Chronicles of the Long Shot Farm

Barn

Grapevine Wreaths

Posted on

A little side benefit from growing grapes is an abundance of grapevines that need to be trimmed off every year.  We’ve been getting better at making wreaths – one at a time…

The largest wreath we made so far was measured around the outside of our round patio table.  We used an old woven wire fence panel to support the wreath.  When we had wrapped sufficient vines to make the wreath the size we liked, we fastened the wreath to the fence panel with wire.  We then cut around the outside and inside of the panel with wire cutters, basically making a wire form on the back of the wreath to keep it stable.  We then fastened several strings of brown wired fairy lights to the wreath.  Duff and Caleb helped to get the wreath positioned at the peak of the barn – climbing to the vent from the inside of the barn, they lowered a rope, which we used to pull up the wreath.  Inside the barn a very long extension cord with a timer connects the light strings of the wreath to an outlet.

We also made some smaller wreaths and Lars is getting rather good at it:

 
We use the wreaths for decorating outside and inside:
 
Wreath underneath bell
Wreath wrapped with bells

 
 

 

Sign Post for The Long Shot Farm

Posted on

A pretty awesome birthday present from my family – made by a local blacksmith/welder/artist, based on a design by Sammy:

Jeff dug a hole and filled it with concrete to permanently anchor the sign.   I was so excited, I made a garland and decorated for the holidays right away:

“Sandy” Barn Damage

Posted on

The massive hurricane, properly called “Sandy”,  left our part of Pennsylvania relatively unscathed.  We were truly very, very lucky, especially when compared to the devastation the storm brought to the coastline, just a few hours east of us in New Jersey and New York.

We had some issues with our power, it was off most of the night on Monday.  We played Monopoly with oil lamps and candles and then we all slept in the living room, as we had the back-up gas heater running.  The electricity came back on around 7, just in time for everyone to take a shower, and then it was back off by midmorning. 

We had some trees uprooted (just small ones in the fence row), and a lot of small and mid-sized branches all over the place.  The only real damage was to the back of our barn, where about 20 boards got torn off, and the vent on the very top of the barn got knocked out as well.  Everything that was stored on that side got rather wet, but it was mostly our unused stainless steel tanks and stacks of lumber – so it could have been worse. 

The damage was toward the top of the barn, so we had to get some help to get this one fixed.  Our friend Mike, who happens to run a construction business, managed to squeeze us into his schedule today.  He brought scaffolding and ladders – and not only replaced all the boards, but re-nailed all the existing boards as well.  Lars climbed up on the scaffolding as well – Jeff stayed on the ground, cutting boards to length. 

Birthday Party in the Barn

Posted on

Our grandson Toben turned 3 today! And fortunately for us, his birthday party took place in our barn.

Rachel arrived with a complete birthday party in a crate!  Favors, decorations and games galore.  All we had to do was clean up the barn to get ready.

This ended up to be a family pig roast as well  – no use not utilizing our pig roaster, and Zach and Rachel got half a pig for roasting.  We had lots of potatoes, corn and rolls with jelly, as well as cakes, muffins and jigglers.

Overall, we had about 40 people, including a dozen kids – all under the age of 4.    Caleb brought over his hay wagon, with some hay bales, and took all the kids and some parents for a ride around the farm. 

Gracie brought a pinata – which we hung up outside of the barn.  None of the small children were able to break the pinata, though not for lack of trying.  It took Lars to break it open 🙂

Other games included “pin the tail on the donkey”, and “go fish” – with quite an elaborate set-up.  And the of course there was birthday cake, balloons, presents and treats for everyone.  What a fun day!

Birthday Cake
“Go Fish” setup

Barn Remodeling Continues

Posted on

Even though the downstairs of the barn is basically done, the entire upstairs as well as much of the outside of the barn still needs to be fixed over the next couple of years.  But we made some more progress with the outside of the barn this weekend:

On Saturday, we got the barn and tractor shed roofs painted – by a team of South Carolina barn painters that travels up and down the east coast.  They had huge sprayers, special roof paint and they managed to get the entire roof done in less than an hour.  It looks so much better!!!

On Sunday, we tore down the rickety old connection between the barn and the silo.  This must have been built to keep the silage dry in bad weather (and the person getting it).  It was a real eye-sore and we have not need for it.  We won’t use the silo for feed – not quite sure yet what we will do with it at this point.  It could be used for storage, we could even build ceilings and stairs.  Actually saw some pretty neat silo to house conversions on the internet .  Here is one example:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmrF3er7zus 

But  maybe we will use our silo as a water tank to use gravity to irrigate the grapes an blueberries.  We’ll have all winter to think about it.  But the painting crew is planning to come back later in the fall and they will paint our silo as well.