July 13 Shepherd's Corner

We had an exciting adventure early this week when our new ram, Dillon decided that life was more exciting with the ladies than with his bachelor flock buddies.  Well on the one hand we know that Dillon is indeed interested in the ladies and on the other hand, we’ll know that any lambs born in January are his since he was the only ram that felt the need to mingle this week.  Hopefully we’ll have no more break-ins until something more like October so that we can wait for lambs to start arriving until March where hopefully we’ll have some milder weather.

            We are looking forward to lambing and more importantly receiving data from our lambs next year.  We’ll then have two years worth of lamb data and we can then start making some production decisions as far as lambing time and genetic quality in our lambs for both breed standard and production for your freezers.  If you have bought a lamb from us, we would love to hear back from you.  While we are providing a quality product now, we are always looking for ways to improve!  Your comments will always be instrumental in our production decision in years to come!

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Newsletter for July 13, 2011

The Zen of Weeding

Everyone has weeds.  Nobody likes weeds. Then again, shouldn’t that be more reason to find some joy in taking care of them?  There is certainly a satisfaction when one finally finishes weeding a row of vegetables.  Kneeling, crawling along on the ground, level with the cabbages or broccolis or chards or salad, searching for every last weed attempting to choke out the vegetable’s hold on resources, one realizes the benefits of a broccoli canopy to the soil below.  There is a detectable difference in moisture and temperature, a relief from the heat of the bright sun.  I’ve found that once I get into the rhythm of weeding there is a certain zen to the whole thing.

Where we grow our veggies, the weeds grow in entire matts.  Needless to say, we do a great deal of weeding here.  There is a certain triumph as one grabs whole fistfuls of weeds and stuffs them in the weed bucket. I only have to weed around about three nearly-grown cabbages to fill my bucket.  It’s a lot of work and not easy either.  But it also allows me time to exercise my imagination.  I’ve dreamt up products for gardeners who want to wear shorts while weeding on hot days.  I’ve thought about time management as far as the possibilities of producing such products as baby wraps, my personal favorite for carrying children when little.

I’ve thought about how to make a big enough jump in our farming to allow me to not have to work during the “busy” months of summers.  I’ve pondered over what it really would take for neither of us to have to work off the farm.  I’ve pondered whether we really can do what so many people have told us is simply not possible and truly support ourselves and our family on our farm income.  I’ve always thought so but I’m wondering just how close we really are these days.  I’m thinking pretty close.

Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Fourth of July!  We hope that everyone had a safe and fun holiday on Monday.  We sure did!  Independence Day is one of our favorite holidays.  The weather is nice but not blistering yet, the days are still long and it comes with no other stipulations than pyrotechnics.  But it also is a yearly reminder of the struggle and sacrifices made by our military since our nation declared itself free.  What better way to celebrate independence than by recognizing the hard work and delicious rewards provided by our local entrepreneurs.

Be they farms or a locally focused business, there is great satisfaction to be found in buying and supporting whenever possible the local people who work so hard to keep our local economy strong and vibrant by just being local.  Yes, American made items might be more expensive than their foreign counterparts but you know that at the end of the day, the extra money you spend on those goods is helping to support another American family.  The time you spend finding locally grown food is certainly more than that spent picking the first items found at a chain grocery store but the joy of growing and being part of such a community is more than the meals made from that food: it is the beautiful relationships and support structures nurtured by that time and knowing that being a part of your farmer’s life will be repaid in top quality foodstuffs year after year.

Many of the founding fathers were farmers, gardeners and businessmen.  Each year we are reminded of our unique connection to these people, being farmers, gardeners and businesspeople ourselves.  Each year as we take a few more steps towards owning a business that not only supports our own family but also supports other families in our community, we are grateful that these men made the choice to declare independence so that we might have the option of being independent businesspeople and have the freedom to choose exactly how we live our lives.

In remembering and thanking all those that played a part in earning the freedoms that we enjoy every day, thank a member of the military, a military family, and thank all the other folks out there who do what they can to keep America independent and free.