August 5, 2021

Our garden has been going gang-busters on us.  We wanted to compare the different types of growing beds (hugelkultur raised beds vs mounded beds). Unfortunately, we just can’t do that!  All of it is growing very well.

In early July, I realized that all my garlic has grown scapes. I noticed it a little too late and they were all hard. That meant I had to harvest it all.  It was actually quite fun digging up the garlic – every single clove I planted grew into a full head!  We set them out to dry for a few weeks.  Once they were dry, we split all the heads, peeled the cloves, and are storing them in olive oil in the refrigerator.  We processed them this way because these were hardneck garlic and we let the scapes get too big, the cloves won’t last as long in our storage bins.  Do you want a great tip on how to peel garlic? Take 10-15 cloves and microwave them for 10 seconds. Immediately, roll them in a kitchen towel and then peel them.  It is MUCH easier!

We had a family reunion in Georgia and were going to be away from the farm for 5 days, so we had to spend time preparing the farm.  We set up multiple automatic waterers and feeders for the chickens, gave the kitten extra food and water, and set up an automatic drip irrigation in the garden. We harvested as much of the produce as we could – and took it with us!

While we were traveling the 10+ hours in the car, John and I had lots of time to talk.  We spend so much time together and have a great relationship, but we are often talking about the next thing. During this car trip, we discussed more of our goals, our priorities, and our hearts. It was amazing.  One thing we decided was that for this year, the priority on the farm had to be the apple orchard and the house.  Everything else had to take a back-seat.  That means we will not be having long days canning tomatoes, we won’t be making bbq sauce this year, we won’t raise any more meat chickens, and we won’t start any new “fun” projects. We will do quick preserving methods so we can reap some of the benefits of our garden, but we really do need to spend the majority of our time and energy getting the house finished so we can move in.

When we got home, we picked all the produce that was ready and I brought it into my office.  They were thrilled to be the benefactors of our decision to not process! I also brought some to our local food bank to give away to our neighbors!

These pictures are from our harvest this week. I froze many of these tomatoes in case we have time this winter to process them. And I cut up 20 tomatoes for the dehydrator (it took less than 10 minutes).  I’m also going to freeze the peppers once they turn completely red. We are going to make hot pepper sauce, smoked paprika powder, and chili powder if we get the chance. 

It is freeing knowing that I can pick food from my garden and give it away instead of being stressed that I have to process it right away. Usually, I love vegetable processing days and I love putting food up for my family, but this year, we have to focus differently!