Happy New Year !!

May your 2011 be 1 better than your 2010 ;)

Great Xmas

What a fun, comfortable family Christmas we had. Kept the house warm with a roaring fire while we exchanged presents. Then we packed up a bunch of snacks & some perogas and drove out to see big Sis for the evening.

So now it's easy for me to wish the whole world a Happy New Year too! It's always kinda weird as the last few days play out. We can all use the extra well wishing.

Mid Winter start of planting season

Dad filled a couple of 288 trays yesterday with fresh made soil and I've just about got the plant/sprout room cleaned up. Gotta buy a few seeds but should have early spring greens planted before new year.

I've been having a good time in the dark mornings writing on some software for android apps. Should have my first apps up on Market in a month or so.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Good skygazing to you!

Hooray! Full lunar eclipse tonight! Got my eye on the radar images, looks like there's a clear spot on the back of the next front. Should be through in about 2-3 hours, leaving (maybe) an hour window for viewing right around 10:30. Good sky gazing to you! Thanks Uncle Bob (Amos) for getting me into the stars.

Showery Fall Wind-down

Headin' out to do a little prunin' on the apple trees between rain showers. Mt Fielder is looking quite pretty on this rather temperate late fall day. Hope you're all being productive and/or having fun.

Fall ruminations

Wouldn't you know it, just when I overcome a couple of hurdles and start to make a little progress on my software endeavors, the rain goes ahead and moves out. Darn! good weather means outdoors work.

Not that we were totally sedentary in the rain. Yesterday Dad and I dug a trench in the big greenhouse to drain one of the air inlets and then we fenced an area in which to slaughter the hogs. <-How's that for not leaving a preposition at the end? Also set up a tarp cover for if it's raining, probably the reason it stopped all butterfly effect and stuff.

So we'll probably kill the hogs this weekend sometimes, not sure if I should post pics of that.... probably not a good idea.

Hope y'all are enjoying the fall wind-down.

Cooke's Frontier: Virtual Cookie Exchange on the Frontier!

Here's a neat-o chance to win some Xmas gingerbread goodness from my niece! Give it a whirl. Deadline is tonight at mid-night. Sorry about the late notice.

Cooke's Frontier: Virtual Cookie Exchange on the Frontier!

Red Alert Klaxon's a'ringin'

Well, the United States government is taking a swipe at having total controlling power of its citizens food supply. Check it out here. Senate Bill 510 currently in line for a vote in the next 50 days or so will hand enormous power over to the government's bureaucracy. It will allow the imposition of extra-judicial punishments (i.e. without recourse to either judge or jury) on citizens. It will create a new class of criminals from one group of innocent people.

fall recovery

Getting our fall legs back under us after the colds & closing. Also had my laptop die on me so that complicated things for a bit. Finally knuckled under and bought a new HP presario which I got pretty cheap on sale. So far it's quite nice. Still, even cheap it cost me more money than I could really afford. Gonna have to hunt me up some winter software work or design some sellable apps.

Anyways, still a lot of clean-up to do in the fields, harvest a last little bit of winter squash, maybe help Bro butcher a couple of hogs.

It sure has been a lovely fall, lots of good color.

fall slowness

Been fighting an intermittent head/chest cold for several weeks now. Sort of comes and goes with fits of coughing and spurious fevers.

Add to that the rains, short days and post-sales-season let down and you get some major slowness going on around here. Just doing a few "baby step" things each day, catching up on reading, email etc. Making plans to spend some of my time writing some software ("apps") for android. Have all the software, sdks and all that downloaded just need to buy an android phone now for testing. Got my eye on an HTC phone.

Y'all take care and enjoy the fall colors.

Relief

Feeling lots better. Still a little coughy, congested and feverish at times but so, so much better than 48 hours ago. Nice to get most of a good nights sleep. Was also blessed to dodge the rain while picking corn and punkins this morning. Y'all have a Happy Halloween.

headcold

I am experiencing a fierce head cold. Fever, sore throat, cough, nausea the whole 9 yards. Better today than last night, hope it's a short one. Wash your hands, cover your mouth and avoid sweets!

