Light reading material
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Monday, August 22, 2011
Hometown Weekend
This weekend was chuck full of home town fun. Friday night started the Old Timers softball tournament in MC. It’s slow pitch softball and you have to be over 30 to play. Seeing as it’s such a small area everyone pretty much everyone else on the different teams and I’m guessing that the majority of them are related somehow. So the highlight of the tourney was the free roasted corn. I love sweet corn and they had some of the best sweet corn that I’ve ever had. Saturday was more softball and St Cloud actually ended up winning the whole tourney. The payout was beer! Lots and lots of beer. After the games it was time to chill out and relax for the evening.
Yesterday I went to the garden to pick whatever was on my purple bean plants. I’m having a bumper crop of beans and they are amazing! I ended up only picking half of the plot but ended up with just under 8 pounds of beans a whole sink full! I will pick the 2nd row tomorrow and get them cleaned up and in the freezer. Next year I’m going to be applying for my farmers market vendors certificate. I could be getting three to four dollars a pound for these beans and now that I know this garden is the perfect spot for this type of plant I will be filling it with beans for next year. My tomato trellises were an epic fail so I’ve been working at trying to get the fruits to ripen before they split on the vine. Next year I have a different plan for tomato trellises so we’ll see how they end up working otherwise I may have to go back to tomato cages and I just don’t want to do that.
I have to start taking some pictures of the farm while we are in the middle of renovating the barn to make it so the momma’s can stay inside all winter and not freeze their knockers off. There is so much work to be done and only a month and a half to 2 months to do it and I’m gone for most of September and October. It’s going to be hard to get everything done in time!
Monday, August 8, 2011
Country Mouse Visit's the Big City
Went to the big city this weekend for an anniversary party and to have lunch with Tanya and say hi to baby bump Stella. Saturday was packed with running around to pick up things you just can’t get in or around St Cloud. One thing you don't see around St Cloud is a Lincolin Zepher with spinners on it with two guys in it laid back, hats on crooked...... drinking Capri Sun.... the juice in the bag. You'll see guys walking down the street with Miller Lite in wife beaters and cut offs but never Capri Sun.
moving on
There was a trip to the “good” Target to pick up little things for Baby Paige’s birthday next weekend. There was a trip to the craft store to see if there was anything new that the local Evan’s doesn’t carry. (Evan’s is like the Ben Franklin on Monona just half the size!) I found everything I needed and some stuff I didn’t but it was a good trip down. The highlight was the anniversary dinner at TSO’s. Ken’s burgundy peppercorn steak, a pork griller, tons of wine, and great conversation. I miss my GE friends so much, I miss the access to anything I could possibly need at pretty much any time of day but really when it comes down to it, I’m exactly where I need to be. This backwards town of 506 people is starting to grow on me. The accessibility to my family is something I haven’t had for the last 16 years and it trumps having access to Chinese food and a Starbucks.
I do have to say though, I thought I would really miss my “good coffee” but there is a coffee system here at work that makes the most perfect cup of coffee and mocha that is better than Starbucks and Caribou combined. There is a coffee shop in the town I work in but the 2 times I’ve been there I’ve had poor service and gotten watered down bland coffee. I’ll take the mud from work, thanks!
Wednesday night we picked up our 22 bales of straw and put them in the top of the barn. Slowly but surely we are getting ready for the momma’s to come in late September. It will be nice to have animals again. I miss having my cows and it will be nice to get 2 that are already pregnant so in May we’ll have babies on the farm also.
I’ve started drawing plans for my chicken coop; I’m thinking a name of Henny Bunkport or Cluckingham Palace would be a great name for the future chicken shack. I also found an Amish gentleman to do the chicken dispatching for me. We have a pack of coyotes that lives in the back woods and they keep getting closer and closer to the house. I’m worried if we actually process chickens here on the farm that we’ll encourage them to come and hang out more than they already do, and that will mean a stressed out Erin and some stressed out chickens.
