As in life, there is a fine balance in maple sugarmaking. The temperature has to stay cold enough to keep the sap from turning before you can boil it down into syrup. But if the temperatures are too cold the sap freezes. It's slow going, turning a 20 gallon ice cube into syrup.Our first boil of the season was today. As we stood around the pan, watching the rolling bubbles, we figured this is our fifth season. We've come a long way from hanging milk jugs on the trees and using my largest kitchen pot. But in all that travel, it's nice to know that the underlying joy of sugarmaking is still there.
The kettle is on. The kids are getting up early. Soon they'll be eating oatmeal and drinking hot chocolate, outside in the cold, but ecstatic that the new season is upon us.
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