It's just a baby..... radish! Our very first baby radish! Can you believe that we're in this cold climate and we haven't even grown radishes??? Unbelievable. Of course I never gardened before coming to this cold clime either. But there you are...our first baby radish! : D
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So here we are back in the land of blueberries--and aren't they lovely scrumptious little things? Let me assure you--they most certainly are! And we should know...we've been munchin' on 'em non-stop for the past week! Now take a look at the rakes we're holding...not your typical rake, huh. These are small hand-held jobs in varying widths...adaptable to the width of your bucket. I'm so glad that people out there think of such things! We determined to fill up a 5 gallon bucket and that's why raking was our choice du jour! I wish that I'd thought to take a close-up of the rakes but, alas, I didn't. The closest I got was that one dropped over there on the ground to the right, so I'll just describe them as shaped something like a metal dustpan with the bottom made of small round metal slats or rods with points on the ends (as opposed to being solidly flat--like a dust pan). The handle also went down over the top of the 'pan' part rather than pointing up--like a dust pan. Other than that, it WAS like a dustpan! Here we are with all of our nice berries...this is just the overflow bucket. See all those leaves and grass? We really want those out of there...and this place had the technology. I was SO impressed! This great contraption 'winnows' out the leaves, sticks, and grass for the most part... Winnowing and waiting...waiting and winnowing...then all of a sudden it left us with this...Beautiful, huh! To top it all off, Karyn plopped down in the grass with the kiddos and read one of our Maine favorites, Blueberries for Sal. That Sunday was also 'Maine Day' which meant that all the state parks were free admission, so for our picnic lunch we decided to go to the state park in Searsport. We heard that it had a nice picnic area next to the beach. We heard right...it was gorgeous! And also had some paths through the woods along the shore and a playground, too! Lovely place...lovely day...I must say! Woohoo! Two sunny days in a row! We left poor daddy behind to work on watches while the rest of us loaded up and headed south to Stockton Springs and Staples Homestead for some blueberry pickin'. We drove along coastal hwy. 1 passing up all sorts of fun flea markets, yard sales, and antiques places as well as a great rug hooking store in Searsport that I've been longing to visit for over a year now--Oh! If only there were more hours in a day! We discovered yet another wonderful Maine U-pick farm for our first authentic blueberry experience. We decided to rake as opposed to hand-picking since we weren't all that particular to the size of the berries...plus it just goes a whole lot faster! There's actually much, much more to our blueberry story here, but I've been fighting with THE slowest moving computer this side of the equator today! So I'll post this much tonight and stay tuned for more tomorrow...and hopefully my computer will be on better behavior, too! My daughter just took it upon herself to be the official pea sheller, so she plopped herself under a shade tree and started to shellin'! If you've never had the unique opportunity to shell peas before, then plop down here in the shade with us and let Heather give her wonderful demonstration on how to get those little peas from their pods (but you have to promise not to munch while you're doing this--OK, not too many anyway!).... I love those little crown tops pea pods have on their stems--aren't they so cute and dainty? Is that not just the perfect picture of domestic bliss...?? Ahhh! Baby's knocked over her water bucket again...she prefers the pool...much to the children's utter distress! And I kid you not they taste better raw than cooked....I'm not kiddin'! These are the sweetest peas I've ever tasted in my life! Beats M&M's any day! It's July...can you get a whiff of that sweet somethin' in the air? We sure could yesterday as we pulled into the Stevenson's U-Pick Strawberry Farm with rows upon rows, clusters upon clusters of these.... Yes, take us to your berries...quick....before we are completely unable to fully contain our children! (I'm pretty much convinced that I really need a sign like this, too!) And our kiddos proved to be all around avoid-the-squishy-green-a little too-hard-yet-stay-in-our-designated-area stellar strawberry pickers! THEY"RE convinced we need vast acres of strawberries! I suppose the two sorta go together...although from slightly different quantities of work angles... By the way, I love how the fields up here are surrounded by the dense woods and huge pine trees....not only is it just beautiful, but it gives a real appreciation for what the farmers from an earlier time had to do to clear these fields for crops! Can you imagine....?? I can't even begin to imagine! As with most farms, they have more than just strawberries....they also have some sweet peas coming in....and they're very sweet, sweet peas! And these adorable baby calves (with a very loud vocal mama cow in the near vicinity)! For more fun photos from yesterday, click on my Flickr gallery! So now it's time to shell some peas, make some jam....and have heaps and piles of strawberry shortcake--wanna come