Life in death

On a coffee break last Sunday, we sat outside watching the goats in their temporary pen. Large logs from the dead portion of the maple tree outside our kitchen door remained where they’d fallen—the goats like to climb on them, and one long branch looks like a sculpture of a praying mantis. So we had...

Seeds of summer

Between my trip in January and the endless snow, the possibility of summer seemed very remote, and so I placed my Fedco seed order a month later than usual. Hopefully my order will arrive quickly because according to last year's records I started our first seeds on March 4th. One of the problems with ordering late...

Perfection

On this rainy morning I woke up out-of-sorts because of all the things not yet done…and the limited time I have to spend on them. The chickens have caused a lot of destruction in the vegetable garden—they’ve shredded much of our Swiss chard, and have pecked away at four beautiful cabbages. We now include cabbage...

Summer wanes

Despite the beautiful day, I can’t shake this feeling of melancholy. I believe it is predominantly a change-of-season reaction or, more explicitly, summer-to-fall. I love fall, its crisp coziness, and the winding down of work in the garden. But unlike other seasons, this change seems less about a shift in the weather and length of...

The early bird

Three peach trees have borne fruit. The first, an early variety, was covered with beautiful peaches that turned a lovely reddish color. They smelled wonderful. This was the year we would outsmart the squirrels and get to the peaches first. Yet somehow two days elapsed before we went back, and by then only five peaches...

Nature’s balance

Not only was I stung (twice) by a bald-faced hornet (after I foolishly, if unwittingly, disturbed their nest several times), Koa and Oliver have been stung a couple of times by a second hive near the chicken coop. We never considered killing the hornets, though. Cherisse looked them up, and they are known as a...

Looking forward

Twelve months have passed since I began this blog, although, as is so often the case for me, the time passed in a blur. And yet a closer examination of the day-to-day proves how full those days were. In the next twelve months many of our life's activities will repeat. Vegetables will again be harvested...

Sunday morning chores

 

Future farmers

Every September, growing up, we looked forward to the Guilford Agricultural Fair. We loved the rides, the games of "skill", the foods we never ate anywhere else. Most of all though, we loved the animals: cows, horses, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens. Kids our own age would lead their animals around for judging, and I envied...