around the farm

 Raspberries are almost ripe! The bushes are loaded this year, and the one ripe berry I found was sweet and delicious! The sun was just beginning to set as I took my walk, and the golden sunlight filtering through the lush raspberry bushes was incredible. Honestly, I think the summers in Oregon are so beautiful and pleasant that it makes up for the seven or eight months of grey and rain!

 The garden is looking lovely right now. Not quite in full bloom, but lovely nonetheless. I took a lot of pictures last night, as we will eventually have a data base with a picture and description of every plant we grow. This will be a big project, so I am working on the pictures as I can. I thought about buying a macro lens for my camera, but the one I really wanted was six hundred dollars. Yikes! Maybe if I were earning a living by taking pictures I would plunk down the money without a second thought, but I am not, and so I will just keep an eye out for the lens used somewhere.

 Love having roses in bloom. This time of year is so crazy busy for us that my house is often times not as clean and organized as i would like it to be. A vase of beautiful roses always seems to add a note of beauty and charm, even if the rest of the house is lacking in those areas! I have them in the (clean because I can't stand a dirty bathroom) bathroom, dining room, kitchen (which is also clean because i can't work in a dirty kitchen and also because my new stove is coming today and I am too proud to let the installer dude see a dirty house) and living room. I am planning to go see my mother this evening, and will take her a big bunch, as she loves roses and always had a beautiful planting of them.

And, just because I really like the looks of the silo in the late evening light, one more garden picture! Blue berries and blackberries will be ready soon, and the eldest farm child just picked the first batch of green beans this morning! Hooray for fresh fruits and vegetables! Green beans with a garlicky, Asian sauce are on the menu for dinner tonight, along with champagne to celebrate the new stove and the harvest season! On second thought, the two don't really sound good together- better save the green beans for tomorrow night.....

another season

Beautiful strawberries

Coffee for sale, fresh roasted and delicious!

Baked goods on display

Strawberry tart

Colorful beets from the garden. Roasted in olive oil with fresh pepper and coarse salt for a perfect side dish!

Antiques for sale

Another farm season has begun. U-pick strawberries are in full swing, and the store selling already picked strawberries is also open. The store opened ten days ago, U-picks four days ago. Today was the first absolutely crazy day, where I was on the run from sun up until sun down. Even after the store and u-picks were closed for the day, I had to drive in to town with a load of (very, very) overdue library books. While I was downtown, I ran into a friend and her daughter and we walked to the gelateria and had gelato and coffee. It felt good to relax and enjoy the last few minutes of daylight, and unwind from the craziness of the day. Sometimes, the days are so busy and the cares of farm and home weigh heavily on me (not to complain-I love the life we have chosen and the business we have and life with my farmer and the farmhouse full of children) and I forget to enjoy the moment or season I am in. I feel as if I don't even have the time to enjoy it, I must just get through it. I am learning though, that the attitude of "I must just grit my teeth and get through this" is not the best attitude to adopt. Sure, there are lots of unpleasant tasks and onerous responsibilities that require such an attitude, but I do not want to view my whole life that way! I am much happier when I learn to enjoy the work I have been given to do, to laugh at the crazy days, to be grateful for this growing business, and to look for the joy in what seems sometimes to be an overwhelming day. It is there. I need only look for it. So! Enough philosophizing for one night! Tomorrow morning will come bright and early, and I am going to need a lot of coffee to make me bright!

The season begins!

Strawberry season has officially begun! The store selling already picked berries opened Monday, and u-picks will begin on Saturday. I am trying to figure out how to get pictures from my iPhone to my computer, as most of my photos these days are taken with my phone. On my phone I have pictures of beautiful, ruby red strawberries, darling little strawberry tarts, fresh beets, pies, and scones. You will have to imagine them until I either figure out the picture transfer thing or get down to the store with my camera! The last few days have been rainy and grey, and I have had no energy or motivation. Today, I woke to partly blue skies, sunshine, and a nice breeze which, if I were to be fanciful, I would say is blowing summer in for us. However, we will have more rainy, grey June days before summer really begins, days when I long for a warm fire and endless cups of hot coffee. My husband heard a quote (I believe in a British gardening book) that said "there is nothing as cold as a June day in England." We have decided, as we hug our mugs of coffee tightly to us this morning, that the same can be said of this area of Oregon!

Progress

 Plums! The few red ones we have (either Hollywood or Early Laxton) are putting on size nicely, and should be ready in a few weeks. After last year's miserable crop, I am really looking forward to fresh plums!

.

 One of the green plums varieties- I think these might be Green Gage (the farmer is already asleep, so I can't verify the variety). These trees are loaded! I am going to try a plum cordial this year, so as happy to actually have some fruit to use. The plums are not u-pick at this point, but we will sell them already picked at the store.

 The blueberry bushes are now loaded with little green berries! Looks like a good year for them, and they will hopefully be ready to pick by July 4th.

 Lots of lovely green strawberries! The bushes are loaded, and the weather right now is ideal for ripening. Last year's crop was a near failure, so we are very grateful for this healthy crop and perfect weather!

 Lots of apples this year! I haven't looked at the apples and quince in the front orchard, but the trees in the back orchard look great! We should have a good crop this year, and I will be spending days canning applesauce and making quince preserves!