Jack Frost stay the heck away!

A chance of frost tonight is threatening to end our season early. Considering how short a season we had on the other (spring) end I'm really hoping this one misses us.

Tomatoes!

Finally! Tomatoes! Dad, Robin and Amber got all medieval on the tomato patch and we finally had a big display of tomatoes in the stand all day.

cold summer & fall, slow business

It's been one of the toughest summers we've had in a long time. Just way to cold, lots of things not producing well. Very little summer squash, cucumbers and tomatoes are just finally starting to ripen, almost 2 months of lost sales late.

It has been a good watermelon and sweet corn year though. Some of the biggest cobs we've seen in decades. The grapes are doing well also. Although it won't come out ahead at least something is doing well.

The weird part is how slow the traffic is. I'd guess there's 20% less tires on the road just in front of our stand. And people coming in are spending less too.

Despite it all, there's still nothing I'd rather do. Keep on keepin' on.

the day before

Another fairly cool day. Still few tomatoes. Fragments of thought skittering around in everyone's head at the stand it seemed. Dad and I couldn't do math and our customers were behaving stranger than unusual. A lovely day, all-in-all. Be well.

Tuesday overcast

Nice cool morning. Lots of melons to pick today. Still waiting on the 'maters. Have a good'n.

Rockin' day at the stand

Had one of those top ten awesome closing hours. Was selling watermelon like crazy! All the people coming by were in a super mood, very happy with what they were buying and full of energy. Probably the cool weather and beautiful skies.

Speaking of skies, on the way home there was a huge, glorious rainbow circle broken by bands of virga hanging above our driveway. It made me feel so glad to have been on this earth long enough to see such a thing and to know enough to appreciate its beauty and rareness.

Intending to you that life gives you a moment to love the beauty and wonder surrounding you.

Stormy turnings

Want to apologies to any of my late day customers. Had to dive out early because of this big ugly storm that is blowing by. Some pretty gnarly rain and lightning drove me off to take care of jobs that had to be taken care of before being outside became too dangerous, slippery and wet.

Anyways, if the "H" stuff doesn't pound my crops and the rain doesn't split too many tomatoes and melons we'll be back in good stock during the next couple days. Thanks for your patience and keep up the good spirits.

Pizza & Root Beer

Wow! Almost a whole week since my last post. Been real busy picking corn and melons. Today was a slow day at the stand, too short on tomatoes. The cold spring and early summer has really cut into productivity.

Pizza & Root Beer for dinner, gonna crash early in hopes of having some energy for tasks tomorrow morning.

Wishing you happiness and comfort.

A lovely Sunday morn

Finally got a couple hours of good sleep this morning. Funny how much better everything is when you're not exhausted.

Our little dog, Sparky, got sick 2 days ago, throwing up blood no less. So we ran him to the vet who said he might have cut his insides on some grass he ate & we left him there overnight. He seems fine now but we're still touchy about him and have to struggle with a different routine for another day or two until we're sure he's ok. Plus we've got to give him antibiotics and another medicine for a couple weeks.

Corn harvest begins Monday so that'll be another routine change. Kinda weird after the long pre-harvest season it seems like starting this is actually winding down when actually we've still got a lot of picking ahead of us.

Wishing you all a day with small wonders and large joys.

slow day but tiring

Had a decent Saturday. Not terrible busy at the stand. Got our puppy back from the vet, (thanks for looking out for him, Ellen.) he's a bit subdued but we're all happier now, he had us so worried. Now for a little actual weekend relaxation. Everybody be well & happy.

TGIF business

Just about to head out to open up the stand. Way too little sleep last night. Cukes, squash, onions, taters, tomatoes and golden sweet melons all on deck this morning. Happy TGIF.

