September

Not a lot of building took place this month. Hubs took some time to rest and when he was able to, he definitely worked hard on just a couple things.

This month was nice as we got to celebrate my birthday at a hotel. Hubs booked us a two-night stay in town so we could finally explore parts of town we haven’t yet visited and I could feel a little pampered with warm showers and a bath. Before we could leave our home for two days, there was a little extra preparation we had to do in order to be away from the house. It’s something he’s mentioned before, especially in winter when it starts to freeze. So we made sure to plan ahead with grocery shopping, making sure we didn’t leave extra water filled up in our containers and just keeping it clean.

The hotel stay was lovely and I’m so pleased because he had put in the effort to plan and save up for it. We had a nice time eating out and I didn’t have to cook for three days! However, even with the huge comfortable king bed we got, Hubs didn’t sleep well. We think he was subconsciously preoccupied with how the house and our plants were doing. He had a much better sleep the night we got home from the hotel stay. The house held up well on its own and I was very happy to be home at the end too.

Something Hubs does that makes me feel he’s wonderful is how well he takes care of his plants. He really cares for them like they are babies and has genuine feelings for them. It’s very special to watch him care for the plants.

Unfortunately, one day we had a crazy hail storm and hail had come down and tore up the plants we were growing on the back of our house. He was as devastated as the plants were because a lot of them were about to fruit or had just started fruiting. We’re learning from the weather here and this prompted him to build a green house.

His first attempt at building it was to make a stand alone structure using extra wooden beam pieces we had and some plastic he’d bought. It got ripped apart by the wind the very next day. Eventually, he decided to create a green house that was attached to and therefore supported by our house. It has expanded the house by half its size and feels wonderful to have an extra sheltered but sunny space right at our door step now. I miss opening the door to nature right outside it and it definitely has changed the space a little bit, but it is so very helpful to have this mud room for our muddy shoes.

One night, we were awoken by heavy, heavy rain pounding down on us. Hubs immediately got up and had to go outside to make sure we weren’t getting flooded. I got up and went with him, grabbing our torches. He ended up digging some drains to lead the water away from the house and it was such a mess the next day. That’s just the way it is here until we get some gravel to lay all around the house!

I, on the other hand, have been working on sewing some curtains for the windows and am finally done with the first (colored) layer of them. I can now start on the second layer, a thicker fabric to keep the house warmer and then I will work on some smaller curtains for under the sink.

The sunflowers are still thriving in September and many of the ones we accidentally grew from throwing some bird seeds around are getting big!

October

The weather started changing around the end of September. It has always been cold here because we are on a high elevation more than 7000ft above sea level, as my sister rightly pointed out one day, but this time, it’s constantly cold even when the sun is shining at its brightest.

I was thrown into a moment of deep reflection some time this month. I had to reflect deeply and sincerely about lessons that were presenting themselves to me. It was a very difficult time but staying in a place of love and light helped me see my lessons for what they were. I had to learn what my priorities really are and learnt that I needed to go home into myself. There were both inner things I needed to do as well as outer things I wanted to do for the house. Being a better wife and partner meant lovingly being around my husband even when tension presented itself. I say presented because it is an opportunity for me to learn something that really wants to make itself visible to my awareness. Being a better wife and partner also meant understanding that it is my responsibility to prepare meals that I feel excited about and taking my other responsibilities with a loving mindset. I felt like I was going under the water with all the pressure but taking time to really open myself to what my lessons were helped my spirits greatly. Thank you for guiding me love and light.

This made me realize I needed a personal, indoor space for the winter as well. I’ve been looking at having a space for myself so I can do more healing work here and thought of purchasing a green house but Hubs says that’s silly because it would be so hard to keep cool in the summer and warm in the winter. I thought it was a beautiful idea to have a healing room in a garden but I think he’s right. I didn’t get a green house in the end but started looking at tents for the winter. I would still eventually like to build a cob structure. Maybe the following spring.

This month I received many parcels from home. My mom had been trying to figure out which items belonged to me and through what seems like an attempt to clear out the house, a whole lot of my stuff is now here instead of at home, where they… should… be… I feel evicted from my home. I am very happy to be reunited with my belongings though. I feel more at ease knowing my mother is taking time to help me get these things packed up and sent here. It feels like a positive type of transition and I’m glad we got to do this together. I know how much she loves and misses me. My granny sent me a knitted scarf too.

Hubs and I finally put up a sign for our home after talking about it for a long time. He had been talking about having a “no trespassing” sign and I had no idea that what he wanted more than that was to put up a signage to make our home cozier. We named our little place, YoEl homestead.

It is officially getting colder and I’ve got my puffer jacket on all the time now. We finally put up a wood burning stove we got and it makes a beautiful fire with some juniper and one other kind of wood we bought from someone who works at the grocery store here. He had agreed to deliver it to us but could only do so after work at 8pm. Now the sun sets at 5pm and so by the time it’s 7, it’s all pitch black here. It was crazy that he found his way to our place as agreed and dropped off a whole lot of wood. It was crazier to me that, even after all that wood had been dropped off, he was still going to come back the next day to drop off the remaining wood we had purchased. It cost us $300 in total I think. That wood should last us all winter.

I have something really important to share here too. While keeping the house warm indoors, we use a propane heater. One day, I tried to pick up a grill Hubs had set on top of the heater for a fan to sit on. I carefully felt the metal grill to see if it was hot and it wasn’t so I picked it up. Then I tried to place it on the table and carelessly grabbed onto the grill with my other hand and burnt my fingers badly. The moment I did that, I yelled and dropped it. The pain was intense and my fingertips were seared. However, here’s what I did that helped so much that I was able to wash the dishes again two hours later.

I applied a thick layer of aloe vera and honey to my whole hand. I reapplied more of it to the burn every 15 minutes or so. When it hurt less, I held my fingers tightly together and applied pressure for as long as I could while breathing healing light into them. I held my fingers tightly for about 30 minutes and rested when I needed to. I left the thick layer of aloe vera and honey on for about an hour or two and allowed it to soak in. The pain eventually subsided after two hours and I avoided using my fingers as much as I could. The following days, I would apply aloe vera and beeswax to it while holding it tightly every now and then.

I learnt to hold on to the wound from the Lymphology class I’m taking. This pressure keeps the cells close together and allows for the transfer of oxygen into the cells and for the removal of waste into the lymph system so healing can take place. It prevents swelling from happening. It took a total of five days to heal and I am so thankful for what my body can do.