Will's Monday Lunch

2nd CSA Weekend...

So Friday comes, and HALF of our member familes show up in the evening to help with the harvest! This is great, because they are doing the lion's share of the hard stuff...and they can go home on Friday with their baskets. This is working well. I am not kidding you when I say these fine folks picked 100 POUNDS of green beans!...and this off of the same two rows that gave us 60 lbs last week! AND they weighed and bagged all of them. They also dug enough carrots for the 40 families (and they washed and bundled them too). While all of this was happening, other members were staking and tying the zinnia rows - a precaution before they blow down in a storm we're probably never going to get at this point). Below is a very busy girl...mom has her hands full- Ah yes - I do remember the chasing of small children.

Here are the carrots - quite nice. Cover them with a wet tablecloth

and they'll overnight just fine.
The Hall family (5 beautiful kids) cut and bunch the arugula.

Here is the Saturday morning carport. It was just as busy last night...lots of organized packing of baskets and checking of lists.

And here is a random shot of some of the packed baskets,

with Weekly Selection Sheets sticking out.

My goodness but we're tired. Last night, after all was over for the evening (Will and Rich Beam picked squash in the dark) I brought out a pitcher of Sangria and Will and I sat in the galvanized livestock tub we have in the yard freshly filled with cold water) and we watched the lightening bugs. Seemed like we didn't sleep for 5 minutes before we were up and at it again. But it's what we do. And we love it. We have the most fabulous group of CSA members this year. They all 'get it'...and we're enjoyng their company. Two weeks down - six to go - maybe seven. Lots of good food all over the place.

What month is it Anyway?

June-like hot in late March; cold front in late May (nights in the 40s) and no rain, no rain, no rain. So we've been watering non-stop...two kinds of sprinklers, two kinds of drip hoses and flooding the field with the pond water. Distressing, but if we had a good thunderstorm things would be very raggedy out there, so you just don't know what to wish for.

And the bell peppers have TERRIBLE aphid problems and Will has been doing everything there is to be done, but the problem is not solved - we shall see. And the basil on one side of the field is dying - some kind of bacterial rot thing. And the first planting of cucumbers, after two weeks of good production - well, those are dying too. But it's strange - they're dying on the tops. who knows. Every year there are some things that fail - but it's still heartbreaking. All is not bad, though,. The garden as a whole looks pretty fabulous. You have to be very intimate with the garden to see the problems and worry about them. There is another planting of cucumbers and of basil, both of which look great so we'll cross our fingers on both. Maybe even plant an extra row of bell peppers, even though they won't be our own seedlings. Here are some random garden photos to keep you going...just this and that from here and there.

Dinner

Beets, beet greens and chard, fried zucchini, cucumbers...yes.

The Weekend

....very productive. Many things done. Will always gets so worried as the week goes by-tasks seem to multiply and this is a very hard time of the season. Then the weekend comes, our members show up to help and the list is back to a reasonable size - not nearly so scary. We've gotten almost everything in the ground, whether it be seed or plants we've started. Just as the flats at the greenhouse dwindle in number, it's time to start more yellow squash, more zucchini, more cucumbers...because what's out there is just the first go-round. So it never looks like we'll be at the point of no flats with seedlings in them - don't know if that's good or bad. And my word it has gotten hot out there. One of the many big deals this weekend was the mulching and staking of the tomatoes that are NOT in the greenhouse.and maybe my sense of time through the morning is skewed I don't know, but it seemed like they got this done in about 40 minutes...which is very fast work! And a huge relief, I don't mind saying. In addition, the field peas were planted, and two more rows of green beans; the little rainbow chard plants put in among their big brothers and sisters The herb beds got some attention in the weeding department, and Will is out there now fertilizing and hilling up the corn. A word about fertilizer. All of the organic choices are pretty darn stinky. I don't know which is worse; crab meal, chicken stuff, or fish emulsion. Because this time it's fish emulsion (pretty much ground up and liquidized fish) I vote for that. I dont remember how many gallons of the stuff Will bought but it was a LOT. He rigged up this system whereby he puts (I think) about 5 gallons in a big 55-gallon tank, then fills it up the rest of the way with water. Then he attached it to a frame on the back of the ancient Farmall tractor and fits plastic piping to it - with a valve you can turn on and off. The pipe has holes dilled exactly where the rows of plants are. So he cranks the whole mess up and gets positioned and I have to get in there and open the valve. Thank goodness it didn't splurt all over me. It's pretty ingenious - but it still smells to high heaven.
and VERY IMPORTANTLY!...the little watermelon plants have been awaiting their new home! One of our new members is a couple who I swear have been here every single weekend for many many weeks! and they showed up today, Sunday...and because of that, the watermelon rows were lined with hoses (for watering) and laid with black plastic! do i get a halelujah!?

no, we didn't get the plants in this evening but we will tomorrow - that is small potatoes compared to preparing the rows...a VERY big deal. Thank you and you know who you are!

And now for some flowering plants; potatoes! :garlic

div align="center">borage (see the bee?)eggplant
and I leave you with the first tomatoes of the season...