Pure winter joy.

Photo copyright Aji, 2022; all rights reserved.

That was yesterday: pure winter joy. 

Today, for us, it's all pure winter work.

Of course, we lost the first half of the day with Wings's dental follow-up, which didn't go well. It took forever (no fault of the dental technician who did her absolute meticulous best with what the lab had sent her), the office was ice-cold, the chair miserable, and in the end, he can't wear them because they need whole new impressions. So.

Back home, and he's back plowing the snow again. He has a system whereby he first creates walking paths and tracks and a way to get the truck out; then he turns to plowing the rest, shoving massive snowbanks up against the base of the trees, like what you see above.  The purpose is two-fold:  First, the plowed areas, which are where we tend to need to walk, melt first and dry first; second, the big banks take days, usually weeks, to thaw completely, and so as they thaw the water slowly trickles into the root systems of the trees without overwhelming it. It's part of why we've managed to save most of ours; because he does this every time.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to get caught up on things that I had to let slide with the pressures of the holidays. New calendar year, but no signs that the country is going to do a single thing to get us out from under the death sentence it so gleefully seems determined to enforce. But this is our most expensive month of the year (followed very closely by July; I'm not even including April, which is tax month, in all of this). So while we had a far better holiday sales season than I could ever have hoped, we still have to keep the cycle going. This is our livelihood, after all, and there's a lot of expense ahead, medical and otherwise (and this has to be the year the drill the well because there's no other option at this point; "first thing," indeed).

So, as always, it comes back to that: more sales. A lot more, because we have two years' worth of a shattered pandemic economy to make up for, by which I mean we need to gain more ground ourselves financially to be able to be sure of making it through the winter and the rest of the year. I've posted a ton of Wings's new work lately, and there will be more in the days and weeks to come. If I could sell one of the big works, like one of the belts, maybe I could get us on the drill list for the well that is the only thing that's going to keep this land alive. But I've got way too much to do and too few hours and other resources to do it. Which means that I'll be stepping back significantly in terms of my online presence, because there's just too much else to do, and I am no longer well enough to maintain the kind of pace I once did.

So, since we have to continue to make sales, so links are here:

• Sales here; 
• Testimonials here; 
• Amazon wishlist here (priorities are first and foremost, the ladders);
• Patreon here;
• Ko-fi here.

And if you've been contemplating a purchase? This would be a very, very good time to do it; I've got to cover all this staggering outlay somehow and get us through twelve whole months of a new year, plus put aside enough for a new well when the ground thaws enough to drill in the spring. And there's lots of fabulous new work, so please share all of the links. 

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2022; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.