Sunday, October 28, 2012

2012 Fall Season, week 5

October 27, 2012

This week's harvest:
Kale
Sweet Potatoes
Butternut Squash
Garlic
"Hakurei" Salad Turnips
Greens Choice: Arugula, Swiss Chard, Mizuna, Red Mustard
Daikon Radish
Sweet Red & Yellow Peppers
Hot Peppers

This week's farm news:

Early in the week our family took a couple of days off from the farm to celebrate our 13th wedding anniversary and Olivia's 3rd birthday (yes, she was borm on our 10th anniversary!) we went to nearby Barren River Lake State Park and enjoyed some fishing, the bike trails and playgrounds, and the glorious autumn weather!

Once we got back on the farm, we (with Jesse & Hannah's helping hands) got busy mulching the garlic patch. We started out by raking and bagging leaves from our driveway and then spreading them a couple of inches thick over the garlic beds. We then covered the leaves with old hay mulch to keep them from blowing away in the wind! Now the garlic crop is all tucked in for the winter.

Then the final not-so-fun-hoorah for the week was having Olivia, then Opal, then Ira come down with some type of flu bug leaving them feverish and laid-up in bed and leaving Mama & Papa sleepless and bedraggled. I look very forward to seeing the sparkle return to their sweet blue eyes!

May your week be full of good health!

2012 Fall Season, week 4

October 20, 2012

This week's harvest:
Sweet Potatoes
Butternut Squash
Garlic
Lettuce
"Hakurei" Salad Turnips (and their delicious greens!)
Baby Ginger!
Greens Choice: Kale, Mizuna, Collards, Red Mustard

This week's farm news:

The week was a busy one! With a little help from (our new neighbors!) Jesse and Hannah, we finally finished digging the sweet potatoes! Hooray! Now they are tucked away in our greenhouse for curing and storage. We also planted next year's garlic crop. Double hooray! We still have to mulch it but otherwise, two major projects were checked off our "to-do" list this week! We also dug our first ever crop of ginger. We didn't grow a whole lot for our trial year, but it's enough to give y'all a taste! And it was successful enough that we intend to grow more in the future. And, boy, is it yummy! Our growing season isn't long enough for ginger to obtain that characteristic tan-brown colored skin. Here, we harvest it in the "baby" stage...while it is amazingly tender, juicy, and not at all fiberous. Enjoy this special treat! Also, enjoy this gorgeous autumn weather and beautiful fall foliage! What a special time of year.

2012 Fall Season, week 3

October 13, 2012

This week's harvest:
Arugula
Lettuce - "Bronze Arrowhead"
Kale
Salad Turnips
Sweet Red & Yellow Peppers
Sweet Potatoes
Butternut Squash
Hot Peppers
Parsley
Garlic

This week's farm news:

The most exciting news of the week is that our dear friends and now new neighbors(!) have officially moved to Bugtussle! Jesse and Hannah arrived with a big moving van on Wednesday (with a big dog and chickens in tow!). They have been busy trying to get themselves settled back in their old "intern rooms" in the barn...their temporary headquarters until they get their little cabin built on their new homestead. What an amazing and fun development for all of us. I just feel so much like all of our lives are going to be greatly enriched. And so we open a new chapter for Bugtussle Farm.

Otherwise this week Eric and I could have been found with our hands in the dirt grubbing for sweet potatoes!

Saturday, October 13, 2012

2012 Fall Season, week 2

October 6, 2012

This week's harvest:
Sweet Potatoes
Butternut Squash
Garlic
Kale
Mizuna
Salad Turnips
Sweet Red and Yellow Peppers
Tomatoes
End-of-the-season Basil
Assorted Hot Peppers
Eggplant

This week's farm news:

The week started out with a good amount of rain, which was welcome, but it left the garden too wet for us to be able to plant garlic and finish digging our sweet potatoes. (Which is no small chore!) Eric did manage to get in a cultivation of some young lettuces and greens on Friday afternoon. It was a little wet (still) but more rain is on the way and the young carpet of weeds was really hoping to take over!

Eric purchased two new rams this week from our good friends at Windy Acres Farm over in Orlinda, TN. This is the first sheep purchase we've made since we originally started our Katahdin flock. Eric just felt like it was time to introduce some fresh young blood to our flock's genetics. We won't put the new rams in with the ewes until around Thanksgiving, so in the meanwhile their mower-mouths are being put to good use in our orchard and overgrown areas of the garden.