Part 4: Finishing

The sewing is done! All I have left are the closures and trimming off the bottom. The sewing was actually done Thursday--which was a very Good Thing as temps here have been below zero for the past couple of days and this is the only coat Dave has. He wore it to take me to the hospital yesterday morning and then out for lunch and errands. He got many compliments on it, and a checker at Safeway tried very hard to convince me to make and sell them online. (Insert ROFLMAO emoji here.) 

The hospital trip was to make sure I hadn't broken my hand below my right index finger while wrestling with firewood the day before. Looks like I probably just dislocated and relocated the finger. It was all swollen and sore yesterday, but it's much better today. Dave made me get it x-rayed as he was unaware of my medical certification and unwilling to accept my diagnosis without additional input.

But back to the coat... Now it's time to do the closures. I use the word "closures" instead of buttons because I am not going to use buttons. I am going to take two pieces of elk antler crown (the place where the antlers detach from the head when they are shed) and drill holes in them through which to run strips of hide. The crowns will be sewn onto one side of the coat and the strips will tie around antler tips sewn onto the other side. I can do three if I need to, but I'm guessing two will be enough.

When the closures are done, I will do the hem. Well not really a "hem" as I won't be folding it under and sewing the bottom edge: I'll just be cutting it straight. Right now there's a tail hanging off the back, and the curved edges of the natural hide make up the bottom edge. Dave has decided that he would like a straight edge--and he definitely doesn't want a tail--so I will have him stand while wearing the coat, and I will measure up the same distance from the floor all the way around and cut along the resulting line. 

The hardest part will be drilling the crowns and antler tips to attach them to the coat: not because of the drilling but because my drill press is in the garage and it's -17 degrees right now!

Part 3a: More Sewing, Less Blood

All I have left to sew are the sleeve together--I had to section the sleeve pieces into three parts each to fit the hides, the sleeves to the body, and the side seams together. The hardest part of any upper body pattern (for me)--the collar and collar facings--is done. After that I will put on the closures. I can't really call them "buttons" as they are (big) pieces of elk antler that I will need to drill before attaching them, and then I will have to cut strips off the hide to be the ties between the antler bits. Fortunately there are front facings down both front pieces that will hide where I sew on the closures--and where I also will add reinforcement to the hide body so it doesn't rip at the attachment points. 

Previously my goal was to have the coat done for our trip to Austin at the end of next week. But the weather is changing here and we are set to go from 30-some-degree temps every day to -18 (with a -30 windchill) by the end of this week. Dave has dithered about getting a winter coat of any kind so the best he has right now are his data.world fleece vest and his big sweater. The sweater is warm and cozy, but the wind will cut right through it and freeze him into a Davesicle. 

In preparation for the cold, I drove up to the Murdoch's Ranch and Home Supply in Columbia Falls yesterday and got a new heavy blanket for Turi. I had to get the biggest size Weatherbeeta makes--an 84--for him so I could layer it if necessary. There were none at the Murdoch's in Polson, Missoula, or Kalispell so Columbia Falls it was. Remy came along for the ride--they love him at Murdoch's. We also picked up some more coarse waxed thread from the Joanne store in Kalispell so I can be sure I have enough to finish the coat. I'm not sure they love Remy at Joanne, but they didn't have a sign on the door prohibiting his presence so I took him in with me.

Spending an hour each way to drive somewhere shopping is nothing new--for me, or probably for anyone anymore. But the difference between driving along a lake below the mountain peaks with few other cars on the road in the crisp blue and white winter for an hour, and driving in stinking, sweaty, mind-numbingly slow traffic in Austin, or Atlanta, or, or, or... Words cannot describe, and my heart sings.

Part 3: First Blood AKA Sewing the Pieces Together

Speedy Stitcher and binder clips

I have sewn garments since I was so young I don't remember learning. I know my mother taught me to make clothes for my Barbies--though I lacked the patience back then to do more than whack fabric into some rude pieces and sloppily stitch them together. I also remember writing somewhere some years ago about finding a quilt project that I had started with my grandmother when I was about ten. It was the Sun Bonnet Sue quilt, and I still have all the pieces we cut out and the few that we (probably Gramma) hemmed. By hand. Patience, again, not my strong suit. But someday I will finish that quilt--and the one I am making for Patrick McGarry out of his Crown Royal bags--though that last project is going to require an actual sewing room with multiple machines set up to complete it. Dave's coat is a project for a simpler, less technical time as I am hand sewing the whole thing. You read that right. Me, the anti-queen of patience, I am sewing every seam of a full-length coat by hand. In fact, I have already begun to sew--hence the initial part of the title of this post. It's hard to type with a deeply stabbed middle finger. 'S' is an irritatingly frequent letter. But I'm getting ahead of the story.

