Happy New Year!

Sending us all a fine & fortuitous 2012.

Christmas misfortune

My friend Terrie's sister lost their home & possessions in a house fire Christmas evening. We're all pulling together trying to help them out, if you'd like to participate in the helping, here's a place for coordinating contributions & donations.

And a special thanks from me in advance for even a prayer of help.

Life moves on

Got the 1st leg and rafter of the small greenhouse put up on the back of our house yesterday. 9 more to go plus 2 pieces of polyethylene to top it and 2 ends to cover plus a smattering of slats, stakes and gussets. Tomatoes are growing great in the basement along with some super happy looking cukes and zukes so the greenhouse is becoming a pressing issue.

Xmas behind us, New Year ahead. Lots of work to do real soon & already falling behind on the pruning and spraying of fruit trees. But I wouldn't know how to operate if I wasn't behind schedule :)

Hope life is turning over little treasures for you all.

We've got the unpleasantness of the funeral and the pleasantness of seeing so many wonderful family members behind us now. The hard, cold, icy snap of the last 2 weeks is abating before a stormy night tonight. I'm starting to get my mind back on the work plan. Tomorrow I plant tomatoes, squash, and peppers. Wishing you all a fine late autumn night.

God Speed Johnny

At 3:45pm today our father Johnny Giesbrecht at last set down the burdens of this world and went on to that great adventure which awaits us all. He was surrounded by his loving wife and children and was in no pain. We're all grieving here but you needed to know Johnny to understand why that grief comes with a silver lining. Though dad was often a sombre man he was never one to dwell in grief. His humor and stick-to-it-ness support us even now. Dad often said "Take care of your job & the rest of your life will take care of itself." and with that we should all get back to the business of living.

Late autumn relaxations

another foggy Oregon morning. Aunt Anna & I are enjoying a nice pizza breakfast with hot tea.

Uncle Leo, aunt Margret & uncle Ben left a little early yesterday, uncle Ben wasn't feeling good so they made sure he had plenty of time to rest at the hotel before their flight left this morning.

Dad is resting ok, but he's got the hiccups pretty bad.

It's Sunday, so no work for me today :) Hope y'all enjoy this fine day and find many inspirations.

2011 season end

Hi folks! Just wanted to let everyone know we were throwing in the towel on 2011. It was a great season, we had lots of fun growing great food for you all but business has slowed down too much and we've just got too many chores that need doin' so next year will be even better. Thanks again & God bless you all.

autumn check-in

Busy! Good weather means good work. Mom & I are gonna break routines and run errands in town this evening. Hope fall is treating you well.

Prizes from my niece

My niece is having a giveaway! on her blog "Cooke's Frontier", 3 boxes of cereal & a 25$ Walmart gift card. Check it out & sign up at Cooke's Frontier. Expires in 3 days, on Oct 12th so get on it!

Dad inspecting the gala apple harvest.

Sweet seedless grapes

Today's canning corn orders

Some went out in bags so it wasn't all cased. Lots of happy canners!

Here's our little buddy Sparky enjoying one of his favorite repasts....

Cantaloupe crown pick is upon us!

Gotta go crash into my bed soon, must get up early while dew is still on the melons to pick them and pack them in before they get even 1 degree warmer. It's the crown pick, I'm predicting better than 4 wheel-barrow loads. Sizes are running A-1 to freakin' huge! And just standing over a bag of these things is like intoxicating.

And on that note I'll tottle off to dream land.

Sweet & fragrant !

I'm just astounded by how many large cantaloupe are coming out of the field. Their fragrance fills the stand & even seems to billow a ways out into the breeze where I sit in the shade.

Still a steady trickle of our regular customers finding their way to our new/old location & here's one now!

Summer sales & fun

Cantaloupe continue to come on strong. Saw one of our good regular customers, Randy, at the post office & told him where our new/old location was. He showed up shortly before closing & picked up some corn and 'maters.

