Monday, November 9, 2009

I've Got To Pull Myself Together. . .

I am in a sort of post-slaughter daze today. Last night was uncharacteristically lazy, as we watched America's Funniest Home Videos with the kids, and after they went to bed, The Wrestler, which I'm sorry to say had too much wrestling, not enough relationship, and though the acting was, in fact, great, it was just not good enough to redeem the story. Netflix can have that one back. And this morning I'm just sort of roaming around with my coffee, trying to plot out my next best step.

Which is likely preparing the beds for the allium sativum we are now a full month late in planting. But that is a huge effort, and my back is already sore, and it will be easier if I wait for Matt to mow the field. Unfortunately, I am seeing a rainy weekend forecast, so whether that field work happens or not is unclear. This farming thing would be so much easier if we were both home farming, rather than farming one or two days a week and only if the weather permits.

But there's bread to bake today, and pumpkin to can (since we are absolutely out of freezer space until we unload some of those chickens), and another round of apple sauce and apple butter to make. And so I think I'm going to have a kitchen day. A quiet, simple, kitchen day.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Stymied.

We finished the chickens. All 25 of them. They are not so bad. It would be easy and quick, if we had a
Whizbang plucker, to process all our own chickens.

Turkeys, though. Turkeys are gross. And huge, so our plucker doesn't work at all. And they smell really bad inside.  We only got through one before dark, and we are searching Craigslist for someone, anyone, who will do the rest for us. And if our friendly neighborhood small-scale processor doesn't open back up next year, I am not sure we will stay in the turkey business.

I am happy to be entering a week in which I get to plant garlic and start cultivating life again.

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Sometimes, You Just Have to Be Very Brave.


Today I pulled a dead chicken's head off (to prevent bone shards) and cradled it in my palm, staring, absolutely astounded that I had done it. There is a picture of this, though I have chosen not to include it here for fear someone may report me for gratuitously bloody blogging. I stuck my hand inside 7 body cavities and tore out 7 sets of vital organs, which are even now transforming into the compost that will grow next year's raspberry and grape crops. I held seven sets of chicken feet still in the killing cone while their owners bled out into a bucket, convulsing in the throes of death. The plucker (shown here) works well, but painfully slowly. We have 7 lovely and delicious whole chickens, bagged and ready to roast, in our chest freezer. There are 18 more chickens and 6 more turkeys to go tomorrow. This business of chicken processing is actually not as gross, in real life, as it must sound here. I am surprised at how well we took to it.

Matt's thought, as we were cleaning up and getting ready for tomorrow, is that we are both different kinds of people now than we were this morning, pre-processing. I don't really think so. I think we are still two people that are very determined to turn our small farm into a livelihood. And I think we are still two people that believe many of the world's ills can be healed with proper nutrition, and that ethical participation in all aspects of dinner preparation is a noble and worthy pursuit. It's just that today's efforts toward our goals took a little more courage, and fortitude, and strength than normal.

One thing has certainly changed: I will never feel awkward about calling myself a farmer again. Today, I think I earned the right.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Things Are About To Get Messy.



This was the best thing Sarah Palin did, in my opinion. I don't agree with much she said on the campaign trail, but I can respect a woman who doesn't get too fussed about people killing turkeys. During a press conference. Right behind her. Sure, it was last year, but it's relevant.

Tomorrow, Matt and I will be the guy wrestling turkeys into a cone and slitting their throats. We bought brand new knives from the hunting section of Walmart, built ourselves a handheld drill plucker, and once I disinfect the table, cutting board, scalding pot, soaking tubs, etc, we will be all set. Except we realized last night that we don't have vinyl aprons. So we will also likely never wear tomorrow's clothes again. Good thing the kids are going to my parents' house, because we expect some serious gruesome.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

I Don't Often Get Political On The Blog, But Today. . .


I read this.

http://www.rmfu.org/2009/07/24/congress-about-to-hand-over-food-safety-to-agri-business/

It was written in July, but the food safety bill is still in committee. This bill is full of well-intentioned bad ideas. Not the idea of food safety in general. I stand, of course, 100% with the idea that food should not poison people. It's just that as currently written, this bill would lump my tiny 6 acres of production together with the guys that package lettuce for the entire nation in Salinas, California, and put us all into the same regulatory structure fueled by the fees they'd make us pay regardless of the size of our operation. And I think the guys that in one day sent E.Coli spinach to thousands of our nation's grocery stores could use more regulation. But here's why I think the nation's small farms, ours included, should be exempt. And why I think you should tell your congresspeople so.

Michael Pollan argues that one of our big food safety issues is that we are "washing the nation's salad in one big sink," which allows for a small number of contaminants to spread quickly through the nation's food supply. The same thing could happen here on our farm, but we are very careful that it doesn't. More careful, I believe, than a packing house in California. Because when I hand over a bag of salad greens to a customer, I am using my actual hands to do that. I am face to face with my customers, and often, their small children, every time I deliver any sort of food product raised on my farm. There is nothing that the government can do that will hold me more accountable than the fact that my friend's three year old starts eating peas from my farm right there at the CSA drop off point, or that my own kids frequently pick their own snacks straight off the plants in my field. That, my friends, is the ultimate accountability, and a responsibility taken very seriously by the nation's small family farmers. We need customer trust for our businesses to run, and we work incredibly hard to make sure our practices keep our customers safe and well-fed, all season long.

Locally-produced food from Colorado's small family farms, or small family farms in any region, is naturally fresher, more delicious, and safer than food that sits in a bag on a grocery shelf after a long trip through the packing house and halfway across the country. Because I live and farm right here in northern Colorado, I am naturally more accountable to my customers, who are my neighbors, friends, and at the very least, members of the same community. Adding the same layer of fees and regulation to all farms, regardless of size, just might be the last straw for small operations. The cost of compliance would be a much larger burden on small producers, driving many out of business. Which means that the food safety bill, as its written now, would have the opposite of its desired effect. Because this bill would leave fewer small family producers in business, it would give more market share to national scale, less-accountable food producers, who rarely know their customers or watch their produce be consumed in real life.

So let's get that language clarified, shall we, and be sure that locally-produced, small-scale food remains a viable choice.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Pork, Anyone?


These are our little piggies. . .not so little anymore, actually. . .from Madzie's perspective during her very exciting day with the camera. They are getting big, but we don't think they've made it to traditional slaughter weight yet. Deciding when they are ready to go to the butcher (that's right, there's a million small-scale butchers for larger animals around, so no way am I going to be killing these giant things myself) is a task complicated by our lack of experience and our lack of an appropriate scale. They are certainly too big for us to pick up and hold on our bathroom scale on a stump, which is our weigh-in method of choice for the poultry. But are they at 220 lbs? Perhaps not yet.

Either way, they seem to be taking a really long time to grow up, and we've decided to try to get a processing date sometime before Christmas, no matter how big or small they are. But between this and our spotty-at-best record keeping, our goal to expand pigs next year is still a little shaky, as we're still not entirely sure exactly how to price them and time them and the best way to sell them next year. And people are asking. Lots of people. Because pork, no matter how you eat it, is delicious.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Clean Up for a Good Impression

Though this picture of our garage and pole shed barn was taken before we moved in, during the inspection, I think it illustrates quite nicely the rather decrepit state of that little building. There is not usually quite as much crap in the yard as there is in this picture. But sometimes, alas, we crap it up just as much as the renters before us. 

The roof needs to be replaced. And the entire structure painted. I don't know exactly when it was hip, in this area, to paint the trim on white structures various shades of blue, but it clearly was. Our home is not the only one still sporting the outdated colors of that unknown era. In fact, the blue trim on our house is actually halfway painted over, as though someone fell off the ladder in the middle of the project and just never got back to it.

And here's the thing. We're having customers out to the farm fairly regularly now, and I'd like it to look less shabby. Which means I'm itching to paint this garage and the trim of our house before February hits and the crazy cycle of the season starts all over. Because the siding on the house has a nice white paint job already, I'm sticking with this as the main color, but I'd like to paint the trim black and the doors either red or forest green. These colors fairly scream cute little farmhouse to me, and that's what I'd like to have. Also, in much the same way I feel obligated to eat brussels sprouts, I think we should work a bit more on the grounds around the house. We're actually good growers of almost all things, but you wouldn't know it from the landscaping here. I have some interior projects swirling around in my mind as well, and most of these also involve painting . . .and making curtains.

Matt's winter is already all booked up. He will be building more portable poultry pens, rigging a grow light system in our cooler so we can grow our own plugs, getting our old transplanter to work, and building a tractor implement that can lay drip tube 6 inches underground. So if I want to paint, it will be 100% my show. And since he and I painted the exterior of our old house before we put it on the market a few years ago, I know exactly what I'm getting myself into. I hated that project and in the midst of it, swore I'd never do it again. But I will. I know I will. Because I'm tired of feeling faintly embarrassed by the state of the farm. And shame, as we all know, is a powerful motivator.

Monday, November 2, 2009

Whizbang!

We're gearing up for a big weekend here at Boyles Family Farms. We've got some giant old Tom turkeys that need killing. Also, 25 broiler chickens. And I'd just like to point out that we never imagined we'd be slaughtering animals on farm.

But the small-scale processor we used earlier this summer has closed down in the midst of divorce and other rumored sordid personal problems, so we don't have much of a choice. It's either kill these birds ourselves or not sell them. And we've sold them all already, so onward it is.

Ideally, we will build a Whizbang chicken plucker, which is a tub-like McGyver device that tears the feathers off birds. Because plucking takes a long time, and we don't want this to take forever. In fact, the less time we spend killing poultry, the better, as far as I'm concerned. But that's too involved for this year, so we're building a power drill plucker that will be much messier than the Whizbang, probably, though that's hard to imagine.

So, Saturday, after Simon's final soccer game and the end-of-preschool-soccer pizza party, you'll find us in the barn. We'll be slitting throats, running that plucker, and scooping guts into a bucket. And while I know we'll get through it, I'd be surprised if we enjoyed it. But misery loves company, so if any of our fine readers would like to come on out and help out, we'd appreciate it. And there'd be a free chicken dinner in it for you.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

NaBloPoMo

I had no idea that such a thing as National Blog Posting Month existed, but as it seems far more manageable and less exhausting than National Novel Writing Month, also now, I think I'll give it a try. So look for me to post every day this month, which will be a record. There should be no end of interesting things to say, as we are slaughtering turkeys and chickens and continuing to slog around our muddy field tidying things up.  Thanks to my new friend over at Midnight Rambler for the idea!

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Eulogy for my Dishwasher

In our prairie home, the holiday from apron strings is, very sadly, over. Oh dishwasher on wheels, I loved you for the racecar sound you made as I rolled you across the pergo floor each evening. I loved the spacious wash basket capacity and how you would clean even the most troublesome scorch marks off my copper-bottom cookware with only minimal prep from me. I loved the tidy order in the way our wedding-gift blueberry hearthstone plates and mugs stacked into your easy-rolling dishracks, side by side.  And though you were quite loud as a kitchen companion, squirting and swishing through your cycles in the middle of the night, splashing decisively into the sink as you drained, you will be sorely missed in the years I imagine it will take us to replace you. Rest in peace, dear dishwasher. In this, my 200th post on the little farm blog, I honor your life and work.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Heavenly Day. . .


Three hours of my afternoon, if you believe it, were spent writing on an old laptop in front of our cozy woodburning stove and drinking hot tea. Everything outside is dusted with snow, public radio is playing Bach and Lyle Lovett, and the kids are on their way home from school. I'm switching now from tea to wine. We're going to make Halloween cookies and read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. We are right at the part when Harry makes Tom Riddle's diary work and discovers that it was, unbelievably, Hagrid.

The prairie is so beautiful when it snows. And our farm, so cozy.

And there we have another comma lesson for freshman composition. . .how the lowly comma makes meaning explicit in lieu of other wordy additions.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

When The National Weather Service Says It. . .

you'd better believe it. Because the National Weather Service, unlike our local news meteorologists, don't do drama. Except for the all caps font, which I suppose does make the whole thing seem that much more serious. I love this warning, as part of a winter storm warning forecasting 18-24 inches of snow between now and Thursday morning:

RESIDENTS SHOULD PREPARE FOR A LONG PERIOD OF WINTER STORM



CONDITIONS WITH DIFFICULT OR IMPOSSIBLE TRAVEL ON WEDNESDAY AND


THURSDAY. EXPECT CONDITIONS TO DETERIORATE CONSIDERABLY WEDNESDAY


MORNING. CONSIDER COMPLETING TRAVEL TONIGHT IF POSSIBLE. IF YOU


MUST TRAVEL WEDNESDAY OR THURSDAY...TAKE ALONG A WINTER SURVIVAL


KIT.

Get where you're going and get your sleds out, people!

Pumpkins


Our kids are sort of getting the worst of the pumpkin patch they helped us grow, since we made them wait to pick out their jack o'lantern pumpkins until after all our customers had. So the pickings were a little slim, but they managed to find a few good ones. We'll likely carve them tonight, which is very exciting. Last year I had a meeting or something, so Matt helped the kids carve while I was gone. So this is another reason I feel happy to be around more. I can participate this year.







The girly girl found one with no trouble. She's so excited about Halloween, since she's old enough to know that this is the beginning of the holiday season. And by that I mean the long string of things for kids to get worked up about between now and New Year's Eve. Parent teacher conference days off, Thanksgiving break, Christmas break. . .all that. It's a big time of year for kids.




Here, Simon is being a tough guy. Somewhat ironically, he's doing that because it's in a commercial for the new Tinker Bell movie, as in Tinker Bell asks a lightning bug, "Are you a tough guy?" and the lightning bug puts up his dukes. My kids think that is hilarious. They are both very excited about the new Tinker Bell movie.

Bring 'em on, I say about the holidays. Because it's nothing but joy with kids.

Monday, October 26, 2009

Probably Not, Garlic.

We're about to get some snow and cold, according to the National Weather Service. So we've got to get those gladiola bulbs out of the ground, stat. So this is now the extent of the farming plan for the week.

And I just noticed that the title of this post could be a comma exercise for freshman composition straight out of Eats, Shoots, and Leaves. As in, how does the lowly comma influence meaning in a sentence or phrase. As in the following.

Probably not garlic.
Probably not, garlic.

Apparently, you can put the grammar teacher in the field and cover her with pig slop and poky weeds, but you can't make her forget how much she loves commas.

We've Managed to Get Behind Schedule For Next Season


because we haven't planted the damn garlic. The garlic is currently sitting in a box on the floor in our mudroom, surrounded by dirty laundry, stinking slightly (the garlic, I mean, not the laundry). And it's because the field needs cleaning before we plant the garlic, and cleaning the field is a Big Job. We had to purchase equipment to get it done. But before we could use the new mow deck, which comes home today, we had to pull all the drip tube out of the beds by hand. That process looks like this:

We have six beds, each with between 30 and 100 rows in them. Each row has one or two drip tubes, as in this picture, that run its length and attach to the header line, also shown, that runs along the entire north side of each bed.

The tubes are connected with pieces that screw down onto the tube and then spike into the header line for water to go through. If you'd like a description of the installation process, see "Adventures in Irrigation" from the 2008 season.



We detach the tubes by unscrewing the connector, leaving it in the header line (unless it accidentally comes out, in which case we curse loudly and save it in a bucket). We also have to carefully walk the length of each row pulling out each and every metal hook we've used to keep the tubes firmly on the ground through the season's windstorms. There are between 3 and 8 in each row. Because if we miss one, it will likely pierce a hole in the tractor tire. And if that happens, according to Matt, we're screwed. Our tractor's tires are on their last "legs" anyway, what with the rubber beginning to dry rot and peel, and tires for a tractor are surprisingly expensive.

The next step is to pull the drip tubes out from under all the plant debris and line them up in the road so that we can bundle them for disposal. This pulling is easier said than done, as the corn roots and dead soybean stalks have grown over top of the drip tubes. So it ends up being like tug-of-war, but tug-of-war against the Governator, or something. It's hard to get those babies out of there. And the weeds are dead and dry and poky. Also, I am allergic to something in the fall air, so my nose was running something fierce, but I had prickers stuck in my sleeves, so I couldn't wipe the snot off my face without scratching myself all up. And the wind was blowing my hair around, and some of the short wispy pieces kept getting stuck in the snot drippings from my nose, which made my face even more itchy, which made it harder not to scratch myself with the weed pricklys that were stuck to my sleeve. It's the small things that make this job tedious, really. Otherwise, it's nice to do some labor again.

So now our field looks like this. All the debris is still there, but the drip tubes are out of four of the six beds. The next step will be to dig out the gladiola bulbs with the digging fork, and then we'll see how beefy our new brush hog mower is as we try to mow all this junk down. And once it is mowed, it will need disced. And once its disced, we'll plow it. And once we've plowed it, we'll set the rows. And once we've set the rows, we'll plant the garlic. So our hope to have the garlic in by the time we hit the trick-or-treating Saturday night might be a pipe dream. But perhaps on a candy-fueled Sunday morning, we'll bust it out. Stay tuned. . .

Friday, October 23, 2009

Homesteading



That's right, homesteading, which is both verb and gerund in the context of the Movement, as in "Those crazies out there have decided to try homesteading," or "Those old hippies are homesteading their way right into an early grave." Modern-day homesteaders aim for self-sufficiency. . .you know, they want to live off the land, so they leave their city lives and buy a farm and try to get back to basics. Quickly peruse their internet literature, and you will find helpful links on how to butcher a goat, how to spin yarn and make your own clothing, how to make yogurt with the milk you get from Old Bessie twice a day. That sort of thing. They are very serious about sticking it to the man by dropping off the consumer planet. And though some of them seem fairly moderate and reasonable, if you read the literature more closely, you do encounter a lot of crazy. I had a roommate once in college who bought reusable fabric maxi-pads in order to keep Aunt Flo from killing Mother Earth. And that's okay. But she would boil them in a stock pot (the same one we used for soup) to clean them, and then water the plants in the yard with her "broth." And it all logically makes sense, but really, it's loony gross. And some of the homesteader bloggers remind me of this.