First blood on the top edge

I am hand sewing the coat for a couple of reasons, the main one being that I do not have an industrial machine that will sew leather or fur. I know! A tool I do not have that I did not buy just for this project!! The second reason is that doing it by hand that I have more control over the outcome. And I did get to buy a special tool for it: A Speedy Stitcher sewing awl.  It's basically a wooden-handled awl with a sharp needle on the end and a hole running up through the handle to carry the thread. The thread is a heavy waxed linen, and instead of pinning the pieces together together to sew them, I'm using binder clips. The Speedy Stitcher is used to sew heavy materials like leather, vinyl, canvas, and upholstery fabric. It has two distinct advantages over a regular needle and thread: 1) The way you use it creates a locking stitch just like a sewing machine does, and 2) the awl handle makes it possible to push the needle through the heavy material without having to use pliers.

The sewing itself is not too difficult unless I hit a tough piece of the hide. When that happens I need to have a thimble (though a block of cork would probably be better) on the back side so I don't jam the needle into my hand. Luckily I've only stabbed myself twice, and I have already sewn the front pieces to the back at the shoulders, the under collar to the coat, the under collar to the upper collar, and half of the front facing to the front. Tomorrow I am taking a day off from sewing to go to Missoula with Dave for shopping, dinner, and a movie--and to give my wrist a chance to rest as I feel a repetitive stress injury coming on.

Part 2: Cutting the Hide

So there I was with my spiffy new pattern and two massive bison hides, and it was time to lay out the pattern, and cut the coat. Oh the terror and reluctance. A bison hide is a complete, beautiful piece of nature's art all on its own. How to even think about marring the existing flow and lines by cutting it? It was beautiful in the way a sheet of patterned blown glass is beautiful. I still have sheets of glass I bought over 30 years ago to use in stained glass projects that I haven't been able to cut because they are so exquisite just as they are and I have not not been able to see a way to make them even more. Then there were the technical considerations.

Typically, to layout a pattern and cut a garment, you lay the fabric lengthwise down the table. Then you start at the top (one of the short edges) and put down the pieces one after another making sure to align the grain of the fabric and the grainline on the pattern. Bison does not have grain in the way woven fabric does. And it's nap--the direction of  the fur, the direction you pet a dog or cat unless you want to piss them off--doesn't run in a straight line along the length of the hide. It radiates out from an area on the top of the hump. This directionality makes sense as one of the functions of the fur is to shed rain and the nap is the mechanism that does that. And there were more things to take into account like the variations in length, texture, and color of the fur. And the variations were not just between the two hides, but within each one. The area around the legs had long, coarse, straight, black, guard hair. The hump fur was long but not as long as around the legs, very thick, but finer, and it was a little wavy, mid-brown, and gold tipped. Vast swaths of flank and shoulder had soft, short, light espresso-colored, non-directional curls--and then there were the combination areas. 

So how to cut the pattern so that not only would both sides match, but also so that there would be flow and continuity between the pieces on either side of the seams (e.g. sleeve to front and back, back to front, facing to front, collar to back, etc.,)? The answer: very, very carefully. I painstakingly laid out every piece and imagined how each would look when sewn to the others. Then I moved them around, tweaking the image in my head to match the new layout. I wanted to emphasize the upper areas of the coat--the shoulders and front collar by using a longer, thicker, lighter area there. For functionality and comfort, I wanted thinner areas under the arms--that area didn't need to be thick for warmth, and it would be easier to move the arms if they weren't encased in massive cocoons of fur. I also wanted to place the hump on the coat where it would have been on the animal--between the shoulder blades on the back. All the fur needed to point down to shed snow. I wanted to keep the option of using the natural edge of the hide on the bottom in lieu of hemming it, and I wanted to use the longer dark guard hair to fall over the wrists--negating the need to hem the cuffs. Finally the biggest consideration of all was that all the pieces needed to all fit on the two hides.

The hides were the winter coats of two bulls. One of them was pristine. It was the work of art that I mentioned earlier in this post. But the other one... I'm not sure why I picked the other one except that it called to me. The tale of sourcing and handpicking the hides is a story for another day, but I mention the condition of the hides now as it added the final frosting on the complexity of the design. 

The second hide had many scuffed and scarred areas down the flanks and around the legs. It was clearly from an old bull who had lived a long life, owned his environment, claimed his place, and dominated his herd. The more I looked this hide, the more I wanted to honor that life in Dave's coat. So I decided that, rather than only use the unmarred areas of the hide, I would incorporate the scuffs and scars to show how badass he had been. 

