Tag: garden

  • Weeding & Weaving

    Weeding & Weaving

    Weeding and weaving… That’s the name of the game at the farm this week! The hot weather really got the weeds fired up, and most of the mustard greens and radishes already bolted (it was 90 degrees last week and today I lit a fire in the woodstove because 60 degrees with an overcast sky just felt so chilly…)

    Anyway, back to the greens: I think the bigger leaves on them are still totally fine to use in cooked dishes as they are less tender for salad greens now. The goats love them too so they don’t go to waste!

    You can see the cucumbers now! It’s the “National Pickling” variety that we have saved seeds from for a couple years.
    The enamel basin holds 3 gallons, and that sucker was packed and heaping with mustard, lambs quarter, radish, and other greens for freezing

    The volunteer mustard from last year was overtaking the cucumbers babies but at least when I was weeding and thinning the cukes, I was able to collect about 8lbs of greens to freeze! We don’t do anything fancy with the greens; just rinse, roughly chop, and pack them a little snugly into canning jars for the freezer. No blanching or pre-freezing in a single layer (ain’t nobody got time for that). Because there’s no liquid in the greens, the jars don’t burst in the freezer and we find a quart is great for a big batch of soup, and a pint of greens works for stir fries and pastas. Just thaw and cook!

    As for the weaving part of the week, I’ll share more details in another post in a few days when it’s complete. I’m proud to be working on a custom wool shawl for the Free Range Food Co-op‘s silent auction fundraiser next month. Here’s a sneak peak of part of the project on the warping board:

    Enjoy the cooler weather this week, friends!

    -Shara

  • Oofda it’s hot…

    Oofda it’s hot…

    It’s been a hot end of May but we are chipping away at the springtime “must do” list. Planting the garden, building the new perimeter fence, and keeping everything watered and alive during this heat wave has taken up most of our days.

    Here’s some pics of the garden beds, most things aren’t germinated yet because they were just planted. Yeah the weather had been nice but we don’t really trust Minnesota weather to put tender plants out any earlier than the last week of May. We’ve been burned frosted too many times!

    You can see in the 3rd photo that those beds are beyond a fence… That will soon be contained within our new perimeter fence. Gotta get that installed before the corn pops up and the deer find it!

    Also used this hot weather to wash a few skeins of yarn I finished in the last week. 3 skeins of alpaca and 1 of angora rabbit from a friend. The rabbit’s name was Theodore and I’m pretty sure it’s the absolute softest thing I’ve ever touched 😍 I can hardly stop squishing it and saying “oh my god it’s So. Soft.”

    Anyway, using this heat to quickly dry yarn is one perk I suppose. Now, back to finish watering the garden…  🌱

    -Shara