The main source of heat in our home is a wood-burning stove.
Every fall, we go "get wood" in the mountains near our home. We take the truck & a flat trailer, and load up the boys, snacks, chainsaws, axes, gloves, and warm apparel.
We weren't able to go any time in September due to Josh's and Ammon's schedules (driving bus, running in XC meets, working at the golf course for tournaments, mowing lawns, etc.), and the only day we could all go in October was Thursday the 3rd. It was the day of state in-service, so the boys and I had the day off from school. The remaining weekends in October were filled with more XC meets and pumpkin patch sales.
Unfortunately, when we woke up on the cold morning of October 3rd, there was a blanket of snow in the mountains. Our usual wood-getting spot is along the mountain ridge, and Josh was very doubtful that we'd be able to make it up there to get to it. But since it was the only day we'd all be able to go, we went forward with our original plans. We loaded up the truck and the boys and headed up the mountain road. As we neared the top of the mountain, the snow was getting deeper, and we knew there was no way we'd be able to go to our usual spot. So, instead, we just pulled alongside the road in a spot that we could see lots of dead trees.
It was the first time we've ever gotten wood in snow like that. And it was the hardest wood-getting trip we've ever gone on. It was difficult to trudge up and down the side of the mountain in snow. We had to work twice as hard to get about half the amount of wood that we usually get. The spot was steep where we got the biggest dead trees from, and it was exhausting to push them all down and keep heading up in the slick snow for more. We were there at that location for several hours (and we were all pleading with Josh towards the end to PLEASE STOP cutting down trees because we were all cold and miserable and tired and cranky and wanted to go home), but we managed to fill the trailer with a fair amount of wood lengths.
I didn't take my camera with me that day, and I regret that. Because this wood-getting trip was so unlike any of our others, it would've been neat to remember it with visual reminders. I wish that I had a picture of the boys trudging up the mountain in the snow, or working together to roll down/carry wood along the snowy path, or having snowball fights next to the partially-unplowed road. I wish that I had a photo of Josh the Lumberjack carrying large logs on his shoulders down to the truck, or a shot of the trailer covered equally in logs, snow, and mud. But all I got was this photo of Kanyon the Monkey in a snowy tree that he climbed up and stayed on for a very long time, because my cell phone battery died shortly after.
It was unusual to have heavy snow like that so early in the season, and we were totally surprised by the deep amount of snow that fell overnight. We thought it was signs of an early winter, but by the next weekend, it was all hot and sunny again and the weather was beautiful the rest of October!
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