GPID sent out the ditchwalker yesterday & hooray! today the water is full and deep. Now it will be interesting to see if we can keep any water into the week. In the meantime, the extra power service is really paying off. We've been able to run a big sprinkler across the top cornfield in just 2 passes. Really soaked the fields too.

Hope these fine summer days are delivering a harvest of fun.

Sweet, sweet melons

Can hardly believe how great the cantaloupe crop is turning out to be. Glowing feedback from everyone who has taken one home & the crown pick is still to come in. Now if the water stress just won't squelch the late season fruit set we'll all be happier. Corn is coming in really nice too, just picked the 1st of the "Incredible" type, a little young but so tender and sweet.

Gotta go now and pick a few more mickey-lee watermelon, sure don't wanna run out.

Y'all have a fun day.

Corn harvest begins

Nice bit of corn coming in, and the cantaloupe are so sweet. Wow! was the stand busy today, the melons sold like crazy.

Lots of familiar faces coming in all day, "rediscovering" us back at our old address in our new location in the same building we used to have down the road. A few new people have also been brought in from our web presence. Which I find very cool, thank you much!

Work will be intense this week as we lean into the beginning harvest-avalanche so posting will be sparse and sporadic.

Here's a heartful of peace for everybody :)

Fresh cantaloupe

Just picked these sweet Oregon beauties!

Sweet and pretty

Yummy plums

Morning chicken cackles

I keep forgetting about the eggs. We are now carrying eggs from my sister-in-laws chickens. Finest quality, these chickens are fed the surplus from our garden so they eat as well as we do. Supply is limited so get here early.

Green beans!

Green bean harvest has begun. Only 5 to 10 pounds a day are becoming available now but we anticipate a much larger harvest as water and labor allow us to increase.

Getting some color

Summer vicissitudes

Whew! what a long, hot day. A little business at the stand, mostly our regular regulars. Now enjoying a banana popsicle while waiting for the delicious smelling B.E.L.T.s mom is making. Today is our last full irrigation day, hope to have the last field finished by midnight. Electricity coming on Tuesday will make watering easier, I might even get a full night's sleep next week!

Have fun & stay alert.

Open for business

Dad's summer job

Here you see dad, my brother & I moving the new power pole for the additional irrigation pump. And the resulting green tag (hooray!)  This was a very stressful job for dad, so glad it's over.

Opening day

We will be opening tomorrow, Wed. August 3rd around 10am. I say around because we'll be around before that :) Cukes, zukes, sweet onions & red taters along with a few other goodies will be in supply.

Sorry I haven't posted more frequently but I'm doing most of the garden work by myself this year due to dad being busy with other stuff & chemo, so I haven't had much time to blog. Add to that the new website for Savage Creek Farm I've been working on & you get the picture. Speaking of pics I'll have a few new up shortly.

Lookin' forward to seeing you all down at the stand. Have fun and stay alert.

We have bean!

Getting closer

Last corn planting for 2011

Cement work

Last week we poured the slab for our new selling location. Here's Amber, Rodger, Todd & Travis finishing up the final troweling. It turned out beautifully. A little more carpentry to put up a couple walls & it'll be done but we might open before then so don't be surprised if you stop by for some squash or a melon & things are still looking a little rough.

Earning the pity of Sisyphus.

Once more I envy Sisyphus, he just had the one job to worry about.
But at least these wonderful cantaloupe are growing so nicely.
Hoping this fine summer day fills you with joy.

Trying to identify this tree.

We thought this was a black walnut for years. Now it has flowered we are sure that isn't correct.

Update: It's Sumac. Soon to be a very short stump.

Blueberries!

Dad on his cubby.

Summer solstice delights

Popsicles are so wonderful on the 1st day of summer.

