Hi Friends & Farm-ily,
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We hope you all have been enjoying the delicious Spring veggies as we roll into our second month of harvest! We can hardly believe how quickly the time passes between one harvest week to another. We’ve been extra bee-zy this weekend taking care of the farm and have been gearing up to ceremoniously begin sowing seeds for our Fall succession of crops. Does anyone else think June is just flying by… ?
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Two farmers, One farm. In 4 weeks of harvest we’ve distributed 8,400lbs of produce to our members! All of that produce has been grown thoughtfully and with love. Prepped, seeded, transplanted, weeded & harvested by 2 sets of hands (each and every berry was picked by farmer Jess or farmer Brian). With the shares getting a touch more bountiful with summer crops, that puts us on track to grow and distribute over 60,000lbs of produce this season. It’s a pretty amazing number and we look forward to harvesting the bounty over the next 6 months. **Last year at this time we had distributed 6,800lbs of produce and two years ago at this time we had distributed 2,100 lbs of produce to our members which means your farmers are growing better with each passing season. This is our 6th season running the CSA and every year it just gets better and better.**
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The summer solstice, the longest day of the year, is just a few days away (on Sunday) and we certainly feel all the energy as we’ve been up with the sun at 20 past 5 and heading in at sunset around 9:30. We’ve been getting better at taking breaks during the hottest times of the afternoon/early evening to make dinner and get back out in the fields at 7 for a few hours. We call 7-9pm the “magic hours” here on the farm… from the low, glimmering sunlight to the cooler breeze – it’s just such a joy to be out in the garden. The animals love it too – they’re all out there filling their bellies – in the settling of the day – before perching or laying down for the night. On the farm, we’re all ready to hit the hay hard by the end of the evening.
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Feelin’ hot hot hot. We keep waiting to see some clouds or rain in the 10-day but are amazed to see the weather keeping up with the hot and dry pattern this season. Between slowly acclimating to the heat and taking better care of ourselves we are feeling like we will make it through this hot and dry season with smiles on our faces.
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No matter what the seasons may bring, our hearts are in this crazy farm life and we LOVE providing high quality food to our community, Your support and appreciation and utilization of our produce is so encouraging and inspiring to your farmers. So keep up the good work and we promise to do the same!
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Besides the hot and dry, June is also an incredibly busy time in the garden (perhaps one of the busiest of the year). It’s a balancing act between maintaining Spring crops, weeding, sowing summer successions, watering, weeding, preparing stale seed beds, trellising tomatoes and beginning to seed all our fall brassicas (kale, collards, broccoli, cauliflower etc) and root crops (carrots, parsnips, storage beets etc) to name a few. There is much to be done and the list is ever long but we are focusing on the daily tasks at hand. We are being mindful and supportive, patient and encouraging. The simplest thing we can do for each other as farmer’s (and as a husband-wife team) is to remind each other of all the things we have accomplished and try not to worry too much about the things that remain on the list. The balancing act continues..!
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So, happy early summer solstice to you all. We hope you all find yourself enjoying all that summer has to offer. Take time for yourselves, keep being inspired in the kitchen and filling your tummies with delicious food.
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Thank you all for returning berry hallocks and rubber bands. A note about Egg Cartons: please only return our Working Hands Farm egg cartons.
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We leave you with one of our favorite poets.. Ms. Mary Oliver and ‘The Summer Day’…
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The Summer Day
by Mary Oliver
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Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
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working hands farm 