And dear readers, I am aware that the homesteaders may also sound eerily similar to, well, us. We have, in fact, raised and butchered our own dinner. And we heat our house with wood that people give away and that Matt chops every evening with an axe. And I bake bread for the family every week. And we grow probably 75% of the food we eat ourselves. And all this independence is like crack. . .we want more, all the time, and we care less and less how nuts it makes us look. I'm happy that I don't write a giant check to the propane company every month. I love roasting up a good Boyles Family Farms chicken dinner. I totally covet my neighbor's beautiful solar panels. We are planning our way right off the grid, and we love it. So now all I need is a way to mill my own wheat and to think up a good name for a dairy cow. . .

Seriously, though, it does make you stop and think about all the things we've traded for the privilege of not chopping our own wood or raising our own food, doesn't it? Most of us are like hamsters on a wheel, all the time, trying to make the money it takes to not do these things for ourselves. And we work hard, it's true, here on the farm. But doing that work at home means we don't have to do it for someone like Michael Scott. Or less of it, anyway.

I've got one foot into a world of crazy here, with the homesteaders, but I suspect I may have found my people.

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Somedays It's Easy, and Somedays. . .


it's not. We've all been fighting some sort of nasty around here. With full-body aches and coughs and the whole thing. It's much less colorful and cheery than the Matisse. It might be H1N1, but we're not going to panic.

And it sort of comes and goes. . .we've been joking that we're having a www. recovery, as we're better, then bad, then better, then bad. Up and down and up and down, like Simon writes a w. It's been weeks now. And it didn't help that yesterday, on an upswing, I ran for 45 minutes. That idiocy set the down in motion, and for the rest of the night I was on the couch. And today my cough is a little deeper than it has been.

So today I'm going to work hard not to overdo it. But there's cleaning to be done inside and drip tube to pull in the field. And all that can wait while I lounge in my robe (which I wish was purple, but it's not) awhile and contemplate the fab wallpapers one can always find in a good Matisse.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Imagination


Here are my lovely children, in a brand new canoe, floating through the Poudre Canyon on the run-off fed river. Simon is working the paddles and Madzie is fishing for dinner to cook over the fire when they make camp for the night. Or at least that's what they think they're doing. And Simon has his helmet on for safety, which is a good thing.

Parents my age are criticized for overscheduling their kids. And there is some truth in that, for sure, at least for those of us in the middle class (or above). It's hard to resist the traveling sports team, music lesson, bilingual, all around overachiever child model that has become the norm.  Because if something is the norm, it is really hard not to think that your kids will miss out on something essential about growing up in their time if they don't participate. And teamwork and practice and all that are great skills for kids to get young. I know that. But it's tough, when other families talk about their 10 year old's championship hockey tournament that was held in North Dakota or the Julliard Junior music camp that their 8 year old attended in New York City over the summer, to sit there with nothing to add except that your kids picked beans and threw mudpies at each other for three months. Not that there's anything wrong with that. And it sounds like sour grapes, in that conversation, to say that you believe that any kind of organized activity that requires expensive travel puts unnecessary pressure to Achieve on children who don't yet have the teen suffix in their age. Even if that's what you actually do believe.

And though I know that these children, when they aren't participating in organized activities, are often being raised by the Cartoon Network, I'd just like to say that I haven't lost all hope for the future. Because no matter where they live or how many organized activities they are involved in, kids find a way to be kids. They build tree forts outside, read Harry Potter and Junie B. Jones, ride bikes, make up elaborate rules to games they invent at recess, and generally use their imaginations every day. And even though I don't think we can schedule or screen time the imagination out of kids, I think we'd be wise to give them a bit more free time to practice day-dreaming. And to use more of our precious grown-up time to do the same.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Aaaaand. . .Done.

These idiot turkeys, gobbling their way around next year's pumpkin patch, and a pen of 28 broilers, are all that's left of our 2009 farm season. I drove a truck full of jack o'lantern pumpkins, cured onions, and brussels sprouts into town for our last delivery of the season last night. And Paula fed me steak and potatoes and wine, and I felt a little sad about not being able to see her every Monday all winter long. But still I'm wondering when it will sink in that this is it.  My suspicion is that it won't really happen until next Monday, when I can spend all day writing rather than scrubbing carrots. Or maybe not until Monday night, when I can eat dinner with my family and watch The Big Bang Theory like a normal person. Who knows.

But the end of the season is absolutely making me think about the beginning. And I don't mean the beginning of this season, but the beginning beginning, like years ago when we first decided to get ourselves into this. And how little we knew what the future we were dreaming of would really be like. How in February of 2005, I was not even thinking of being a farmer, and I officially and uneventfully turned 30. Friends of mine seemed to have a lot of angst about 30. . .unfulfilled dreams, wrinkles, that sort of thing. Turning 30 did not bother me one bit, I swear, mostly because I had other things to worry about and because in my mind, I had really turned 30 in 2001 when we found out we were pregnant and bought a Subaru station wagon. Not the cool Outback, but the cheaper, far less hip Legacy model. It was a grown-up thing to do, buying a station wagon with a high safety rating and car seat anchors. And then in 2002, just after our fourth anniversary, we bought our first house, a 1952 brick ranch with rusty plumbing. We had a baby and a station wagon and a mortgage and, between us, ten years of college under our belts, and we were both still only 27. My mother has always accused me of being “in such a damn hurry about everything all the time.” And I’ve always just rolled my eyes, because she’s my mom, but I did beat thirty to thirty, so I suppose she’s right.


My husband is incredibly thoughtful about gifts, about everything, really, and that year he helped me celebrate my birthday by taking our screaming, colicky newborn son and our potty-training challenged 2 year old daughter to my mom’s for the night so that I could have a few hours of peace, by myself, in the house. Turning 30 was not stressing me out, but many other things were. When Simon was a newborn, he screamed all day and through most nights, was losing weight, and was generally a source of incredible worry for all of us. We didn’t know it then, but he was allergic to dairy and soy, both of which were staples of my nursing-but-trying-to-lose-the-baby-weight-diet. Madzie, at two, had developed a habit of hiding behind the couch to poop in her new “big-girl” princess panties. “Poor Cinderella,” she would say as we swished yet another BM off of Cinderella’s big underpants smile and into the potty. If I knew then what I know now, I would have just put her back in diapers. At the time, though, I was panicked that she wouldn’t be potty trained in time to go to preschool, so I tortured both of us by making her try, day after unsuccessful day, to use the toilet. My totally inept potty training regimen is something I’m convinced she’ll speak to a therapist about when she’s older, along with the fact that I humiliated her by writing about it here.

And money, of course, was another issue. I’d gone back to work, teaching night classes at the community college, 10 days after having my son. I’d done that because we had crappy private health insurance, and were facing a $4000 out-of-pocket hospital bill for my 24 hour maternity stay, and our savings were hovering somewhere between 0 and $15. Matt had a good job, but the health care crisis hit our family before most others. We are that family, the one that doesn’t have employer-sponsored coverage, makes a little too much to qualify for government health care assistance, and spends between 9 and 15% of our net income on health care. We’ve been doing this since 2002, when we decided that one of us should go part-time and raise our kids. And at that time, and sometimes even in this time, our health care costs were absolutely keeping us from paying other bills on time. Our credit card balance soared into the thousands before we really knew what was happening. We were horrified.

And in the midst of all this, my mind got pretty dark. I was having trouble staying calm. Life felt frantic and I was nervous all the time. Anyone who has ever faced the demon that is post-partum depression will understand why I don’t want to go into too much detail here. But I was yelling at Madzie, something I hadn’t done before and really never wanted to do. (Okay, I still yell a little at my kids. They are sweet, but they are a sweet handful. But yelling days are not my best days. Not by a longshot). Simon's poor pitiful crying grated on my nerves, and it was hard for me to remember that I loved him and he was only a baby and he was in a lot of pain. I didn’t keep up with the housework. I said horrible, mean things on the phone to my sister. My teaching suffered. Matt was sympathetic, but it was no picnic for him either, and neither one of us had much left for the other at the end of the day. And one afternoon in March that year, I put both of my screaming children in their bedrooms, called my mother and my doctor, and told them both I thought I was losing my mind and I was the most terrible, ill-equipped, witch of a mother and that I could maybe use a little help. My mom came over right away, tucked all of us up in warm blankets and love, and saved the day. My doctor prescribed Paxil. Matt patiently and lovingly suggested I try massage and acupuncture, despite the fact that our insurance didn’t cover them and they were pretty expensive therapy and he would never in a million years have done either of those things for himself.

And so we began to recover from what remains the most miserable few months of our life together, during which we both turned 30 and neither one of us cared. Paula and Brooke started bringing their kids (and Starbucks) over for regular playdates and gossip, which was better than therapy for me. My neighbor and dear friend Gwyn and I started a fairly serious stroller fitness program, pushing our four kids to neighborhood parks on long walks that frequently ended at the local donut shop (so much for losing the baby weight). There was suddenly a lot to laugh about, and I wish everyone who has been shamed by post-partum depression got to do it surrounded by such delightful and forgiving people. And because once I had the Paxil, I got back to being my old silver-lining sort of self, I realized that with love like this all around, there really wasn’t anything to fear. And that change could really happen. . .that you could really just decide to make things better for yourself, and if you put some effort in, things would, in fact, improve. So once I had gotten back on my feet, mothering-wise, Matt and I started looking around at other things we’d like to fix up in our lives. Like we’d like to have more control over our schedules. We’d like to have someone home all the time with the kids. And we’d like to make a little more money, because our emotional recovery had not helped our financial situation at all. Not like trip around the world money, but no credit card debt and bills paid on time and a little bit of savings type money. And it seemed to make sense that starting our own business would be the best way to accomplish all this. And if we could get through the post-partum thing, we could probably make starting a business together work.

And now, almost five years later, here we are. Post-partum made us buy a farm. We don't quite have the more money thing solved, but the bills are getting paid, usually on time. I'm at peace with it. And the schedule and being home things, well, I am almost full-time home on the farm, and we can see a time when Matt might be too, a few years down the road. Our kids are happy, running wild around our wide-open acreage, and they witness every day the way that family, and love, and hard work, when cultivated together, make this a life we can all finally be content with. And being content is a new feeling for all of us. We may not be at the end, but we've found our way. Thank God.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Today I Am. . .

Uninspired. So in searching for inspiration, I came across this. And I like it. From Gladys Taber:

"We found that a very old house in the country does not encourage sitting under blossoming apple trees and sipping tall, cool drinks or strolling among the wild flowers in the woods. When we were in the yard, we were mowing or planting roses by the picket fence or trimming the lilacs."

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

When I Left Last Thursday, It Was a Perfectly Nice Colorado October. . .



but when I returned Sunday night, it was December. Or so it seemed. Icicles! While I was gone, the temperature dipped to a frosty 17 degrees. I say bring it on, except that bringing it on so soon may have killed some of our more tender perennials. We'll see if the St. Theresa's grapes come back in the spring, and if our raspberries survived the sudden, early cold.  And this weekend marks the end of our CSA deliveries for 2009, but the big glean we invited everyone out for may be less exciting now that so many things are completely dead. I was expecting to have more live stuff.


The kids, though, were thrilled to see that our ash tree had dropped more than half its leaves over the weekend. It went from green leaves to mostly bare in three days, which means that the Front Range will likely have less fall color than usual this year. But, there will be a longer pile jumping season to make up for it. So we're good.







Also, my pretty display (I can't make it rotate. Dumb blogger) is fairly well melted. . .the pumpkins sag and the gourds have taken on a sickly sort of color. I will have to redecorate before the party on Saturday. Luckily, I had some extra gourds and pumpkins in the barn that did not get frozen enough to melt away. So I'm happy about that. And about the end of the season. And about all the possibilities for next season. And well, what's not to be happy about?

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Crafty Things. . .


I set these gourds out to dry last weekend on an old busted up pallet. Another @#$#@$ exercise in patience, they will take a few months to get all the way dry. And will get all moldy and stinky along the way. And then I am going to make birdhouses and wreaths out of them. Probably, they won't be ready for the farm craft sale in November, but next year, I'll have them all set to go at the farmer's markets. I don't know. . .I'm just trying this stuff out to see what sells. And if they don't, I have lots of trees to hang them in and (truly) millions of birds to house. Perhaps if I make them pretty enough I can coax the barn swallows out of the barn and into the gourds.

Also, I am still working on the dried floral. It's taking me a long time, mostly because I'm starting to worry that it's not going to be worth the effort, and as a result have been putting my efforts in other directions.  But we'll see. I do so love the dried stems. And there are areas of my house that seem lonely without some sort of floral arrangement. And I suppose they will make nice Christmas gifts, if nothing else.
And today, I'm going to try to get a dress finished to wear at my cousin's wedding on Saturday. I best get to sewing, if there's any chance at all of finishing.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Cleaning Up

All season long, our home has been in a state of  perpetually filthy chaos. We have spiderwebs in the corners of the living room. Our houseplants have a half an inch of dust on their poor leaves. The carpets have turned the same color as the dogs with all the hair left un-vacuumed. Even when we get things tidy. . .no small feat when Thomas the Tank Engine and My Little Pony seem determined to be constantly underfoot. . .everything has been covered with dirt for the past four months. I am not exaggerating. It has been very unpleasant to be inside our house most of the summer.  
Now that we've got time to notice, I have decided that this is not how I want to live. It seems like when the house is filthy and cluttered, so is my mind. I cannot make peace with this anymore. I am going to clean up our collective act in here. And this winter, I am not going to let these home beautification projects that are percolating in my head get away from me. I plan to paint, people, and rip out more carpet, and these are things that will not happen if the carpet is covered in pet dander and the walls are covered in red dirt.

From my favorite public library, I have checked out Martha Stewart's Housekeeping Handbook. Because I am not good at keeping house, and I need to know where to begin. This woman knows everything. Truly. Library book sales, look out, because I plan to own this book someday. And you want to know what? She's right about the importance of cleaning ceiling fans and windows. This took an hour in my tiny house and really brightened the place up. She advocates for fresh towels in the bathroom everyday (though that sounds like laundry to me, so I'm not going there until we've got a master bath). And we're trying out a new system for dealing with office paper straight off her first page. We'll see if it really works for us or not, but it sounds good.

I once kept my house spotless for an entire year while it was on the market to sell. I know I can do this. It's a matter of consistency. I think I would be a better person if I was more consistent with things in general. When Simon was born, I wanted to be more patient, so I started sewing. It worked. Enough, anyway. Now, I am going to start cleaning, and see what happens.

Monday, October 5, 2009

I Feel Obligated to Enjoy Brussels Sprouts. . .

so I'm going to try them like this. I've never been a fan of these tiny cabbages, except (of course) when tossed with bacon. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Anyone have any other ideas?

Setting Fire to the Yard


This is the ditch that runs, north to south, down the west side of our field. This ditch seems to run year round, though in winter it becomes more of a trickle than a stream. It pools near the road, between our pond and our corral, before it heads through a culvert and down through our neighbors' fields.

The giant brown weeds line the length of the ditch, and since our 20 acres is a thin parcel that runs about a half a mile north to south, there are a lot of big brown weeds. And when the wind blows, the seeds spread themselves across the land. Our lettuce heads have weed seeds stuck between their leaves. This is next year's backache, preparing itself.


If you look carefully to the left here, you can just make out our pond, nearly drained with the efforts of irrigation, through the tall, browning weeds. Which we should have kept up with using our weed whacker, but like so many other things, just didn't.

So now, our land has huge pockets of big brown weeds. And it has gone beyond what we can really handle with our hand held weed whacker. And if we want it cleaned up (we do! we do!), we're going to have to burn it all down. 

Most everyone burns the debris of the season out of their ditches out here. It's very common to see billows of black smoke above someone's property. While driving, I often see smoldering piles left totally unattended on the shoulder of the road, inches from wooden telephone poles. It's a little unnerving, and though common, not without mishap. Just this spring some guy 10 miles north of us let a burn go out of control. . .destroying $75,000 worth of someone else's property, including a mobile home. And because Weld County is very wild west (a quality I sometimes love), it is unclear whether he'll be held liable for damages. Hey, I mean, ditch fires are a fact of life. If they burn down your house, well, that must be an act of God.

So, with this cautionary tale in mind, we'll proceed with our own burn.  It will likely be the last step in our field clean-up process, so I'm thinking December or January before I'll be able to post pictures for you all. I imagine we'll try to get the hoses set in case we accidentally light our fence or the bridge we built last year on fire. I'm thinking, though, that once we get it done, our property will look quite clean. . .assuming the house is still standing.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Sweet Sleep


This is us, all of us, now that the bulk of harvest season is over. Do we have a few more weeks left? Yes. Do we have a ton of field clean-up to do? Yes. Are we sleeping more and more each week? Yes. Are we kinder and gentler with one another as a result? Yes.

My other favorite thing about this picture? It suggests that coffee, water, and beer were all part of whatever meal this is. Something for everyone. Okay by me.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Pumpkin Harvest

We've had a few light frosts, nothing serious yet. But tonight, we're supposed to dip down into the 20s, so now I have old man hands from the preparation. Fabrics cling to my palms, scratching across my dried-up brillo pad skin. Ah well. We're getting ready. Matt went through the tomatoes and picked all the nice ones out, greens included, for the last few weeks of the CSA. Yesterday, I cut through all the flowers that could be dried, and picked all remaining eggplant and a huge tub of peppers. But the big job we had was to harvest the pumpkins. We've been told that when the weather gets down into the 20s, we should have them covered up with a tarp or some such, so Simon and I spent the morning out harvesting the pumpkin patch.