Finally, pattern laid out, it was time to cut. I didn't even try to pin the pattern pieces to the hide. Instead I laid them on the tanned back side and traced around them with tailor's chalk, Then I used a furrier's knife--a handled tool loaded with a cut-down, double-edged, super-sharp razor blade--to delicately slice through just the hide. I didn't cut the fur, instead pulling it gently apart as I separated the pieces. It took two days, and I am thrilled with the way all the pieces came together. Luck and skill. Luck and skill.

Next up: Let the sewing begin!

Part 1 : The Pattern

To make any garment, you need a pattern, and garment patterns are more complicated than you might think. There are more pieces than just front, back, sleeves, and collar. There are also (at minimum) under collar and front facings. Then there's the way the pieces are sewn together and which lines get moved to size them up or down....  If you are lucky enough to have a pattern with which to start, then you still have to carefully measure your model to make sure that the pattern fits in all the appropriate places. You might think that if you are a size X in ready-made clothes, then all you have to do is buy a pattern for size X garments and they will fit just the same. However, consider this: When you go clothes shopping, does everything you try on in a size X actually fit you? No. Because there is no such thing as either an absolute standard size X pattern or an absolute size X body. 

The next consideration for the pattern is the material for the piece. There are MANY issues with my material. For the purpose of pattern fitting, the biggest one was thickness. The final pattern had to accommodate the thickness of each of the components (sleeves, front, back, collar, etc.) so that Dave would have the ease to move in the finished coat, but it also had to be tailored enough so that he wouldn't be overly hampered by the bulk of it.

Right off the bat I was at a disadvantage because I had no coat pattern. I had a sketchbook containing a "pattern" of an original bison robe coat, i.e., a not-to-scale line drawing of the various pattern pieces with no suggestions on how to measure for them. I had several photographs of the coats worn by Kurt Russell in the Hateful Eight, I had photos of coats made by other craftsmen, and I had a womens' wool coat of my own whose lines I liked. The only true "pattern" I had was the one I use to make Dave's Hawaiian shirts. In my mind, I had a fuzzy image of how I wanted to combine the various elements of the coats in the photographs with the design of my wool coat to make a unique garment. To give me a leg up, I used the shirt pattern for the basic shape of all the pieces. Like I said--garment patterns are complicated and it's hard to tell which edges have to be which lengths in order to sew them together. Collars, facings and sleeves are not as straight-forward to resize as shoulders and sides are. 

It took three days of futzing, changing, and modifying to come up with a first draft pattern to use for the muslin. I had Dave try on my old wool coat for fit, and I made notes for where it needed to be adjusted for him. Then I traced the pieces of the coat (without taking it apart because I really like that coat) and added in the adjustments for his body. Finally I overlaid those pieces with the shirt pattern as additional validation that I was on the right track. When I was satisfied, I cut and sewed the muslin. 

For those unfamiliar with the term, a muslin is a test garment made from muslin or some other inexpensive fabric to test the fit of a pattern. I chose heavy canvas for my muslin to simulate the drape and movement of the finished coat. I lucked out in my choice of canvas fabric from WalMart--the only place in Polson left to buy fabric now that the local quilting store closed--in that it had a stripe pattern and the stripes in the finished muslin gave me a visual reminder of the direction of the grain of each piece. More on grain in the post on cutting the actual hide.

I finished my muslin at 8:00 pm last night, and when Dave tried it on it fit perfectly. There were a couple of places where I needed to extend the length of a piece so it would fit with another piece sewn to it, but those are quick fixes easily made today. The fit and drape were the biggest issues, and they worked out. Was it luck? Skill? A combination of both?  I am not silly enough to think it was all skill, but I'm not falsely modest enough to lay the win entirely at the feet of luck either. It was a good day. 

Happiest New Year!

In years past I would have posted about resolutions and changes. This year I'm blowing past all of that and jumping right into the first project of the year... The Coat! 

For Christmas this year I gave Dave two bison hides, a copy of the Frontier Scout and Buffalo Hunter's Sketch Book, and a promise: A custom-made bison robe coat by mid-January. As I was making the pattern yesterday, I decided to chronicle my progress here. 

So why a bison robe coat? Well, Dave has embraced his new inner Montanan, and saw a picture of the coats made by Merlin's Hide Out on the web. Merlin's made the bison robe coats worn by Kurt Russell in Quentin Tarentino's movie the Hateful Eight. But he didn't want anyone to buy him one, and I (of course) decided that it would be much more fun to make it than buy it anyway!