The garden is finally producing and I should have a bunch of purple beans to pick this afternoon and hopefully some ripe tomatoes! As far as I know there’s only been one ripe one so far. I’m guessing there has been more but someone has been getting to them before I am. My tomato trellis’ were an epic fail and we will have to revisit that plan again next year. I have more ideas from them and I’d like to get them perfected before the big market gardens go in. I’m still on track for my 5 year plan and hopefully maybe get the market part started within the next 2 years and the CSA started at year 5.
Pictures of the purple beans and garden tomorrow.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Radio Silence
Not to much is going on lately at the River Ln farm. It's to hot to do anything outside, there's a big snake living in my flower bed and a small snake living in the basement so now I have a ton of weeds in the flower bed and I'm to chicken to go down in the basement to cool off.
The garden is perking up after the wind storm a couple of weeks ago. My corn is back to its upright position and the tomatoes are climbing their trellising twine. I'm guessing because of the heat we're going to have a bumper crop of tomatoes just in time to make salsa!
Work is going well and I'm learning more and more every day. I was telling my boss the other day that I've learned more in the last month from him than I did in my last 9 months at my previous job. It's nice to actually be using my education!
It's farmers market time and I hit up the one in Chilton every Friday to get my lettuce, my first attempt at lettuce ended in an epic fail but I'm not upset in the least. There is a farmer at the market that had the best lettuce I've ever had so the disappointment I felt in my mini lettuce gardens is quickly washed away as soon as I open up that little bag of yummy! My other favorite person at the market is the woman who sells the hydroponic tomatoes. They are the absolute best tomatoes I've ever had and because they are hydroponic they have a consistent taste through out the year. I will never have to buy mealy yucky tomatoes again! Besides Chilton I try and hit up at least one if not two more farmers markets during the week to get all of the produce we need to get us through.
I've been designing market garden plans, learning about manure, fertilizer and compost and what I want to add to my veggies to make them more profitable for the upcoming years. I think the librarian doesn't think I sleep for the amount of books I check out in a week. She always has some funny comment about the books that I check out and how they are always on farming, gardening and cooking. Well why bother reading if you're not passionate about it or enjoy it!
The garden is perking up after the wind storm a couple of weeks ago. My corn is back to its upright position and the tomatoes are climbing their trellising twine. I'm guessing because of the heat we're going to have a bumper crop of tomatoes just in time to make salsa!
Work is going well and I'm learning more and more every day. I was telling my boss the other day that I've learned more in the last month from him than I did in my last 9 months at my previous job. It's nice to actually be using my education!
It's farmers market time and I hit up the one in Chilton every Friday to get my lettuce, my first attempt at lettuce ended in an epic fail but I'm not upset in the least. There is a farmer at the market that had the best lettuce I've ever had so the disappointment I felt in my mini lettuce gardens is quickly washed away as soon as I open up that little bag of yummy! My other favorite person at the market is the woman who sells the hydroponic tomatoes. They are the absolute best tomatoes I've ever had and because they are hydroponic they have a consistent taste through out the year. I will never have to buy mealy yucky tomatoes again! Besides Chilton I try and hit up at least one if not two more farmers markets during the week to get all of the produce we need to get us through.
I've been designing market garden plans, learning about manure, fertilizer and compost and what I want to add to my veggies to make them more profitable for the upcoming years. I think the librarian doesn't think I sleep for the amount of books I check out in a week. She always has some funny comment about the books that I check out and how they are always on farming, gardening and cooking. Well why bother reading if you're not passionate about it or enjoy it!
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Garden envy
This is the lovely Amish garden I drive past every day on the way to and from work. I'm super jealous of the lack of weeds and how green it looks!
This is another garden on the way to work. The stakes in the middle are actually tomato trellises. The tomato plants wrap around the rope hanging down and it provides support and is easier to control the taller bushier plants as the metal tomato cages tend to tip over and are rarely tall enough to support the whole tomato plant.
This is my sad weed garden. I've been making progress on it so I will take another picture but there's still a ton of quack grass in it and it's just in a very sad state right now.
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