Will Spring Ever Come?

I know that, technically, Lady Spring has arrived, but it doesn't feel like it. We still have lows in the 30's! In spite of this, on Friday Adam put the plastic back on the hoop house.

 This year he added PVC rollers on the bottom edges so we can roll the sides up and cool the house that way, when need be.
Adam snapped the plastic in place with this brilliant wiggle wire:

 The four large, leggy tomato plants from the front porch were moved out there right away. I don't care if it was 38 degrees last night -- they have overstayed their welcome on the front porch!

 Adam is building a new door for the hoop house. He used the old one on the chicken coop. Chickens first!! Haha!

Our greens are slow but doing well. Can you see them in the bed? From left to right, a smattering of spinach, red kale, lettuce, and more kale.

 The peas are up and looking great, about 25 of them, too short for their trellis.

 The apple tree in the orchard is blooming. They are the loveliest blooms.

 I let my younger chickens free range today; I feel so sorry for them with no greenery in their run.

The three hens didn't want to eat. They wanted to dust bathe.

 I want them to free range, but I lost one of the young chicks to a predator about a month ago while they were free ranging. A second chick died because of its cross-beak. The third chick, Cassie, is the lowest of the low, on the Chicken Totem Pole. It's so sad. They make her sleep on the floor of the coop, on the other end, while they all sleep on the roost. I feel sorry for her.
Speaking of birds, these friendly fellows perched near us on the ferry yesterday, as we returned from the flea market.

 The gulls were particularly active. Some have white heads, and some have jet black.

 We went across the river Saturday morning just at sunrise -- the 6:15 a.m. ferry.

 Those of you following my weaves, here's the finished shawl/scarf, for sale. It came back home with me. It ended up being 12" wide and over 70" long.

When we drove into the driveway, Trixie trotted up to greet us. She was not supposed to be loose! Trixie was left in the fenced farm pasture with Ned and Baby, to play for the day while we were gone. She should have been behind that fence, but she had somehow escaped! It was horrible to think of what might have happened, but evidently she's a smart cookie, and knew to stay on the back porch waiting for us to come home. Phew! Adam was mighty relieved.

That new market across the river is wearing us both out. I think the verdict is still out, whether we will do it long term. But yesterday was good. However, this not-a-morning-person girl finds it a challenge, that's for sure!

You will probably read this on Palm Sunday, or afterward. Please have a blessed Easter week. It's time to think about Jesus, about His mighty sacrifice and His eternal, persistent love for us. We're having a Seder Supper at our church on Thursday evening, a "recreating," if you will, of the Last Supper, which was, of course, a redoing of the Passover, and simultaneously the first Lord's Supper/Communion. Adam walks us through the dinner, explaining it all, and we break half-way for our own covered-dish supper also. It's a great evening -- if you're local, please come! All are welcome at 6:00 p.m. Have a blessed week.

Everything's Growing But My Bank Balance

Adam just walked in from the garden and said, "You know that wild grapevine on the back garden fence? It's loaded with grapes!"

The back fence is out of control. I don't know what large shrub is under the grapevine, but it's growing on top of it in the sun, as vines love to do. Little clusters of grapes are All Over It. Adam's back there now, whacking off some to produce better grapes. I imagine the birds will find them too.

We've had no success with our grapevines in the "orchard" because they don't get enough sun.
We put some of our Wando peas on a trellis of 4" welded wire, and they are standing upright and beautiful.

They're easy to harvest. But we ran out of that welded wire and thought we'd make some wattle fencing, remember? This is what inadequate wattle fencing will do to your peas:

Next year it's welded wire all the way. We've still harvested bags of peas so far and have a long way to go. A good year for peas. You pick them when they look fat and plump like a sausage but haven't started drying out yet.

Some of my tomato plants have early blight. See it? We pulled about ten beautiful, full plants right out of the bed and threw them on the burn pile :(

The trellising system thus far is excellent for tomatoes.

Can you see how the cord curls around the main tomato stem? It's easy then to gently wrap it around a little more every day or two as the plant grows.
I had a few random volunteer tomato plants in pots. They nearly died when we went on vacation. I put them into the beds where I'd ripped out the sickly tomato plants. They're so short the cords don't reach them yet!

My two rows of bush bean plants are coming up nicely, much better than last year. I probably have them way too close together, but I overplanted because last year I had such bad luck with their germination.

 I'll plant more beans in stages so they don't all come in at the same time.
Here are two volunteer cucumber plants that sprouted in Adam's compost

 Several of these early volunteers already have baby cukes starting on them. They will go in beds later.

 A volunteer tomato and cuke are in one compost pile,
and a volunteer cuke and watermelon are in another.

 

 These are perhaps my healthiest volunteer tomatoes -- three plants that sprouted up from the chicken poop compost pile intended to enrich the asparagus. I wrapped a piece of leftover fence around them for support.

 I guess that chicken poop's not going anywhere for a while!
And speaking of watermelons, Adam filled two more tire planters in the garden and I planted watermelon seeds in there. What do you bet the volunteer watermelon does better? Yep.

