Weeding

With the intense amount of rain came an intense amount of weeds. This took me the better part of a day and it was gratifying to say the least. 

The Bean Pickers

They do need the occasional reminder to be gentle with the plants, but otherwise I have found picking beans with the kids to be a very relaxing and almost meditative activity.

Dwarf Cherry

Today we added a dwarf cherry tree to our community garden plot. I can't remember the variety at this moment; but we chose it because it was good for eating (the other varieties said "pie cherries") and at full maturity it will be relatively small, 8'-10'. In regards to the size, we figured it would be good for a community garden plot. Ours is in the northern corner so we won't have to worry about shading out our neighboring gardeners. We will use the dirt around the base of the tree to plant shade loving greens. 

The catalogue said that we can expect fruit in 4-7 years. The dwarf plum in our backyard is finally going to fruit after three years. The change brought on by the plum tree to our little backyard ecosystem has made the wait seem like nothing. We anticipate the cherry tree bringing the same benefits to our community garden plot. 

Preparing our Community Garden Plot

Last year we let our community garden plot get a little out of control. Typically we try to go no-till, but this time I needed the help.

Planting Beans

Jude has grown into an incredible garden helper. 

A Day with Will Allen

So we got to meet Will Allen. He came to our school to be the keynote speaker for a yearlong program I ran title "Agriculture and the American Identity." The event was surreal.

The program gave me the time and resources to think about food and food production in ways I had not anticipated. Now I know that I've been far too absent from this rag to go off on a rant; so I'll save us all from that. However, there is something I want to share, something that I have felt for a very long time, but could only put into words shortly before this photo was taken:

If we believe in social justice and the empowered individual, then the conversations about what to do should start with food. If real food is a solution, then agriculture must adapt itself to the needs of the people—not the other way around.  

First Pruning

Two years ago we planted a plum tree out back. We have very little experience pruning, but we figured—What the hell, let's go for it. There is no established cone or goblet shape, I just didn't see how to do it. What we did do was eliminate any crossing branches and tall vertical spikes. Oh, and we made sure not to cut more than a third of the branches. In short, we shot from the hip and we're hoping for the best. I think it looks pretty damn good.

Mostly Tomatoes

Our seedlings are doing great. I believe the number of tomato starts is somewhere between 100-125. A majority of these are determinate paste tomatoes for the community garden's market garden area. In a third tray we have a slew of greens and some flowers. 2014 is off to a solid start.

Planting Peas

The 2014 season has begun.

Applesauce

Today $20.00 in seconds became four gallons of applesauce. What's even cooler is that Jude and I got to spend some time together in the kitchen. His knife skills (for a kid who doesn't turn three for another month) are impressive.

Winterizing

I'm not sure if this shot is pretty or perverse. Either way, our community garden water storage is ready for the freeze.  

Making bread and a brief word about simple food

We have some special guests coming for dinner tomorrow. They know more about food than I could ever hope to learn myself. It can be intimidating to cook for intelligent pallets; however it is also quite exciting. I love to cook, but my dishes are very simply. I grew up with over seasoned food. Now, when I look at Van Gogh's The Potato Eaters my stomach begins to rumble and mouth begins to water. It's all about the (good) ingredients.

On the menu tomorrow we will be having a simple beef stew and brown yeast bread. Jude likes to help in the kitchen, so we have to account for that when timing the meal. Rather than complicate things tomorrow, we decided to bake the bread today. I'm amazed at how good he is in the kitchen and he's not quite three.

The garlic is in

The garlic got in a little late this year. I'm counting on a late start to winter; which has been the norm around here. There are 250-300 cloves planted. We're going with three varieties (all hard neck): Georgia Fire; Music; and German Hardy.

I only planted the left half (southern) of this bed. Our plan is to plant determinate paste tomatoes on the right half. The bed is roughly 4'x30'.  

Rare Family Photo

There are plenty photos of us, but not often are we all in the same shot together. Meg says the light's not good, but I'll take what I can get.

Thank You Lou Reed

Very grateful he lived.

Billy Bragg

I caught onto Billy Bragg late. I remember listening to him when I was growing up in the 80s, but I was a kid and his music didn't strike a chord with me like some of the other more trendy/daytime Mtv bands of the time. However, towards the later end of my twenties, when I started to become aware of what the hell was going on with my life and all the little isms that are a part of it, I stumbled across an album of his that started a tirade of collecting and listening. His music since then has had an influence on and given a voice to my moral compass.

This past Thursday Meg and I got to catch a show. The dude is incredible.

The Potato Harvest

Since we've been together, Meg and I have had only one good potato harvest. The rest have all been crap.

However,

this year was not too bad. I give credit for our success to Jude. This was the first season that he has been old/able enough to help from beginning to end. He took part in the planting, hilling, and harvesting.

Our literary influence this year was Two Old Potatoes and Me.

The Garlic Harvest

This was our garlic harvest over at the community garden this year*. There are two varieties here and both are hard neck. The small bunch on the right is Georgia Fire. Maybe 10% of what we planted actually came up. We won't eat any of this and just plant it later this month. The big bunch** on the left is German Hardy. This is the third season we have planted this garlic from bulbs we bought three years ago. This stuff is awesome. We would be tempted to just plant this variety only since it does so well, but we like to have variety; so we will continue to invest maybe half to two-thirds of our garlic patch to this stuff and the rest to others.

What we'll be planting this season will be ~60 sqft of of the German Hardy, just a few square-feet of the Georgia Fire, and ~30 sqft of Music. The Music garlic will be a new addition. It's all we had when we lived in Downingtown and if we would have known how difficult it would be to get planting bulbs, we would have taken some with us when we moved. I predict that it will be as successful as the German Hardy. Fingers crossed.

*Yes, yes. I know garlic was harvested a while ago; but I have a lot of catching up to do. Who says that this stuff has to be in order?  :)

**Don't let the photo fool ya. That wheelbarrow is a Jackson (it's deep).

Best Paste Tomato Year Yet

We planted ten paste tomatoes in our community garden plot and we will probably harvest 100 pounds of fruit. The two bags in the photo are from the first harvest, which yielded 30+ pounds. The second gave us 42 more. We planted two determinate varieties, one called Margherita (I think that's right) and the other is just plain ol' Romas.

In terms of end product, the first 70+ pounds gave us 30 quarts of juice that was then cooked down to 15 quarts of thick sauce. Next year we may plant more, but first we will want to invest in a pressure cooker.

Our New Addition

This is our Daughter Wren. She just joined us on July 2nd.