Sunday -A Family Day

Since the storm on Friday we've been hanging out close to home. Today we adventured over to the Swallows Nest. Josh tried to clear the driveway with a tractor but wasn't able to contend with the drifts. We set out to build a snow fort in those drifts. Izaak and Josh took the lead and built, what Josh calls, a 'once in a life time' snow fort. It has three tunnels, one central meeting place in the middle and great access for snow ball tossing. We went sledding and then had hot chocolate and stove top popcorn. It was a wonderful family day. Frank was a bit whiny, but that happens. And now we are planning for another week.

This week I am heading out to Saskatoon with my father. We are speaking at the Canadian Farm Business Management conference. We leave on Wednesday AM and arrive home on Saturday PM.

See you soon and enjoy the week!


Lily buried in the snow to keep warm.

Swallows Nest in the snow.


Fort building - Frank and Josh on top and Izaak inside the tunnel - working.

January 28th

Last night was the first Agricultural Land Review public consultation meeting. It was held at the multipurpose room at the Forum in Halifax. If you are interested in following along on this you can check out the website www.nsaglandreview.com.

I realized last night that I will be missing everyone for the most part of February. There is a public meeting scheduled every Wednesday in February. So I will be be around on share night for the month. I will miss everyone.

I started the mung bean sprout yesterday and today the greenhouse is getting cleaned up and ready for the next batch of greens to go in.

Here is Josh, Lily, Frank and Valarie. They are all wearing lovely sweaters that a good friend of Valaries made. Frank is 21/2 now - he's growing so fast.

Wind

Well it is 4:07 AM. I haven't been able to sleep much tonight as the wind is gusting so much it sounds like the greenhouse will drift away. Josh just got up and is pounding boards down to help hold the plastic in place. I am reminding myself that there are some things we must accept - wind tonight is one of them. I will keep you posted.

This week Josh and I are participating in Hort Congress and the Fruit Growers conference. Yesterday the Hort Congress keynote speaker was a woman from Iowa, Jolene Brown. She was great - reminding us to be current, willing to adapt and change and to have fun while doing it. An overall great message.

I am a bit behind this week as I just realized that I haven't posted the share list for this week. I guess that is what happens when I get out of routine and am not in my office.

Well - I am off to try for a bit more sleep. I hope you are all well and that the wind isn't too bad where you live tonight.

Delivery today anyway

Hello All,
I really can't see any reason to hold off today. I can understand the buses not running but by noon I am sure it will be a fine driving day.

PICKUP TONIGHT at all locations.

I will send an email too.

Hopefully this only happens once. It is too confusing!

Storm Day

According to our snow 'policy' - we decided that share day will move ahead a day if the schools are cancelled.

It is noon now, and there isn't any snow, but it could get bad later.

There will not be deliveries today - they will come tomorrow.

We will have pickup at the farm tomorrow too - same times same place.

I'll send out an email too.

Seems odd to do this when there is no snow, but it will get confusing if we don't stick with the plan.

Sprouts

On Friday I started 13 large jars of Alfalfa sprouts. I was hoping they would be ready for Tuesday. But here it is Monday night at 10:02 and they will not be ready for bagging tomorrow. This is a bit of an experiment. Do we need to start on Thursday or Friday? Do we use a 1/4 cup of sprout seeds or 1/2 cup for the jars? Lots of questions and trials to get it right. Next week those in Halifax will get sprouts, this week we hope that they will be ready for Wednesday. Fingers crossed.

I spent the day with the kids. We had a great day. We cleaned up all of their toys - a serious clean up. I have two boxes to donate and one box that is toast (recycle and garbage). Whow it feels great to clean and purge.

Enjoy the Week!

todays events

I am running off to a meeting of the Agricultural Land Review Committee. Soon I will be able to provide you with more info.

I just noticed that Amy has posted the annual report on the web page. Thanks Amy! Here is the link for your reading pleasure.

Also, the pdf of the registration forms for 2010 will be posted soon!

Josh ordered chicks and they will be here on Feb 8th. Also we got 50lbs of sprouting seed yesterday. I will start the sprouts tomorrow for next week's shares.

Enjoy the day!

Bringing in the New Year

Great food, great company, a great beginning to the year. Thanks to Tom and Lisa for having us over to share in bringing in 2010.

New cookbook Idea

Thanks for this !

I picked up this book at Chapters and have been using it with great results.