join us...??!! Daddy's out scything more grass for hay...with lots of helpers! Then we raked it out to let it dry...so very glad we've had some sunshine! Hey! Bring on that Ha--aa--aay! It was drizzly and cold and rainy but we still made it out for MOFGA's (Maine Organic Farmers & Gardeners Assoc.) Small Farm Field Day on Saturday--along with a respectable turn out. We also managed to pick up some things we didn't know before we went and had a really good day to boot! While my husband hung out with the guys with the scythes, I went over to hear some stuff about goats and goat-keeping. This couple from Harrison, ME had 30 years combined experience with goats and passed their goat pearls of wisdom on to us. And even though it continued to be cold and rainy, we hooked up with our friends, Steve and Karyn and their little ones, and as usual the kids were like, "Rain--what rain?" So we just didn't tell them that they were actually supposed to be cold and miserable--and went and had some lunch instead. Nice shot, huh! Don't ask me what they're doing--or looking at--I guess this is what happens to children when you talk about farms and goats all morning--in the cold, drizzly rain. After lunch, things really picked up. I took the kiddos with me to listen to someone tell me all about chickens while my husband went back to the guys with the scythes. And then for the grand finale--and grand it was too! Kindra and her earth oven that she completely constructed on her very own and who was also responsible for starting the fire in that clay oven five hours earlier in order to bake the most heavenly scrumptious sour dough bread you can ever imagine! First she scored those luscious lumps of dough with this handy little razor-blade tool--so that the bread would not explode through some little hole of its own choosing--and come out looking like sheer perfection. Then she used the short peel to put the remaining loaves toward the front of the oven--and she was such a whiz at this most of my photos are completely blurred! I never realized I'd need high-speed action for bread baking--you could just tell she was lovin' every minute of this stuff! These small ridges in the bread were created from the willow bowls she used--which are supposed to be perfect for allowing the dough to breathe as it's rising (available online). Plus they make the loaves look quite lovely, don't you agree...? The children--as well as adults--couldn't get enough of that bread! And she made this all look so fantastically fun and easy that everyone in the crowd (including ourselves) is now fully convinced they must have one of these in their own backyard! Just the term, 'Spring Tonics,' conjures up freshness, cleansing, invigorating images and the prettiest shades of cool, crisp cucumber green in my mind. Spring cleaning and cleansing are really resonating with me at the moment so let me show you a few of the sites I happened onto yesterday--before I lose track of 'em all! Now all you naturalist, herbalist, super-healthy types have probably already heard of all this stuff before, so just please bear with me as I stumble through my lttle discoveries here. One thing I found was that dandelion greens and roots are packed full great nutrients and cleansing properties. Wow! Can I say, 'danelions!' I've got dandelions of the most sturdy organic variety growing like gang-busters--all over the place! OK, so that was cheap and easy. Also good cleansing herbs are burdock, nettles, osha root, violets, mint and several more. Here are some sites that provide some tonic recipes I can't wait to try! First, Spring Cleaning Yourself and Spring Cleansing by Elson Haas, M.D. and here's a nice list of Spring herbs: I'm discovering that I really need to get some sort of a juicer going if I really want to do this up right! Viva Terra has this snappy spicey recipe and here's another one by Recipe Zaar. Now, for some topical (versus internal) homemade cleansers, check out Care Fair for some wonderfully easy concoctions! Have fun and enjoy rejuvenating! We just feel so tremendously blessed to be plopped in the current location we're plopped in right now. We are surrounded by such beautiful families and farms around here in this rural region of Maine. One such place is Avalon Acres Orchard and Farm found just a couple of miles around the bend behind us--with a hilltop view overlooking our serenely lovely Indian Lake here in St. Albans. This couple moved up here to Maine a couple or so years ago and have renovated, refurbished, re-instituted....re-whatever it is you do to a languishing orchard and traditional lovely New England farmhouse, to restore it back to its former glory. And I should say it's really much MORE than it's former glory because they're moving way beyond merely apples (although apples are PLENTY of work in and of themselves). They offer an assortment of fresh organic foods including vegetables from their garden, blueberries, strawberries....and, according to what they were mentioning last fall, they will eventually have peaches and maple syrup, too. And here's Avalon Acres at apple picking time. Yes, Avalon Acres is a member of The Maine Highlands Farmers organization which is a wonderful resource for local farmers and lists several more farms and orchards in this area just waiting to be visited and supported. You can find all the details you need there! |
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