It's a chilly day. I had Simon in his snowsuit, and I was in my coveralls and a thick fleece. We spent about three hours (which includes a snack break) moving the pumpkins into four piles. . .one for pie pumpkins, two for jack o'lantern size, and one for specialty pumpkins and gourds.
In the picture to the left, you can see one of the big pumpkin piles, with the pie pumpkins behind it, and big sky to the Rockies behind that. It's snowing in those mountains today, and the north wind is carrying that blustery chill across the prairie. It's got some serious muscle, this wind. I like it.

Here are our specialty pumpkins and gourds. . .my favorite are the speckled swans, but I think these striped pumpkins are quite spooky looking.  I like spooky. We also have some white pumpkins that look like Cinderella's coach, and a bunch of smaller gourds in yellows and greens and warty whites. Our turban squash mostly rotted away. I blame the squash bugs. Or the corn bugs. Or perhaps our hot and cold relationship with spraying, which was certainly cold when it came to getting bugs off our squashes.
I really love having access to all these fall decorations. We are giving most of these pumpkins to our CSA members, of course, but we could have kept 30 members in pumpkins and gourds this year, so I took a load in to decorate my house. I plan to bring in some more, and I have broom corn stalks and ornamental corn that I'm excited to play around with to make some wreaths and such.

Until then, here's what we did with our first load. Simon helped. The kid's got quite an eye for such things. . .




















Wednesday, September 30, 2009

The Police Called Today


The electronic reverse 911 sheriff, a "woman," called today to let us know that our little neck of the country woods has had a rash of burglaries to outbuildings and vehicles, and we should lock up well, and could we please call in with any relevant information. Also, be wary of strangers and call 911 immediately if we see a crime in progress. I wonder how many area burglaries there have to be to trigger a call like this. . .seems likely it was more than a few.  We'll have to keep our eyes peeled.

Also, the National Weather Service has issued a "red flag warning" because the fire danger is so high on the prairie. Dry grass. High winds. And sometimes people burn their ditches in this weather, though this is something they'd like us to avoid today. And the power went out for about 10 minutes.

Sheesh. If I didn't have all this electronic gadgetry, I'd have just thought it was windy.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Keepin' Mama Happy

Our flower season ended abruptly last week. The cool wet weather had taken what was a lovely set of blooms on Friday afternoon to a browning, shriveling mass of ugly by cutting time on Tuesday. Now, all that's left is the dried floral, so I am still scouting through the field to find nice stems to hang for dried arrangements. There are a few out there. And I'm hustling to find them all (well, not presently, of course) since we are set to get a possible killing frost. . .maybe tomorrow night, certainly by Friday morning. We'll also have to glean through the tender veggies. . .eggplant, peppers, tomatoes, and get them stored for our shares next week. We've got three more veggie delivery weeks, and I'd like to leave people with a good impression. Which, come to think of it, is a good idea in life, not just Community Supported Agriculture.

It is lovely to have the flowers come to an end. I had hoped for another week, maybe two, of income before things declined, but the end of flowers has slowed the pace of my weeks down considerably. Before, I cut flowers most of the morning and/or the entire evening on Tuesday, then for the couple of hours between the time the kids got on the bus Wednesday morning until I had to go teach. And then again, all Wednesday afternoon and evening, after my class, finally arranging into the wee hours with Matt. It was a wild few months of these weeks, bookended by vegetable deliveries and market harvests. I love working on the farm, but I am happy for a change of season.

And then there is the time alone. This past Wednesday when the kids got on the bus, there was no mad dash to the field. The house was eerily quiet, and incredibly peaceful. I spent the morning catching up on prep and grading, folding laundry, and scrubbing the bathroom. And thinking some things through. And daydreaming. So satisfying. I didn't even listen to NPR. . .the lack of noise was so appealing.  It feels very profound, this time to myself, after so many years of the constant (but very sweet) child-produced background noise. It's a little like a dream, and very luxurious. I love raising my kids, and I miss my family when they're not here, but I have also missed peace and quiet. Now that these old friends are back, I am certainly getting the best of all possible worlds. I am very happy and grateful. . .and I don't know why, but I feel a little guilty about it.

Especially after I read this post about women's happiness, or the lack thereof, on another blog I follow. It's hard to believe that so many women are less happy than men. I wonder if they are less happy than their men, or just a general male population sample.  Like if the men with colicky newborn babies are really that much happier than their wives, or if they just asked fewer men with colicky newborn babies how happy they were. Or maybe the men just answer the questions differently, even if the emotions are the same. Things just don't eat away at Matt the way they can sometimes eat away at me, even if he's down about them. Like when we had a colicky newborn baby. Things were tough all over then, and bless him, he held the screaming Simon just as often as I did, but he's not the one that needed the post-partum paxil, you know?

Either way, I hope America can figure the happiness thing out. Especially America's women. Because we all know what life might end up like if the collective mama ain't happy. . .less peace and quiet for everyone.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Since we're talking sentimental. . . .whatever happened to Laura Ingalls?


That's right. We've read the entire Little House series to the kids. And since it has been a year, we're thinking of re-reading them. Our public library carries DVDs of the TV show, so we often check one out, pop some popcorn, and settle in for an evening of good wholesome fun. It's not easy to entertain everyone in a family that ranges in age from 4 to 34, but this series manages the task, and the adults don't have to cringe about inappropriate content. Ever. Okay, there was one show where Mr. Edwards, the family's drunken bachelor friend, almost got eaten by a bear. The kids slept with us for a few nights after that one.

I thought we might be the only modern family interested in these shows.  You know, that this habit of ours was just another farming-related phenomenon. Until I saw a Little House DVD on my friend Paula's kitchen counter Monday night.  Paula's house is our vegetable drop off site in Fort Collins, and in between customers, I often wander into her kitchen. . .and not just because she usually feeds me or gives me a glass of wine. She is a dear friend, and I don't see her much since we've moved, and Monday nights are my chance to catch up.

Anyway, there it was. A Little House DVD from her local public library. "Are you guys watching these too?" I asked.

Paula: "Oh, we looooove that show. But I'm bummed because we didn't get through all the shows on this DVD, and now it's due back at the library tomorrow."

Me: "Can't you renew it?"

Paula: (indignantly) "No! Someone put a HOLD on it, and who knows when we're going to be able to get it back. I think I'm just going to keep it until we're done and pay the fine, and even then I'll probably have to put a hold on the next in the series and wait to get that. And it's never available from Blockbuster, either." And then Paula looked at me, eyes narrowed,  "Hold on. Is there a wait at your library?"

And I knew if I told her no, there would be soon. Apparently she was willing to drive 45 minutes, get a library card in a different town (which requires some dishonesty), and rent the shows that way. Apparently, in Fort Collins, Colorado, one of the hippest little towns in the nation, there is a LINE for Little House DVDs.

So apparently, we are not the only family that wishes current T.V. programming wasn't quite so dark and cynical. Not that I don't love me some "Mad Men." (And I get it from netflix and am only on disc 2 of season 2, so don't spoil anything for me in the comments, you hear me?) There is not one show in current network prime-time programming that is family friendly in the way this Little House series was. . .where both the adults and the kids can really understand and enjoy the story. It seems like there used to be when I was a kid. . .Seventh Heaven, where have you gone?

So, for my lovely family members in the industry. Especially those who work at Soapnet. Get some wholesome family fiction back on T.V. please. And when you make your millions doing it, and I think you will, remember who the trendspotter was, please.

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

I'm getting all sentimental. And country, I suppose


It didn't used to be this way. Used to be, I never cried in the car because of a song. That's because I used to hate country music. I liked Ray Lamontagne, and Feist, and G Love, and The Killers. I still like this music, precisely because it doesn't make me cry on my way to the post office. But I like country music now, too.  It has taken me some time to admit this to myself, and I definitely had to work into a public post about it. Because I used to think I was too hip to ever like it. I'm over it now, though. I step in pig crap everyday. I'm about to butcher 30 chickens outside my barn. Let's face it, I'm pretty country.

We started listening to country music when we decided to buy rural. We were sort of trying the identity on for size, and we tuned into country stations while we were out driving around looking at land, or on road trips. We didn't often have the country stations on in Fort Collins, though, because, well, how embarrassing. It just didn't fit who we were living there. But it seems to fit who we are living out here.

Before I lose half of what I know is a very urban and hip audience reading this blog, I still don't like a lot of country music. There's a blowhard "We Are America and We're Better Than You, World" theme that I can do without. And the goofy stuff about beer and tractors and checking girls for ticks loses me pretty quick.  But really, I like a lot of the songs about family, and love of country, and living simple. And I think its because living out here just feels healthy. There's not much to complain about (not that I don't try), and a whole lot to be thankful for. And probably because I'm a mom, life feels a little more sentimental. Not cloying and sentimental, like pink clouds and kittens. But look at this picture of my boy. Just sweet, really. And I like music that reflects this happiness more than I used to.

So, if you see me crying in the car, it's probably because I'm listening to "You're Gonna Miss This" or "When I Get Where I'm Going" or "Where The Green Grass Grows" or "American Girl" or some such country song. And I'm not embarrassed about it anymore. I think we all grow into who we're supposed to be. And maybe I'm supposed to be a little more sentimental than I'd like now that I'm a farmer.

Diatomaceous Earth


We bought a 50 pound bag of this powder-of-fossilized-diatoms to help with animal deworming and insect control in the field. Essentially, the stuff acts as a dessicant, so it dries out the insects and keeps them from doing their damage. We will use it to try to keep the plague of grasshoppers we have in the field from eating the fall brassica crops. . .though Mother Nature may be taking care of that for us soon anyway. The pigs will thank us too, I think, and will likely gain weight faster now. We don't know if they actually have worms, but they may. We are starting to supplement their diet of leftover veggies with a high-protein feed store blend, and we have seen some serious gains in the past week as a result. So who knows? With some diatomaceous earth out there, they may be ready to cut and cure in no time.

According to the internet testimonials we've read (always the best place to go for medical advice, I know) this diatomaceous earth is also excellent for human health. There's much discussion about the importance of silica to all living things. . .with the website we ordered the stuff from actually proclaiming, in baby blue italics, no less, "There is no life without silica !!"

Here is the "Human Use" section of the flier that came in the box:

"Many people, including all of us here a earthworkshealth, are taking food grade DE every day. You might ask--'How can something that kills bugs be good for people?'  Remember, DE kills bugs by scratching them--no chemicals are involved. For people, DE is a source of available silica. Silica is a major mineral we all need that is lacking in our foodstuffs today (note: it might not be lacking in my foodstuffs anymore if I start feeding it to the laying flock and the animals we eat. Just sayin'). Most are taking 1 tablespoon of DE per day in juice, water, pop (note: obviously, these people are just taking the DE in the desperate hope it will make up for other bad lifestyle choices), applesauce, yogurt, protein shake, or liquid of their choice. After hundreds of feedbacks (sic), this is what we are hearing from people:
1. Sore joints feeling better (note: AMEN! We are achy!)
2. Lower cholesterol (usually 50-75 points lower)
3. Lowering high blood pressure
4. Keeping blood sugar levels stable
5. More energy
6. Healthier skin. Softer, less itching, faster healing, psoriasis gone.
7. Stronger and healthier nails and hair
8. Calming Nerves and better sleep.
9. Aid in weight loss
10. Cleansing digestive tract of parasites."
So we're going to start putting some in our orange juice in the morning and see how we feel. We are both of us wondering if all our various aches and pains are a result of our advancing age, the trememdous amount of physical labor we've been doing, or some combination of these two. Either way, if the DE does even 10 percent of what they are claiming here, I'll be happy.

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Preparations


Well, the National Weather Service has adjusted the temperatures down out here in Gill, Colorado tonight. They still aren't calling for a hard frost. . .35 degrees and possible snow. But if it dips just three degrees lower, it might just take out the tomatoes and flowers. Luckily, it is supposed to be wet, which means it would have to be in the high 20s to really kill things off, but we've got quite a few families counting on us to take the appropriate vegetable precautions. And we don't have enough tomatoes canned up for winter yet, either.

I know I've been anticipating frost for a while, but up until last night they still had the lows listed at 38 and 39 degrees all week, so it did sneak up on us a bit. It changes the plan for the day, that's for sure. I'm going to try to get the flower orders for Thursday cut completely and safely in the cooler today, just to be on the safe side of things. This is likely the last week for flowers, frost or no, since the wet and the cold will get the powdery mildew going faster than you can say zinnia. We're going to tuck the tomatoes and peppers snug up in a big old frost blanket. And then we're going to light a fire in the wood stove, drink some hot chocolate in the rocking chairs, and see what happens.

Happy first day of fall, everyone. What a fabulous season.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Turkey Weigh-In


We weighed our turkeys today. I can't believe I didn't take a picture of the event, since it included Matt standing on a bathroom scale on top of a stump in the middle of our field holding a big ol' upside down Tom. Good stuff.

They are not ready yet, but they won't need to go until Thanksgiving, either, unless someone wants to stuff a 50 pound turkey. I imagine there may be weekly weigh-ins in our future, so I might get that picture yet!

There are rumors that our processor closed down. They are fairly reliable rumors, so we may be doing the poultry butchering ourselves. Groan. We're hoping the processor opens back up. Those turkeys have a lot of feathers to pluck.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Saturdays

Madzie took this picture of me last Saturday. I look old and run-down, despite excellent nutrition. I think the fine wrinkles around my eyes look just as big and obvious as my giant glasses in this picture. And my hair has indeed entered that transition stage between blond and gray my mother told me it would have in my thirties. And truly, I am not saying this so you'll all comment your disagreement. I know what I look like better than you. And I look old and tired. Friends of mine, when I see them, peer intently at my face and ask, in concerned voices, "How ARE you?"

Here's what I have done so far today. I got up at 5:00 and drove the veggies down to Louisville. It's an hour and fifteen minute trip, one way. And it's not so bad because I get to be alone with my thoughts. . .at least on the way back. To be honest, I don't have many thoughts on the drive down. It's too early. All I think about is deer jumping out of the dark and into the path of the car. That has happened a couple of times, though I've yet to hit one. And I forgot the tomatoes, which is very unprofessional. Stuff like that makes me wonder if I'm really detail-oriented enough to be a successful entrepreneur.

I stopped at the store on the way home to pick up snacks for Madzie's soccer team. I got go-gurts, since there are not always organic options to be found in the typical Greeley grocery. Go-gurts are truly as awful as their name makes them sound, some yogurt-like substance that kids suck out of a plastic tube. This tube was invented either because a spoon is just too much trouble or to encourage horrible noises at lunchtime. I tried a "Berry Blue Blast" (I can't describe the color, but it is clear it did not come from any actual berries) and regret it deeply. Matt's reaction? "It tastes a little bit like play-doh."

When I got home we packed up and headed out to the soccer field. Two interesting things happened at the game. One is that a boy on Madzie's team, in all his gangly awkwardness (these are seven and eight year olds), managed to play such a physical game that the parents of the other team asked the referee to remove him in very loud and indignant voices. The kid really wasn't trying to hurt anyone, so after a conference with the coach, he was allowed to keep playing. Soccer is serious business, people, when adults start screaming at referees about a seven year old. The other interesting part was when Madzie was put in the goal and allowed three points in the following two minutes. The first was because the goalie jersey was adult size, and the referee started the game while the coach was trying to wrestle my tiny daughter into it, and while the coach had both Madzie's arms pinned with the giant sleeves, the other team put a nice shot into the center of the net. After that, it became clear that Madzie hadn't been given any instruction in how to be a goalie, as she was taking great pains not to touch the ball with her hands as the second well-kicked shot went just to the left of her. The third shot she accidently put in the goal herself, getting a little tripped up on the ball as she tried to kick it the other direction. The coach pulled her out of the game after that.

When we came home, we had lunch and I took a heavenly 45 minute nap. Now I'm writing and then will clean the house. We're freezing corn tonight, and watching a movie, and we'd like those things to be pleasant experiences in our sweet little house on the prairie rather than depressing events surrounded by dirty laundry and dustbunnies. Matt is weeding the fall peas. The season is tapering off, and the workload is lessening, and we are getting to a place where things feel less frantic. So we will soon be back to our bright eyed and bushy tailed selves, I believe.

And not a moment too soon. I may look tired in my picture from last Saturday, but at least I'm awake. This is Matt AT OUR NEIGHBOR'S HOUSE last Saturday afternoon, helping make applesauce. But I can't really blame him. He works hard too. I just can't wait until Saturdays are even more napping than work. And it's coming soon.

Friday, September 18, 2009

What's In a Name?


We don't have cable. Neither Matt or I has paid for T.V. since we each left home in 1993. Our T.V. is a hand-me-down from my parents so old that we were one of the families that had to apply for a digital converter box coupon from the government last year. If I didn't know that Matt's sister and her husband applied for one as well, I'd think we were the only thirty-somethings in America that weren't already well set up for the transition.

But not having cable, I didn't know that there exists a show called "Little People, Big World" about little people who farm. And so I think the name and subject matter of my blog might be a little too similar to this. So I am experimenting with new blog names. I am not sold on the one I put up, but I am a woman of action (or impatience, depending on who you talk to), so there it is.