Though I would love to get into more details, I need to actually go work on it. Tune in tomorrow (really) for initial pics and process!

Twas the Day After Christmas and All Through the House...

Yesterday we could see the mountains of Glacier

It's freezing in here--well, 52 degrees anyway (inside--26 outside). I have become my parents: they kept our house 50 degrees at night and 62 during the day. I hated it when I was growing up, and Jessie hates it now, but I strangely like it. Fortunately for Jessie, the radiant heat from the floor in the basement keeps her room and bathroom a bit warmer. Today looks like a good day to try out a fire in the stove down there too. There is a vent in the dining room on the main floor for passive heat from it. Today we'll see how well it works. 

Snowing this morning!

I am going on and on about the temperature as this is one of the first mornings I have been out of bed before 9:00 am. I wake early, but it's so cozy under the down comforter that I hang and read for awhile before getting up. This morning, however, I had someone coming to service the gas fireplace on the main floor--our main source of heat--so I was up and dressed by 8:00. I turned on the heat, made coffee, and watched it snow while waiting for the guys. Sadly they forgot to tell me that the unit needed to be cold for them to take it apart and clean it so off they went, promising to return sometime next week. Back to the snow. It's snowing!! Little, fine flakes, but snow!

This Christmas was one of our best ever. I usually overdo, buy too many presents (spend too much money), and burn both myself and everyone around me out. This year we stuck to two presents and stockings, each and it was glorious. Dave got hiking poles for us and we started the afternoon with a long walk up the hill behind our house (it's tribal conservation land). Then, for the first time, we walked around our own property. Wow is it big!! Turi is gong to be one happy horse. The former owner created little resting/viewing areas and cairns across the property which are just stunning--and so fun to stumble upon while walking. our land is also mostly hill slopes so we followed animal trails up and down and around.

Dave and the Pablo Reservoir on our walk

Today I begin work on Dave's Christmas present. I learned my lesson about the necessity for proper fittings from the sweater I knitted him a few years ago, and this year's effort is too precious to waste. Details tomorrow...

Enjoying my new walking poles

The happy campers

Dave heading to the top of the hill

A Carnivore's Responsibility

View from the Nest (tm Anya)

Yesterday I spent the late afternoon arranging the furniture in my Nest. I borrow that name from Anya as for the first time I have a small, cozy (the word of the year) space for sewing, spinning, and other lap fiber crafts. It's almost like a tower room as it is at the top of the house, a smaller mirror-image of the master bedroom and has three sets of windows. The bedroom faces east to the Missions, the Nest faces west towards the Flathead river and the Salish Mountains beyond. Dave helped me wrestle the new cozy chair purchased the other day in, and then made me a Negroni to sip as I watched the sunset from it.

This morning there is fog in the valley and sun up here and across to the mountains. I am, as usual, in the cozy chair in my nook in the dining room, enjoying an iced latte and a Croffle from Bayside Riser. My wonderful spouse went out foraging first thing this morning before I was even awake and brought me sugary goodness and caffeinated sustenance. 

Today marks a new point in life for me: I put my money where my mouth is and I am assisting in butchering and packaging half a steer this afternoon. I like to eat meat. I LOVE steak. I love beef, chicken, pork, duck, venison, elk, bison... the list goes on. I also believe in responsibly and humanely farming the animals. I could go to the grocery store (or, rather, Dave could as he does all the food shopping) and buy cellophane-wrapped, sanitized meat in a package without a care as to where it came from, or how the animal that provided it was treated during its life. I could pay money and support the factory farming system. Or I could pay more and trust the marketers who label meat organic, free-range, grass-fed, etc. Frankly, I don't trust those marketers. Every one of those claims could be "true" and the animal could still have had a miserable life and/or end of life. Being a control freak, I found a way to know about every step in the life of my food. 

There is local rancher who raises all his cattle completely free-range on grass. He supplements with hay and a bit of grain in the winter, but the animals are still out in the field, in their herd. They are hormone, antibiotic, and everything-else free. They are never jammed into cattle cars and trucked to a feed lot to stand in misery and filth, eating grain and not exercising so that their meat gets softer and fat, (the way most people like it) until they are killed one after the other by strangers whose only job is the slaughter and butchering. They live their lives free and as comfortable as living outdoors in Montana in the winter can be until they are humanely killed at home by a person they know and who knows them. No fear, no stress. I know it's weird that all of that makes me more at peace with being a carnivore, but it does.

