The Garden of Eden...

it ain't.  But I'll have spinach, herbs, and flowers this summer.

Spring has sprung!

Last weekend was the Spring Equinox.  I had decided to plant spinach on my balcony, as it is both shade- and container-tolerant.  So I went to Home Depot to purchase containers, dirt, seeds, and tools.  I was surprised to find that, at least at my location, they did not stock large bags of potting soil, nor large containers of the type I wanted.  I decided to improvise; I bought a plastic tub of the type that is meant to store out-of-season clothing under the bed, and a set of power tools, including 18V drill/driver, 5.5" circular saw, flashlight, and dustbuster.  I used the drill to make some holes in the bottom of the tub (for drainage), but alas, I still had no dirt.  After a week of asking countrified friends if they had any dirt, the tub was still empty.

Today, after attending a baby shower in Chanhassen, I went to the Eden Prairie location of Menard's.  Their garden section is considerably more useful than HD's; not only did they have many different kinds of soil in large bags, they stocked gravel (to improve drainage), sand, watering cans, and other heavy duty materials and tools.  I have figured it out.  Home Depot is where suburbanites and urbanites go for their DIY needs; Menard's is where ruralites, farmers, and wanna-bes (like me) go.

I wish I could have taken pictures of the process, but my hands were rather dirty.  First, I took three trips to lug the gravel (very heavy) and two 2 cu. ft. bags of potting soil to my apartment.  Then I shoveled/swept the snow and most of the ice off the balcony.  I got the tub positioned and added the gravel, then a layer of soil.  When you use potting soil, you're not supposed to use it dry; you're supposed to get it thoroughly "moist", but not too wet.  I decided to use hot tap water, since it was pretty cold out, figuring that if the water started out hot, it would be less likely to freeze completely overnight.  I ended up doing three layers of soil, watering with hot water and mixing with the hand rake between each layer.  It felt amazing to dig my hands into that warm, moist earth.  My arms were black to the elbow by the time I was done.  Finally, I sprinkled the spinach seeds over the top and covered them with a little more soil.  I wish I had a big piece of Plexiglas to put over the top, to help it stay warm.  I hope they don't freeze.  Updates will be forthcoming!

After all that (plus getting up at 4:30am; long story), I was a little tired.  So I watched a documentary that I just happened to find at the library, The Farmer and the Horse, which Jenna happened to mention recently also.  It made me so excited!  All about farming with draft animals instead of tractors, in NJ, of all places.  Being originally from NJ myself, it was super cool to see the Howell Farm and even a shot of the Hopewell Borough train station and farmer's market.  Wow!  I highly recommend watching this if you can get it.  [Mom: I checked the MCL catalog, but apparently they don't have it.  Since it's about local farming, maybe you could suggest they buy a copy?]

Book Review: Jayber Crow

Jayber Crow: The Life Story of Jayber Crow, Barber, of the Port William Membership, as Written by Himself
by Wendell Berry

This was recommended to me by a good friend, upon hearing that I'd started reading fiction about farming and small-town life.  He cautioned me that it moves very slowly, and not to get impatient with it.

Maybe it's because I've got the flu, but I wasn't impatient with it for a minute.  It certainly does ramble along, not always logically or chronologically, but it keeps moving and is never boring.

It's the story of a man's life, from childhood outside the small town of Port William, orphaned twice, oppressively schooled at an orphanage and later a college, how he started his trade of barbering and was gradually pulled back by the gravity of his hometown.

There is a good portion of philosophy about God, life, and love, but it's never heavy-handed or proselytizing.  (Holy cow, I spelled that right on the first try!)  Mostly, it is conversational, like an old man telling of his life and what he learned.

I loved it.  It fit perfectly the kind of story I wanted to read just now.  Berry (or supposedly Crow) often describes the life of the river near his home, and the story is like that.  Sometimes slow, sometimes reflective, and sometimes flooded or wild.  Just like life, in his view.  Sometimes I get so wrapped up in the minutiae of daily life that I forget the whole, beautiful flow of it.

Whee!

I just got A Countryside Anthology 1998, published by Countryside Magazine, in the mail.  I'm so excited to read this, you have no idea.  Just to give you an idea, here's the main sections:

Alternative energy
Gardening, orchards, crops & soils
Country kitchen
Beginning homesteading & finances
The beehive
The homestead dog
The poultry yard
The rabbit barn
The goat barn
The sheep shed
The cow barn
Livestock and health
The pig pen
Book reviews
The machine shed
The workshop
Miscellaneous tips/crafts/leisure
Homestead health
Emergency preparation
Country neighbors

and more!  Between this and Storey's Basic Country Skills, I should be all set.

Whee!

Tomato Tasting

Yesterday, S and I drove down to Seed Savers Farm near Decorah, Iowa.  It was a long drive (almost three hours), but totally worth it.  The weather was gorgeous and cool-- just the first hint of fall.  The tomato tasting event was scheduled to start at 1pm, and we got there just a little after noon.  We had some time to tour the gardens.

Several varieties of sunflowers:

Giant sunflowers!!!

Some really tall corn, beans, herbs, and squash, among other things.

Is this a squash or a gourd?  I don't know.

Near where the tomato tasting would take place, there was a small folksy band, complete with violin/fiddle, accordion, guitar, and drums.

The band.

(Also many loud children playing in the sandbox and slide.)

