Heating with wood is pretty common here in Maine. We heat with wood and both of us We are lucky enough to have a wood furnace not a wood stove. A stove does have the benefit of working when the power goes out but the furnace creates a more consistent heat throughout the whole house. Our furnace is a forced hot air one so it is a little bit loud to run as you are constantly listening to the blowers. Ideally, we'd have a wood boiler instead then we could heat with hot water and it would be … [Read more...]
Spring in Maine
Spring in Maine!! Spring has finally hit here in Maine. Some years it seems to take longer than others. Even though I know that it's coming, I sometimes lose hope that the snow will ever melt and warmer weather will arrive. As I type this, we are even having an unseasonably warm day in the 70s! What a lot of people outside of Maine don't realize is that Maine looks very different in every part of the state. Everyone thinks of us as the coast but that is a very, very small part of our … [Read more...]
Maple Syrup and How We Make It
It's that time of year again. It's maple syrup season! I think most people realize that maple syrup comes from maple trees but that is all they really know. There is so much more to it than that. There is quite a bit of science to it. First- Maple syrup comes from maple sap that is boiled down to remove most of the water but leaving the sugar. Second- It take approximately 40 gallons of sap to make just 1 gallon of syrup. Wow! Huge ratio for sure. Third- The weather has to be just … [Read more...]
Two (Simple) Exciting Things
I must share my excitement with you! They are small things but they both make me so incredibly happy.First:Saturday I took the leap and made granulated sugar from maple syrup for the first time. It was scary as you have to heat it to such a high temperature then stir it constantly until all the moisture suddenly leaves and it becomes sugar. Simple process but any time you heat sugar to a high temperature, it is scary with the possibility of getting burned, burning the pan, etc. I used my Kitchen … [Read more...]
I Feel the Earth, Move, Under My Feet
So around 7pm last night I was minding my own business, when all of a sudden the house started to shake like someone was on the roof above me...but not quite. I knew it wasn't Matt. He was outside but he was working on an old Coleman lantern outside. When it didn't stop, I was worried he blew himself up. I went running around the corner. He was fine. Just an earthquake. Wait. What? Earthquake? In Maine?!?! Yup. It happens. We have one every few years or so. No reported injuries or … [Read more...]
April Fool’s… Trick or Treat?
This is has been quite a strange year. And it isn't over yet! And I'm only talking about the weather. We won't even get into everything else that has happened. We had a rather big storm on April 1st. Our April Fool's storm. Now, we have a Halloween weekend storm to go with it. This is my backyard this morning. A bit blurry as it was still snowing a little and windy. We have about 5 inches out there. Since they were predicting 5-10 inches and, being in the mountains, we always get the … [Read more...]