I do not expect today to be easy. It is hard thinking that an animal that was living a week ago is now not living because I want to eat it. But if I want to eat it, I should own the rest of the process and take part in the rendering of that animal into food. As I do, I will give thanks to it for feeding us. Were I a better person, I would be a vegetarian or only eat meat from hunted--not farmed--animals. And I would also do the hunting myself. (I will not go into the necessity of humans hunting and our responsibility to keep down the prey populations since there are not enough other predators left to do it. That's a rant for another day.) 

However I am not yet that person. Maybe next year.

Life Goes On

It used to be I'd start my posts with what coffee mug I was drinking and what music I was listening too. Now it's where we are in relation to the clouds. We are inbetweeners today: Polson and the wildlife refuge are shrouded in fog below, there are clouds above the tops of the Missions, but we and the mountains are clear and eye-to-eye. And I am never going to get tired of leaning over, sliding open the patio door, and snapping this view from my cozy chair!

Yesterday with Turi (the equine companion) was wonderful!! I spent almost no time with him over the summer between time on renovations of my parents house and moving here--I hadn't seen him at all for two months until yesterday! He let me know it too. He looked at me, and then pointedly looked away when I walked up to the paddock to halter him and take him to the barn for his turn with Sadie the vet. Instead of coming right to me (his usual behavior) he made me slog through the gooey wet mud in my little suede WalMart boots to get him. Ugh. (I put Mucks Tall Chore Boots on my Christmas list when  I got home). But when I brought him into the indoor arena to check him out, he was AMAZING!! I let him off lead and just walked/ran around the arena with him at liberty, and he stayed right with me! Wer swooped and turned and he pranced and kicked up his heels and was my perfect boy. I am sooooo looking forward to bringing him home this spring.

When I got home from the barn (I drove the grey beast--my favorite vehicle) I unpacked my goodies from Harbor Freight which included two truck ramps and a big Yukon tool chest. I put the wheels on the tools chest in the back of the pickup, put the brackets on the ramps, and then Dave and I wheeled the tool chest out of the pickup and down the ramp. There is no way we could have lifted it out. As it was, it skittered kind of fast down the ramp.

By then it was dark, but not too late for either UPS and FedEx who both delivered packages to our door. Our driveway is a half mile long (I measured). It is gravel/dirt, one lane, twisty, narrow, and uphill. And they STILL deliver to our door! USPS, on the other hand, not only doesn't bring packages up the drive--or leave them at the bottom of the drive, but they don't even bother leaving slips! Going to have to have a talk with them today...

And that's enough babbling. I'd forgotten how much I liked the morning ritual of posting. It's not as good as my regular coffee with Zaga, but it's going to have to do till she gets here this summer! Biscuits and gravy are ready (thanks Dave) got to go.

PS-Dee, horse pics tomorrow, and Anya, yes! fulltime!

I Have My View Back!!

Northeast from my cozy chair 

Today is another day out and about, and I still have to shower, but the reemergence of the views from the house merit a quick post! These are pretty much the same shots I took yesterday, but even though it's still cloudy, you can see all the way to the mountains on all sides.

Southeast to the Mission Mountains-my favorite view

Today I am off to the barn where I stable Turi. The vet is coming for vaccinations and deworming, the farrier is coming for winter shoes, the dentist is coming to check and grind (I think), and the chiropractor is coming because every horse needs a good adjustment! For me it means a lovely, chilly, winter day spent with my horse. I won't ride, but I will brush and treat and hang with him. 

South to the hill behind the house

For the near future I am keeping him where I currently board him as what the hell do I know about caring for a horse?!? But this spring I plan to get him a companion (donkey? llama? horse for Dave?) and bring him home. This house has a paddock, a tack room, feed storage, and a loafing shed. No, I did not make that up. Apparently the shelters for animals that have no doors are called loafing sheds. Additionally the entire 33 acres the house sits on is fenced so they could free range (like the llamas that used to live here did).

Off to dress and shower! Long sleeved shirt? check. Jeans? check. Cozy vest? check. Warm glove and scarf? check. Work boots? No, but sneakers!

North to Flathead Lake and towards Glacier Park

West over the Flathead River to the Salish Mountains

A Rural Life

Grey Beast and Scoot Scoot

Pomeranian sleeping on my slipper as I get in a quick post before heading into Missoula for banking and shopping. Going to take the Grey Beast today so I can haul a tool cabinet from Harbor Freight and a chair from Furniture Row. Hope she starts. The Beast is a 1989, 4WD, Ford F150 that I bought from a friend last year so I could Haul Sh*t (including a horse trailer). It turns out to be very useful as it is also the vehicle we are using to truck the garbage from the house down to the bear-proof (saying that never gets old) garbage can at the end of the drive. It's about a 20 minute walk down the drive (no, really... well, maybe only 15), so hauling the bags on foot one at a time is Not Feasible. 