Weekend shadow

Preparing myself mentally for another couple days of being open this weekend. Corn will begin harvest Monday or so, 90% likelihood. We've harvested the first few golden sweet asian melons so those should be on base for this weekend.

Hope life is bringing you all many wonderful moments.

business Saturday

Taking a short break after picking squash and cukes. Dad & Todd picked tomatoes. Heading to the stand shortly, gotta be open before 10. Happy Saturday everybody!

Ooops

Wanna apologize to any friends or customers who stopped by after this weekend. I had meant to mention on my previous post that we were just going to be open on the weekends. I can only claim industrial scale fatigue as my conditional explanation. Thanks for everybody's patience, we're loadin' up with tomatoes so we'll have plenty on Friday. I've also noticed that several of the golden sweet melons have started to shade towards a honey-chiffon color soon to roll over into that sweet golden glow, we'll see if any are ready by then.

Keep on noticin' life's little miracles.

Scramble

Suddenly getting ready to open tomorrow, too many squash, cukes and onions coming in. Even some nice tomatoes ready. So it's a real scramble to get everything done.

Kinda wacky.

Found this article about flash mobs performing useful work. Seems like a great idea to me, we've been trying to get people from the "u-pick" movement to take up a "u-weed" alternative but so far no takers. Isn't that strange?

Summer slog

had an ok day. Too hot. Motor on one greenhouse fan croaked, Bro's fixin' that. Dad's chemo took him out of the picture around 11am. Just got real weak and tired pretty much like usual. I managed to keep pluggin' and even catch a nap this afternoon. Now signing off with my typical bout of summer insomnia. Happy TGIF all.

first melons!

Got some nice piel de sapo and golden sweet melons sizing up already in the cantaloupe patch. Also some mickey lee watermelons bigger than golf balls already. Been very, very busy getting the first planting laid by, now just water, fertilizer and weed control to eat up most of our time. The chemo has been making dad pretty tired and weak but he still hoofs it out and does some work each day, what a tough ol' dude!

Hope life is serving up the lemonade already made and not too many rough patches.

Happy Birthday, America!

May all my fellow Americans have a liberty laden Independence Day.

Soil surfing.

Started picking okra. First flush tomatoes are passing the size of hardballs, 6-8 ounces mostly. Plant corn and cultivate corn tomorrow (long dusty day that). Also fertilize and water as needed, pick cukes and hand pollinate summer squash in the greenhouse. Forgot to tell you guys about the hours of soil surfing yesterday. You'da loved it. A bit dangerous though.

Blessings and wonderments.

It is hot out there

Just unstacked/restacked 2 pallets of fertilizer with dad and it liked to make me a bit grumpy sweatin' that much. Ran weed control all morning thru noon with help from Todd and Robin. We're kickin' it now until things cool a bit and after we have Todd's birthday dinner. Hope the world is treating all my peoples well.

tired out after a long day of babying cabbage and committing wholesale bloody (well, sappy I suppose) mayhem upon acres of defenseless weeds. Gotta at least try to rest, getting up early to avoid the 90°+ day. Sweet dreams all.

Fund raising event

Some of my friends from high school are putting on a fund raising event for our classmate Michelle Hiltbruner who is fighting cancer. They will be selling Krispy Kreme donuts at Wheeler Toyota (375 Redwood Highway) 4-6pm Friday June 25th. If you get a chance at least stop by and hassle them for me.

busy, busy, busy

Starting the slow summer burn. Planted the rest of the 4th corn field today. Planted 1/2 yesterday then had to wait for the rest to dry enough to plant.

Hoping that Amber (and an army of experienced farmers) will be available tomorrow to help finish getting the tomatoes in. It's always fun to have family along on planting day.

My feet hurt! Hope everyone out there is finding all of life's little happiness surprises.

Looking for Grants Pass area housing

The house my niece Amber was renting has been foreclosed from the previous owner so now she is scrambling to find a place to stay for her & her family (Travis & 2 delightful daughters) If any body knows of a reasonable (cheap!) place they could rent in the Grants Pass/Rogue River area please leave me a note.

