The mornings are getting darker and cooler. Part of me wants to put the breaks on summer. I feel like I haven't done anything and it is almost over. Especially with cooler days and cooler evenings. Another part of me is thrilled my favorite time of year is here.
The garden, for what survived, did well, but not what I was hoping for. Not bad though for the first year and a million projects that were priorities over it. Squash plants are huge! I mean huge bushes and long running vines. The winter squash are coming along nicely. Today I am going to dig up some of the beat up potato plants to see if we had any luck with them. The other plants are gorgeous. We had one of the onions so far. They are getting larger by the day.
My hope was to have a big harvest party. We are still trying to throw together a party. It just won't be much of what we grew. Luckily, I live in a pretty big Ag community with plenty of farms to buy from. We are also hoping to get some music and have folks just give a donation to the band. I am looking forward to making it an annual gathering, if we can just get the first one off the ground.
Yesterday we picked up a chest freezer from a friend. We have a quarter share of beef coming in a couple weeks. I will also have some veggies to be put up in the freezer and we are thinking of getting some meat birds that we can grow in 12 weeks and harvest for the freezer to cover us through winter.
How we are slowly changing the way we think about food and eating is such an amazing process. I weeded the strawberries yesterday and I am thrilled that the majority of them survived, even thrived, and are shooting off runners. The patch will be great next year.
We have plans for trees in October. While we have to prepare wind breaks, I am also shooting to get the orchard started. The overall plan for the land is starting to come together. We can see how it is going to evolve over time. That makes it feel a bit more manageable. By next year we should be able to introduce new chickens, meat goats and pigs. It will be an interesting year two.
I am putting together a photo book of the first years evolution. It was just barely over a year ago that I put a bid on the farm while J was at Sundance praying. We closed at the end of September and this incredible journey began. The change in the farm and in us in mind boggling. I went through the photos the other day and still can't believe what we bought and what it has become. No wonder I am tired. Good bone tired from a labor of love.
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