"People travel hundreds of miles to see this, and we get to just wake up and walk outside"

I am utterly exhausted. Today, Alexis and I took the second largest tree down of everyone in Tools class.

Here is a quick photo montage of my weekend and the past 2 days in school:

This is the view from a neighbors backyard at their "summer home" in New Hampshire (I crossed two more states off my "I've been there" list for the US--the whole purpose of this overnight trip was to go to a state fair in Maine on Saturday for FIBER)!! I spent Friday evening at the parental home of a classmate of mine named Julia. Her parents are awesome to say the least.

They live way out in a gorgeous and secluded area of New Hampshire and these are a few shots I took from their neighbors land which Julia took us too just for the views.

I love and hate this situation--the land here is PERFECT for my future dreams to come true and these people own it, mow it, and are rarely here (according to Julia). It's truly a shame

A PORCUPINE!!! I saw one in real
life! It's running away because I was
so loud with my excitement for having
seen a real live porcupine in the wild!

The living or sitting room

 So Julia lives in this wildly gorgeous house, but it's been built on to this amazingly quaint and lovely little cottage from the 1700's.
I didn't take pictures of the main house, it's beautiful, but it's a typical American "cottage on steroids" addition.

I want to live in a home like the little one.

Reclaimed and painted crazy uneven wide plank wood floors.

A fireplace or wood stove in every room (all 2 of them).

And breathtaking classic and elegant woodwork.

A close-up of those gorgeous bowls on the mantel--
I definitely want to make these someday. It looks as
though they were glazed with a shino which I'm finding
that I love more than any other glaze I've worked with
yet. I love the color borrowing qualities of the shino.

The living or sitting room--just look at that light!

One of the 2 upstairs bedrooms--I want that bed frame!

What once was the kitchen and eating space in this tiny home.
In the far left corner you can't see is the floor markings of
a different paint color indicating where cabinets and a counter
space once stood. That tiny wood stove has cooking capabilities
on top as well as general heating for the entire house.
The door to the left leads to what was the front door and up the
stairs directly in front of the entrance.

Views of New Hampshire

 My Fiber Arts homework: spin and ounce and a half of the fiber we prepped into 3 different thicknesses of yarn; as thin as possible, as thick as possible, and somewhere happily in between.

Then wrap it onto our Nostepinne (Nist-pin) to create in inner and outer pull ball of yarn--no more "granny balls" as my zany, unmanageable yarn balls are termed. I learned that on Monday.

My very first ball/skein of hand-spun, hand-wound yarn!

 Monday in Agricultural Techniques class we pressed apples in preparation for making cider--hard cider that is!

And we'll also be making some apple cider vinegar. This semester in Ag Tech, it's all about the fermentation of farm fruits and veggies!

And yes, we get to partake in the fruits of our labors! I'm wicked excited about that!

More delicious than you would ever imagine. Just look at that!

This apple press was hand built by Eric there (in
the blue) from one tree he fell in our nearby forest.

This is Dave, he's super cool--and "quality" testing the cider
straight out of the bucket.

Another cider prep contraption made by Eric. Clayton peddles
his heart out while Kendra feeds a consistent flow of apples
into the chomper.

The chomper--yeah, scary!

"People travel hundreds of miles to see this, and we get to just
wake up and walk outside--and we get to go to school here."

 And on to today's Tool class

THIS is the tree we're going to take down.

 The story of this tree is actually quite funny. Alexis was the one to pick it out, with all her balls and "I can do it better than any of these guys" qualities (we get along nicely I might add).

Half way through, I thought I was going to throw up--eating a healthy lunch then taking a tree this size down almost immediately afterwards, it just doesn't mix well in the guts.

But Alexis is a great cheerleader and we made it happen... Well, actually the tree decided on it's own it was going down.

As the two of us, with our instructor Allison, were discussing whether to place the felling wedges in and where to place them--chit chatting and laughing as women usually do--we hear a quiet creek. Then a snap. Then Allison says "does it look like... I think it might be going...."

"CLEAR!"

And again, in typical female fashion, we all jump up and run our designated escape routes, completely forgetting about the massive cross-cut saw we've left in the tree truck (for explanation, if the tree were to jump off it's base and do even a slight kick-back, this saw could take limbs off--and I'm not talking about tree limbs) so I run back, snatch the saw and toss it aside as I jump up and give my usual "WOOO HOOOOOOO!" personal victory cheer (it's my thing in tools class because everything we do in this class makes me feel more and more... invisible but with mortal understanding and complete and honorable respect for my tools and the Earth).

THIS is the massive stump left and THESE
are two exhausted but proud women!

That's right, we chopped and sawed this massive White Pine.
I saved a slice as commemorative of the first massive tree I felled.

Alexis proudly mounted upon our felled tree.

This is Matt and Dylan, their tree was the only other tree in
class that was bigger than ours, and we were the only double
female team.

 Love!