What a wild ride August has been! The kids went back to school, we held our first farm happy hour (which was great fun!), it has either been unreasonably hot with no precipitation or dumping inches of water over very short periods of time, and I have a chicken that finds it fun to fly over a 7 foot fence in order to go lay her eggs in the tall grass at the edge of our property. Before I get into more details and farm updates I will share upcoming events so you can mark your calendars.
September:
Table Root Happy Hour: Friday, 9/22, 5-6:30
School Lunches Revamped: Tuesday, 9/12, 11-1
Communally Cooked Dinner: Wednesday, 9/20, 6-9
Table Root Talk (How to boost immunity): Wednesday, 9/27, 7:30-8:30pm
October:
Communally Cooked Lunch: Tuesday, 10/3, 10:30-1:30
Table Root Happy Hour: Friday, 10/13, 5-6:30
Communally Cooked Dinner: Thursday, 10/26, 6-9
Table Root Talk (topic TBD): Sunday 10/29, 7:30-8:30
*Starting in October, I will be offering a year long gardening course that will guide you on what to do each month. The course will be $200 for the year. This course will meet either every month or every other month, at the farm. Snacks and drinks will be provided. Please fill out this form if you are interested in this course. If there are other gardening classes you would like, please reach out to me so I can see what I can make happen! (If you filled out the form last month and asked about information between meetings, please email me as I didn’t have a line for your name at that point!…and the answer is absolutely.)
Please register for any events you plan on attending here.
And, as always, please reach out to me if you would like to request a class for your family, friend group, a ladies night out, or a date night.
The farm garden has undergone a major overhaul over the past couple weeks as the plants lost to bugs and fungus were pulled. Bug covered plants were left in place and the chickens were let loose to eat caterpillars, squash bugs, mexican bean beetle larvae and whatever else they could find while tilling the soil and leaving behind some nitrogen rich deposits. When they had finished their work, I hauled beautiful compost from the Art Barn back to the garden. Just this past week I planted lettuce mixes, mustard greens, broccoli, and purple bush beans. With an incredible amount of help I turned all the soil in the unplanted part of the garden, added compost and planted buckwheat as a cover crop. I would like to give a huge shout out to farm member Tamara Barker, who has been helping with many of the dirty, sweaty and physically exhausting jobs this past month. The work has gone much faster with her help and the company has kept me from thinking that the chickens are actually communicating with me.
The chickens had a phenomenal first full month as layers with 196 eggs laid between the 7 hens. They have started to trust me more and I understand them better so I am starting to see my vision of a symbiotic relationship between the garden, myself and the chickens come to fruition. As I continue to build my vision for Table Root Farm and think forward to 2024, I would love to hear from as many of you as possible. I would love to know what you would like to see from the farm or at the farm. I am open to all suggestions and will be adding some fun workshops in the next couple months…fall crafts, skincare, and nutrition to name a few.
While some of you may be enjoying the continued heat, I will be here eagerly awaiting some cooler weather as my collection of sweaters is just begging to be worn around a fire pit. And in the spirit of fall, I have attached a recipe for pumpkin pecan waffles to get you in the mood.