Willie and I spent the morning preparing for “Mind Mulch”, a program organized between Kate, an extension agent, and local farmers. It’s the first year that they’ve tried the program, but interns from various local, organic/biodynamic farms near Port Townsend will meet every two weeks for a couple of hours to socialize a bit and meet each other as well as have a quick lecture from a farmer about the methods of composting or biodynamic farming. This will allow us to learn from each other and other farmers. Willie was hosting this particular program and planned to discuss the methods of composting.
Cob Oven Pizza Party at Finn River Farm
Without turning on any lights, I popped a mug of water in the microwave and I flipped through Zack’s photos of the JMT. When the microwave beeped, I stood and carefully pulled my cup from the microwave. In doing so, I noticed something the size of a nickel was floating in my cup. Apparently a spider had decided to weave a web inside my mug (odd, I know, but it’s true) and I fried him in my microwave in my quest for a cup of Lapsang Souchong.
June 30, 2009
Carrots. So many carrots. I weeded carrots for 5 hours today. That’s 2 rows done: two more to go. It’s a tedious task. The leaves are lacy and small, resembling parsley. The weeds are thick and 12 inches tall, making me feel as if I were playing “Where’s Waldo?” with the carrots. After tiring of the carrots, I weeded strawberries. Same game. Except I got to eat the strawberries I managed to find, ensconced in the fuzzy, almond shaped leaves of the flowering night shade.
Sarah and Eric Fixing the BCS. Farming is EASY. That's why Sarah's wearing a dress.
After tiring of the strawberries, I decided to weed the cabbages with a hoe so I could stand up and stretch my stiff back and knees. Feeling my jeans rub uncomfortably on my lower back, I looked down and realized that I had actually managed to sunburn myself. I had forgotten my belt, so my pants were riding unusually low, especially while crouched with my back to the sun. My shirt had ridden up so the white slat of skin between my jeans and shirt caught several hours worth of intense rays. Though it’s not very hot here (relative to the South), the sun is extremely intense. I feel rather baked and exposed so I bought myself an old man’s fishing hat from the local thrift store, Olycap. Later I learned that Washington has the highest rate of skin cancer in the nation. Part of that is attributed to the short summers with intense sunshine. People don’t take the time to use sunscreen and find that they are burned quite badly—even I was burned quite badly after just a few hours!
Golden Beets are BEAUTIFUL
July 6, 2009
I worked two weeks straight with a one-day weekend, so was allowed to take a three day weekend this week. I certainly deserved it. Though I didn’t spend my entire weekend sleeping (there’s too much to do on the 4th of July!) I do feel quite rejuvenated and ready (mostly) to go back to work. I’m not particularly excited about it though. I don’t mind the work too much, but I don’t really look forward to it either. Over the past two weeks, I realize that I would enjoy the work if I did not work as much. I would be able to appreciate growing a garden of my own, producing as many fruits and vegetables for my own family as possible, but I have not discovered any hidden desire to start a farm of my own. Not to say that working at Sunfield is a waste of time—I have so much more respect for farmers than I ever thought possible.
This is also a chicken.
July 7, 2009
Oh…this is awful. I accidentally labeled every single artist in my iTunes library as Bela Fleck. I thought I was in the Bela Fleck section and was trying to consolidate some songs so I can have enough room on my laptop for my new influx of photos, but messed up my entire library instead. I thought I would be clever and delete my iTunes library and reload the music from my hard drive, but the changes follow through to the hard drive as well. So now EVERYTHING I own is apparently written by Bela Fleck. I had no idea he was so into techno and rock. Quite the versatile man.
This is a chicken.
I weeded today—strawberries and pumpkins. Then I harvested summer squash. There were not too many that were ready for harvest, but there are enough to fill the CSA shares tomorrow. The delicately curved produce indicates its ripeness by the flower on the end of the vegetable. If the flower is in full bloom, it’s not ready. If it’s wilted and brown, it should be ready for harvest. Otherwise, we I only worked from 8 to 5 today since Sarah and I were the only ones on the farm. Danielle had the day off, Heather was taking care of her kids, and Willie had a doctor’s appointment in Seattle, so nothing was keeping us on the farm for too long. Woohoo!
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