Cold Spring plantings

We're scrambling to get mounds pulled before the next block of rain blows in. Harvest in the greenhouse has begun with Zukes, cukes & broccoli. So far just enough for friends & family but in a few more weeks we'll have enough to open, although the broccoli will be done by then. We've got 4 fields of corn planted with the 1st 2 out of the ground already. Funny what we heard from the uncles in Mississippi: their corn is tasseling already!

I'm off to work, wishing you a delightful Memorial Day.

1st harvest 2011 !!

We ate the 1st bok-choi out of the greenhouse stir-fried w/ chicken, broccoli, other veggies & sesame-peanut sauce for dinner. So delicious! Gonna have to start selling soon.

hot & cold spring day

It's sooo hot in the greenhouse. Well, so hot anyways, especially when compared with the chilly breeze outside.

Ice on the water buckets this morning but everything in the greenhouse was fine, whew! 1st zucchini should flower in about a week.

a little greenhouse action

the 1st of our pak-choi type chinese cabbage is just about ready to cut, some of the lettuces are getting close too. Gonna have to scramble to get the stand moved and open before the broccoli starts to head. Here's a pic:

long time no blog

An apology to any regular readers I might still have, we've been mighty busy with the greenhouse and garden so it's been hard to find spare time to write. I'm gonna line up the stuff so I can blog from my android phone & then we should see a more regular flow of posts. In the meantime, here's some cuteness to assuage the hurt.

rain delay

Starting to burn our way into our spring planting dates as the rain continues to sludgify every open soil surface. The brief periods of dry coming up in the forecast won't help much either but I'll sure take every hour of open sky I can get.

Nonetheless, it's a beautiful winter day in early spring.

Winter working

It's a rainy day but the work goes on in our big greenhouse. We've spent the last couple days cleaning it out after last year's tomatoes & a brief stint of chickens. Dad tilled and fertilized a bed for our first lettuce and cole crops while I was hauling out debris. We'll probably start planting later today.

Dad's heading into the doctor's shortly to (maybe) get his chemo if his blood tests from yesterday came out ok.

Mt. Fielder is putting on a lovely show of fog and trees this morning while Sparky and I enjoy our morning tea time.

Hoping your day is peaceful and lively.

Signs of things to come

We're putting together one of our last seed orders. Holy Cow! the prices have skyrocketed. This and other expenses will have to be passed on to our customers which will not be well received.

This shows exactly what is happening throughout our economy. And hints at just how bad things can become in a very short time.

Hooray! for Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin.

Keep up the good work Scott, it's time for the reasonable and realistic people to put their foot down and tell the whiners to take a Waaa!mbulence out of town.

It's still winter

I could feel the bony grasp of the ol' hags hand through my moccasins this morning.

Forward thinking

Our Egyptian buddy Sandmonkey has an idea for them that sounds like a good idea for America too! A way to circumvent the gridlock of our Dem-Rep dichotomy.

A call to freedom

A fellow I've followed for about 8 years now, the Egyptian Sandmonkey has posted this extremely moving piece about the situation in Cairo. It is a must read cry to duty and a warning to all those of us who wish to live out from under the thumb of tyranny. Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.

Update: Some a-hole authoritarian has shut down Sandmonkey's site. Until it comes back up, here's the Google Cache of his very fine prose. SM was arrested and beaten after writing this, trying to take medical supplies to his people.

Re:Update: SM has gotten home and seems to be well, hopefully he's resting now. More details on his twitter account. The pigs stole his phone... No offense to actual porcine.

Winter morning reflection

On a lighter note, it's cold and foggy here. The first hole in the sky is shinin' through on Mt Fielder.

Sunny winter day

Today should be round 2 in the fruit tree spraying battle. Really soaked the almond trees yesterday. Apples and pears get it next.

Enjoy this fine day on planet Earth.

Spring's a comin'

Already getting busy with spring anticipation. Also would like to get at least 1 of my software projects finished and released before we get too busy and lose the rain time.

Hope things are sailing smooth for you.