Each season is busy in it’s own way.

In the spring all the raised beds need to be prepared in the garden, and all the planting done. In the spring we feel a burst of energy with all the possibility for the year, and want to do all the things. Do you feel that way too?

In the summertime, both harvesting and watering can feel like a full time job at times. And then there’s the preserving too. By summer, we don’t want to add anything like we did in spring, but have our hands full just maintaining what’s already on our plate.

In the fall, the last of the harvests come in and everything needs to be preserved. There is much to do to prepare for winter, and we dig deeper into our energy reserves to wrap things up. By that point we’ve been hard at work for many, many months and are looking forward to the slower pace that comes with the colder months.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, our winters are very rainy. Every year we have things we want to accomplish before the rainy season hits. It’s the fall hustle, with busy, squirrel-like activity before the cold season arrives. This year felt like we had an especially long “before the rainy season” list.

Back to summer for a moment. A big project on our list for the summer was to remove the front porch, which was at the end of it’s lifespan. It was a huge undertaking and Jeff and I felt overwhelmed and intimidated by the project. We’ve tackled many projects together over the years, but this one felt particularly daunting.

Some friends offered to help us and I cannot express enough how grateful we felt for their help. So very grateful! They took a day out of their busy schedule and gave freely of their time, their experience and expertise, and their tools. What a blessing it can be when people so generously share their skills.

The relief we felt after the porch project was done was huge!

After that Jeff and I needed to repair some siding on the front of the house, and do some painting. I learned some new skills! I had never put up siding before. There was no siding available to match what was already there, but we found some siding that we liked and I felt really proud of all the work we did.

Ideally, I would have gotten all the painting done during the heat of the summer, but projects always take longer than you expect (and we always have a lot of projects going on at one time), so I was busy painting in the fall and trying to beat the rain.

Jeff had been busy building me an adorable shed for storing animal feed, and things for the animals. (The majority of the materials were repurposed, much of it from the old deck boards my dad and stepmom brought us when they upgraded their deck. Everything was appreciated, and put to use. Moving the animal feed to the new shed meant clearing out the garden shed where it was blocking all the tools we needed access to for all the projects we do around here, so this was a great project to finish up for so many reasons!)

In addition to finishing painting the front of the house, I wanted to get that shed painted too, so I had lots of painting to do. Jeff was busy with some painting also. Our truck bed was rusting, so he sanded it down, did a rust treatment, and then painted the back of the truck. Much better!

There would be plenty of outdoor projects that we’d do on rainy days, but for all the painting we were wanting to do, we were trying to beat the rain!

My dad and stepmom came for a visit in October, and we had an early birthday celebration for B. We sat around the campfire at night, ate homemade ice cream and brownies, sang silly songs, and watched the night sky. Some good memories were made with B’s Granny and Gramps.

While they were here, they helped us with the garden clean up and we appreciated the extra hands so much! It looked like our last sunny weekend in the forecast for awhile, so we made the most of it and got a lot wrapped up in the garden for the season.

And now are we all caught up on projects?

Hahaha.

We have a list of outdoor projects for sunny days, and for days with lighter rainfall, and every time we cross something off the list it seems we think of three more things to add! Funny how that goes, isn’t it?

Our family has been building cover for some hay storage, so that’s one project. We cleared out the woodshed for firewood (I had been storing bales of orchard grass in there all summer), and got firewood stacked. With storms in the forecast last week, we did all kinds of storm prep, replacing some ties on a greenhouse, and getting buckets of water filled for extra water for the animals. We are in constant storm prep mode during the fall and winter.

Our rainy season is here, and the days are shorter. More time is being spent indoors now, which is appreciated. I’m reminded every year how important the colder months are to regenerate. Our bodies need a chance to recharge!

We’ve been working on some cleaning and organizing projects around the house, and making lots of things for our family’s woodworking shop. Since I find it easier to encourage others to slow down than to follow the advice myself… I appreciated the outside encouragement from a friend to pull out my knitting. I did just that. It’s a wonderful, and calming way to end a cozy fall day. Are you making anything these days? Do you feel that push in the fall to get all the things done before the cold season arrives?