Some recent pictures

Cousins: Sena, Aiyana, Julia, Stella and Lucy

 Aiyana with Lucy

My mother, the girls and I went to Stonington a couple of weeks ago, for an Oceanography class that Sena and Aiyana were taking. It was a foggy day.

 My mom, Buca to the girls

 Buca, Sena and Aiyana

 Empty docks

 Aiyana and her doggie friend, Yo.

 Aiyana wearing a scarf

I just found out that these lovely flowers are called grape hyacinths. They come up wild on the edge of our field, and smell delightful.

 These are hyacinths I planted two winters ago and they too smell heavenly.

 What my hands look like at this time of the year.

 Midnight

Peace

The leaves are out!

Ed saw a fox this morning near the cow pasture.

Yesterday after the rain, I looked outside, and to my surprise, I could see that tiny leaves had appeared on many of the trees. It’s like that every year, one day the trees are bare, and then, seemingly quite suddenly, the leaves are there. It’s a lovely pale green color which surrounds the trees like a halo and makes everything seem more vibrant.

Yesterday the cows got out of the pasture. Their paddock was close to the road, so we’re guessing that something must’ve spooked them on the road, and they ran the other way. Fortunately they did not go too far, and were still in the enclosure of the electric fence, in a safe spot.

Today Sena and Aiyana and I are having our tea party. We have one every Sunday. We use the fancy china cups I have from my grandmother Mamaia, and we have herbal tea and biscuits. We knit and talk and just hang out. Sometimes we pretend to be fancy ladies and we act in a very dignified manner. Mostly we just have fun.

The peach and apple trees are in the ground. The blueberry bushes just arrived on Friday – we will get them planted this week. The kale is looking like it’s recovering after the frost damage last week. Everything else in the field is looking good.

I love this time of the year, but I’ve been feeling tired over the past two weeks. I think it has to do with seasonal change and the increased level of physical activity that came with it. I started taking a multivitamin again, the New Chapter Organics brand that helped me in the past. I hope it works this time. I certainly need all the energy I can get at this time of year, and can’t drag myself around feeling being tired.

peace

The kale and peas got hit by the frost we had last week. They were not killed, but set back with damage to the leaves. Hopefuly with the nice weather we're having now and some rain they'll come back nicely.

Tomatoes are looking good. They're in soil blocks right now, and will not go in the grouind until early May. We keep them in the green house during the day and bring them in the basement at night to protect them from the cold, since our greenhouse is only heated by the sun. This is quite an undertaking every day, bringing them back and forth, given that we have about 450 plants, but tomatoes are a very important crop for us so we must do everything we can to take good care of them.

Everything else that we planted so far is mostly coming along nicely. We're starting to see the usual culprits as far as insect pests for this time of the year: imported cabbage butterfly, flea beetles, and a little cutworm. The fleabeetles have damaged a bed of arugula already and i plan to stop planting that crop until the flea beetle cycle is done (a few weeks?). Cutworm damage has not been bad at all yet, have only lost a few beets, but we'll have to see how things continue to go. It's really interesting to notice these patterns over the years, the insect pests and their cycles. Since we do not use pesticides, one practice that is part of our tools is to time our crops based on pest cycles in such a way as to avoid peak damage times. For instance cutworms are very active in spring and they slow down considerably later in the season. Another important tool is to attract beneficial insects and encourage them to stay on our farm. We call them beneficial because they kill pest insects. We attract them by planting flowers and herbs that they like, and by not spraying pesticides, which kill target as well as non-target insects. I already saw a few beneficials like wasps and bumble bees.

Opal is "bagging up", which means that her udder is getting visibly larger, as she approaches birth. Today we're having a large animal vet come and meet the cows, and us. Hopefuly won't need him but we want to establish a relationship anyway.

We've been giving Opal and Jasmine treats from the greenhouse every day. They love claytonia best and second best, lettuces. For me, the treat is simply spending time with them. They are beautiful animals. I love their presence, their unhurried ways, the way they smell, the way they stretch their necks to be scratched. They brought a whole new dimension to our farm, and it feels more whole now. I also feel more whole, and I am grateful to them for that.

Peace

(Tuesday 4/15)

I always forget how busy this time of year is. As soon as the weather warms up, as it did over the past week, there’s an explosion in plant growth, and everything wants to go in the ground. Onions, kale, broccoli, cabbages, chard and other plants, which we started as seedlings in soil blocks as far back as February, and which were barely growing until a couple of weeks ago, have since been picking up and growing visibly overnight, and now must be transplanted in the ground. We have also been working on transplanting apple trees, and are expecting a shipment of blueberry bushes and peach trees at the end of this week, all of which need to go in the ground ASAP. This urgency combined with the fact that the soil is wet and unworkable for days at a time make this time of year pretty stressful. Today and overnight we are expecting 2 to 4 inches of rain, so I’ll just have to postpone any planting until the soil dries up in a few days.

(Wednesday 4/16)

After writing the above, we ended up getting snow overnight, and the ground was covered when I got up in the morning. I inspected the plants and everything seems to have held up fine. But tonight we're expecting a low of 25F, and I am worried. We covered everything, but some of the plants may still get damaged.This is April...

This week has been much warmer and as a result we’ve seen a spurt in plant growth. The spring peepers are out every night, and in the morning, many birds call. The cows have been shedding their winter coat and replacing it with a soft, fuzzy, new one.

I’ve been busy with the usual: cooking, homeschooling, planting, taking care of seedlings, harvesting and selling at the farm. I’m also training myself and Opal for milking. Her calf is due in early May and I have to be ready to milk her then. I’ve been training her to come out from the pasture and into the stall where I’ll milk her. She comes for greens. I put a bucket of claytonia or mizuna or other some other fresh greens in front of her stanchion and she comes right in. Then, while she eats, I sit by her side and touch her belly and udder, similar to what I’ll be doing when milking. So far, she hasn’t tried to kick me yet, because she’s such a good cow. But I am not expecting things to go too smoothly at first. I’ve been warned by enough people that at some point I’ll be in tears. For now, I’m doing what I can to get both of us used to the milking routine.

I love being with the cows. The nicest thing I did for myself lately, (other than lying in bed with Sena and Aiyana telling stories at night), is to sit in the pasture with the cows and be part of the natural world. It’s peaceful and grounding.

It’s a beautiful day today. I hope you enjoy it!

Peace

I put pictures of snowdrops up every spring. They're very special.

Jasmine and Opal on the move. In the background is their movable shelter and stanchion where we're going to milk them.

Opal. She's so cute and very pregnant.Today her baby was moving a lot, I could see ripples going through her belly, and I felt it kicking too. She's due to calve in early May.

Peace