Hoar frost

The world outside my window is also still grey this morning, and the hoar frost is even longer. Makes me just want to cuddle up in a chair with a cozy blanket and read all day, but not today. Today I go to the Big City for supplies. Polson has Safeway and Super One for groceries, Ace and Western Building Supply for Hardware, and WalMart and Murdoch's Ranch and Home Supply for everything else. If you need anything else, you go to Kalispell or Missoula for Home Depot, Lowe's, Target, Costco, Harbor Freight, Butterfly Herbs (not all destinations have to be big box stores), etc.

Still need to shower, set up the printer for Jessie, and get the truck defrosted and warmed up, so I had best finish my coffee and get to it. Got a lunch date and an afternoon visit to old friends to set up too.

Oh the Weather Outside is Frightful, but the Fire is So Delightful!

The view from my cozy chair

Sitting in my cozy corner in the new house (located in the dining room, of all places) and looking out the window at... well, you can see for yourself! This is not the way I remember Montabna winters being--though that is probably because I have always lived down in the valley instead of up on the hill. Up here at Coyote Song (now officially named for the romping and singing we hear almost daily), we are IN the clouds. All day every day for the past several days it has been white as far as the eye can see (which, to be honest, isn't very far). And it's not snow--it's hoar frost! And it is cold... High 20's every day. But I am still soooo glad we finally moved here!

Part of living in Montana in December is (re)learning a whole new skill set. So far I have mastered the gas fireplace (our small, primary source of heat), and am learning how to use the atv with the plow on the front, and manage garbage until we can drive it down to the bear-proof garbage can at the bottom of the drive (which is to say some enormous, to-be-measured-later distance). e got a cord of wood for the stove downstairs but haven't had a real fire in it yet. The closest I have  come is burning packing material and junk mail. That's mostly because we do not have a sitting area set up down there yet (though we got a small love seat last week to put down in front of the stove for cozy reading. The main room down there will house the games table when I finish repairing it from the move. It was badly packed and lost a leg. Once it's up J and I will do puzzles down there, and Dave and I will play games.

Frost whiskers on our porch raccoon

Jessie rarely leaves the downstairs. We have the radiant floor heat on all the time down there, and she also has a small space heater in her room so it's nice and toasty. The main floor is noticeably cooler as the gas fireplace is really small, and there are high ceilings and openings into the rooms on the upstairs floor--which has no heat at all except for a small space heater in Dave's office. The upstairs--our bedroom, the master bath, Dave's office and my sewing room--are quite chilly. But since we have a Mr Big down comforter from Three Dog Down (big enough no one can steal the covers) on the bed, whenever we are are upstairs we are just fine. In fact I am warmer and more comfy in this house than I ever was in Austin when it was cold. I think it's mostly because it's not damp here, and the house isn't as cavernous as there. 

Enough talk of the cold! Time to bindle up and go pick up another load of stuff at the old house--small trailer and sheets of plywood to put up walls in the shed/new glass studio. Pictures are all from today.

Looking down the front porch steps

The garden in front of the front steps

Poor Austin rose on the back deck

The greenhouse behind the house

Looking up at the hill behind the house

The vast, empty nothingness all around

Day 20? Day 43?

We have been in our new home for 43 days, but as I have only been here for 20 days, I'm not sure how to count it! While Dave has held down the fort (and the cats), I have been laboriously transporting our lives and belongings from Austin to Polson in a 16 ft trailer towed by a 2002 Ford Excursion (it's for sale if you want one!) or in 26-ft UHaul trucks. Four trips, two with each vehicle configuration, and I am done. Well sort of done if you don't count the last trip I will have to make with the 4Runner and the small trailer to pick up some wood (ironically purchased a few years ago in Montana and carried down to Texas), a loom, and some finished glass work. That trip will happen when the Austin house sells or spring, whichever comes first.

I meant to start posting again on Day 1 as I am that kind of a girl. The kind that can't watch a series on  tv without starting at Season 1, Episode 1--even if the person with whom I am watching it has already seen all of Season 1 and the first episode of Season 2... (Dave!). The kind that has to have ALL the possible crayon colors (currently Crayola has120 in production of the 400 they ever made). But here I am, breaking the mold, being a little less rigid, and starting in the middle of the beginning...

Dave put up the new Christmas tree today. It is new because the tree we had in the Austin house (9 ft) was just too big for the new house. Now we have a lovely little 7-footer, and it's just right. Too big/too much for the new house is the story of our lives right now, as we have seriously downsized on house (while upsizing on land). When we  moved from Atlanta to Austin eight years ago there were seven UHaul loads (I think--it is a bit of a blur in my memory). To get everything down to the four trips for this move, we had to divest A LOT. 

