Life is getting colder here on the farm. Our bus has a wood stove which we've been putting to work to be warm and toasty in the evenings before snuggling under our good sleeping bags, but it is now cold enough that Tilly seems to need to be tucked in too to get a good night's sleep. There is something about being cold that is a little nice, and makes being warm that much more special and wonderful, like how much better food tastes after being truly hungry, or birthday cake when not every day is a dessert day. The intensified reward of something really waited for and wanted, especially with these basic daily things - warmth, what we eat - is something that with all our modern amenities, I haven't experienced in a while. It's easy to dart from warm car to warm building and miss out on that all-day cold that makes curling up in bed in front of a warm fire so lovely. Now I am working outdoors with kids and with our farm things and Tim is outside frequently for his electrical work and we are feeling the cold and appreciating the warmth.
The chickens are also going through the changes of winter. Did you know eggs are a sometimes food? It's easy to imagine tomatoes and watermelon and corn on the cob as seasonal foods, but eggs are often neglected from the list. Before chickens were bred and manipulated for maximum production year round in lit, heated, totally controlled warehouse factory farming, eggs were a seasonal food that needed to be stored and preserved through the winter. These methods of oiling eggs and packing them in sawdust or brining the eggs for storage are nearly forgotten. Our chickens are still laying a few eggs in the winter, but not enough to sell to all the neighbors like in the summer - closer to a dozen a week than a dozen a day. So I'm having to have the "seasonal foods" conversation with many disappointed egg fans. Maybe in the future we will have more winter-laying oriented chicken breeds, but for now, they are summer girls and need the extra energy to molt (grow new feathers) and stay warm.
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