FYI, it’s not ALL fun and games at Rosslyn. Sometimes there’s tough work to do! Like root wrangling, for example… But there’s no reason work shouldn’t also be fun, right?
Do you remember that whopper of a storm this summer, the microburst that blasted Rosslyn, snapping limbs and uprooting trees? At last we’ve de-stumped and extracted the root balls.
An excavator muscled the massive root systems out of the earth. And, in the case of the video above, extraction involved breaking the stump and root ball into smaller, more manageable debris.
But the towering sugar maple that was destroyed by the microburst didn’t yield to mechanical muscle quite as readily. And so Bob (driving the tractor) and Hroth (root wrangling) applied the rodeo treatment!
Tie dye dome behind carriage barn (Source: Geo Davis)
Last night — while walking out to the vegetable garden for a last minute harvest — the sunset tried to outcompete the colorful veggies. And the tie dye dome mounted a heroic campaign!
Even after all of the veggies were gathered for for our impromptu salad (a rainbow haul of red and green romaines, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, banana peppers, tomatillos, and a single looong radish) the hands-down winner was clear. Winners, actually. Sky for color, veggies for flavor.
Tie dye dome behind carriage barn and ice house (Source: Geo Davis)
Not sure I’d earned this reward, but I certainly did appreciate it.
A productive morning at my desk followed by an equally productive afternoon on the tractor brush hogging some of the back meadows with the new offset flail mower. If you think that’s the foundation for a perfect day, you’re right. But there was even more goodness in store. An end-of-day wake surf with Susan, Amy Guglielmo, and Brian Giebel was followed by a “Surprise, I brought sushi!” dinner made possible by Amy and Brian. The perfect accompaniment? A jumbo salad harvested at sundown!
Tie dye dome reflects on carriage barn’s West façade (Source: Geo Davis)
It was already well into nightfall when we walked from the house toward the barns, but the day wasn’t yielding without playing out a sky-wide drama. It was spectacular! We stopped and gawked. We acknowledged our good fortune. And then we gawked some more.
With last remnants of fading light, we made our way past the carriage barn and ice house toward the garden.
Tie dye dome beyond vegetable garden (Source: Geo Davis)
Once we removed the silhouetted buildings from view the tie dye dome appeared even more vast, more vibrant, more spectacular. Fortunately the still empty garden hod reminded us why we’d come.
Tie dye dome above the [uncovered] high tunnel (Source: Geo Davis)
For a moment I imagined the high tunnel sans cover as a vast ribcage, as if some prehistoric whale had emerged from the garden. Our very own Burning Man?!?!
With the final fiery light guiding us, we filled the hod with harvest and headed back to the house for a laughter filled dinner…
Ten below zero without wind chill and Babe – our cooold blue tractor – needed to be warmed up with a kerosene heater under a tarp “tent” in the carriage barn before it would start. (Note to self: Next time, remember to plug the tractor in over night…) Then off to Peru Tractor Center for windwinter tractor service.
Babe’s Annual Checkup
I’ve learned that cars and tractors and John Deere Gators need annual checkups just like we do. And early late February or early March is the perfect time of year to service Rosslyn’s heavier equipment so that everything is ready to run come spring.
When the tractor service pickup was scheduled there wasn’t any significant snow in the forecast. The good folks at Carriage House Garden Center in Willsboro plow our driveway, so in theory we no longer need to rely on the tractor for snow removal. But it’s a handy backup in case we need to we get a huge snow dump and then need to remove our cars before Carriage House plows us out.
But a clear forecast indicated that this was a good time for Babe to take a tractor spa-cation. That little slide show above was photographed on March 4 around 7:30 AM.
Bye, bye, Babe!
March Blizzard Blankets Essex
A week and a half later we’ve received no update and no tractor drop-off. We have received possibly the biggest snowfall of the year. Murphy’s Law.
Fortunately the Carriage House team has cleared the driveway (after a new fellow accidentally plowed a new driveway across our back lawn), but Doug is still lamenting the fact that we don’t have the tractor to push back the banks. Maybe it will be dropped off early next week? Maybe not? Hurry up and wait! Again…
![Tie dye dome above the [uncovered] high tunnel (Source: Geo Davis)](https://abdul2.rosslynredux.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/7ae20af2-067b-4ea3-af82-bd62ab23c452.jpg "Tie dye dome above the [uncovered] high tunnel (Source: Geo Davis)")