Late spring rain

The season is having a late start thanks to some cooling in the ocean I suppose. We got some cukes transplanted out yesterday and fertilized the 1st 6000 feet or so of corn this morning. Just as we finished the rain started coming down and has washed the fertilizer in very well I think. These rains have also saved the big onion patch again. However the increased river flow might shut down the irrigation pumps for a few days and could even dump more gravel into the intakes. We'll see how that goes.

Hope life is bringing you satisfying moments and bright reflections.

Water in the ditch

Hoorah! There's water in the ditch.

Dad and I got busy after his chemo treatment today planting mixed cole crops. We're gonna be coming up on about 600 of those in the field shortly. Also got our 2nd field of corn in yesterday.

So we're keeping busy as spring moves forward.

Wishing you all a happy Boatnik weekend!

Spring progress

Assailed by the threat of rain showers and nutsedge. But man! The blueberries I was putting mulch on this morning were shiny, bright and happy. Looking forward to checking the sweet onions. Wishing you a shiny, bright and happy day.

very busy spring planting

!

The Cubby !!

Dad picked us up a new member of the family, thanks to his buddy Terry Spencer. Took us all a couple days of finagling but we finally got it running today.

enduring beautiful weather

The freshly transplanted raspberries loved the rain now they're loving the sun. Have a great Day everybody.

good weather= busy busy busy

My arms are so sore from pounding in tomato posts yesterday and I must have walked about 6 miles just moving stuff around, bringing up supplies and checking on things. It's Sunday but I've still got more to do that can't wait. Hope your weekend is full and fun.

Starting another great spring day

Had another great breakfast at the Powderhorn this morning, what a great way to start the day.

The big greenhouse is all inflated and dad has tilled the soil so we're just about ready to plant tomatoes in there, fully a month early. It's so warm in there we're also planning to put in some okra which should do really well. Might have to get some mason or bumble bees in there to pollinate though.

Hope you have a great day.

Lost another sweet one

Just found out that one of our truly great customers, the delightful Florence Hopper has passed away. That's a downer.

Sudden spring deep freeze!

Dammit, Al Gore! where's my global warming? Froze so hard last night we lost 6 trays of plants even inside the greenhouse. Probably also will be no early summer cherries now. That's just shy of 450 plants.

Fortunately I put the tomatoes in the heated chamber just around dark or we would have lost them too. Keeping my fingers crossed for the rhubarb plants. The pepper plants and all the rest of the tomatoes were still in the basement sprout room.

Got the big greenhouse up yesterday afternoon, thank goodness we didn't move any plants out there already.

Hope the day brings us all better turns of events, lovely vistas and smooth sailing.

Sprouts and errands

Had a good day today mostly. Dad transplanted a bunch of sprouts. I filled trays and then ran some errands in Rogue River. Got some books at the library. It was nice this morning so we got some walks in & I moved some plants down to the greenhouse before the rains set in. Hope it clears out soon enough that our cherry blossoms set.

Y'all have a great day or night.

bad news on Easter

Just found out that we lost aunt Edna today. Bummer. She once went for a long walk in the woods with me near our home when I was 8. I still can clearly picture this hesitant Mennonite lady having to jump over streams and brooks to follow my winding trail amidst tree, flower and moss. It was just about this time of year. About 10 years ago she sent me a book of sermonettes and I always meant to write her to say thanks but one thing lead to another and I never did.

Happy Easter

Bring on the candy!

Just kidding, hope your all able to spend this day with friends and/or family and that all your reflections are peacefully, easy and kind.

Spring procrastinations

Been slacking off a lot because of the storms blowing through. Wanted to have the big greenhouse inflated by now but fear of the big winds and snow held us back. No snow but the wind has been pretty fierce.

