We’re fond of mushrooms out here.  All kinds.  They are magical and wonderful and responsible for so much good in this world that they rarely get acknowledged for.   Did you know that though they were once classified as plants, fungi are actually more similar to us in one significant way than they are to plants?  Plants famously breathe in Carbon Dioxide and breath out Oxygen.  Conveniently we do the exact opposite.  But, so do fungi!   They form an interconnected network under our feet and are responsible for helping plants and trees grow.  They balance out nutrients in the forest, literally taking excess nutrients from one tree and sharing them with another tree in a more deprived patch of soil.  It’s...

Hello hello!  We have had a wonderful season of Spring flowers and are all super happy with how everything went.  Our crew has been fantastic, our days have been filled with so much beauty, and our customers have all been so kind and uplifting.  Such a great season for us and we appreciate you for helping it to be a success!   And so another beautiful Spring gives way and melts into the season of electrolytes and fireflies.  We’ve been hot out here, but fortunately and unfortunately we’re devoid of the humidity that generally accompanies the heat.  It looks like that may be coming on Monday though, so we are excited to be getting some real rain!   These temps punctuate the...

As I sit here wondering what on earth to write about, my kitchen table cluttered around me reminding me that there’s supposed to be life outside of work, the scent of Sarah Berhnardt peonies slides across the kitchen and into my nose and reminds me why the work is so compelling. I’m at the point in the year where Mandy is a little tired of hearing me complain that 7 day weeks for almost half a year straight is eroding my state of health.  She’s built tougher than me.  Thrives on the constant hustle.  It’s in her DNA and her upbringing.  Her people are constantly motivated and generally happy to have long lists of tasks to accomplish and she’s the...

One of the best parts of our job is the fact that we are the conduit for so many good intentions.  We work in the heat, the cold, the mud, and in what all told, sometimes feels like a Sisyphean effort to make a living by fostering fragile lifeforms through hostile conditions that seem to be getting more erratic year by year.     We live a fairly isolated existence and only see employees and delivery drivers most of the year.  In some ways, we are very disconnected.  But, it’s become more deeply impressed on us over time, how much the results of our efforts are directly tied to thousands of gestures of love sent from one person to another.     It’s like...

It’s safe to say that Mothers are the most frequently under-appreciated members of a household.  Having literally created another human from their own flesh and blood in what appears to be a great deal of discomfort for the better part of a year, they then endure for many more years, with herculean displays of patience, one or more tiny narcissistic sociopaths running around destroying things and pooping everywhere.    For the next 18 years (at least), the unending load of thankless work, lack of sleep, and all around self-sacrifice is often met with attitude and dismissive sass from a completely helpless and fully dependent person who is not only unappreciative, but is severely self-assured in their condescension despite not even having...

  It was a close call with frost this Monday and Tuesday.  We woke up to 34 degrees and concern that we may have lost our veggie plants and possibly some mother’s day flowers, but I guess we lucked out.  All survived. I hope any of you living a little further north or higher in elevation were able to protect your precious veggie babies. It’s always a tough blow to lose your plants to frost and we’re not supposed to get any after April 15th each year, but we all know how that goes.     We did lose some of our favorite peonies to that real deep freeze awhile back.  Not the plants, but the flowers.  They are always the first to bloom and each...

  We’re a little run-down, so I don’t have much to say or share this week.  Cotton is doing great.  The snowball viburnums have been blowing our minds.  The weather has been perfect and we apparently live in a bird sanctuary.    Lunaria flowers have carpeted the landscape for more than a month now and kept us in a constant backdrop of beautiful purple, juxtaposed against the reds of the Japanese maples and greens of fresh grass and foliage.  If you have a yard, you should consider planting Lunaria.  I love it.   Spring is my absolute favorite season, but I’m always a bit torn by it.  Each year I grow to love and appreciate it more deeply, yet each year I long to experience it more...

  We’ve got some cold nights coming!  Tonight and tomorrow are both going to be in the 30’s with potential for frost, so please consider protecting all of your fragile garden starts by either bringing them inside or covering them with a tarp or some other insulative material. Make sure to fasten down your tarps too, because it's going to be a bit windy and that wind has been known to blow away good intentions and kill many a plant.   We’re wrapping up the plant sale out here, but there is still a little time to place an order for those plants you missed!  The sale ends tomorrow at noon, so head over to Our Plant Sale Page to order your tomatoes, peppers, and...

  We’ve started a new tradition at the farm.  Friday Bocce games with the crew!  If you don’t know, bocce is an old Italian game kinda like lawn bowling.  Mandy’s Dad Tony, who is a talented wood turner, gifted us with a gorgeous and painstakingly crafted set of bocce balls from hard wood he got from our farm.  The amount of time and skill that went into making these is mind blowing to me. I can’t overstate my gratitude to him.   I previously mentioned that my dad’s parents were from Ireland in the St. Patrick's day story, but my mom’s parents were actually from Italy.  My mom’s first language was Italian.     When I grew up, we spent our 3 weeks of vacation each summer up...

  Hey y’all!  Not much to say this week.   Or rather, not much time to say it.  We’re just racing around trying to get it all done.       Rachel has been organizing the plant sale and brought in Abby and 2 new helpers (Laura and Rex) to organize all the orders and make sure they are ready for y’all to pick up at your appointment.      Naw and Marry have brought in Naw’s sister in law, Eh Plaw, to keep up with all of the flowers steadily growing in the tunnels and fields.  Eh Plaw only recently arrived in the U.S. after the genocidal military campaign against their people ramped up in Myanmar.  She’s smiley and shy and...