I didn’t want to add to the landfill so I tried to find homes for the things we decided not to keep. I sold some online, I donated some to various charities and Goodwill (a lot of effort to load, drive, and unload), and I still had mountains of stuff to deal with. I was overwhelmed and in way over my head, and then Angie the Estate Girl stepped in and took care of EVERYTHING. By the time I found her, I would have happily given everything we still had away just to get rid of the headache and stress. Instead I handed it all over to Angie and she not only managed to sell far more than I would have thought possible, but she also coordinated the donation of items that didn't sell, and the disposal of items that couldn't be donated. She (and her crew) were warm, friendly, professional, honest, supportive, and incredibly hard-working. I could not recommend them more. I cannot stress enough how STUPID I was trying to sell and give away our lifetime's worth of belongings without Angie! My recommendation: Do yourself a favor and hire her to help you move on to the next stage in your life or to assist you in dealing with someone else’s lifetime of stuff. If you're not in Austin, find another good estate sales agent.

I wasn't there, but Angie had an estate sale in Austin last weekend and we made out like bandits on stuff that I was trying (and failing) to give away. It was a three-day event, and at the end everything that didn't sell and could be donated was (handled by Angie), and everything that couldn't be donated was hauled off in a dumpster (again, coordinated by Angie). 

The Austin house will probably go on the market in the new year when our fabulous real estate agent Dina deems it ready (repairs, painting, cleaning, staging...). In the meantime, we settle into our new life on in a house on the hill on 33 acres in Montana overlooking Flathead Lake, the Mission Mountains, the one million acre Bob Marshall Wilderness area, and the Pablo National Wildlife Refuge. On a clear day we can almost see Glacier National Park to the north.

Another Storm Cometh

I got back home from Florida a week ago, and I am just now getting back to a normal life and schedule--including posting! When I arrived home (7 pm last Thursday), there were so many trees down on our drive that Dave couldn't pick me up at the airport. The Uber driver even had difficulty getting me home as one of the main highways on the way home was closed due to downed power lines. At home the power had been out since 7:30 am. It was dark, but not too cold as Dave had a fire going. He had done some fancy cooking over the fire when the poower was out the night before (photos in the last post), and I continued the trend by toasting myself a bagel. Best bagel I ever ate--smokey, everything-bagel, and melty cream cheese.

Friday dawned still cold, but no longer freezing, and the last of the ice melted off the ground during the day. Dave was resigned to not being able to get to the office, and we hunkered down by the fire. I wore my Minus33 long underwear, jeans, a t-shirt, and a sweater. Zaga came over and I boiled water and heated cream on the fire for French press coffee. It was surprisingly easy and good--albeit the pan of water kept tipping and spilling into the fire when the logs moved...

When I went outdoors I layered up with a sweater vest, a hat, and combo mittens/fingerless gloves. This Montana girl was not daunted! (It actually felt kind of wimpy out for so much devastation and lingering problems--the power outage). In the afternoon an enterprising crew from a tree company came t the door and bid on removing all our downed trees. We took their bid, as did Dan and Zaga next door. They cleared our drive, vowed to come back the next day, and we haven't seen them since. Fortunately no money has changed hands and we can get a car down the drive, so we can wait.

Like other preppers (in our case posters), we went to Walmart that afternoon for supplies, and got candles (not regular ones as they were sold out, but they had a lot of the tall glass religious ones for $1.57 each--sweet!), a grill rack to put in the fireplace to cook over, and a cast-iron griddle to cook grilled cheese sandwiches on over the fire for dinner. 

That evening we lit every pillar candle I ever bought in our married life as well as the new glass-jar ones and some beeswax advent tapers I found from years ago. I thought I had finally thrown all the old pillars away last fall as they were very dusty and we hadn't lit them in YEARS. I was glad to find I hadn't gotten around to it. Proof positive that as soon as you throw something out, you are going to need it. I am never throwing anything away again. Then we moved the games table over in front of the fire and spent the evening playing Terraforming Mars. One game lasts a few hours, and we ended up going through quite a few of the beeswax advent tapers. Pro tip: Take a plate, melt the bottoms of several little advent tapers. and stick them to the plate for a great improve candelabra.

