The Beauty of Vermont Farm Life

Release the quacking! So, let me just apologize for not talking much in this video. I have been sick for the last couple of days. I've had a bad cough, sore throat, that sort of thing. And so I wanted to make a video today, but I didn't want to talk. So, I've been meaning to do a video where it's mostly silent anyway for a while, and so it just sort of synced up perfectly. We continue to have our very warm winter right now. I mean, here we are in January, and it's like 33 or 34 degrees today. We got a little bit of snow last night, like a dusting of about another inch or so. But there really still isn't much snow on the ground at all. Isn't that sad, baby Abby? I know, I feel sad about it. You know, one question I often get about the farm is, when I get sick, who takes care of the animals and who does stuff when I'm sick? And the answer is, generally speaking, I do. You know, number one, our farm doesn't have any full-time employees. And number two, my wife has a full-time job off-farm, and I feel like it would be grossly unfair for me to expect her to come in and pick up the slack. And so, when I get sick, it means I got to still do the chores. But to be quite honest, I really don't mind it all that much. I actually find it therapeutic. I actually find that it probably makes me heal from sicknesses faster. And hopefully that doesn't sound too crazy to you guys, that idea that I'm, like, healing myself by coming out here and spending time with the animals and being out in the cold. But, I don't know, there's something about it that sort of toughens me up, and where, you know, kind of a typical man cold might derail me and leave me on the couch for the entire day. Because I had to get up and get moving and get my day going, it actually was not nearly as bad. And now when I go inside and I sit by the warm fire, I'll be feeling like a million bucks. Isn't that right, Abbie? Isn't that right? So I gotta admit, I'm actually thankful for having the animals and having the farm as something I have to take responsibility for each and every morning, even on the days when I am feeling miserable like this. What was outside there, Abbie? Huh? Something caught your attention? Where's Mr. Toby Dog, too? He must have found something he was more interested in than getting brushed. Usually he, like, rushes right in here to get brushed. Hey, there's Mr. Toby Dog. How's it going, buddy? You gotta share me with Toby. Yes, because Toby is my original little doggy. You. You got enough love for both dogs? Yeah. I will admit, nothing makes me happier than to have both of these dogs hanging out here with me like this. And it's really nice and warm in here. I mean, like I said, it was just about freezing outside in here, I don't know, with the dog warmth. You know, I could probably spend all morning out here. So, yes, for the last couple of days, I've continued to be collecting maple sap. The first, I don't know, four gallons or so that I collected, we actually just drank it as, like, maple water, which makes for, like, a nice, refreshing sports drink. I mean, it's got, like, the tracest amounts of maple sugar in it, and so it's, like, really good, it's really refreshing. Between the four gallons I collected this morning and about a gallon I collected about two days ago, I think I have about five gallons of sap ready to go for boiling. Because of the ratio of what you get in terms of boiled down sap to maple syrup, I could probably expect about a pint of maple syrup from that five gallons. So when I go inside today, I just might take that sap and toss it on the stove burner and just let it go. Ordinarily, I'm against people trying to make maple syrup inside their house, but number one, my new evaporator hasn't arrived yet, and number two, it's such a small quantity, and I have, like, a ventilation hood for my stove that I think if I turn the ventilation on and just run it, it should be totally fine, and it won't introduce too much moisture into my kitchen. So while I probably have a day of being lazy on the couch today, because I still feel so miserable, I'll at least try to boil some maple syrup inside the house, because it'd be nice to have, like, some midwinter syrup kind of going. Oh, man, I'm getting dog-filed. This is great. I will say that that's probably one of the luxuries of having a farm here in northern Vermont and, you know, being in the winter season. Like, this time of year, I don't have a lot to do. I got a little bit of chores to do in the morning, and I got a little bit of chores to do in the evening, but other than that, it's not too bad, and so the beauty of the Vermont farm life in winter is really that you can take it easy and relax and get cozy, and so, yeah, I definitely see some maple syrup and a warm fire in my future very soon.