The thing about living on 40+ acres, renovating a farmhouse, growing a big garden, and having a few chickens is this: there is always something to do.

There are the extensive walking/running trails to maintain and mow; there’s the chicken coop that needs more secure hardware cloth added to it, and the roof over the chicken pen that is still half finished. There’s the garden, of course, and a bit more planting that needs to be done, and then there’s the picking of lettuce and chard and basil for a salad at night. And deer-proofing the fence around the garden . . .

And I replaced the kitchen faucet the other day, and we discovered that the eaves of the garage roof on the East side are badly damaged due to improper installation of the drip edge years or decades ago. The list of things to attend to waxes and wanes, but never vanishes completely.

Such is living life. But the bottomless nature of the to-do list is magnified when you take on the task of renovating an old house by yourself, and learning as you go.

Along the way, we’re enjoying this land greatly: watching green herons alighting in trees, the chimney swifts flying at night; discovering and identifying the rare “purple milkweed” in the back pasture; and just spending time walking and running the trails. Living on and enjoying the land is a priority. And it’s so easy to do.

However, the heat of the summer is the prime time for getting deeply into renovations, and if we want to see another round of changes to the farmhouse, now is the time to let most things on the to-do list just simmer for a few weeks … and return to renovating again. It’s time.