When we finally went to bed (the cotton sheets under a down comforter are FREEZING in a cold room!), we made bets as to when the power would come back on. Dave said Saturday afternoon, and I was sure it wouldn't be till Monday morning. We were both wrong as it was back by Saturday morning. We were lucky. We were only without power for three days. There are still 451 active outages in Austin with over 2,000 people affected a week after the outage started. Austin Energy hopes to have all power restored by Sunday the 12th. In the meantime, flood warnings and thunderstorms today. Definitely time to look into a way to flip our solar over from the grid to us so we can access it during an outage.

Girding My Loins to Arrive Home to Icemageddon

Just finished a Sweetwater beer and a burger in the Atlanta airport, and am now on the plane and charging every device I have with me--laptop, iPad, iPhone, Muse meditation device. I even bought a big laptop charging battery in the airport and am charging it for Dave. We are still without power at home with no idea of when it might be restored. I also heard from both Dave and Zaga that we lost a lot of oak trees from ice and breakage. As I understand it,  there are so many trees down in our drive now that Dave can't get down it with a vehicle until I do 2-3 days of chainsawing. Guess I'll be Ubering home from the airport. 

The pictures are courtesy of Dave, who cooked merguez sausage and leftover golden potatoes in the fireplace tonight. I am convinced he did it as much for experience points as for hunger. Thank heaven we got that half cord of wood earlier in the winter. Now if we just had a generator or a way to switch our solar from the grid to our own use when the power is out...

This is the last time I am caught by stupid winter in Austin. I am going into full-on prepper mode, and will be ready for power outages with their dark, and cold, and meat-ruining abilities next year. I am afraid to know the current state of the meat in the freezer (all of the wild game and other exotic meat I got Dave for his birthday). We can't even get to the store to buy a bunch of bags of ice to throw in there to keep it cold. Never again. We have solar that produces 25-115 kWh of electricity a day--all of which is dumped when the power goes out and the grid is turned off. With the current state of batteries, there is no way to store enough to run the house, but we could go to emergency rationing at night, and probably get by during the day. 

Good-bye Florida Sun, Hello Austin Ice

My time in Florida comes to an end tomorrow. We left the condo in Cedar Key and did a little shopping in Ocala (bead store and quilt store), before splitting up and heading back to our respective lives. I drove to Sarasota to deliver J's car to her, and to meet the boyfriend and have dinner with the two of them. It has been a bittersweet day: I miss Dave, Rémy, and the cats, but the weather here has been particularly fine and my only responsibilities have been to sleep, eat, craft, meditate, do yoga, and be somewhat social. Of course, now that I am not gainfully employed, most of my days may end up being like that! 

Cedar Key had a lovely small-town vibe, and  was relatively empty of tourists. Maybe the majority of the "locals" were snowbirds, but at this time of year there weren't gaggles of families with whiny, sticky, sunburned children clogging everything up. It was refreshing to see a median age of (I'd guess) 65. Or maybe I mean average age... Bah. It's math, and Dave's not here so it'll just be whatever I want it to be. Anyway, they were comfortably rowdy, rumpled, grizzled and grey-haired--and that was just the women! The sunsets could not be beat, and the stillness refreshed my soul.

It was good to spend time with my friends on the annual trip--and I picked a particularly auspicious time to be gone as it's in the 70's and sunny here, while it's freezing ice, downed tree limbs, and electrical outages in Austin! I'm glad my flight tomorrow isn't due in till late--hopefully everything will have had a chance to melt and Dave will have been able to clear the driveway of downed tree limbs. Last night for our farewell dinner we went to the Big Deck Raw Bar & Grill for dinner and some stompin' good live  music (really. everyone was stomping). They had an amaaaazing selection of bourbon, and I ended dinner with a shot of Blanton's, ice on the side. There were only two women working the front of the house and one cook in the back, and it was PACKED). The one who waited on us as we sat at the bar--the only available seats in the place--was VERY generous with her pour... I ended up carrying some of it home there was so much.

In line with being a newly poor, unemployed person, I am staying at a motel called the "Golden Host Resort" in Sarasota. It is also close to Ringling so will be easy to have lunch with J before heading to the airport.

It is cutie-patootie and claims to house Florida's oldest Tiki Bar, the Bahi Hut. It also has a saltwater pool, drag bingo on Sunday, and other scintillating activities throughout the week. It looks to be a 1950's/60's originally side-of-the-highway-now-in-town motel, with a really spiffy remodel. The shower floor is a beautiful pebble mosaic, the fridge and microwave are 1960's baby blue replicas, and the furniture (chair and tables) is Jetson's chic. Seems clean, and has a comfortable bed--what more could I ask? And I might need to stay an extra day if the weather in Austin continues to suck. 

Okay, off to meditate before heading to dinner. Cute as the room is, I don't think I'll get down on the floor--even with my mat--to do yoga.