Any suggestions? If I was a better blogger I would make this a contest, like with prizes and official comment counts and such, but I don't really know how to do all that. I'm offering gratitude, though, and flowers if you're in the area. Better post quick though. . .frost is fast approaching.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Fall Flowers. . .My Favorite

The amaranth has started showing up in bouquets, frost is just around the corner, and we are grateful for all of this end of season work we've found ourselves. Timing flowers to bloom in the appropriate seasonal phase has been an acquired skill for us. In previous years, we have had the fall colors way too early. . .like in late July. . .and by September were out of the rudbeckia and snapdragon crops, which are turning out to be nice fall flowers. In flowers and in life, timing does turn out to be everything, doesn't it?

I like these lemon sunflowers as fall color, too, though my sunflowers are all going to the drying rack from now on. I am racing frost to get this dried floral program stocked with material in the next two weeks or so, since the weather could turn at anytime now. And regardless of frost, most of our crops will start to decline with the cooler temperatures and longer nights.

I think these fall colors are my favorite because they are so rich. . .golds, burgundies, blues. In the midst of the harvest season, which also appears to be the start of a national economic recovery, these flowers help me remember where to look for our riches. And I often forget that it's not Quickbooks (until I look at Quickbooks, at which point it becomes very obvious). It's dozens of glass jars of canned vegetables, all the work of our hands and the product of our soil. It's the delight and the joy the flowers bring us and the customers we are lucky to share them with. It's a hoophouse full of healthy range turkeys, happily fattening themselves up to grace thankful holiday tables. It's Simon helping Matt build the chick brooder, and Madzie's request for her own patch of ground for jelly jar flowers next year. The million tiny blessings of life on our farm may not deposit well, but they certainly pay dividends.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Faith, Hope, and Love. And the greatest of these. . .

Today I watched a little bit of the September 11th memorials. Madzie is part of the baby boom that followed; though we weren't motivated to have her by the horrors of that day, her life was confirmed about three weeks later by a home pregnancy test. And I wonder how much her generation will grapple with that horrible morning and all the other horrors that have followed.

Here's what I hope. I hope to her, to all of these precious children, September 11th will seem very distant, something that happened a long time ago, the way Vietnam always seemed to me when I was young and the way I imagine my parents viewed World War II. History. I hope it remains an emblem of our time, not something alive in theirs. Of course, I don't want them to forget the significance of the day, but I do hope the memory inspires patriotism and renewed love of liberty, not perpetual fear and hatred and dread. And I hope that there are events in their lives, on the same scale as September 11th, where humanity acts with courage, in faith and in hope and in love, in the name of freedom. Like when the Berlin Wall fell. And when Semester at Sea took me, an American teenager, to the newly-opened markets of Saigon and the Mekong Delta in 1995. So that they see temperance and acts of love, and know that what's bad in the world doesn't always have to change for the worst.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Not Quite Keeping It All Together. . . .

The nights are suddenly lengthening. We are waking at our usual time, but fumbling around in the dark mornings rather than the eastern sunshine. And the mornings are crisp. I dug my slippers from the closet last week and thought, hello old friends. Our evening cuttings are more and more frantic as the sun sets earlier and earlier, each day pushing us closer to frost. And the end of the flowers. And the magnificent dropping leaves. And sweaters. And Saturday morning soccer games. And a slower, more serene pace to our weeks.

Today I forgot about an event I was supposed to attend until it was too late to make it happen with all the cutting we have to accomplish to fill our orders for Thursday morning. These large orders are wonderful, but they take up the entire space of our Tuesdays and Wednesdays, deeper into the nights than we'd care to go otherwise. And delivery is a sleep-deprived, coffee-fueled, hazy relief every Thursday morning. And I remind my exhausted self, over and over again, that this is all a blessing. I do love the farm, despite the chaos and scheduling mishaps and the constant feeling that I can't come close to getting everything done. We are blessed. That's truth.

Fall is my favorite season, but it is coming too quickly this year. As we struggle to make up for our hail damaged loss during early season, we pray for frost to wait, for the heat to remain, for a few more solid weeks of flower income before the long frigid winter.

Saturday, September 5, 2009

What Do You Mean, Flower Processing?

Here is how the flowers come in from the field. Randomly assigned into buckets of solution by color/sowing/variety. Sometimes, we cool them before processing. Often, we are cutting right up to dark the night before a big delivery (or by headlamps), so those cool after we get them processed.

We sell zinnias in market bunches of ten stems, which is the industry standard. Sometimes, clients want single color bunches, while others like the bunches in mixed colors. We charge more per bunch for the mixed colors since the labor is more intensive, but they sell better in some markets than single color bunches. Also, we only cool the zinnias if their blooms are totally dry. If they have the slightest bit of moisture, we keep them in the cool barn, but not in the walk-in cooler, to prevent bloom spotting. These bunches are ready to go, and all have been put into clean buckets with clean solution.


Bouquets also get a slight bit more per stem to cover the labor of assembling them. Sometimes I wonder if they draw enough more money to make the labor worthwhile, but I enjoy making them. Now that it's September, we are transitioning into fall colors. . . not really shown here except for the red and lemon sunflowers, but we use a lot of lemons, golds, reds, blacks. . .and different textures like amaranth and strawflower. It's fun to adjust to seasonal demands. And challenging.

This is the big mess of stripped leaves and trimmed stems and second rate blooms we leave on the floor of the barn. On good weeks, when we've got it together, this is swept up and taken out to the compost heap before we head into bed. We've only had a couple good weeks.








These are our leftovers, with some strawberries from our patch. It's nice when we have leftovers for the house, though this time of year I find the energy to make my own bouquets less and less often. But they're nice when we have 'em, and I love those lime green zinnias.

Friday, September 4, 2009

Using Data to Make a Point. . .


When cutting the wholesale orders this week, I started really thinking about what flowers we have left in the field. And then tonight I went out and thought I'd start cutting for tomorrow's market, and upon surveying the situation thought, cut what? I'd like to keep filling these bigger wholesale orders, and I have two more weeks of CSA flowers to go. If I cut what's nice for the market and then have to compost it when I get home, I'll probably be short for my wholesale clients. And Whole Foods has asked for some dried arrangements in October, so the next 200 sunflower stems, 150 amaranth, 150 Queen Anne's Lace. . .all going to the drying rack.

We have stems in the field, but it ain't much for what we've got going on. And I've been lobbying to get out of the farmers market for weeks now, as sales are so far down from last year, but Matt has been lobbying for me to stick it out through September. And having said that, I feel I should say that this is not a big argument for us. It's just a small business disagreement. Luckily, working on this farm project has brought us closer together, even when we disagree about the specifics. And he's right about a lot of things.

So, I consulted Quickbooks. I have a love/hate relationship with Quickbooks. Mostly I hate it because accounting just isn't really my bag. But I do love it for making sales tracking so easy. And because it's on my side about the market.

According to Quickbooks, our average market sales last year dropped about $60 a week in the month of September (in a good year, when average sales were much higher to begin with!). We didn't finish out last September either, choosing instead to end on the 20th. And I sold lots of dry stems, which I have sold somewhere else this year. Quickbooks says to quit the market. All this will make a much more compelling case to my rational, data-analyst husband than my assertion that I just don't wanna go anymore. I'm going to wait until he's had a beer tonight and lay this all on him. I have a few other tricks I may try, as well. I'm hoping by the end of the evening he will join me and Quickbooks in the no more markets camp.

Quickbooks had a lot to say about our 2008 season. Surprisingly, this was the last week that we had zinnias on our availability last year, and our last wholesale delivery of the season was September 23! With a late frost, we're poised to finish much stronger this year, as our second and third zinnia sowings are really just now coming into their own, are not full of powdery mildew, and are set to be great producers for the next three to four weeks if the weather holds. We've got three full sunflower sowings just about to bloom, and one or two colors of our tragically delayed gladiolas might make it in. So we accomplished the goal of late season extension this year, even if we struggled with zinnia quality early on.

So, the data is helping me confirm my instincts about how to proceed from here. But we all know that data analysis is a fluid science. So we'll see how Matty reads the same info. . .

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Just pick up one thing, and put it away, and then get another thing, and. . .


Sometimes, when things get away from me, I get overwhelmed and don't know what to do first. I wander from room to room, looking at the mess, checking the mental list of tasks (harvest for market, weed fall kale and peas, mow grass, can tomatoes, scrub potty, vacuum)wondering how in the world I will ever get things back under control, and before I know it, two hours of sweet time passes. And I haven't done anything but think about all the stuff I should be doing. This happened to me on Tuesday. Today, it is happening again. . .but I did only get about 5 hours of sleep, and I know that's not helping. I tried to nap, even, but it didn't take.

I suspect I am not the only one who has these phases of immobility. It's not laziness, really it's not. It's just failure to start. High season out here seems to have me all daydreamy and slow-witted. I need to perk up and get to work. Flower season likely has 5 good weeks left, if we're lucky, and the veggies are easy to manage on their own once the flowers are done. Come Halloween, I'll be all finished up and ready to add some serious rocking chair time to my days.

So I best get to to it. Just like I tell the kids. One thing at a time.

Sunday, August 23, 2009

I Am Martha.

Okay, not really, because my house is really, really, a big fat mess. But I did process that giant tub of apples we picked last weekend. Which is to say I used my new apple peeler/corer/slicer, a wonderful machine straight out of the 1920s, to get them all set, dunked them in some fruit fresh to keep them from turning brown, and then made 1 apple pie, 1 apple cake, and four jars of canned apple pie filling. I felt totally Martha.

I like the Martha side of me. It's like she was always in there, just trying to get out. . .turns out, she just needed a farm. I once was like most moms I know and saw cooking as a giant chore I needed to just get over with at the end of the day. Now, I'm spending huge hours in my kitchen, not just cooking fairly adventurous dinners with these vegetables but fresh breakfasts (waffles, egg and cheese burritos with peppers and tomatoes, coffee cakes, zucchini bread) and lunches (fried eggplant and zucchini, PB&J with homemade bread and J). And I am shocked how much I love it. Really love it. I honestly wish I could spend more time in the kitchen. . .or just in the house in general. I love being a homemaker, even though I've never been one without having to have a job too. But the nice thing about the farm is that I do believe we'll have more help someday soon, and then my job will be to be the homemaker. I'll have the farm stuff too, but I live here, so it's all part and parcel, really.

So now, when I have the surprise of my life and get a couple quarts of strawberries, I can't wait to spend three hours canning up some jam. Seriously. If I don't have a pressing harvest deadline, I will drop everything and can. You can find me canning. Talk about slow food. Canning jam is slooooow. And I much prefer the slow life, centered at home, than the chaos we had in the city trying to make it to every outdoor concert or event.

I hope I am a less uptight version of Martha, but I'm probably not. I'm probably just as controlling as she is, and for sure I am a bit crazy, just like her. And I suppose I'm okay with that as long as I can avoid the jail time.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Backyard Chicken Bans and Other Stupid Ideas

Last night I was awake at 3:00 a.m. because of the smell blowing in through my open windows. My best guess is that it was coming from the giant stockyard a couple miles down. . .that's what it smelled like, at least. And it was so bad that it woke me up AND kept me from going back to sleep. I generally don't mind a little ag smell. I know, Right to Farm county and all, but I could live without it when it's so bad it wakes me up in the middle of the night. Want to know what I never smell? My chickens.

Last summer, we kept our small flock of 5 chickens in our backyard. Their portable coop, sometimes called a chicken tractor, was within 20 feet of our bedroom windows for about two months, and we never smelled them. They didn't wake us up in the middle of the night (or in the morning, because they weren't roosters). All our chickens did was provide us with fresh eggs, eat mosquitoes, and entertain us with their birdbrain antics. They were essentially pets, like our dogs Spiderman and Big Rig, only the chickens were much more self-sufficient. Chickens don't require the love, affection, and training that dogs do, and chicken poop is far less gross in the yard (and much easier to clean up, and nitrogen rich). We now eat lots of eggs. . .scrambled and fried, baked into quiche and pound cake, and because pastured eggs have been proven to be more nutritious than store bought eggs, we know we are eating the best available food. And because of the current debate about food security, I'll just add that the best way to know your food is safe is to raise and handle it yourself, or buy it direct from a farmer you trust.

Despite the many ridiculous restrictions that keep people from buying healthy food directly from good farms (raw milk bans, on-farm processing prohibitions), we are lucky enough to live on agricultural property in the country, so we now have a larger flock and are even allowed to sell a few of our extra eggs to friends and neighbors now and then without government oversight. Our friends at LifeTransPlanet are not so lucky. In attempting to gain some control over their own food supply and enjoy some chicken companionship, Cassie and Britton raised up some chickens. And keep them as pets. And talked to a Greeley Tribune reporter about it. The resulting article led the city code people to tell them their pet chickens are violating city code, and so begins an appeal process and a movement to allow all Greeley residents to keep backyard chickens, if they so choose.

As I've described, my family benefits greatly from our ability to keep a small flock of chickens. Because I've taught college composition and know that effective arguments refute at least the strongest point of the opposition, I've really tried to imagine what the objections to backyard hens in Greeley might be. I can't think of any. Hens are easy to care for, quieter and less messy than dogs, and as few as three can keep a family of four in eggs most of the year. As much as I love my dogs, they are far less practical than my chickens, and as far as I can tell, Greeley residents can own as many dogs as they'd like.

Now, I will say, I don't think roosters would be good backyard pets in the city. Talk about noisy. And I think it might be reasonable for the city to require that the hens have protective shelters, like the chicken tractors, to keep them from becoming raccoon bait. Are these the objections? They seem small details. If the good people of Fort Collins and Loveland can see their way around these issues and legalize backyard hens, I feel fairly certain the good people of Greeley will do the same.

Food security and food independence are essential to the health of our society, especially in tough economic times. Keeping backyard hens is one small step in the right direction. If you want to help, get in touch with Cassie and Britton, or better yet, with your city councilperson, and tell them that backyard chicken flocks should be allowed in Greeley.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Apple Picking


Our apples have been dropping for a week or so, and the windstorm last night knocked down quite a few, so we went backyard apple picking today. Simon rode his bike from the side door to the tree. We can't really get him off that bike, not that we're trying. It's cute.

We don't have too many apples, and they are a bit sour for eating. Madzie didn't care one bit.

We separated our apples into family apples (red tub) and pig apples (black crate). I think our family apples look great! We don't have too many, just a quarter of a tub, but that's enough to can at least one round of pie filling, I think. And better than last year, when we only got two apples off the entire tree.

Between these apples from our yard and the apples from our neighbor, we ought to be well set for pie, cakes, dumplings and the like this winter. I'm also hoping just to get some of the best apples whole in the fridge drawer for lunches. They last a few months in there, at least my mom's always did.

Noodle and Piggy enjoyed the nasty apples. I like having these pigs to eat the extras. Our compost pile is big enough with flower and brooder waste, so it's great to see the extra veggies become meat for the family. Beautiful.

Good Times at the Barn Dance. . .

We had an excellent turnout of friends and customers (one and the same now, really) at the barn dance last night. Mother Nature did not cooperate well, blowing in a storm that kept us from the flower arranging contest, but we did get to show people our field. A few intrepid families stayed for the actual dancing to the Gypsy Kings and Rob Base. We lit a fire and made s'mores. The kids fed the pigs.

Thanks all to all who came out and got down!

Friday, August 14, 2009

Putting Food By. ..

I should not be writing this post. I should be harvesting flowers and veggies for the CSA/Farmers Market/Whole Foods Superior delivery tomorrow. But I need a bit of a break, and am trying to write a little every day. It's an exercise in self-improvement and discipline. At least that's how I justify it. Some might say it's a selfish half hour away from the field.

Anyway, yesterday I picked strawberries from our little patch, and ended up with about 2 quarts! This is a record, people, a serious milestone in our small fruit cultivation project. One downfall of these candy sweet berries (the only downfall, believe me) is that they don't keep in the fridge. So I made some jam. It's delicious, and I managed to find the gelling point using a spoon sheeting test. No commercial pectin for me! Here it sits, with the homemade apricot preserves and the homemade applesauce (more on said applesauce later).

I have also made 9 jars of dill pickles and 18 jars of green beans, with help from Sally, when she was still here. I am not sure where I am going to store these as my shelves are full, so they are sitting on top of the dishwasher for now. They have been there for two weeks, and I'm still pondering where in the world I should put them.



And the freezer is full of ziploc bags of sweet peas, broccoli, zucchini, and greens. And the new beef that my neighbor traded me for vegetables, which will hold us over until the chickens finish, at least. We are about to be living on a fairly steep financial cliff. The budget works, on paper, but now we need new tires, and that is not in the budget. Also, it is unclear if the $550 per month we budgeted for health care will actually cover the health insurance premium. But we are hopeful. Anyway, at least we are getting things put up so the grocery bill can stay low. We are certainly not going to starve.

And we are not the only ones, judging by the endcap displays of jars and pickling spice in every grocery store in Colorado. It is my suspicion that people in the country have been canning their whole lives, even before it was recession-trendy. But that is good for us, because they are willing to teach me new and wonderful food-preservation techniques. On Tuesday, I spent a lovely afternoon making applesauce with our neighbors. It was way more fun than muddling my way through my first batch alone, and they have been making it for years and have all the necessary equipment. The kids ran around crazy while the adults chopped, cooked, and sauced. The apples came from another neighbor's tree, and there will be more in September, so we'll have another very saucy party coming up. Have I mentioned that we have fabulous neighbors out here? We really, really do. And we all eat awfully well.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Back in Business. . .

The kids stand in front of our mixed bouquets at Whole Foods Fort Collins early this morning. Deliveries happen early every Thursday morning, but today we didn't deliver to Denver, so they are actually less dazed than normal in this picture.