Dad's on another round of chemo so he's sleeping in his chair right now. I'm heading off shortly to water all the sprouts we've got in the plant room and maybe look into doing the last few steps to make the greenhouse ready. That way we just have to plug in the fan. Got a bunch of already seeded pony paks just waiting their turn in the sprout room.

It's really nice outside right at the moment, can definitely tell it's Easter weekend. I could almost smell the jelly beans when I took Sparky out for a walk.

Happiness to all.

Equinox

Happy first day of spring/fall (depending on your hemisphere)

Cooke's Frontier

My niece has started blogging! She's pretty good, funnier than me & getting better. Check it out

WimpyCare

Global wandering

Here's a great article by Michael Crichton about the science behind current climate change ideas.

good weather blues

Been so busy this week, this darn good weather is keeping me out in the orchard.

There's a lovely fog bank covering our whole farm right now.

Mom's birds are enjoying the bird feeder we got from Bill Imel (Robin's dad) yesterday. We were helping him, spraying his fruit trees and got a tour of his wonderful bird house & feeder shop. Now planning on stocking some of his great woodwork at our stand this summer.

We had blueberry pancakes & bacon for breakfast. So delightful.

Wishing you each and all a relaxing, rewarding Sunday.

sunny winter Sunday

being soooo lazy. Might go spray peach tree sometimes this afternoon.

showers moving in.

got a little more apple tree pruning done before the showers moved in.

Finally a little winter comes back

Been sunny and warm with night time freezing for about a week now, so we've been working like crazy.

Showers came in around noon, very fine mist at first but real rain now.

I got some more pruning done and dad did some tractor work before it actually turned into something you could feel.

Gotta go get some equipment from farm#2, be well!

Bright sunshiney winter day

Had a slow start to the day but once it warmed up we really got going good.

I pruned on the apples, sprayed copper on the peaches and cherries and burned some debris while dad pulled up drip tape. Our good friend Ed Gramc came over and pruned in the vineyard for a while too.

The sun was bright and warm with a light breeze to keep winter in mind.

Dad and I had plenty of appetite this evening I'll tell ya. Work makes food taste good!

Hope life is filling your day with vigor and joy.

A lovely winter day

Got some good sun out today. Managed to get a few chores done. Sprayed the peach trees for peach leaf curl. Placed 2 of the 3 big seed orders. Gotta finish & place the E&R order tomorrow.

Mom & dad went to town for dad's chemo drip. He's doing about as well as can be expected.

Gotta love these days getting longer.

China has a lot of money

Upon reading this article, I was taken back to my childhood when I would listen to Alan Stang. I can almost hear him saying something about China defeating America not through warfare but through financial means.

waiting for rain

Got our first 288 tray planted with lots of different greens/ cole crops.

Will be placing our winter seed order today too.

Big storm front headed our way out of mid-pacific should bring higher temps & lots of water to southern Oregon. If snow level doesn't raise too much should pack away some good water in the hills.

Hope your having fun.

morning delights

Coming home from breakfast with my good friend Del I saw the most beautiful hawk sitting on my neighbor's fence. It had red shoulders and head with black and white barred body and tail. I'm having a heck of a time identifying it. It was so majestic & bold, quite a thrill seeing him so close. Seems like I often have a special encounter after one of our breakfast outings, last time it was a white raven.

Update: found the variety. It is, simply enough, a red shouldered hawk. They're usually found closer to the coast. Here's a pic I borrowed:

Farming season 2010

Bought my first couple packs of seed yesterday. Sooo much hard work ahead. Got to repair the clutch on the brown truck, brakes and 3rd point pump on the Massey-Ferguson tractor. Put the ends on the sprouting greenhouse, pull tomato stakes and plastic mulch, repair fences and fertilize the winter onions. Oh the list goes on and on.

This week we'll start filling 288 trays with soil for the early greens, lettuce, cabbage, etc. sprouts which can start in the basement plant room.

Mom & dad are frying some hash for breakfast in the kitchen. Sounds like they're feeling ok this morning.

Hope your day is full of promise and answered hope.