 Raspberries! The bushes are loaded right now, so we wait with bated breath to see if there will be enough to meet demand this year! So far, they look great. The raspberries are so hard to grow here, and are also very popular with our customers.

 And, finally, no farm update would be complete without a mention of the garden! The roses are coming on nicely, and I have vases of them all over the house. I love these roses, and always feel as if my house is cleaner and more beautiful when a vase full of them is gracing my table (or bathroom, or book case, and so on!).

The rest of the garden is a verdant green, with splashes of color here and there. Most of the flowers are summer blooming, so apart from some roses and columbine, not much is blossoming right now. I picked up two new canning books this weekend, and can't wait for fresh fruit and vegetable season to try some of the recipes. The first book is The Preservation Kitchen  by Paul Virant. He has not only recipes for jam and jellies, but for relishes, Aigre-doux, cured meat, and fermented  food as well. The book has a lot of seasonal recipes, so you get ideas for using spring and fall crops as well as summer's bounty. The second book is Food in Jars by Marisa McClellan. She has fantastic recipes for jams, jellies, fruit butters, pickles, syrups, and nut butters (and that is only a partial list.) What I really like about this book is that the recipes are for small batches, so if I only have a small amount of time, I can still get some preserving done. Between the six children, the running of the farm, and the cooking and cleaning, small amounts of time seem to be all I have! I am especially looking forward to trying some fruit butters. The author also includes recipes for mixes in jars (the pancake mix sounds especially good), and this is something I have wanted to do for a long time. On those super busy days, the idea of having a healthy, pre-made mix is very appealing, but I try to stay away from store boughten ones which often have a lot of additives and are expensive, especially for a family of eight! Time for all good farm wives to be in bed, so thus ends the update from Fordyce Farm!

In the garden

There are not many flowers in the garden yet, but I did see this cute little visitor tonight. He stayed very still for a minute or two, but  once I started to creep closer to get a better shot, he scampered away.

Coming soon!

Gooseberries! These are the pink variety. Tart and delicious.

Strawberries! About another month on these.

Stuart wanted me to post the picture of him with his Star Wars pen.....

Tomatoes! Already looking better than last years!

Raspberries, about to bloom.

Green Gage plums! We didn't get any last year, so this loaded tree makes me very happy!

Blueberry blossoms. Lovely little things, aren't they?

Quince blossoms.

Next year's strawberries are being planted today and tomorrow, and, to add a bit of craziness, we are supposed to have more frost tonight. The boys are setting up irrigation right now, to try and keep the strawberries from being harmed by the frost. We have also hired a helicopter pilot to fly around early tomorrow morning to "move the air", which is supposed to help protect from damage as well. Once again, we have a great planting crew, and the job is going well. I am in charge of keeping the crew caffeinated and fed.

I went for a walk last night, with camera in hand to record the lovely spring evening and progress on crops around the farm. As it turned out, both my DLSR and point and shoot cameras had dead batteries, so I have no photographic record of my lovely walk. This actually turned out to be a good thing, as it was such a beautiful night that I was able to give it my full attention without being distracted by taking pictures and worrying if I lost my lens cap. I even ran up and down a large hill several times, which surely burned off all the calories I had just consumed in the form of a slice of Kentucky Bourbon Pie the Farmer made. If I had taken pictures, this is what you would have seen:
-A large pile of coats, sweaters, and shoes discarded by the farm children as the day turned warm.
-Plums trees covered with tiny, green plums! Since this crop was a total failure last year, I was delighted to see this! I have a recipe for plum cordial I want to try this year.
-The first tiny green blueberries. The bushes are still in full bloom, but one or two bushes had an actual berry or two on them!
-A beautiful sunset mirrored in the glass like surface of the lake-gold, pink, and dusky blue.
-Strawberry plants in full bloom. No fruit yet, just lovely white blooms. The field looks great this year.
-Quince and apple trees in bloom. The quince trees have especially lovely blooms. They are white with strips of pale pink on the underside, and are larger than an apple blossom. So pretty I wanted to pluck a branch to take inside, but I would rather have quince jelly and tart in the fall!
-The Farmer and the eldest farm child (who just turned eighteen and is technically another farm adult, but bear with me as he is still my little boy) trying to fix the John Deere so the field plowing could be finished. They were successful, and as the sun sunk low into the horizon, I could hear the roar of the engine.
-The raspberries, almost ready to bloom. They also look really healthy this year.
-The garden, in all it's lush green glory. Not much has bloomed here yet, as we have no spring blooming bulbs planted. A bleeding heart, a few columbines, and some Camas lilies are the only flowers right now, but the rose bushes are loaded with swollen buds, and my vases are all clean and ready for them!
-The little girls drug out the wicker lawn furniture yesterday afternoon, and spent the first really warm day of the year lounging under the hickory tree begging for popsicles. I unearthed the last bag of frozen blueberries for them instead, and with that they were content. I probably would have taken a picture of my lawn furniture, so happy was I to see it's return.

The long winter has passed, and although we may have more rainy, cold weather, (I have lived in Oregon too long to forget this fact!) it will be interspersed with beautiful, warm, sunny days. I am trying to plan a summer's worth of meals, so during the busy days of June and July I have at least some idea of what is for dinner before 4pm. sneaks up on me. I would love to hear what people's favorite cook books are, as I am always looking for new recipes to try!