Blog update

We love sharing our stories and photos from the farm with you. Thanks for returning to read our farm adventures. 

A few notes about the blog:

1- Have you noticed the new page at the top? I added some of our most popular posts under the "Favorites" tab. Outtakes + Pumpkins + Pigs and Prom dresses!

2- Reading your comments makes my day! Our wonderful brother/IT Guy wrote some directions on how to do just that. Click this link for his very thorough directions.

3- Finally, I have a way to view the blog "Stats", they include which countries are viewing the blog. The United States is always in the lead with the most views. However, I love the breakdown from around the world. A lot of international views come from random countries and I have no idea how they would have found us. But, my favorites come from countries where I know who is looking at the blog - Belize, Portugal, Tajikistan, Greece, and most recently Hong Kong. It always brings a smile to my face when I think of those far-away friends and family reading about life on the farm. 

And to thank you ALL for reading, here is a picture of an itchy cow:

Close-Ups

We hung out with the herd for a while last night. A few of them came trotting right up to me when I got out the camera.

The calf is healthy and growing bigger everyday.

In my opinion, this is the best-looking bull we have right now. His hair is long and silky, and makes him look so rugged when the wind blows. 

Last night was one of my favorite parts about farming. We weren't busy doing chores, and the herd seemed content to have us around. It's fun to hang out with the animals and just enjoy our land. 

Do you have a card?

Why, yes. Yes, we do.

I mentioned a gift in this post. It was this beautiful illustration from K at Little Alexander.  We are thrilled to have our farm represented with this image. Expect us to be passing out our new cards as often as possible! (Bonus points if you catch the typo)

Spring Greens

The garden by the house is taking off. Farmer John dedicated the majority of it to early crops, mostly greens.

There are three rows of radishes,

four bushy rows of spinach,

and several raised-beds of lettuce mixes.

And I've been thinking about something. If I had the chance to do it again, maybe I'd carry a bouquet of Spring-fresh asparagus down the aisle (with broccoli, lettuce, and Swiss chard too!) But, then I'd run the chance that Farmer John might eat it!

Dinner with the herd

Friday!

This video is a bit out of focus, but I hope it will give you a laugh anyway. 

Little Alexander

This weekend I did some business-y work for the farm. The Farmers Market will be up and running again soon, and I'd like to have new business cards and egg carton labels ready. 

While working on this, I got to thinking about K+A over at Little Alexander. They have been some of our biggest cheerleaders and have played an important role in helping the farm get to where it is today. 

K+A have been at the farm to help with weeding the garden and unloading our first beef. They've also helped from very far away - encouraging us to start this blog, lots of business support and ideas, and one other BIG plan (more to come on that). 

I should also mention that I've been friends with them since elementary school. Farmer John has been friends with A since they went swimming in Lake Superior. A few years later K+A drove all night from Seattle to join us for our wedding on that same shore. 

If you haven't done so already, I would encourage you to take a look at the Little Alexander shop on Etsy. They make beautiful notecards, postcards, and notebooks. I have a particular fondness for the rural-themed illustrations. And I have the green one of these full of notes and Belize adventures. Farmer John keeps crop notes in this. They gave us a beautiful gift recently, and we're excited to share it with you soon. In the meantime take a look at their shop. 

In the ground this weekend

• Lettuce mix
• Red lettuce
• Swiss chard
• Beets
• Peas
• Red onions
• Fence posts for cattle's temporary pasture
• Lots of rain!

This was the calf's first time in a new pasture. She was particularly curious about the chickens. This was the best photo I could get of her trying to play with them. Cutest.thing.ever. 

Good News / Bad News

I've got good news and bad news. Which do you want first? Bad news?

One of the pigs died. (Please, no bacon jokes on this one, ok?)

It was the runt of the group. At first this wasn't noticeable  but over the last couple weeks it didn't look like it grew at all. We didn't worry about this, we just thought it was the runt. Maybe there was something else going on, but it never showed signs of being sick. One day is was rooting around in the pasture, and the next day it was dead.

That's really all I have to say about that, besides that it really just...sucks.

Now...good news!

On Sunday, Farmer John moved the pigs from the barn to their new pasture. I know the move was frustrating at first, but then he figured out a method and it worked perfectly. Hilariously and perfectly.

The pigs seem very happy in their new pasture. They scampered around with us for a few minutes, then started rooting. It's been so much fun to watch them out there just being pigs.

Spring hay

We, like other parts of the country, are experiencing a late Spring. The land is just now starting to green up. 

A couple weeks ago we were worried about this. Our hay from the summer was almost gone, and there was no new grass in the pastures. This unfortunate combination meant we had to buy hay for the cattle.

Farmer John and his Dad took two trips to a farm in the neighboring county to get four round bales of hay.

Farmer John unloaded three of them in a spot the cattle could not access.

Then gave one to the herd in their pasture. They were so excited that they pushed and shoved...

...and rolled the bale down into a little ravine.

Despite the cattle's antics, this hay has worked well for us. It fed the cattle while Farmer John was away for several days, and should last until they are once again on green grass.  

Porcine Pallet Palace

Throughout the past week Farmer John has been making preparations for moving the pigs outside. A pasture was cleared and he has electric fence around it. On Saturday we worked on a new pig fort. They will need some shelter once they are out of the barn. 

Let me preface the following photos/text - we had no idea what we were doing, no plans, no forethought, no engineering abilities, and no money to spend on this particular project. 

Farmer John gathered some pallets from behind Tractor Supply in town and around the farm buildings. We set them up and slid some boards through the openings to keep them together. We also anchored them to some T-posts with baling twine. At this point I was kicking myself for not paying more attention during all my knot-tying classes at Northland College!

Farmer John pretended he was a pig to see how sturdy the structure was. Turns out, we needed more T-posts and baling twine with better knots. Somewhere in here we got pretty frustrated, took a break, and re-worked some of the plans. 

Farmer John scavenged one of the old hand-rails from the walking bridge to form the highest part of the roof.   

We pulled a tarp over it and tied it in place. We are hoping we tied it at an angle that will shed water. 

The true test will come soon when the pigs make their big move outdoors. An afternoon's worth of work might be knocked down with the push of a few strong snouts. 

Identity crisis