So, we didn't take a FULL week off from flower cutting, but the five or so days we did exercise restraint have paid off in a full crop of zinnias and the return of beauty in our other flower crops. And the sweet corn and melons aren't doing too bad either. Or the edamame. And the kids have had enough of a rest from field time that they are anxious to get out and cut some jelly jar flowers tomorrow. And I am happy that I can finally feel very proud of the quality we're delivering to customers.

Here are some more images of the field and flowers this week:





Saturday, August 8, 2009

A Peaceful, Easy Feeling. . .

Sometimes, it's easy to get down about the farm. We love it, but right now it owns us, and it wears sometimes. But nothing worth doing is ever easy. And now, I feel peaceful. The kids are bathed and sleeping (it's 7:30 p.m.). The sun is setting brilliant behind a massive thunderstorm to the north and west of us, but here we have only a breeze and a fantastic view of the thunderhead. The turkeys are singing, happy on their pasture. They are the world's dumbest birds, but I kind of love them.

I am about to eat ice cream with strawberries and dark chocolate chips. I have prepared for this by walking out into the old corral, past the soon to be grape arbors and the soon to be pork chops, to pick a handful of the sweetest strawberries around. And tomorrow, we will all put these fresh strawberries on Sunday morning buttermilk waffles and spend the morning at the pool.

Farm life at high season is harried. But still, it is sweet. We might not be living high, but we are certainly living well. And we are certainly blessed.

Friday, August 7, 2009

Sloth. Thank Goodness.

Last night all four of us sat on the couch for two full hours after dinner watching the final "So You Think You Can Dance." We only saw about 5 shows this season, and those only when I remembered to tape them. Yep, that's right, tape them, like on a VHS tape, like my dad did in 1985. Because a DVR seems a little much when you're using a roof antenna and a digital converter box. But I am very excited that there is a new season coming on this fall.

Here is what we discovered. Madzie loves to watch the costumes and listen to the music, but Simon just can't sit still. He has to dance. And he is actually pretty good at it. And he knows it, once remarking that Brandon (the dancer on the show) was almost as good as he (Simon) was at dancing. We will not have to worry about confidence in this kid. And we all had a warm fuzzy feeling about spending some time together, all four of us, relaxing.

We haven't had any time like that since about May, so a couple of weeks ago Matt and I decided that we had to start putting family time on the to do list. The past two Sunday mornings have been devoted to family time, in the form of trips to the pool and trips to the fair. And last night wasn't planned, but we were all so exhausted that doing anything else would have been near impossible.

So, we were lazy, and it felt great. This week marks the halfway point of our season, and while we are enjoying the ride and hoping for a late fall to make up for our late flower start this year, we are also excited for frost. Because come November, I see a lot more cuddle time on the couch for our family. Sweet.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Suspended Availability. . .Just In Time for Back To School

Last night, while processing huge orders we couldn't come close to filling, we decided to take a week off from flower sales to let the field just grow. We are hoping that by not cutting flowers from the zinnias, sweet pea, and other delayed and/or damaged crops, we will give them the boost they need to get growing, already. This is not good for the farm's bottom line, but we will manage to make our loan payments. We haven't missed one yet, and if we have to move heaven and earth, we will. Hopefully, things will turn around and that won't be necessary. I love, love, love the farm, I believe passionately in its importance, and I am grateful to be here in this place at this time. But between the hail and the debt, it is a giant pile of worry, most days, and it is wearing me out.

Mother Nature continues to be uncooperative. Today was supposed to be in the 90s, but it stayed overcast all day and now is threatening more rain. This is not the boost to field growth we need, but it is out of our control, so we'll let things rest a week and see what the field looks like the week of the 17th.

Which is, and I can't believe this, the week the kids go back to school. They start August 19th, both of them, with Madzie entering second grade and Simon attending school-sponsored preschool on Mondays and Wednesdays. So, Wednesday, August 19th, I will cook them up some eggs (farm-fresh!), pack their little lunches, take some pictures, and send them both off on the school bus for the first time. It feels big, this new chapter we're entering. I expect I will cry a little. There have been many times during their young years that I thought I would be so happy about school starting, that I would be thrilled to have some "mommy days out." Now that it's here, I'm very sad to be losing that time with them. And the control over their influences and social development. And the giggles and snuggles in the middle of the day. I am going to really cherish the three days a week I am home with Simon this year, because kindergarten in our district is full-day, five days a week. He will likely be ready to go. I will not be ready at all.

And here we come to the upside of the suspended availability next week (eternal optimism is one of the most important qualities of a farmer. For serious). The plants need a rest, sure, but it is clear that our kids do too, before we add school and homework and soccer games and such to our load. And I haven't had more than 6 hours sleep for about a week, usually a little less. And Matt looks thin and worn, with all these vegetarian meals and the endless manual labor. So while we won't have the week off, exactly, with the CSA shares and preparing for our party on the 15th, we will have some time to breathe. And we like breathing.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Hail Damage and Growing Pains. . .

Last Monday night a very scary thunderstorm whipped through our little farm. It was around 2 in the morning, and the lightning was flashing constantly. Later, my neighbor said it looked as though some kid was just flicking the big lightswitch in the sky on and off as fast as possible. Sally came in from the tent as the thunder and wind were too much. We got up, checked the NOAA website for a tornado warning, put a super frightened Madzie in bed with us, and battened down the hatches a bit. When I heard the hail start hitting the barn, I thought to myself, "There it is. This is the end of our season. I'm going to have to get another job." And then 2 minutes later it turned to pounding rain instead. And once again, by luck or by grace, we were spared the worst Mother Nature has to offer.
Here is the aftermath. The rudbeckia have not really recovered, as for three days after the hailstorm we had abnormally cool temps. . .highs in the low 70s and frequent rain. Luckily, we have a new crop coming in behind this. It's just not quite there yet. This crop, like the zinnias, likes things hot and dry.
The tomato staking system was woefully inadequate. You can see the bent stakes, listing rows, and general catastrophe of a system in this picture. We will not repeat this next year.
The sweet pea took it hard. I haven't been able to fill orders last week and am still short this week because of the bloom bruises and other messiness. The zinnias are very delayed. I had orders for almost 800 stems and had only 320 to deliver. ARRRGH.

It is very frustrating. We are a bit underplanted, but not too bad. Our problem is that the weather has delayed or damaged our crops so much that we have only been able to fill half of the orders we've gotten the past two weeks. I could get them cut, processed, and delivered, but they are just not in yet in the numbers we need. It is high stakes. . .we need this season to cover the farm loan payments through next July, and would like to use farm money to pay off the credit card debt that we have incurred on our personal cards for the farm. The farm NEEDS to produce, and if this madness keeps up, it will not. We will be as creative as we need to be, but right now, we need more luck or more grace in the form of some summer heat. Pray with us, if you're so inclined.

Monday, August 3, 2009

The turkey house and the truck farm

Matt spent the weekend building the turkey house. It could also be a cold frame hoophouse or shade house someday, if we decide not to put turkeys in it. But we like turkeys, so we'll probably stock it full next year. We are hoping to increase pasture quality next year, but the old alfalfa will do for now.

Here are our 14 birds. For the first time, we built the structure to hold more than we had, so next year, we can run 50 birds in here without building anything new. Look at us, planning ahead. Foresight is a good thing, Martha.

Mondays are CSA harvest days, so here was the truck after 2 solid hours of veggie harvesting. Quite the haul, even if lots of the squash got too big.

We also harvested for flower subscriptions.

And our sweetest crop of all hitches a ride to the cooler. They could be the turkeys, too, depending on everyone's mood. Mostly, though, they're very sweet.

Friday, July 31, 2009

Stepping It Up at the Market

Sally has a degree in film, and has experience with production design. So she and I went down to the Salvation Army on 8th in Greeley (the world's best thrift shop. No joke) and helped me dress up the booth. Sales of flowers are way down, and vegetable sales are very competitive at markets. Obviously, we are not the only farm in town. So we're hitting the merchandising hard to see if we can boost sales that way. It worked when I was a produce clerk at Alfalfa's back in the day. And the vegetables are keeping sales up at the markets where the flowers aren't really moving at all.

So, we put our veggies on random platters, plates, and pans.

We're trying to make our flower prices more competitive to keep up with the market. We have noticed our Whole Foods floral managers doing the same thing.

Notice the jelly jar bouquets on the table. Madzie and Simon use our short stems and lower volume varieties. They make the bouquets themselves while I prep everything else in the barn, and then we sell them for 4.25 each. The kids get $2 of that for spending cash, and I use the rest to pay market fees and taxes. Madzie fairly bursts with pride with the compliments she gets. She's really good at making bouquets.

Market sales are still down between 35 and 50% for us from last year, even with the addition of vegetables. But we're plugging ahead. . .we're going to pull this season out, and then we are going to re-evaluate the place for farmer's markets in our business model over the winter.

Ohio Fried Chicken

We only kept two broilers from the last batch for ourselves, as we wanted to fill customer demand. Sally came from Ohio, and had just eaten some of her mom and dad's chickens, freshly "processed" and fried in butter by her grandma Schnellinger. No breading, no corn flake crust, just butter. Butter? Fried? Sounded good to us. We kindly asked her to make it for us.

As you can see, we made it with new potatoes and fresh green and wax beans from the field, and fresh-baked homemade rolls. Sally likes to joke that I cook like a 1950s housewife, except I don't wear a dress and pearls while I do it. I consider that a very high compliment. Now, if only she were going to be here when the pigs finish up. . .

Flowers in da' House

Now, if only I could keep the house clean enough to deserve the abundant floral beauty we are blessed to have. These were our bouquets last week. . .all at once.

Kitchen table, by Sally

Family room, by Madzie

Larkspur on the buffet, by the stems that were too far open to dry or sell.

Our bedroom.

The computer desk.

And we actually had some sweet pea (ha) in the bathroom, but I forgot to photograph it. Lovely, lovely, lovely. So eating well is not the only perk of farm life.

Monday, July 27, 2009

Crop Duster Buffer Zones

The farmer growing field corn on our neighbor's land called in the crop duster today. I know this because he arrived about 9 a.m., about 15 minutes after the kids and I got out to the field to start harvesting for the CSA shares today. It is not organic land, so I am assuming that whatever he was spraying was also non-organic, not that it matters one bit when it is essentially sprayed on my kids' heads. We smelled the chemical, watched it drift over our ornamental corn and amaranth (thankfully, non-edible crops), and I sent the kids running back to the house until the airplane moved on to another field. I wonder whether the pilot would have started spraying if HIS kids were in my field? I doubt it. What a lovely, keep-your-chemicals-to-yourself-buddy start to the morning. So much for the fresh country air.

Our field is not very wide. . .a thin strip, maybe 300 yards, that runs about a half a mile north to south. I suppose we'll have to plant a buffer zone along that east side to keep the spray off our crops, because though we aren't certified organic and don't plan to get certified, I don't want that stuff on my food or anyone else's. And apparently, I don't get to have any say in it except a buffer crop, because the guy dusting the crop wasn't being very careful about his drift. I know, because I saw it.

I'm not against all pesticides, truly. We use some on our farm, and some of the flower chemicals are synthetic. No one wants to lose a crop to bugs. But we use chemicals as a last resort, and we're moving into OMRI controls. Also, we're applying what little chemical we do use through our drip lines to targeted crops, or with a backpack sprayer, which gives us more control over the amount we use AND means we aren't accidentally "sharing" our pest control methods with our neighbors.

We're giving up fertilizer in favor of homegrown chicken manure and nitrogen-fixing green manures. We do our field crop weed control with tractor cultivation and good old-fashioned elbow grease so we don't have to use so much chemical. Our methods are far more labor intensive than any we see around us. That's true. But I sleep better knowing that I'm not responsible for spraying pesticide on someone's children with an airplane. And that our farm is growing clean, healthy stuff. And that we can combine good business with farm practices that incorporate respect for God's great creation and a strong land ethic. And we don't need a crop duster to it, only a buffer from one.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

The Good, The Bad, and The Decapitated

Dragging the broilers around the field in this pen has paid off for us. Quite literally, actually, in that we sold 14 of the 17 we took to the processor and kept the rest for us. We had some loss, most sadly the four that seemed to keel over in the heat a few days before we had them processed. Even so, we covered our costs and got three chickens for home eating out of the deal. And we would have made a profit had we not had the loss factor, so we are tweaking our system. . .mostly looking into changing the quality of the feed and adding some natural supplements. So. . .broilers? Good.

The CSA customers got a very nice box this week, with lots of summer veggies. . .zucchini, green and wax beans, peppers. And we have some extra for farmers markets this week (I have decided to go to the Greeley market on Wednesday. We'll see how it goes). I hope our customers are happy with their shares. . .I am very conscious of value. Because if you give up the choice of what you get each week, you should really get more for your money. I am confident now that our customers will get more vegetables than the same money would have purchased in the store. After doing some mental tracking over the past few weeks, I think that to harvest and prep the CSA boxes takes about 1/2 hour each share each week, which is a good figure for planning if we grow and have to add paid labor into the deal next year. It doesn't include the drop offs or sales or planting/weeding/tending crops, but it is something. So. . .CSA? Good.

The flowers, well, they are really just getting started. Sales at the Louisville market are down about 50% from last year, as are orders from Whole Foods. Luckily, I have more Whole Foods markets as clients, so I'm matching with two stores what I made from one store last year. And the money crops, like zinnia, snow on the mountain, and sunflowers, aren't in yet, so I will reserve judgment on the flower sales until later in the season. Flower subscriptions, now that we have the CSA in place, are up 75% over last year, though. We had 100% customer turnover (except my mom. She's still in. Thanks, Mom) from last year since I stopped delivering door to door and instead deliver at the CSA drop-off, but I lost so much money on those subscriptions last year with the gas prices that I'm unapologetic. Also, we offered the big bouquet subscription again, but also a much cheaper stem subscription. The stems are just an assortment of what I have on the farm in one bunch for people to arrange at home, $100 for 10 weeks, and we have 9 floral subscribers.So. . .flowers? The jury is still out. Not bad. But not exactly good, either.

And so we arrive at the bad. Not just bad, but tragic, really. Eggs. All but four of our hens have been eaten by something (we think a family of raccoons) in the past few days. So we have had to stop egg sales for the rest of the year. The truth is, we were losing lots of money on the egg operation anyway, as the girls just weren't laying enough eggs to pay for their feed. And we weren't going cheap, either, as we sold the dozens for $3.50 to CSA members and friends and $5 at the farmers market. We had loss over the winter, with the prolapse issues and scattered predator attacks, but nothing close to total flock decimation. It is true that we knew something was getting after those girls and we didn't act immediately, so it is our fault. We found one decapitated hen in the field in the middle of last week. We were missing a few hens the night after that. The day after that, I had my tooth surgery, we had the promotion at the soccer game, and the farmers market. So, with me out of commission, Matt had to pull all that together on his own and didn't have time to investigate the hen problem. And we didn't know what to do. We have a fence around the hen yard and we lock the hens up in a horse trailer at night. But the hens repeatedly found their way out of the fencing, and no matter what we tried, we couldn't secure them. We wanted to try electric charges on the fence, but we're trying to keep things kid friendly, so didn't. Anyway, the long and short of it is, we had other things going on that kept us from addressing the problem when it needed to be addressed. So we lost our flock and found more decapitated chickens in the field. So much for kid friendly. We have learned an important lesson, are totally rethinking the housing options, and are starting over. But this has been bad. Very bad.

Overall, though, the diversity of our operation has turned out to be the blessing we hoped it would be. My guess is that these pieces of our operation will all perform differently from season to season, and my hope is that together they will produce consistent farm quality and sustainability. That the sum will be greater than the value of its parts. That where one piece fails, another will succeed.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Odds and Ends. . .

The first zinnia crop bolts, basking in the July heat, waiting to bloom and sell well.

Pretty black-eyed Susans, snaps, and bells of Ireland.

Sally also does production design on films. She brought afro wigs. Simon adds the tongue flourish. He looks like a muppet Gene Simmmons.

The room off of the garage, called the "chick room" because we once kept baby chicks in there, that I am hoping to turn into private quarters for Sally. Because we are really early risers, and our house is small. It is not ready yet, though I did move all the junk out of there.

Fried squash blossoms, stuffed with ricotta, parmesan, and garlic, and fresh field herbs. Total heaven.

Madzie and Simon, on their bikes. Simon riding independently is a brand new development on the farm. He can stop and start by himself now too, and riding bikes is all he wants to do. The kids are much happier in the field now, as they ride all around. Sometimes they play "coyote" which means they hide in the sweet corn rows and howl at the top of their lungs. Sweet. We were also given a backyard pool, which they love. Life on the farm is better for them now.

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Solitude. . .unusual, and occasionally, wonderful

I am not used to being by myself in the house. This will change, I think, this year, when Simon heads off to preschool two days a week and then next year, all-day kindergarten (unbelievable). Now though, after 7 years of raising small children, time alone is precious, and time alone in the house is almost unheard of. But I am on strict orders to rest or suffer black eyes and a giant face bruise from the dental surgery on Friday morning, so Matt is at the farmers market, Sally and the kids are at my parents' house, and I am spending a long Saturday alone at the house.

Of course, my day of rest will include light cleaning, laundry, paying bills and organizing the office, and some food preservation in the kitchen, and catching up on the blog, but I have a movie to watch and darvaset to take, so I'm generally a pretty happy camper. And then when I'm back in action tomorrow, I can hit the field knowing that the inside of my house is deserving of the lovely flower bouquets I have filled it with.