Then, the tasting started.  Somewhere around 40 varieties of tomatoes, ranging in size from less than a centimeter in diameter to about six inches, and in colors including yellow, orange, pink, red, purple, black, green, and multicolored.

So many tomatoes!!!

At the head of the line, where they handed out tasting comment forms, pens, and seed saving tips, there was also this cool display:

I don't know this woman's name, but she was very friendly and helpful.

Some of my favorites were the Black Krim, a dark tomato from Russia with a really strong, sweet flavor, but not the typical sweetness you expect with tomatoes.  I can't even describe it, but I liked it.  I also enjoyed Dr. Wyche's Yellow (sweet and tangy) and the Velvet Red (a previous winner, cherry-sized).  At the end of the table, there were ballots to vote for your favorite; I voted for the Black Krim (which, incidentally, sounds like a great name for a pirate ship).

After we tasted, we took the 45 minute hayride around some of the outlying fields.  Our guide, Heidi, was very friendly and knowledgeable.

On the hayride, we got to see the compost heap (covered with blue fabric/tarp) and the diseased compost heap (well away from the usable one, not covered, smelled like compost).  It was very interesting to see the fields where they grow their crops-- those that are in danger of cross-pollinating with wild varieties are kept in tents to ensure the seeds will propagate true.  The tomatoes do not face this hazard.  This year, they're growing five varieties of tomatoes-- so many that they have them grow up fences instead of stakes.  It looks like a vineyard out there.

Surprisingly, Seed Savers sells absolutely zero produce.  All their crops are used for seed, which I suppose makes sense if your name is "Seed Savers".  But S and I wondered whether the staff ever just go out in the field for a snack.  At any rate, that's a lot of seeds to extract.

The hayride, while fun and informative, was not nearly as long or involved as S or I would have hoped.  But that left us time to explore a few last areas.  First, the livestock.  Seed Savers keeps heritage poultry and cattle:

This guy was making lots of noise.  Can you see the horns?

Sorry I couldn't get a better photo; these guys look crazy.  They've got big fluffy "headdresses" of feathers.  S didn't get why you would want a chicken to have that.

There was a nice herb garden near the visitor's center, as well as a giant old barn.

That's the visitor's center in the back.

View of the herb garden from the barn loft.

Finally, S and I took a short walk around the grounds.  There are some really neat trails to take around the property; alas, we only had time for the little loop around the pond.

All in all, a very fun trip.  Even driving there and back was fun-- we got to go through a bunch of tiny little towns we'd never heard of, and see all the pretty, just-on-the-brink-of-fall fields.

MN State Fair

Disclaimer: all of the photos below, unless noted otherwise, are from www.mnstatefair.org and do not belong to me.


Yesterday, I went to the State Fair with my friend S.  Despite living in this state since 2005, I had never gone before.  It was a very fun time, and I would definitely go again next year.


First, we went to the Heritage exhibits.  Some nice pottery and other crafts; some really strange kitschy stuff.  After that, we went to the livestock exhibits.  It was 4-H Llama Day, so we toured the stalls with kids brushing llamas.

These llamas look particularly happy.

I was surprised at how intelligent these guys looked.  I was expecting the general interest level of a cow, and instead they were curious like goats.  Several watched us intently as we walked by.


Next, we went into the Swine Barn.  Pigs are big!  And, somewhat sadly, they look like meat hung on a skeleton.  Minnesota's Largest Boar was especially disturbing.

Credit: roadfood.com

The sow and her piglets were cute, but also a little sad in that she's kept in that "sow stall", which keeps her from squishing, eating, or otherwise killing her little ones, for 21 days.  During that time, she doesn't get up at all.  She can't even turn over.  Sad.

We weren't able to go into the horse barn because it was being cleaned and prepared for a new set of horses to move in.

These were all over the place around the agricultural section of the fair.

There weren't any shows going on in the Colisseum while we were there, but it was a pretty cool space anyway.

Note the size of these cows-- significantly smaller than their handlers.  This is what I thought a cow looked like.

In the Cattle Barn, I learned that full-grown cows are HUGE.  Like whoa.

These are Jersey Cows, which, although still XXL, are not as large as...

Holstein cows.  Credit: www.fwi.co.uk

Holy cow!  (Ahahaha...)


Our last stop in the agriculture area was the Miracle of Birth center.  I found this building to be a little silly.  Basically, they get as many pregnant animals there as they can, and hope that some of them might give birth during the fair.  While we were there, there were a large number of people watching a pig give birth.  We didn't feel like fighting the crowd to get close enough to see, so we wandered around and looked at all the other babies.

Lamb-lings!

Now, just so you don't worry, yes, we did look at other things besides animals.  But for me, that was the most fun part.  We ate authentic fair food: fried cheese curds.  We wandered through the international bazaar (but didn't buy anything).  We saw the Horticulture exhibit, including the largest pumpkins:

You could totally make a child's carriage out of one of those.  Cinderella, anyone?

Man, that would be a cool Halloween costume.  Hollow out one of those monsters into a carriage, dress your toddler girl-child up as Cinderella, and have your dog pull the carriage.  Awesome.


Just as we were leaving the Horticulture exhibit, we were halted in our progress towards cheese curds by the daily parade.

There were several high school marching bands, and they were good.  Certainly better trained and more disciplined than our marching band was, although in my opinion their playing left something to be desired.


Once the parade was over, we found cheese curds and walked back to S's apartment.  I was very glad to sit down for awhile.