The Farm!

Well, here is our miracle! We have been wishing for property for a very long time and now we will have some(at least temporarily!) Our heart has been to have a place where we could grow more than enough food for our family to eat, and the abundance we could give to needy people. However, we have not has access to land or the resources to purchase any. God is always bigger than our circumstances! In early December Brian got a call from a client that he has only met once. He wanted to offer his land to us to use until he is ready to develop it(in a couple of years). His own family had gardened there in the past and have some chickens there now. He was thinking abut the land and Brian crossed his mind! So, he called to offer to let us garden(farm) his land for free. We just can't believe how good God is to us! He is providing for us in ways that we would have never expected!
I will try to keep the blog updated with our adventures on, what we are calling, the farm! Please check in the Kitchen and Garden Adventures section of the blog.

Today, we turned in our Garden in a Wheelbarrow project to the county fair. It turned out great and it was a lot of fun. We would definitely do it again, but not next year!This is a science fair project board that we used to display our "evidence of learning." I divided it in half; one side is for Isaac and the other for Elise.

Isaac learned about where food comes from; seeds and plant life cycles; beneficial v. harmful bugs in the garden; sorting & counting seeds; he also wrote a story and a poem; and much more!

Elise did a large research project on Urban Options for Self-Sufficiency, which included the topics gardening, chicken keeping, and meat rabbits. She also did research on a moth that appeared dead on our porch and discovered that it was the Tomato Hornworm in the caterpillar stage. She also learned about the plant life cycle, the parts of a flower, Colony Collapse Disorder and wrote many poems.

We also discovered mushrooms in our wheelbarrow which led to an impromptu lesson on "NEVER eat a mushroom you find in the yard, even if it is growing in your raised bed, or wheelbarrow garden!"

Our plants did not grow very well, so Elise got to do some observations and conclusions about why that might be and added her findings to our project. When we got to the fair, several other wheelbarrows had similar components to their projects.

It did turn out nice, though. Elise made glittery signs welcoming the viewers to the garden, and naming the plant types, as well as, the kids names. Isaac made fences from popsicle sticks for a chicken run. Elise printed out pictures of a coop and chickens that are the same type as Daisey, Dolly and Charlotte. We added all of it to our wheelbarrow garden.
It was really fun to put all of this together today! Showing the kids how all their hard work really tied together was great also! They did work hard, and in the end it showed!

Our Growing Garden!!

Here is our garden now (well, two weeks ago)!!

As you can see it is really growing.

This is our tomato and cucumber bed. We have a yellow pear tomato, a Mr. Stripey, and two cherry tomatoes. Isaac and I started the cucumber and cherry tomatoes from seed, and gave away the extras to some friends. It was really fun and now we are both anxiously waiting our first tomato! When we pick a cucumber it disapears as soon as we cut get it washed and sliced. Even the kids know homegrown is better!

This bed has our Peter Pan squash, flowers, onions, leeks, and bush(oops, pole) beans. It has become clear that we have had another plant label mix up from the nursery. We bought 16 bush beans and 6 pole beans, then we planted and trellised accordingly. When our bush beans sent out shoots and our pole beans just grew into squat little plants, we knew there was a problem.

Brian improvised by putting a trellis on both sides of the clump of (now pole)beans, and they are doing well!

This is our zucchini and pepper bed. We have six different peppers and two zucchini. I have been cutting the leaves off the zucchini to keep them from shading the peppers. This has made the zucchini plants look lopsided, but they are still producing more than we can eat!

OKRA!!

This is my favorite! Well, I suppose tomatoes are a really close second. We pick them when they are about 3-4 inches long, skewer them, and grill them with olive oil, salt & pepper. YUM!

Peter Pan Squash, this is Brian's favorite! It is new to us, but is delicious. We roast it whole on the BBQ then slice it, and eat it with olive oil, salt & pepper!