at the train station to send him back to Ontario. It has not gotten any easier saying goodbye to him. Zoe commented it would be different now because with Brandon staying with us it had felt like home. Now we are going to have to figure out our new home with just the two of us.

By Wednesday we were tearing up carpet and ripping out flooring. This was really neat, seeing all the different layers from over the years, and seeing the beautiful original flooring underneath. The main reason we were doing this all at the same time was smell. The previous owners had had many indoor pets and the flooring was very stinky. I was starting to feel overwhelmed. We were working on every room and therefore still had nothing unpacked and no more rooms set up. After living out of a suitcase for nine weeks-I wanted to unpack! So I did. I have found over the past four years, the best way to handle my stress and anxiety is to tackle it. So whether the rooms were ready or not...I have unpacked and feel like I can live in my new home. We even finally got the mattress out of the living room into a bedroom, set the futon up as our couch and put a table up in the dining room. Ready for company! And just in time.
Mom and Dad are coming out for a "workcation" soon!