It's Back :(

After loving 70's and even 80 last week that stuff on the ground is back. Atleast we did not get 15 inches like western Wisconsin. It is still hard to look at in May. With temps going back to normal next week everything should melt away fast. For all my fishermen coming next weekend don't be to discouraged by the following pictures I do believe it is going to go fast as soon as we get the warmer temps on Sunday. Sunday is the coldest day of the week at 63 and it climbs from there. I am guessing Cliff takes a plunge by Tuesday or Wednesday and the latest Thursday Cliff looking throughly discouraging this morning. It will not be long once the warm temps come on Sunday but til then he is a sad sight Our shoreline with a thin coat of ice back on it. I can not wait til Sunday! Now the question is once the ice leaves how long will it take to get the docks straight and the big ones in the water. For the record we did have our first swimmers in the lake on Wednesday night. I think they were a little crazy and they went straight to the sauna afterwards We dealt with the bad weather by finally boiling off the last of our maple syrup on the stove. Everything we collected over the last month is in the pots boiled down. Someone asked me how does it get brown? When you boil off the water in the sap it naturally starts to turn brown and gets browner and browner the more you boil it down. There is nothing added to the syrup you just boil and boil and boil some more adding more and more sap to the pot as you go When it gets close you dip a metal tub into the syrup and put a hydrometer in it. Once the hydrometer bounces to the right consistency it is time to put it in the jars and a cap on top to can it This year we got about 5 gallons of syrup from our trees. It was a good year. This will get our family of 5 through the year and maybe a little to spare. You will not find these jars in our gift shop, they are like liquid gold after all the work put into it