Kind regards,

The Mills' Family

a few more pictures

Josh took this photo tonight. The kids and I were driving in the driveway after karate and there Josh was slowing us down and pointing out this owl. It was perched on some greenhouse hoops near the house. Does anyone know the type of owl? It must have been hunting and it just decided to hang about with us watching. This is a first for me. I've never that I can remember seen a live owl like this before.
Here is Izaak and his friends finding their 2nd clue on the scavenger hunt birthday party.

A few pictures

Josh and Ron putting up the plastic.


Lily enjoying the popcorn success.
Connell and I harvesting greens for last week shares.

A chance to post

Today has been one of those days when each time I sit down to type something I get distracted and time out before getting anything up.

A lot has been happening. I ordered sprouting seeds today to begin the winter months of sprouts. On the weekend we tried the popcorn again. This time is was dry enough and it popped in the microwave. We had a delicious helping of our own Taproot Popcorn. Today Josh and Ron worked at getting a plastic wall divider up in the greenhouse. I got the final edits completed on the 2010 registration form. And, I cooked a very interesting supper. I soaked some beans last night, cooked them this afternoon and then made a soup like meal. Onions, carrots, cabbage all sauted. Added it to the beans along with cooked bacon. Then I added a few cups of water a few spices and we had a yummy meal. Izaak loved it as did Josh. My vote is that it was filling. Frank and Lily ate it all up too. I served it with rice.

I have pictures of all these farm activities but before I get distracted again, I'll post this and hopefully add the pictures later when I can find the camera. Good Night.

In case you are interested.....

Fermented food is nutritious and delicious!

January 31, 2010

10am to 4pm

In beautiful Centre Burlington, NS

Learn to make your own veggie-krauts, tempeh and fermented beverages.

Workshop instructor Ruth Lapp has been eating, drinking, and making ferments for many years. Recently she studied with Sandor Katz, fermentation fetishist and author of Wild Fermentation. The flavour, nutrition, and craft of live-cultured foods

Workshop space is limited.

To register, call (902) 757-0326 or email ruth.lapp@hotmail.com

Cost is $30 and includes workshop materials and a yummy fermented lunch.

Where does the time go?

Thursday January 10th.

It has been a busy couple of days. Wednesday during the day I attended another of the Ag Land Review Committee meetings. In the next few days I will have a link to email you about where the public meetings will be held across the province. It is really interesting to sort out how to reach people. Obviously paper and radio are really the only ways, but if we can get people informed of the public meetings via list serves and emails that is even better. Anyway, all this to say that things this week have taken off in a hurry and the calm, relaxed days of Christmas have halted for another year. Although, I must say I am rather committed to keeping some of the calm as we move into the this nicely even numbered year. And speaking of numbers, here I am on Monday visiting the accountant. It is always lovely to try and take our own photo, stretching the arm out and getting a somewhat distorted view of your own face, oh well.

And below is me meeting with my sister Carolyn before heading off to Kentville, on Monday. Just a few more faces that are all making it happen.


Have a great night. The kids are racing around getting their swim suits. Josh is helping. We are heading out for a swim at Acadia. It will be a bit later to bed tonight, but we'll have fun!

Window View

The view from my window on this beautiful winter day - January 4 2010 - the first day back at work. Today we will harvest greens, dig out the kale to harvest it and this AM I am off to see the accountant. Enjoy your day!!! Patricia

Happy New Year

We've had a tremendously wonderful ringing in of the new year. I love even numbers, they feel good to me. We had a fun celebration with friends. It was an early night as we had all of the kids to get home to bed, but that was the plan - a kid happy event with a late, but reasonable bedtime.

On New Years day we celebrated my mothers birthday with a morning breakfast. Then off to get a load of wood which we unloaded at the new Swallows Nest. Hot chocolate and hang out time in front of the fire place and then onto potluck supper and games night with my father and family. A fun filled full day.

Today has been so great having this fun storm. We've adventured out and played in the wild wind and snow.

I had a moment today when I decided that I will begin a cabbage recipe creation project. I am going to figure out as many yummy cabbage recipes as I can over the next few months. I made a potato scallop the other night but I ended up adding carrots, parsnips, and turnip. It was so great - now I am wondering how cabbage scallop would taste. I will try it tomorrow and report back.

Josh and I are working on the final details of our OYF (Outstanding Young Farmer) forms. There is a lot to it and a lot of thinking. As we work on the OYF forms we are taming the eagerness we have for planning for the 2010 season.

We will harvest the greens in the greenhouse Monday and Tuesday for your shares. We will put a divider in the greenhouse after we harvest and heat only half for a month or so.

A very happy new year to you. We are so looking forward to this year and this new 2010 journey.