Exciting news for our CSA members! Townshend Cellar Winery has partnered with us for the 2010 season. If you are a member, you can go directly to them and receive a discount on your purchases! We are really excited as they are local and have fantastic wine. We have not had a bad wine from them and really enjoy the T3 and Vortex. Please check them out and let them know we sent you! Also if you are a wine club member from Townshend you can receive a discount with us. Contact us for more details!
So this past week we picked up our "new" truck which is a 1978 Ford F-150. It is mint green in color with only 52k original miles. The truck is needed to take produce to the markets and for picking up supplies for the garden/chickens. We currently pick up around 500lbs of organic chicken feed every 6-8 weeks from a local supplier.
Mr Russ Messing came over on Wednesday to plow the majority of the garden with his tractor (some areas were still too wet) for us to start directing seeding into the ground. We have starts growing in the greenhouse for some of the warmer weather crops, so this was for the cold weather crops (lettuces, peas, radishes, etc..)
We were accepted to the Spokane Farmers Market, but on an as needed basis because we have the same categories as other vendors who have been there for awhile. We have to call them ahead of time to see if we can go that particular week, but with the large variety of subspecies for each category we are think we will be okay.
My mom is moving out here from Michigan in about 3 weeks so we are looking forward to having some extra help as she will be staying with us temporarily until she can move into her own place. My dad will be following her after he is able to get retirement from Chrysler. As always more to follow!
Oliver loved watching the tractor.
SWEET! pea/mint green...
So on Saturday there was a meet and greet downtown with local area chefs in the morning hosted by Spokane Tilth. In the afternoon it was CSA farms that were there to answer questions to prospective consumers. Yes it is sales but it is not the same as it is in other businesses. The reason is that we know we can only feed so many people so it is great to see that everyone has access to food grown the way it should be, naturally without chemicals, without genetically modified organisms (GMO's.)
We did make some connections with chefs and other farmers. We are looking forward to the season as we are in full swing with seeding right now. This week we are looking to plant our cold weather crops provided the soil drys out enough to restructure the row widths from last year. We also had a blessing of the garden and seeds from Father Casimir today.
Our table with some display materials.
Father giving the blessing today.
We are blessed with the rainbows up here (if you have seen our brochure you know what I mean!)
No, not bench pressing, bench building. Still a lot of work, but one could argue this is even better for you (at least in our case) because these will be used to grow organic vegetables. The process of hard work combined with the use of growing vegetables is really positive both mentally and physically. Then add in our kids wanting to spend their time helping out and playing, it adds even more to the enjoyment of every day life.
While I was working on the benches, Emily has been starting seeds in the house, placing them in the small kitchen bay window. Next on the list this week will be re-creating the rows in the garden as the ones last year were too narrow for bio-intensive methods.
Looking out for a start to the day. The city is fogged out.
Isabel watching daddy use the saw.
Oliver using his drill like daddy.
All work and no play, means there are no kids working with you.
The greenhouse looking west in the evening.
Some flats for an idea of spacing.
Seed flats in the kitchen window.
The day is done, but still beautiful from our deck. (Same direction as top picture.)
We did finish the greenhouse last Monday, I am just a little slow at getting the pictures up. We also received all of our seed last week and I have to say it is amazing how many packages of seed we really have. It is also amazing that we are already about 1/3 of the way through March and things are in full swing. Every day there is so much to do. Seed starts, finish up the greenhouse, move the chicken fence, put doors in the fence, etc... There is definitely a peace that comes with this work that I never really understood until now. More to come.....
The finished outside (still some work to do inside)
Anyone like tomatoes?
Isabel saying hi.
I have my eye on you.....
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