Last night's farm promotion at the Force soccer game went well. The share this week is amazing: standard zucchini, Italian heirloom zucchini, sunburst squash, greeen and wax beans, broccoli, carrots, beets, two types of onions, swiss chard and lettuce, bell and big jim peppers, japanese eggplant. The shares fill a garbage bag, so our winners looked like summertime Santas walking around with their veggie sacks. It worked well, thankfully, and I hope we get some good responses for next year's CSA from it.

So, that is one big event behind me, and today I get to rest and eat soft foods. Peace of mind and rest make me happy and calm, and ready to tackle high season next week.

As requested, presenting Sally!

Here is Sally, helping me make jelly jar bouquets for the farmer's market. I have not tried this before, as usually we just show up to the market with flowers in buckets and see what happens. But in the interest of working harder to make it happen, we spent some time Thursday night putting these little cuties together. And Sally is a big help. I don't know that I can call her a farm intern, since her experience growing up on a hog farm means she knows more about our animal operation than we do, but she is great. She knows farming and is also an art student. . .so basically she's everything our little farm looks for in help. And she's my cousin, and the kids adore her, and so do we all.

She is staying for a month, and helps with less pleasant tasks than this one as well. On Thursday, we took our chickens to the processor, and she helped me catch them and crate them up. (And they are lovely birds, sitting in our cooler, just waiting for the grill tomorrow). Even though one of the roosters bit her hand when we first tried to catch them, she persevered, even a bit vindictively, to grab them by their feet and toss them into the crate. And she loves to feed the pigs and helped us make them a wallow (we didn't know they were getting sunburned!) And she might not like weeding (who does?) but she gets out there and gets after them. And she's funny, and not afraid to sing a bit in the field, and it's just way better with her here.

And look what she and I can do in an hour, while listening to After Hours in Studio C on KBCO:
I will report on the jelly jar bouquet sales as soon as I have the numbers in from this morning's market.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Farmers Markets

My market helper, last July, in Eaton.

Farmers market season has begun. We've been in Louisville for the past few weeks not doing very well. I've only really been going because I am delivering the CSA share on Saturday morning anyway, and have been just taking a few scattered extra veggies here and there. This coming Saturday is the first week I'll have quite a few flowers for the booth, so hopefully, we'll do better. Last week I had about 15 bunches to sell, mostly snaps, and only sold 6, which was frustrating and discouraging. I am hoping it was the scarcity and lack of variety, not the economy, that was the biggest obstacle to flower purchasing. We'll also have some extra veggies to take, I'm hoping, since those sell well. The summer squash and green beans are coming in like gangbusters, so I'm crossing my fingers. Also, though, I'm totally getting on the wholesale flower sales to find more customers.

My plan was also to go the Greeley market on Wednesday afternoons. Matt is not really into this plan because, and he's right, we need as much on-farm labor as possible. Also, I am wondering how the flowers will really sell there. I went last week to check it out, and it didn't look good. There were only five vendors and not many more customers, and the only vendor doing any business at all was clearly reselling produce. So, I am torn about attending in the future. I am going to check it out again today and see if more vendors have started, and if it picks up, I'll probably give it a try.

I suppose the only reason I even want to try it is because I like Greeley, and we're rural Greeley farmers, and I want to participate locally. Since I can't go on Saturdays, I'd like to give Wednesdays a try. I understand that if nice vendors don't go to the markets, people won't come either, but it's hard to want to go be a vendor if the people aren't coming. So we'll see. My suspicion is that the market will pick up now that the season is really here, but I won't take a booth until I see that happening.

We haven't been watching T.V. much this season. I've only seen one episode of my summer favorite, So You Think You Can Dance, and I am sad about that. But I have seen the Southwest Air ads a few times. You know, "It's on." I love those ads for the optimism and creativity and determination they portray. The farmers market is not going well, but I am not going to worry. I am just going to work harder.

It's so on, people.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Flowers, flowers, flowers

Larkspur, calendula, snapdragons, black-eyed Susans, sweet pea. The flower season has officially begun. I started subscription delivery to the CSA members yesterday and have my first Whole Foods order to start cutting today. Dropping off in Fort Collins is really fun, since many of our customers are also good friends of ours that we don't see as often as we'd like now. So yesterday there were 5 or 6 ladies at the drop off drinking wine and talking about how they've been cooking the CSA veggies (and other things, of course). Yes. This is what I hoped it would be like. Also, I took two extra flower bunches (because I'm tired and can't count accurately), but sold an extra subscription because of it. I'm happy that the quality and beauty of our products make them fairly easy to sell. Except at the market in Louisville last weekend, which didn't go well at all. I'm hoping it's because I didn't have much variety and not because the market isn't going to go well this year. It is very frustrating to sit at a market all day when things aren't selling.

Also, I need to do some sales and accounting things, and weed through the vegetable bed, and mulch the tomatoes, and clean the house by Friday morning at 8:00. Oh, and I'm making apricot jelly this week. Now that I've typed all that, I am thinking that it might be actually impossible to get that all done, so I suppose I'll have to spend some time prioritizing. Friday at 8:00 I am getting a tooth implant and have been told that I will need to rest for a couple of days so I don't bruise. I am taking the "get rest" command very seriously, because not being able to do any work for an entire weekend sounds heavenly, and because I really don't want a giant bruise on my face. I am thinking that I will try to track down all of the Harry Potter movies and watch those.

Monday, July 13, 2009

Freezing Greens. And Broccoli. And Peas.

I am working hard to get a freezer full of food together for this winter. Mostly because I like our food much better than store food now, but also because we do need to save some money on groceries. Since the greens that came in so strong this year are now declining in the heat, it was time to get preserving. It is unfortunate that food preservation has to be done in the height of the busy season, but it is a fact of nature.


I am very new at this food preservation thing. My garden before was just not big enough to produce any extra veggies. We ate everything fresh and then didn't think about it until spring. Though I did make lots of my own baby food when my kids were little, which was a step on the path. Luckily, my favorite cookbook, The Joy of Cooking, has multiple chapters on canning, freezing, drying, jelly making, etc. For frozen veggies to keep, even in the freezer, you have to blanch them quickly. I did a double rinse of my greens since I have been having a hard time getting all the grit off of them.

And then into the ziploc bags and into the freezer in the garage. We have 5 bags of peas, 5 bags of broccoli, and 5 bags of greens. Today, I plan to glean the peas and freeze more, along with broccoli, but the greens, I fear, are done until the fall crop comes in. That's okay though, because with the heat comes summer squash (almost!), eggplant, green beans, and other wonderful hot season veggies.

Last night at dinner, we made meat sauce with last year's canned tomatoes, lathered butter on sourdough bread from the farmer's market, and heaped fresh pea salad and steamed broccoli from the field onto our plates. Fresh broccoli is like fresh peas. . .super sweet! It is a wonderful thing to eat what you grow.

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Flare Ups and Flowers


I think that the kids are losing patience with the farm. They have been having trouble holding it together in the field this past week. There has been screaming. I am trying to make sure I am not the one doing the screaming. If I believe I am patient and gentle in the face of chaos, it will be so. And mostly, I am succeeding in this. In truth, this time of year is always hard for me on the farm as well, when there is so much to do, lots of bills to pay, and not yet flowers to sell. And the weeds. Oh. My. Goodness. The weeds.

We are back to eating well, however, which is important. Broccoli and beets. Risotto and stir fry. Colorado cherries and apricots from the western slope. Mostly plants until the chickens finish next week, and all this vegetarian eating has me drooling when I think about the pigs finishing this fall. And our friends gave us a fabulous pool for our backyard that is making us all very happy in the hot afternoons. And my cousin has arrived to stay with us for the next four weeks, and it is nice to have help and company. As usual, the love and support of our very wonderful extended family, along witht the nutrition from the vegetables and the beauty of the early flowers, is sustaining me.

This is good, because I have had bad news on the thyroid front this week. I am having a flare up, despite medication. Hyperthyroidism makes me anxious, nauseous, and ironically, run down. So the medical flare up and the farm flare up and the children's flare ups are interacting to make things a little wild right now. As usual, the answer is stamina and perseverance, getting out there and getting it all done, and not whining on the blog.

The greenhorns have a sticker for new farmers that reads: "The man is not hiring. Be your self." Amen. Even if there will be no free time until Thanksgiving. Because even when I feel overwhelmed, life is good on the farm, and when Thanksgiving comes this year, we will have much to be grateful for.

Friday, July 3, 2009

Farming Humble

We've gotten some rain, which makes it easier to pull these giant weeds out, root and all. We vowed to not have any weeds this size this year, but alas, we have been foiled in that plan. We don't have very many, but the perennial bed has gotten pretty bad because it's not yet ready to harvest out of, so we've focused our efforts in other beds. Today, though, we're getting it cleaned out and mulched with straw. I'll post some "after" pictures later. These weeds are humbling us. We always take on just a bit more than we can manage well. . .

We also had a chicken tragedy Tuesday night, when our next batch of 25 little Cornish Rocks arrived from the hatchery at exactly the same time dinner hit the table. I told Matt I thought he should give them some water and come in to eat before he finished the brooder. What we did not know is that the dumb dogs would get out of their fenced yard and either eat the chicks or just scatter them to the winds. When we finished dinner, we had an empty box as a result of our poor decision making, with no sign of any chicks. Now we need to get some more chicks, and quick, since most are already sold. It is a big bummer, and again, just when we feel good at something, we are humbled.

It is a real bummer that July 4th falls on a Saturday this year. For one, Matt does not get a day off for the holiday this year or next. Also, I have to go to the farmers market tomorrow morning instead of the Stampede parade, as is our annual family custom. I'm sad that I won't get to see the longhorn cattle run down the middle of downtown Greeley. But I'm interested to see what kind of traffic we get on the 4th at the market. I'm not especially hopeful for a great turnout. The market managers have done what they can, getting a shuttle from the town park celebration to the market, and hosting a wine and cheese tasting in the pavilion at the market, so we'll go down and see what happens. These snapdragons might just draw some interest. . .I think they're pretty, anyway.

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Not So Slow Food. . .

We've fallen off the wagon this weekend when it comes to eating healthy homecooked meals. In a big way. I think this is one of the downfalls of having had so many fast food and meals out as a child and young adult. When I get really hungry or thirsty, an every day thing now that we're out in the field all day, I just want a Coke and a Big Mac. Luckily, when we're on the farm, there is not a fast food place for ten miles, so I don't go often. Now that I'm frequently off the farm for markets or deliveries, though, temptation abounds.

First, the market has started in Louisville. This means I rise at 4:45 or so, pack the truck, and spend most of Saturday sitting in a hot market booth. This is the only thing I don't like about the Louisville market. The hours are 9-2, though customers are often there by 8 a.m. It's just an all-day production, and I would prefer to be done by noon or one. And it makes me hot and hungry, so even though the girls and I ate an entire bag of cherries in the morning this Saturday, we all wanted burgers and cold drinks on the way home. So we lunched at Burger King. At first, satisfying, then instantly, gross.

Saturday night was big fun at the Greeley Stampede which meant fair food for dinner and cotton candy for dessert. This meal was, in all honesty, just gross. Not at all satisfying, but we did get to watch the longhorn cattle parade down the middle of the main road through the park. And the kids got their fill of rides. Good times, fueled by corn dogs.

Sunday we went to Rocky Mountain National Park with the kids and packed sandwiches and pretzels. Not bad. But we got home late and so ate hot dogs for dinner. Mondays are difficult because we leave for the CSA drop-off between 4 and 4:30, and don't finish until 7:00. It's a problem I need to solve, because I keep meaning to make dinner before we go, but running out of time and stopping for fast food. Which is what we did last night.

So this is why I think I'm out of energy today and feel sluggish and slow. I really can tell a difference when I'm eating well vs. when I am not, and I can see it in my kids, too, and the way they behave. And I don't want them to have the same cravings I do, for total junk food, when they are hungry as adults. I want them to crave homemade comfort foods like beet risotto and creamed greens. So I'm taking back control. Tonight, we going to eat some greens from the field and tomorrow night, I'm going to make beet risotto with the baby beets we grew ourselves and fresh sweet peas, steamed. I have some bread rising in the oven right now to eat with homemade egg salad for lunch at the pool today.

I am determined to overcome this taste for junk food. And since we're eating more and more healthy food, I am losing my taste for it. But one of our goals in buying a farm was to spend more time at home and eat better food, not to be so overwhelmed with work that we don't have time to cook the deliciousness we're growing. I am on the path, I just haven't gotten to the end yet.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

Apologies. . .

I have been a terribly lazy blogger this past week, but a very busy farmer. I am sorry about that, and despite the fact that I've spent the time I would have been blogging pulling weeds, I'm still losing the weed battle. I'm sorry about that, too. While I'm at it, I am going to make some other apologies. First, to my poor barn kittens, who we haven't seen since Thursday morning. I'm very sorry that you (I think) were eaten by something in the night. We tried our best to keep you safe and happy. We are all very heartbroken, especially since you had just started catching mice. If you have just run away to seek better lodging, please come home. To my poor raspberry and perennial plants, I am very sorry that you are being consumed by pigweed. I am coming to the rescue with the action hoe, but very, very slowly through the sweet corn and onions. To the tiny little melon seeds, I'm sorry that right after we planted you we had 10 days of rain and cool weather. We all wish you would have germinated better. So that is why I weeded your rows first thing this week, so those of you that survived will grow. To my gladiola bulbs. I'm sorry we let you dry out in the basement and haven't planted you yet. We will get to you tomorrow. We know you might not bloom this year, but hopefully you'll still grow. Grow babies, grow.

Thankfully, there are some things I don't have to make apologies for. The giant crop of broccoli is putting on nice heads, the red leaf lettuce is crisp, juicy, and delicious, and the sugar snap peas are SWEET! The pumpkins and squash and carrots and green beans and zinnias and snow-on-the-mountain are all coming in great. The calendula, larkspur, and snapdragons are in early bloom. The pond grass, freshly mowed, smells sweet at sunset. The chickens and turkeys are happy and healthy. As are my children. As am I.

Friday, June 19, 2009

Baby Turkeys

These tiny little fuzzballs are our turkey crop for this year. We ordered 10 broad-breasted white and 5 Bourbon Reds with the idea that I'd keep one or two of the heritage breed hens to start a breeding flock. I think I'll have to find a tom that didn't come from the same hatchery to avoid any issues with in-breeding, so I'm on the hunt for that. We went with the Bourbon Reds because they are listed on Slow Food USA's Ark of Taste. And we are all about slow food here at Boyles Family Farms.

Anyway, I've got almost all of them sold already, about five left to go. This is our first go round with turkeys, so we're hoping it all turns out okay come November. But now, we are just enjoying the poults scrambling around the barn. The kittens do sometimes stick their paws into the brooder and swat at our turkeys, but the tiny little turkeys peck at them, so they've stopped. They might be small, but they are scrappy. Like our farm.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

This is the lawnmower we have used for the past six years. Obviously, it is an excellent workout, pushing this around. I worked very well for our small Fort Collins lot, and last year, I pushed through the big yard around our house with it. As expected, it doesn't work as well out here. Mostly because most of our yard here is very weedy.

So this year, we bought this beautiful model for $150 at Lowes. It doesn't have any bells and whistles, but it does have a gas powered motor, so it feels as though we just bought the luxury yacht of the lawnmower world.

The problem is, we seeded the pond with native grass, and in order for native grass to outcompete the weeds, we have to mow. The only mowing apparatus we have is the new luxury yacht pictured above. This picture illustrates the difference between the part we have mowed and the two foot tall jungle we are bogging our cheap lawnmower down into. Sigh. So it will not probably be long before we have ruined my favorite lawnmower we've ever owned.

That's the thing, though, about being new at something. If you don't have the right equipment, and you can't afford to buy it, you just make do with what's around. And I don't think it's so bad, really, all this making do.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Design help

So, most of you have noticed that despite my best efforts, I am truly awful at blog design. So, I am entering a contest to win free help from another blogger at The Design Girl Blog.

It is a nice idea, blog contests. Especially for blog design.

I am really needing help, people. And my chances of winning this contest are likely slim. Any other suggestions?

What, Did They Lose a Basketball Game?

We made creamed greens for dinner this weekend. They are much more delicious than the name suggests. Also, funnier, because the name suggests that they got shut-out in a high stakes athletic contest. Like they just couldn't compete against the Beefsteak tomato team. Like the greens are still playing Little League, and they are getting CREAMED.

Anyway, they were lovely. Madzie, Matt and I enjoyed them, and Simon ate his share, with complaints, on the threat of losing dessert. We had them with fresh-baked homemade rolls and hard-boiled Boyles Family Farms eggs. Matt and I agreed that grilled chicken or pork chops would have made a nice addition to the meal, since we are both huge eaters these days, but even without the meat they made a nice light meal.

Here is the recipe, for anyone interested in upping their green consumption. I based it on the Creamed Spinach recipe from The Joy of Cooking, but any edible greens could be thrown into this mix. It is as follows. And the homemade rolls could certainly be replaced by a Pillsbury tube to save time. And the eggs replaced by an 88 cent dozen from Walmart (88 cents!) to save money. But in saving these things, you would sacrifice both flavor and nutrition, so I certainly don't recommend it. Then again, we're sustainable farmers who sometimes eat fast food, so as Barbara Kingsolver says in her wonderful book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, there are no stone tablets in the kitchen.

Creamed Greens

1 clove of garlic
2 tbsp. butter
1/2 of an onion, diced
1 tbsp. flour
2 bunches of greens (spinach, kale, chard, turnip greens) destemmed and chopped, with stems cut into 1” pieces
1/2 cup chicken or vegetable stock
1/2 tsp. sugar, and salt and pepper to taste
Boil the greens in 2 cups of water, covered, for 5-7 minutes. Run through food processor or chop finely. Add butter to a skillet, add diced garlic and onions, and cook until shimmery. Add and mix flour. Slowly stir in broth and sugar. When sauce is hot, add greens and cook for about three minutes.

