A new era on the farm has begun with the emptying out of our greenhouse to make it into a studio for Grayden. Ken has promised to make a hot bed for bedding plants in the spring to take the place of the greenhouse. When Ellen and I began the CSA in the 1997 we used a hotbed to start our transplants. The horse manure heats up under the hotbed and keeps the plants from freezing at night. It is fun to think of coming full circle with this old method. It beats cutting a lot of extra firewood and having to stay up late to stoke the wood stove in the greenhouse. For a small garden it makes sense, however I would be lying if I didn’t acknowledge a degree of sadness at saying goodbye to the greenhouse and the many hours of joy that I spent there nurturing young plants. It was a wonderful space in the spring when was still cold and brown outside. I hope that the positive energy will carry over to make Grayden’s studio a joy filled space.

My nephew, Stefan, and the crew that he works with at M&D Contracting have been instrumental in moving the rennovation along. Some of the walnut, maple, and ash from our woodlot, that Ken sawed on his sawmill and stored, has been used for a beautiful hardwood floor in the studio. A local Amish woodworker processed the rough lumber into tongue and groove with three different widths. Ken and Grayden helped around the edges and worked on the siding and laying the floor. Ken is happy that he did our major building projects when his body was a few years younger.