The back story: I'm a retired secretary who worked for NJ Dept. of Transportation for 34 yr. Twenty of those years was as a medical secretary, which I really enjoyed. Every once in awhile the State would offer retirement packages and one came up that I (and DH, who also worked at DOT) couldn't pass up. BUT, taxes and auto insurance being sky high in Jersey, we knew we couldn't stay there after retirement unless we moved to the "projects." Since DH's mother was already living in TN since 1977 and we had been around much of East TN over the ensuing 20+ years, we decided to move. So in 2002 our house in NJ finally sold and we found a place in Greene Co., TN. We got 7 times as much land (2.87 A) for 1/9 of the taxes (yeah, I figured it out). Our car insurance dropped in the hole.
The name of the farm, Cherokee View, came from the glimpse of Cherokee National Forest we get between some little hills by our place. The view is better if I walk up the hill to the north, but I rarely go up there. The view from the house is much better during the winter when the trees are bare. Here's a summer view from a few years ago when the close trees were shorter.
Our lot is a double flag, that is, a 50 ft. frontage goes back about 400 ft., then widens out on both sides. Most of the left side flag (southeast) is a downhill pasture, about 3/4 acre or so. One of the neighbors has 5 horses that they were rotating between their half acre pasture, our pasture, and another neighbor's half acre pasture. WAY too much horse on WAY too little pasture. They give them hay too, but, boy, do they beat the ground up. Now their little pasture is gone because they've taken the fencing down so they can sell their house. They'll be moving within a month or two to a bigger property with several acres of pasture, and none too soon. These same folks seem to accumulate dogs too. They started out with 3, all good sized. Then a stray beagle (probably had basset in her too) had puppies at their house. They kept two of the puppies, but once they were too big to keep track of when let out to potty, they let them run the neighborhood all day. So if a car doesn't get them, a farmer with a gun might. And if they don't take care of business soon, there'll be MORE little beagle/bassets running around, since it's a brother and sister and they're about 7 months old now.
The right side flag is uphill toward the north (the highest point of the property) and gradually slopes down along the northwest side. The garden is along that side and counting several raised beds here and there, is about 6,000 sq. ft. total. More on that later. At the back of the property, toward the southwest, we adjoin a semi-wooded lot that used to be a pig farm, according to the locals. There's no remnants of the smell left, thank goodness. The chicken coop and pen and a storage barn are down there along the fence. Right in the middle of the property is the house, which the builder skewed slightly from the lines of the property so it faces directly east, west, etc. I'd compare the builder to the builders of the pyramids, but I've met the guy and I wouldn't insult the Egyptians like that. And I doubt he's even heard the term "feng shui," so I know that's not why he did it. Last but not least, the one story, cobbled together "barn" is next to the pasture. It was built by a committee, apparently. There's a stovepipe to nowhere that drips during rain, so a 5 gal. bucket sets underneath. The starlings have inhabited the spaces between the roof and ceiling of the one, completely closed-in room that is a workshop. And then we went and built yet another room onto it for storage. LOL
Have to go gather eggs and close the chickie girls in for the night. Which I did about an hour ago, after failing to figure out why this post didn't post.
Nighty-night.
Chris
I love how your house sits on a hill catching all those lovely breezes!
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