We're eating our greens, are you?

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Pig Pen, Chicken Pen

We needed to get the meat chicks out onto the pasture, but we had the pigs in the chicken pen. So in order to get the chicks out there, we had to build a pig pen and boot the pigs out. Here, you can see them in their new pen, happily munching away. My Aunt Barb, who together with my Uncle Frank raises pigs in Ohio, was here to give us tips. Because we didn't know how to carry pigs around.

It is an extreme blow to pig dignity. Matt caught them by their hind legs and carried them, kicking and squealing, one by one, into their new digs. Now, whenever either of us goes out to feed them, they bolt away from us. Clearly, they do have some sort of pig memory.

So, once that task was complete, we got the chicks out on the pasture. The land has been in alfalfa for the past 10 years, and so we just left one half acre in the hay for this year's crop of chickens and (soon!) turkeys. The Cornish Cross are much, much lazier than the Rhode Island Red layers we have, and so they don't scratch around all that much. They are learning what to do, though. We move them to fresh ground every morning, a task we didn't have to do so frequently with the laying flock. Apparently, when chickens are bred to mature in 7-8 weeks, they just have to poop a whole lot.

They still seem a bit freaked out by their new digs. But they are eating the bugs, which is very exciting. We have plenty with all the rain we've been having. And they are fattening up nicely, so come mid-July, we'll be able to eat eat eat. They have been surprisingly easy to sell, so thanks to all of our intrepid customers who know what they want in meat. And thanks to Michael Pollan for helping people understand and prefer the pastured model. And thank God, the universe, and everybody for this wonderful, strange, healthy life we get to lead.

Monday, June 15, 2009

More Greens. Because It's June.

Week two of the CSA. . .prepped and ready to go.

I'm always a little nervous when people call up interested about the CSA because their family doesn't eat vegetables and they want them to start. Because it seems like people who have never eaten veggies might want to start more slowly than a big delivery of kale and chard and turnips, which honestly, even I haven't cooked very often before now. These are just some very vegetabley vegetables, right?

But after we made our deliveries last week, one such customer called to tell me that her meat and potatoes husband loved the kale recipe I sent in the newsletter. So I have changed my opinion, and now think everyone should join a CSA. It makes my heart smile to think that all this healthy food we're growing is nourishing so many other families.

And to think, all we thought we wanted was a TREE FARM.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

I Love My Mud Room

Except this is what it looks like after we come in from a muddy day in the field. Keeping the mud room clean is futile, so I just wait for the mud to dry, sweep up what I can, and leave the rest. I am trying to teach Simon how to empty the muddy water from his boots outside, with limited success. His favorite method is to violently kick his feet around until the boots fly off them, spraying water and mud all over the walls and floor. Sigh. I love that kid.

Most days, when the kids and I are home, go like this:

Get up between 5:30 and 6:00 a.m. Matty leaves for work at 6:15. Feed pigs, chickens, and kittens. Kids (usually) sleeping. Read newspaper, drink coffee, snooze a bit on the couch. It is a wonderful time of day on the farm, very quiet and peaceful, not yet stinking like feedlot, the remnants of a lovely sunrise dissipating in the sky. Take deep breaths, think deep thoughts.
7:30 Kids up. Breakfast. Clothes. Boots.
8:00 Work/play in the field. Pull weeds, sow seeds, harvest shares. Drive Tonka trucks, build toad homes, dig random holes.
10:15-10:45 Eat fat snacks in the shade of the aspen trees in the backyard. . .chocolate cake, lemon pound cake, cookies. Giggle at kitten antics. Take a few shots at the soccer goal. Re-caffeinate.
10:45-1:00 More of the same in the field. Repetitive, mindless, refreshing.
1:00-3:00 Lunch. Rest. Check email,return phone calls, clean up the house. Sometimes mow the yard. Lay (rarely) exhausted on the couch and stare at bad daytime television.
3:00-6:00 Weed. Clean house. Chop dinner veggies. Light grill.
6:00 Dinner and dessert, all of us together. Quite nice.
6:30-8:30 or 9:00 Wash lettuce, bunch kale, wonder how to cook turnips. Scout through hay, play pooh-sticks in the ditch, slip and slide through mud puddles.
9:00 Feed and lock up animals, put kids to bed, clean kitchen, watch (rarely)TV
10:30 or 11:00 Blessed, blessed sleep.

And I wouldn't have it any other way. Soon, farmer's markets, flower deliveries, swim lessons, and "meet the farmer" events will have us running and running, but for now, we are, happily, home together. Even if there is mud on the floor, we are happy to be home together.

Monday, June 8, 2009

Harvesting, and an Off-season Easter Egg Hunt. . .

Today, we begin harvesting vegetables in earnest for our CSA members. Our biggest drop-off, in Fort Collins, is tonight, with our Greeley pick-up tomorrow. We have one family in Louisville that took their first delivery Saturday morning, so they served as sort of a trial run for us. Hope you're enjoying your veggies and eggs, Lueckes from Louisville! We learned a few things with that first delivery, like that we need to get our barn coolers up and running and figure out a better system for displaying the share than an old plastic grocery bag. Also, I went to Walmart and bought some of the plastic egg crates from the camping section so we won't have to reuse old egg cartons anymore.

Today will mostly be spent harvesting the shares, but there is so much sowing to do for the flower side, and we have to get our gladiolas in the ground. The gladiolas could have gone in at the end of April, but we've been putting it off. This week is really, really time if we want any harvest at all, and it will be late. And then there's the weeding, which so far is under control but could easily spiral into messy chaos soon. Sometimes, when I'm out there with the hoe, I wish someone would invent a spray or something that can just take care of the unwanted weeds. . .and then I remember, they have, but they haven't made it safe for small children or the water table. So, onward with the hand weeding. We wanted a longer season, and we knew vegetables were the way to do that. Now, we have to figure out how to manage a longer season, and it's not easy.

Also, when the kids get up, I have to send them on another egg hunt in the barn and in the chicken pen. One of the downfalls to giving chickens access to pasture is that they find new hiding spots for their eggs. At least, we hope that's what has happened, that there's a nest we don't know about. If we don't find one, then we'll have the problem of low production, a signal of many possible flock problems, to solve.

Maybe it's the summer cold I'm fighting, or the fact that once again, the day's chores have to be done in the rain and the mud, but today I feel a little beat down by the entire operation.

Saturday, June 6, 2009

At the Livestock Auction. . .

One of the ways we're planning to afford for me to stay home on the farm is by cutting our monthly food budget. Like, in half, and it's not a huge food budget as it is. So, come August, we're hoping to have a freezer stocked with veggies and meat to last us through the year. We've got the meat birds going, and we've been searching around for some weaner pigs to raise. Since we were having trouble locating said pigs, we decided to head up to the weekly livestock auction to see if we could get some there.

The livestock auction is very serious. The auctioneers are fast-talking guys in cowboy hats, who seem to make a lot of nonsensical noises in between their price bids. They started on sheep, and the first few rounds of bidding I had absolutely no idea what was going on. They may as well have been speaking Japanese. Eventually though, after asking some fairly stupid questions and getting some very kind and polite answers, I learned. The auction started at 10 a.m., and by 2 p.m. I finally understood that the price being bid was per hundredweight unless the auctioneer said we were bidding per head. I also figured out that "by choice" meant you picked the animals you wanted out of the lot but "gate cut" meant you chose the number and got the first animals that ran back into the chute.

So, even though it was a long day for me and the kids, it turned out to be a good thing that we didn't get to the hogs until 3:00, because all that waiting around prepared me to bid for my pigs. It was still nervewracking, but I managed to buy two Hampshire weaners on a gate cut without paying more than the other four people buying weaner hogs. We trucked them home in the dog crate, and since we don't have their pen built yet, put them in the chicken pen in the corral until we get something pig specific set up. We let the kids name them (Noodle and Piggy) with the warning that they would in fact be eating Noodle and Piggy all winter long.

We planted the corral in a forage mix that we think the hogs will like, with grass, rape, and peas mixed together. When we got the pigs out in the pen, the first thing they did was start munching on all that green stuff, which was a relief. Since then, we've been supplementing the grain from the feed store with the waste from the veggie processing. This morning, I gave them a dozen eggs that had frozen in the back of the fridge, and they seemed to love those. They seem like happy little piggies, and I hope they stay that way, because I love me some bacon.

A Share of Health

Here is the first delivery for our CSA members, or one full share this week. It includes 2 bunches of spinach, a generous bag of salad mix, 2 bunches of kale, 1 bunch of cilantro, and a bunch of radishes. The eggs are optional, available for an additional charge. This is absolute health in a box, fresh picked the day of delivery. Feed to your family for wellness, obesity protection, and flat out fabulous flavor.

Supporting small farms by eating local, seasonal produce is an important act of patriotism. It's like saying the pledge of allegiance every day, only yummier. Happy eating!

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Peonies

The perennial bed is a big weedy mess again, despite my early season efforts. We are going to get some straw for mulch, but haven't yet, and with all the rain the weeds are back in force this year. Here, the peonies are just starting to bud out. Production grade peony plants take a couple of years to establish, so in this, their second year, Matt pruned out over half of the buds, and those that are left are smaller than they will likely be next year.


And yet, I was able to cut a few peonies for the kitchen table yesterday. These are one of my favorite flowers, and their scent, not overpowering, reminds me of my Granny Ruth. I don't specifically remember if she had peonies in her garden, though she may well have, but she did wear a perfume or powder or somesuch with the scent of peonies in it.


She would have loved my farm. I hope she can see it from heaven.

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Having a Nice Relax. . . .

The rain this spring has given us a few unscheduled days off. And really, it's nice to have some time to work on other things around the house, and I got the sunflowers and vegetables sowed yesterday just in time for the moisture, which is a good feeling. My kids, as sweet as they are, are normal kids, and even though all the adults in their lives know that having a farm childhood will be the stuff of many cherished memories later on, they sometimes don't want to spend all day out in the field with me.

So now, they are happily watching Harry Potter, having a rare day in front of the T.V.. Simon calls it "having a nice relax." We will bake cookies and have a tea party later on, clean up the house, and regroup for tomorrow when the sun comes back out and we head intrepidly into the mud.

Matt and I are aware that working all the time on the farm is not always great for family time. Sometimes, the four of us work together on something the kids can do, but often, Matt and I are working while the kids are entertaining themselves, which may feel to them as if they are being ignored. Before, with two off-farm jobs, we just needed all those minutes to get things done. Now, with me home, we are trying to take Sunday off for family time.

This past Sunday we made it to church, went swimming at the pool, and trucked down to Costco for some bulk shopping. Matt did pull some rows and a ditch with the tractor while the kids and I rested in the afternoon, but overall, we didn't do much in the field.

It felt great to have some time off, and with renewed vigor we will continue onward into full season when we start harvesting this next week. But not on Sunday. Sunday, weather permitting, you can find us at the pool.

Greens, greens, greens

This Saturday, we start deliveries for our CSA members. It's early June in Colorado, so greens are in season. . .our box for the week will include: salad mix, spinach, red russian kale, and possibly radishes. Depending on where you live, these things are likely in season for you, too, so in the interest of increasing everyone's consumption of greens, here are some recipe suggestions.


Claire's simple salad:

Mixed greens of any type, some bitter, some sweet, lots of spinach
2 slices of crispy bacon crumbles (best if still warm)
Sliced strawberries

I toss this together and eat with no dressing, as I find the bacon grease sufficient for flavor. However, I think it would go well with a nice vinaigrette if one so desired. Because it includes bacon, it works as a side salad or as a meal, in my opinion.

We also have eggs available, and this kale and egg recipe from the blogosphere sounds lovely.

Some of these sound better than others, but there are 7 kale recipes on this site.

Any other suggestions, fine kale-eating readers?

Monday, June 1, 2009

Plowing with Old Reliable. . . .

Each year, as things that were once very difficult to do get simpler, we add new things that are difficult to our plate. So, now that the flower operation has become simpler, in that we know what to grow and how to grow them based on our sales records, of course we added vegetables and poultry to the crop list.

We've done a pretty good job with our Community Supported Agriculture shares. We wanted to sell 10 to keep things manageable our first year, and we sold 7 and traded 2, which puts us right about where we wanted to be. In order to satisfy those shareholders, though, we're growing a huge number of different vegetables. Some we've grown for ourselves for years, like tomatoes and peppers and peas. But it is our first time growing many of the cool season veggies like broccoli and kale, as well as other vegetables we added like edamame and brussels sprouts. And because we also added the pastured poultry, we needed to bite off another acre of our land for our expanded operation.

Which is why, on Saturday, Matt decided it was time for me to learn to pull the chisel plow behind our 1952 Allis-Chalmers tractor, Old Reliable. We needed to prep half of our new section for zinnias since the vegetables have taken up most of the land we used for flowers last year, and that meant ripping out the alfalfa we killed off the week before. We will plant only flowers, not vegetables, in the new section because we used roundup to kill the hay and we are growing the vegetables organically. Roundup is a lot of things, but organic, it's not.

Old Reliable is a wonder, but she's not easy to drive. Add that to my absolute inexperience as a machine operator and a pretty bad case of nerves about it, and I was VERY uncomfortable my first few minutes on the machine. My heart was racing and I was convinced that at any moment, Old Reliable was going to go over backwards like the tractors in the Disney movie "Cars." Of course, she didn't. The first few times I tried to turn, the front wheels jammed sideways and started plowing the soil in front of me. It took all my strength to crank the steering wheel to get the wheels back straight, and all the while I was working on that I was heading for the irrigation ditch and just praying that I could get the thing turned or stopped before we took a ditchwater bath. Turning was easier once I figured out how to use the wheel brake pedals, but the pedals were so sticky that in order to engage the brake I had to put all my weight behind my foot, so much so that each time I turned my entire body came up from the seat and leaned into the pedal while I held onto the steering wheel for dear life. Driving that tractor is not that much easier for me than hand weeding, turns out, but I did get more and more comfortable with each pass through.

So, I learned another important farming skill, even though Matt did have to make another pass through with the plow later. He didn't say anything about it, probably to preserve my feelings, but I just happened to see him doing it when I went out to check on the spinach. Still, I'm pretty proud of myself.

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Bare Root Table Grapes

We planted our table grapes about a week or so ago. To establish grape arbors that are productive in the long term, the first couple of years you have to prune them back fairly ruthlessly. So,while we won't be enjoying the literal fruits of this labor for a few years, we are very excited to have them growing in the old corral. We're hoping the salts continue to leach out of the soil and that the sudan grass breaks up the hard pack underneath. There's alot of hope, in farming, this time of year.

We have five different varieties, all of them supposed to be hearty on the Front Range. One variety, St. Theresa's, was sent to a local wholesale grower by some guy in Minnesota who just liked to breed grapes. There were 50 or so different varietal starts, and after a couple of years growing them out to see, the grower asked for permission to name and market the one that seemed commercially viable. . .the St. Theresa's. I'm excited to grow them out and see what happens.

We dug them in and watered them well. With all the rain we've had, we haven't had to run the drip, but getting the driplines, mulch, and the arbors built is on the to-do list as soon as we finish this fat rush of sowing we've got to do.

Friday, May 29, 2009

New Neighbors

It was not an easy decision for us to move to the country. After commuting to our leased land our first year farming though, we also knew we had to live on our farm for it to work out well. And that meant leaving a very comfortable life in Fort Collins.

Our old house was in the Campus West neighborhood, so it was close enough to everything to walk or bike to, well, everything. When my daughter was in preschool I used to walk her the mile over, then swing by the coffee shop and the grocery store on my walk home. If we wanted to go get some ice cream or see one of the many outdoor concerts in the summer, or even go to the pool, we just got on our bikes. One tank of gas lasted me two full weeks. And our neighbors, most young families like ours, were wonderfully good friends of ours.

So when we bought our farm in rural Greeley, we weren't sure what to expect, but we knew we were in for a big change. And things, of course, changed. Like, we don't bike anywhere anymore, because it doesn't seem wise to contend with big farm semis on the narrow country roads, even if they are paved. And having to drive 5 miles into the nearest small town makes going out for dinner or ice cream fairly unattractive, so we spend more time together at the house, which we love.

And our new neighbors are fewer and farther between, but they are the nicest people you could hope for, and a few of them have kids the same age as ours, which is fun. And they are wonderfully generous, thoughtful people, often leaving us gifts when we least expect it. For example, on Wednesday, after a long day of dentist appointments and other errands, we came home to find an entire homemade chocolate cake sitting on our dryer. There was no note, and we didn't instantly know who had brought it over, as ALL of our neighbors are the kind of people who would. It came from the Adlers, who also brought an auction notice since they knew we are on the lookout for a brush hog mower, and then took our kids for a ride on their gator, which is a huge treat.

I think that we would be happy on our farm even if our neighbors weren't so lovely, but having nice people around makes every endeavor easier. Our neighbors know where to find weaner pigs, how to deal with the irrigation company, and how to bake a mean chocolate cake. And they are always willing to share.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

I Think I'll Call Them Lunch. . .

Any Fish Called Wanda fans out there? When I look at my baby chicks, all I can think of is the torture scene, where Otto is eating Ken's fish, and he says, "I think I'll call this one lunch. Hellooo lunch." As you can see, we got our broilers today. . .cornish rocks, bred to have such gigantic breasts that they can't manage to breed independently anymore, because that's how America likes them. They grow from egg to slaughter weight in 6 or 7 weeks, and they stay juicy and delicious out on the pasture, and I can't wait. Matt and I are planning to put up 25 or so for ourselves to last the year, and are encouraging our CSA members to do the same.