 And Adam's willow tree sprig is doing fine in a bigger pot. He will put it in the ground soon.

 In the greenhouse (which is a true hot house these days), I'm starting herbs. I want to start herbs from seed and sell the plants at the farmers' market. Nobody does this, and I think there's a need for it. And unlike cut herbs, the plants only improve week to week. I don't like selling "perishable" items at the market. Any herbs that don't sell I'll simply put in my own herb garden if it gets too big. Below are basil, thyme, tarragon, parsley, and sage, waiting to be born in their little earthen nurseries.

 Many friends responded to my plea for pots!! I really needed the small pots -- the next stage up from the starter cells. I prefer plastic pots; the paper ones leach water away from the little plants' roots.

 There's an issue with little plastic pots. I challenge you to try to find them for sale at WalMart, Lowe's, or your local farm or hardware store. I'm referring to what I wanted: a pack of about ten 2" pots -- plastic ones. I looked and looked. Adam said (as Adam often says), "Let's check online." And we could've bought them online for 30 cents per pot! That's just too much to pay for a very small plastic pot! And if I'm selling my herb plants, that adds quite a bit to the cost per plant.
One day I was roaming in a favorite store, Dollar Tree. Everything in there really is just $1.00. And look what I found!

A pack of twelve little plastic pots -- perfect! -- for $1.00! So I bought 12 packs, of course. Items appear and disappear forever at those dollar stores. Those 144 pots, plus all the donations from friends, will give me pots for years :)
So far I have basil and some early dill to sell.

I think I have a bit of a green thumb when it comes to starting plants, plus I do enjoy it so much. If I could make any money doing that, I would be a happy woman.
Because ... I decided a few months ago to stop working at my part-time afternoon job at an afterschool program for children. It's a lovely place, and I will miss it, but physically it is so taxing. I'm on concrete/asphalt, very active, for 3 hours straight, and it's hard on my bad veins. It wears me out every day and makes me non-productive in the evenings. Even though I don't go to work until about 2:30, it dominates my day from lunch onward. I will still substitute there some, but not every single day. I only have 13 days left! Then I will be a free woman to focus my attentions on my soap/lotion/yard business, and on increasing the productivity of the farm in small ways like selling herbs. So ... here's to new enterprises!

From Soaping to Farming

For any of you who haven't checked over at my personal blog (Through a Glass, Darkly) lately, here's how Maggie is looking. She's a happy, playful, fearless gal who loves to be outside above all things, and hates being in her crate. She cries. We try not to listen.

Red Robin Farm already has a presence each week at the Oriental Farmers' Market, although right now our sign reads "Red Robin Soaps," a business I've had for about five years now. On my market table today, among other things, I had some Purse Babies.

And some crocheted toboggan hats. But since it was 80 degrees, nobody was looking for a hat.

This is an easy-peasy pattern, so fast, and very adaptable to head size.

From that same hat pattern I adapted a head-band too, and these sell well in the winter.

Today I handed out my very last business card from the batch Adam bought me a few years ago. It said "Red Robin Soaps." So it's time to get on the computer and design some new ones to buy, this time with our farm name. We're using Julia's red robin picture this time, of course!

I also dropped by the local pottery store, Pigments of Imagination, to deliver some more lotion bars and talk about the new packaging. I think I decided on the burlap and twine.

Adam filled in some of his trenches this morning, and we picked up pecans this afternoon. Phew!

Then, I knew I had to make a new soap batch if I wanted to have any more soaps for Christmas sales. I was nearly out of lavender and tea tree, plus I wanted to make "Christmas Tree" and "Warm Cider" scents. So I made a batch of soap.

It's resting now, getting into the gel stage under warming towels.

Here's some lemongrass poppyseed, a favorite.

Adam's wheat and barley are looking quite nice. He needs to buy more pipe for his watering lines. Having even the smallest of farms involves lots of work and lots of waiting.

Good Things Happenin'

Our roof is in the process of being repaired! It was scraped, duct taped (temporarily), and now has had self-adhesive metal tape, a primer, and elastomeric paint applied. It has one more coat to go. This is a happy thing!

Adam dug out the beginning of our shade garden and I put these lamb's ears in the ground. This pot divided into four little plants.

He sent me a text while I was at the farmer's market selling soaps and such. He was installing pipe into the trenches in the field! I didn't know he was starting that today. Below is the "T" where the garage pipe goes off the main pipe. He's joined the "T" and buried it already.

The pipe in its trench:

This is the windy section near the compost bins. Still some joining to be done here. He needs to buy more pipe; he bought all that our local Ace homebuilders' store had.

While at the market, a friend stopped by my table to show me her incredibly cute new puppy. Oh my!

It was a sunny, happy, busy day at the market with lots of vendors and lots of  boaters in town. We're heading into the holiday season when I sell more wares. Soon we hope this sign will say Red Robin Farm, and not just Red Robin Soaps -- and we'll be selling farm produce.