And we had planned...

Today's non-planned farming activities have included welding the deck on the lawn mower and going out to buy a new PTO shaft after the old one broke. That entailed cutting the old one off , running to TSC for a replacement, and then cutting the new one to length before the tractor could be used again... There is a lot to be said for TOOLS on a farm! And tools most people don't think about, like chop saws.

In the mean time we got 1200 onions planted, the lawn mowed (a two+ hour task - our lawn is big!), and the balance of the onions (3000+) sorted.

Now hubby will retill and hill and we will try to get seeds in before dark and tomorrows forecast rain...

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Onions, Onions, Onions.

So far we have (of our onions) 2 cases of in the ground. And poor farmer hubby has done all 4,000ish of them himself. I have been working and went to a farm class this weekend. So it has been all him.

It is strange, because he is now on the farm full time. I almost said he "Quit his job" but that implies that he is sitting on the couch and playing the computer, but in the past month he has been a busy boy as he has transitioned to "Full time farmer."

In the same month I have been little help, which makes me a bit sad. But we still need my "real job" income (and 100% of it) to make this work. As the farm pays for itself and finances its own growth my salary pays for all the little things like bills, rent, food, and life. But still it seems like I am missing something on the farm.

Hopefully by early summer I won't feel that way as much.

This weekend the class I took was on farm recordkeeping (among other stuff.) It left me realizing how much better our records need to be. Before my focus was on what the IRS needed, but I need so much more. How many hours did we spend doing X this year. We decided to grow Tinga-Ma-Veggies for market, how much did we make on those, what is the cost to produce 1 Tinga-Ma-Veg, what is the overhead, DON"T FORGET YOUR LABOR... It made me feel that I need to spend more hours in this chair, in front of my computer.

Well, the season never feels real until first market and first CSA pickup anyway. The latter is 6 weeks away and the former we have not set our first week yet. But things are growing and we are getting excited... So much to do, so excuse me, I have 3 cases of onions to help with...

Blogging the holidays...

This holiday season has just kicked my butt! Really. I am finally starting to breath, both figuratively and literally.

We started December by being gone for a week (9th - 12th) for the Great Lake Lakes Fruit and Vegetable Expo. When there we started to feel a little ill.

By Monday the 15th, with no Christmas tasks done (not even the tree) I was feeling well and truly beat. The wonderful flu kept me hacking all night, going to work on massive amounts of DayQuil, attempting to keep my voice from totally going out, coming home and right into bed. Monday, Tuesday, by Wednesday I was getting next to no sleep. I went to the doctor after work Thursday with a 103 degree temp and a cough that would NOT stop! Antibiotics and home to sleep for the next 20 hours, at least for the 10 minutes an hour I was not coughing

Friday I stayed home from work, and still no Christmas got done. By Saturday I was feeling a little better. Which is good because we cleaned ( a little) and put up our tree because my sister and her family pulled in at 5:00.

On Sunday we finally made some cookies, and my nieces helped. I started to feel better and the next week was the whirlwind that Christmas with family staying with you is. I worked Monday and Tuesday and we went to Stan Hewit, December Days at the Zoo, Christmas dinner for 8, and family over the day after, not to mention shopping, shopping and shopping! My 5 year old niece discovered the cookie boxes and until we found 4 cookies stuffed in her mittens no one realized she had discovered the cookie box.

But it explained so much! 6 dozen cookies into a 5 year old in three and a half days... No wonder her tummy hurt! And that was before her 13 year old sister decided to give her Mountain Dew...

Now that the holidays are over it is time to start thinking about our 2009 season! So much to do and the start of the season's work is only a couple months away. Seeds will be ordered in January and the first started in February!

So much to learn...

The life of a farmer is one of never ending movement.

In the spring it starts with starting and planting. The summer sees weeding and harvesting. The fall sees field clean up and more harvesting. But the fall does not see the end of movement.

In the winter is the time to move our ideas. Once planting begins in the spring the plans have been laid the goals set forth and you move in as close to a straight line as possible.

But in the winter we can zig zag, go in a circle, or do anything else we want, IDEAS can fly!

An catalogues come and field layouts start the energy is as frenzied as the spring, just in a more cerebral way. The goal is always that the plan is set come March and we can make the best use of our resources (among which time is the most precious.) Not that it will happen, but we can try!

Dedication to Local Food...

You can tell that the Local Food Movement has come a long way when people are willing to walk a quarter mile, uphill both ways, in 20 degree weather and ice to buy a couple heavy bags of produce which they then carry back to their cars!

And really it was uphill both ways to the market this morning because the path between the Happy Days visitor's center and the parking lot crosses under the road, so you go down and then come back up!

Many of the vendors too suffered for the food, pulling some of what was brought today up from under inches of snow in 20-30 degree temperatures.

All that being said we just about sold out! All our storage onions, pasnips, leeks, and butternut squash went. We had brought 4 bushels of onions, leaving the last one home because last week we only sold about a bushel of onions. Around 10 this morning we looked down and only had half a bushel of the yellow's left! So farmer hubby ran home (it pays to live close to market) and brought the last bushel of onions. We sold every last one of the storage onions !

We did come home with a bushel of red onions, which sold better last week, but that was all...

The customers came and bought! I think everyone had a good day at market!

Our leeks still in the ground froze solid in the 17 degree night last week so this market officially marked the last day of our 2008 season! Deep breath...

The seed catalogues for 2009 have started to come and we are planning big things for next year! Stay tuned for news...