The kids, especially Simon, love the baby chicks. Who doesn't? They are quite fuzzy and adorable. Here, you can see Simon in one of his gentler moments, quite literally loving his food. He often just sits, transfixed, and watches the baby chick antics.


And here is Simon in one of his "Of Mice and Men" moments, in which we have to remind him that he is much bigger and stronger than these tiny, fragile creatures, even though his intentions are pure. Luckily, as chickens grow, they become less and less lovable, so they are very easy to eat as food once they've spent some time as adults.

We got these birds from the guy who will do the processing for us. He had about 1500 week-old birds in his brooder, so our 25 are now relaxing in the relative quiet and calm of ours. In two weeks, we will put them out to forage on pasture, move them around a bit to keep everything clean, and then all year eat some of the healthiest meat around. And now that we've raised up a couple of batches of chicks, it doesn't seem to be the big deal it once felt like.

So, I absolutely advocate for the consumption of pastured meat all around, with one caveat:

Don't eat the fuzzy ones. They're not ripe yet.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

New glasses

And isn't she just a doll? With some encouragement from her Uncle Zac (who,ironically,doesn't wear glasses) who gave her the final word that glasses are indeed cool, she has consented to wear them when reading, writing, watching TV, or using the computer. So anytime she isn't in the field. Because now she is just like me in two ways: she is a bookworm and she wears old lady librarian glasses.

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Thunderstorms, and Mud Season

This is a thunderstorm moving in from the west. The lilac bushes in our windbreak are a bit past prime, but pretty, I think, nonetheless. Last year, spring was cool and dry and windy. This year, though, it has been alternating between wet and cool and hot and dry, which is close to perfect growing conditions. . .for crops and weeds.

The same thunderstorm moving in from our field, and if you look closely, I believe you can tell that I have not weeded the closest rows, but have weeded those farther away. It is nice that you can tell a difference. Today after lunch I laid on hardwood floor with the heating pad, so that my back got the heat and the straight stretch with deep breathing. My back is getting stronger, but it hurts in the meantime.

All this rain has given us a rare Colorado mud season, which is fun and irritating at the same time. You can see that we often have to strip the kids on the stoop before we put them in the shower. It is ironic that I find the mud so bothersome, as most farmers need rain and are thankful to get it. But we on the high plains plan for no rain, or very little, with our irrigation ditch systems, so that mud from natural rain, since it is not necessary in our plan, just mucks everything up. Now we can't get the tractor in or use the seeder for the next few days while we dry out.

And we have to do a lot of laundry.

Monday, May 25, 2009

Meet the Boyles Family Farms Barn Kittens . . .

Madzie named "hers" Sweetie Pie. Sweetie Pie is a bit skittish and doesn't like people so much, so she tried, unsuccessfully, to get Simon to "trade cats." Also, Sweetie Pie spilled the water and had to eat mushy food.












Simon wanted to name "his" cat Old Lady P (I don't know, really, why), but then I carried a box of markers into the house and he changed his mind. His love of a kitten is now named Old Lady Marker. She purrs a lot and loves to be held.

I got the kitties for free after I promised the lady selling them that we weren't going to take them home and feed them to snakes (Yuck, right? But apparently. . .). We're not going to on purpose, anyway, and I hope these little cuties survive.

We had barn cats when we were kids at Sandy Ridge, in the barn behind our house. My dad wasn't allergic, like Matty is, but he didn't like cats and refused to let us keep them in the house. We spent a lot of time playing in the barn with those cats, most memorably creating pulley systems with ropes and sand pails to hoist them up to the hayloft, and then dropping them down into the hay to see if it was true that they would always land on their feet.

We had some kitten loss in that barn, and I have a vivid memory of finding one of my little kitties stiffened up behind a bucket. I ran to get one of the shop guys from my grandpa's shop to help me "wake the kitten up." I was about Madzie's age, first or second grade, and I remember wondering why the shop guy looked like he was about to cry. "Where's your mother?" he asked me.

I hope our kittens don't meet the same fate. We're closing the barn up every night until they get acclimated, and I'm encouraging the kids to handle them as much as possible so they stay tame enough to stick around and be taken to the vet when necessary. We searched for the mouse poison, and didn't find any, so are hoping it was eaten by the mice and won't be discovered by our cats.

For a long time, I've not allowed the kids to play in the barn because of the poison, even though it was well-hidden. Matt and I had a fairly heated discussion about it one day. . .he was convinced that the kids wouldn't eat it if they found it, even though it's bright green like candy. I took the opposite side of that argument. Later that day, while we were at the feed store looking at electric fence chargers, Simon stuck his ginormous tongue on the top of one of the cattle licks, and that settled the question in my favor. Crazy kid.

Still, we had to do something about those mice, and I'm glad that the something is no longer poison. Our cats are a kid-friendlier solution, and they are just so sweet!

Monday, May 18, 2009

A Spinach and Salad Mix Sunset. . .

Growing vegetables is so gratifying. The field is now one big, er, tiny salad. . .the kale, spinach, lettuce, and pea crops are really coming on, with broccoli, cabbage, and onions close behind. In this picture, the spinach is in the forefront, with the salad mix just behind, and sunset over the Rockies backlighting the entire endeavor.



It's simply lovely, despite the weeds. I am proud and relieved about these vegetables growing well in our field. Look ma, we can farm!


The crops are lovely; the farmers, not so much. Note the mud smeared all over my arm to deter mosquitoes. No one ever said farming was for the dainty, after all.

And yes, my knees and muscles ache after a day of weeding, but after a stiff drink and some tylenol, I sleep REALLY well.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Sowing and Weeding and Sowing and Weeding. . .

Adding vegetables has extended our season on either end, and we are not used to having to manage young crops at the same time we sow our flower seeds for the year. We are a busy family. It feels, at times, futile and overwhelming. . .as though it will never all get done. Our neighbor says to Matt, frequently, "You must really like manual labor."

The truth is, though, we sort of do. And while we're out there ten hours a day with our hand tools and our walk-behind seeder, we see our neighbors out driving their tractors. Everything they do, they do in a machine, which seems a little boring, truthfully. It's funny to think that while they're looking at us like we're crazy for what we're doing, we're thinking that driving and spraying is a pretty boring way to farm. We're all crazy, in the country, in our own special ways.

The Greenhorns film project has a farming motto I like a lot: Land. Liberty. Stamina. Sunshine.

I love all of these, but in May, stamina is hands down the most important. Dirty fingernails and all.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Heirloom Tomatoes, a Dog, and Country Justice

It is serious planting time here on the farm. Almost every variety of seed, flower or vegetable, needs planted in the next two weeks. And we have to transplant our trays. And plant the potatoes and the gladiola bulbs. It is a huge undertaking, but we are working hard at it. Sunday afternoon, after a delightful mother's day brunch, we set to planting tomatoes and getting the row covers on them. The row covers will help keep the plants warm at night and get them started quicker, but most importantly, will keep the high spring winds from shearing them off at ground level. These pepper plants in the back of the truck are the next on the list to be planted.

The tomatoes, all five rows, went in quickly. We are growing Beefsteak, Celebrity, Sweet 100s, Cherokee Purple, and Brandywine. Matt and I worked together down the rows; he dug the holes, and I planted the plants.


The row covers were a different story. For not having covered crops before, we did pretty well, but each row took 30 minutes. This meant we only got three rows covered before dark, but the forecast was calling for high winds this week, so we had incentive to work on them as quickly as possible. We were happy with the sturdy nature of our row covers and with how happy our plants looked inside them. "I hope these hold up to the wind," Matt said as we packed up the truck and headed in for the night. We were concerned they might not, and it was not reassuring that we both had to work all day on Monday.

When we got home from work Monday evening, we found this. In fact, all three row covers had been damaged to various degrees. "We're going to have to pull them all down," Matt said, shaking his head in disappointment. "I can't believe they didn't last even one day." We were shocked and saddened by the tremendous waste of time we'd spent installing these flimsy things.

And then we found the telltale pawprints all over the rows. You can see them if you look carefully in this last picture. Our row covers hadn't blown down, they had been destroyed by our neighbor's dog. Immediately, this was reassuring, as it meant we didn't have to tear all the row covers off. We spent another 45 minutes patching and repairing the covers so that they could remain stalwart tomato guardians. But what to do about the stupid dog?

The dog is a frequent flyer on our property, often leaving steaming giant piles of poop in our driveway to prove he has been around. He likes to drag things off and chew on them in his own hayfield. He is particularly fond of children's shoes and Matt's work boots, but once drug Madzie's booster seat a quarter mile down the road. And we are not the only ones. Often, we see other neighbors running search parties through the surrounding alfalfa fields, looking for their shoes, or boots, or car seats, or chicken waterers. The animal is a public nuisance.

His owners are a nice older couple and very sympathetic. When they returned Matt's boot to us, for instance, Mr. H said, "I beat that dog with this boot so hard I'm ashamed of myself." He has also given us permission to shoot the dog with a BB gun if we find it on our property. While they are sympathetic, they are also opposed to what I feel is an obvious solution: tie the damn dog up.

But they are good people, and it is difficult to stay frustrated with them. And so far, no tomato plants or other saleable merchandise has been destroyed. So far. But I'll say this: If that dog destroys any of my hard-won produce, I might just go shopping for a gun, and it may not be the BB variety.

Saturday, May 9, 2009

New Crops

Statice trays--for fresh and dried bouquets

Bare root raspberries, heritage and autumn bliss. . .one row of each

Bare root strawberries, Ogallala and Fort Laramie. . . two rows each

Onions.













Peas.

















Lettuce













Broccoli, now being eaten by unknown insect.
















Peonies. . .if ladybugs on each bud any indication, likely infested with aphids.

Friday, May 8, 2009

Coincidence or Providence?

Because we don't have a greenhouse here at the farm, we bought our vegetable and flower starts from local greenhouse producers, which are in no short supply here in Colorado. It's pricey, and something we need to revisit next year. The average date of last frost in Northern Colorado is May 15th, so we've had to figure a system to hold these trays for the last two weeks until we plant them with row covers tomorrow and hope we don't get a hard freeze. We also started some annuals and perennials in trays two weeks ago, since they are a bit hardier. Grandma Hug and Aunt Barb sowed these same perennials for us last summer, but the trays blew away in a windstorm while Matt and I were at work and we lost the crop.

The "plastic over the fence tied down with logs" approach has been working for the past week. I check water in the trays before I leave for work in the morning and first thing when I get home, and the chickens, who are forever escaping their pasture pen, can't see the delicious greenery available for lunch. The pallets allow for good drainage and air circulation. It's a decent system for a short-term solution.


This morning, though, the wind is howling from the northwest. Little Madzie had the pukes last night, so she and I are home from school today while she recovers. Good thing. At about 8 o'clock this morning, 45 minutes after we usually leave the farm, I heard the plastic whipping around in the wind. It had been blown out from under the logs holding it down along the back and on one side, and was furiously flapping around and flogging our poor brandywine tomato plants. The tray of perennial Helenium had been blown on top of the Catanache tray behind it and ruined. So I got out there and moved all the trays over to our east side patio, which offers some wind protection while still providing sunlight.

You can see that the Brandywines are a bit dessicated from the abuse, but most of them, I think, will live. Had I not been here on the farm to address the situation, and remember, I was not planning to be here, we would have come home to $500 worth of dead vegetable starts and another perennial seedling tray catastrophe. There are a number of possible explanations for this: karma, coincidence, God. I generally don't think God meddles around in people's lives so much that he would make sure I was home to save the seedlings. But in light of recent events, I want to believe in this kind of providence. The world does seem simpler and less scary if you believe God is watching out for you. I don't know if I really believe he is, but I know that I really want to believe it. Let's call that a step in the right direction.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Having Faith

Well, we've gone and done it. I officially gave notice at work that I will not be returning half time in August, and tomorrow, will officially decline a full-time teaching position at the local community college. We've decided that I should try to stay home and run the farm.

This has not been an easy decision. If this past winter is any indicator, Matt's job might not keep him employed through the coming winter, and we need his full salary plus a little more per month to keep ourselves clothed, fed, and housed. My part time off-farm income has always made up this difference, and that has been a warm security blanket on our sometimes precarious financial situation.

This year, we're going to ask the farm to service its own debt, make up the monthly difference in the family budget, and bank a cushion in case of a winter layoff. It's a tall order and a rather frightening leap of faith. It's a hard thing to trade the security of working for someone else, where you know the salary and the benefits and can budget accordingly, to working for yourself, where all of those things are quite variable. And especially in this economy, it seems crazy to decline perfectly good jobs.

But it's time to start giving the farm all of our creativity, and effort, and love, in the hope that if we do so, the business will give more back to us. In making what feels like a huge decision, we asked ourselves whether we really believed in this dream, and in the end, despite the challenges, our answer was a resounding yes.

And so, with faith, we proceed into the unknown. God help us.

Monday, April 27, 2009

Forgetting


The season always comes on stronger than we think it will. Now, with so much to be done outside and both of us at off-farm jobs all day, we are already seeing things slip through the cracks. I have forgotten to send the sales tax in to Greeley. We don't owe any taxes, but we still should have filed a return. I need to send our license renewal fee to the City of Louisville, and get a license to import and sell Maggie and Dan's salmon, and find a local source of organic grain. And many other things that I don't remember I've forgotten, I'm sure.

We need to run the drip lines, and quick. We had some serious germination issues last year, mostly due, we think, to the fact that it took us so long to get consistent water to the seeds. We have been saved this year by a series of late spring rain storms, which have helped get our early sowings started. However, the broccoli, pea, and kale starts will not stay started for long once the heat sets in if we don't have water on them.

The problem is that the drip lines from last year were chewed up by mice over the winter, and we won't get the new heavy duty rolls we ordered until tomorrow. Gnawed sections slow the process of running drip line, already tedious, way down. Luckily, we are supposed to get more rain on Friday and Saturday. You'd think we lived in Oregon, the way it has been coming down. . .

And so, we move slowly toward summer's first harvest. The native grass on the pond is germinating, the perennials are putting on new growth in their newly weeded bed, and the early vegetables are poking their way up through the topsoil crust. The area around the house may look shabby, but when the field is blooming, it just doesn't matter.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

No grown ups or bad kids allowed. . .

This is the "tree fort" that the kids have adopted. They like to climb these trees and play, well, I don't know what, exactly. As you can see, no grown ups or mean kids are allowed inside. Two excellent rules being broadcast to the neighborhood, as that sign is about six feet from the road.

We don't know how long the sign has been posted, and we have decided not to take it personally. Happy is the child with a grown-up-free tree fort.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

When chicks come home to roost. . .


. . .they look like this.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Peonies

Last week, the peonies were just barely poking their little heads through the soil. In this first (somewhat blurry, I know) picture, you can barely see one red tip, April 11th, struggling its way through the dry, crusty soil.




Today, April 20th, they are stretching and vigorous, growing in height and girth, sunbathing in the warmth. The curly willow have small green leaves. The hydrangeas are slowly coming to life.


And we are waking up, too, the four of us. Stretching in the spring warmth, and enjoying the sunshine.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Happy Anniversary to Us!


Today is the first anniversary of Boyles Family Farms in Gill. We signed the closing papers on this day last year, and the moving weekend took sad priority over Matt's birthday, also April 18th. Not today, though, as we went out to dinner last night and will tonight have cake and go see "Monsters vs. Aliens" with the kids. Happy birthday, sweetie. . .hope it beats last year's!

The weather could be better for a birthday celebration. It has been raining since 3:00 Thursday afternoon out here, and is not supposed to clear up until tomorrow morning. We knew the storm was coming, and tried in vain to get the grass and forage seed in before it hit. By the time we both got home on Thursday at 4:00, however, it was too late. The rain, though pouring down, was not the problem. Matt and I are both fully aware that we aren't made of sugar, but it was accompanied by lightning and thunder, which made it just too dangerous to slog around out there on top of the pond with the seeder.

The rain has helped us discover one of the reasons why the soil in our corral is stubbornly refusing to rehabilitate. . .poor drainage, as evidenced by strawberry lake (shown above). The strawberry patch will need a new location three years from now anyway, to prevent diseases from setting into the soil, but we have been planning to start constructing the grape arbors in the corral as well.

The problem is the hard-packed soil underneath the depth we can rip and disc with our machinery. The soil we can work is nice and loose, but it sits on top a layer of hard-packed clay that makes drainage near impossible. Without drainage, the salts won't leach, and if the salts don't leach, yields will stay low on the corral crops.

It's not an easy fix. We don't have the money or the horsepower to rip deeper into the soil, so our machines can't help us. But we don't want to always have a giant patch of dirt right next to the house, either, because despite the fact that my mom is subtly encouraging Madzie's interest in horses, we don't plan to get horses here on the farm. At all.

So, we're going to go ahead and build the grape arbors, but we're going to keep wide paths between them, wide enough for the tractor to fit through. We're going to purchase a mowing implement of some kind, which we really need anyway, and we're going to plant sudan grass in between the arbors. Sudan grass is an aggressive grower, whose roots grow strong and deep. If we get the crop established and then keep it well mowed (or let the hogs forage on it), the roots of the grass will break up the hard clay soil underneath and between the arbors. When the roots shrivel and die at the end of the season, they will have broken up the hard pack and created more drainage, as well as adding "green manure" to the soil with all its nutrition, lowering our need for fertilizer on the grapes.

It's a good idea for a sustainable system. We'll see how it all actually works.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

A Day of Weeding. . .Photography by Madzie and Simon