This is two years in a row we have lit our first fire before Sep. 15th. If you would have asked last year I would have said it was unusually cold but now? Turns out I would have been mistaken.
I tend to think of September as a hot month. A week ago it was. On the 9th I came in from morning chores soaked with sweat and still sweating after I got out of the shower and dressed for work. This morning I wore a hoodie to do chores and it was only just warm enough. But September will warm up again. No doubt.
We had planned to light our first fire a week ago when the forecast called for this:
But when that weather arrived the house still had so much residual warmth we just couldn’t excuse it. Now, however, the A/C units are out of the windows and the house is a little chilly. And for those of you keeping score, when the 13th arrived 8 days later (today) we hit 41, not 46.
We all slept with a few extra blankets on our beds last night. My oldest daughter stood behind the stove to warm up when she woke up this morning. (The other kids will too but she is the only one up this early.) I think this transition into fall is the best time of the year.
It didn’t take much wood to warm up the back room. It wasn’t much of a fire. Just something to warm the kettle. But it was nice.
Chism Heritage Farm 
We are still looking for Fall here. We are in the middle of 10 days of 100+ degree temps. Enjoy putting on clothes and building fires. There isn’t enough clothes to take off to help with 100 degrees.
Sorry Steve, but up here it’s the same as at Chism Heritage Farm – I was in a T shirt and shorts for chores a week ago, and coming in warm. I’m starting out in a sweatshirt and jeans now, though moving the pasture pens has me shedding the sweatshirt pretty early into the roster. This might be my favourite time of year. And if I had a woodstove, like HFS, it would be perfect.
Of course, if Kari’s reading the blog, then she’s got more to say about chilly and the need for woodstoves – there’s been snow out her way already.
lol thank goodness the 11″ of snow (yes really) that Calgary got did not find us! Just rain and more rain and frost – yes I turned on my boiler last wk. Supposed to be 24C/75F on Thur – I am not holding my breath – the weatherman has been dangling that carrot in front of our noses for over a wk now and keeps pushing that coming warm day further away everyday. It is part of the weatherman’s pre-winter training program for us – he says maybe it will get warmer next wk, and next wk never really comes until May lol.
We need heat to dry things up before the snow comes. My neighbor is still trying to get a first cut of hay off his last field – he is usually done well before the end of July! A neighbor just north of me got 5″ of rain last wk. He took his quad out to check how wet his field was for combining – 70% of his field had standing water so won’t be anytime soon. A chronic problem around these parts – the water table is saturated so the combines are parked waiting for things to dry up. I am starting to think about pumping some of my low spots in the yard so I don’t flood in the spring when the snow melts – oh joy!
I am increasingly desperate for a final cutting of hay. It is ready, it just isn’t dry. The ground is wet. The mornings are cold with heavy dew. But I keep hoping…
Weird time of year here. We will have more 90 degree days but we should have our first frost within the month.