Chop, chop, chop. All winter long. Chop, chop chop. Not that I personally chopped a single piece of wood, but it seems like we spent the entire winter chopping firewood. I know that we were only unprepared because we were busy building a house, but it was really annoying to not have a solid supply of heat. Not to mention how little fun it is to try and lug wood around in a winter coat, gloves, and scarf. I did lug a ton of wood this winter.

We are going to more than prepared this year. We have already started wandering around the property, gathering wood that can be used for fire wood. There are quite a few downed trees around the lot that were left by the logger. I have been moving all the logs out of the way of my many projects and into large piles where they can begin to dry out. Right now, the logs are in tangled messes coated in mud and buried in leaves. The cleanup process is quite a bit of tedious work, but there is at least a whole years worth of firewood that is easily accessible.

As I sort through the piles of random logs that are tossed around the lot, I am also finding quite a bit of building material. I can use the scrap wood for my outdoor kitchen, my outdoor shower, my garden fences, and a playhouse for the kids to name a few. We shouldn’t need to cut any trees down, and will still have more than enough to keep us warm and to finish my many projects.

I also have a nice pile of wood that is less than perfect that will make for excellent outdoor fire pit fires. One of my favorite things to do on a cool,clear night is to sit around a fire and just enjoy the stars, the fire, and maybe even a beer. We are going to have to have a few fires outside this year.

An important project that will come out of all of this is a wood storage shed. Here is the spot, right behind the chopping block.