Lovely November Day

We all have those chores - you know the ones.  These are jobs we put off for so many reasons. It will take too long and I don't want to start until I can finish.  It's raining (for outside chores).  It's too nice out (for indoor chores).  It's too messy and then I'll have to put everything away.  No one can see it anyway.  But those chores sit in the backseat of our brains and kick the front seat, over and over and over.

The chore I have been avoiding is emptying the compost barrel.  I have one of those old compost barrels that you turn upside down on an axle to mix the compost.  This year it reached critical mass.  It was sooo heavy I had trouble turning it.  Most years, I go in with my trusty trowel or spade and scoop about half of my "veggie poo" into buckets and carry that stuff to my garden bed.  This year, I decided I had to empty the whole thing and rinse the barrel out.

But it was so hard, my head whined.  It took so long to just scoop out a few buckets.  So, I shoved it into the backseat and did other things.

In the backseat, the chore kicked and kicked and I had to find a way to quiet it down.  I came up with a plan.  Instead of scooping the compost out, I'd dump it on a tarp.  Hope!  And then it rained, and rained again.

TODAY, I substituted a sheet of cardboard for the tarp and I emptied that enormous barrel in 15 MINUTES!!!  I kid you not.  And God bless my youngest brother, he came over to talk and dug all that stuff into the garden beds.  What a blessing.

As he dug - and we talked - I sat in the sun and made a sage wreath - my very first - from wreath forms made of my blackberry canes and my home grown sage and rosemary.  I must find a hook so I can hang it in my kitchen to dry.  Then I will use it over the winter.  And my youngest sister called from far away!  What could be better?

Just a lovely, lovely November day.