The farm is abuzz.....

The bees made it through the winter. Now I am faced with many new options, like splitting the hive to get two, letting them make a new queen or buy a new queen. I know for sure that at some point I will have a propolis trap and maybe the pollen trap on the hive and of corse Honey! It will be nice to get something back from the hive this year, after many years of trying. Now I can finally say I'm a Bee Keeper, and because of that I made my first trip to the SEMBA conference. SEMBA= South Eastern Michigan Beekeepers Association.
The conference was on Saturday, St. Patty's Day, and boy did I learn so much. I came back with new ideas and got to see a few friends. The most interesting part for me were a few "classes" on Apitherapy. Apitherapy is using bee's, their venom, and the products they make, like honey, pollen, royal jelly and such for medical uses. This is one of the main reasons I started keeping bees, so to get to attend a workshop on it was awesome. Now the plan is to save up some money so I can go to their main conference in Oregon, where they teach the corse, in October. I feel like this is something I should be doing. After all my name is Melissa, how serendipitous.  Cross your fingers for me that I can do it. I'm sure with it being in Oregon, it's gonna be a small fortune to get there.

I also took the twins with me, and they had a blast. I was late for every one of the classes because everyone had to stop and talk to the babies. They ate up all the attention they were getting and smiled and cooed and flirted back with everyone. They were dressed in their green for St. Patty's and looking cute, if I do say so myself. All in all it was a very motivating day.

I  just finished up the calender for when to start my plants. With all this warm weather messing with my head, it was good to see all was not lost for the growing season. I think I might even have an "in" with a few of the local Farmer's Markets. Who would have thought that they wouldn't want any more veggie growers. So I am very hopeful for this season's garden, some of the veggies are on the Ark Of Taste Slow Food list. I have one more workshop to attend on the Cottage Food Law here in Michigan. I am looking forward to it and will keep you posted, in the mean time here is a link to the American Apitherapy Society and SEMBA for further reading. Enjoy!

Laundry day today

Its just odd to think about it being over 60 degrees in March in Michigan. But its even more odd to think about the fact that I was bit by mosquitos while washing clothes today. Mosquitos in March. Crazy.
Anyway, I pulled the good ol' Speed Queen out of the "laundry room" and out onto the patio and take advantage of the fair weather to get a few loads of laundry done. While I am getting set up, I happen to notice that the cord on the washer is getting a little dry-rotted and needs to be replaced. I had to call three repair shops before I found one that said they could do it. I think everyone was thinking that I was playing a joke on them when I told them it was a wringer washer. But one of the Maytag repair shops said I could bring it in and they would replace it for me, which is good because I know that cord isn't going to last much longer. They may even be able to put a longer cord on it too so I don't have to plug it into an extension cord anymore. Yippee!
I have to admit there is something fun about actually "doing laundry". So I have decided to write a little how-to guide for using a wringer washer for anyone feeling brave enough to try it. I personally think its greener. The SQ uses less energy, (because it plugs into a 110 outlet and has less of a draw) less water (because it doesn't drain if you don't want it to, so you can reuse water that isn't too dirty) and doesn't have to drain into the sewer or septic if you use a bio degradable soap (so you can water plants with the water when your done).

1.  Fill the tub with hot or cold water, depending on if your washing whites or colors, and add soap.
     I use a bio degradable soap so I can use the 'gray water' in the garden when I empty the washer

2.  Its a good idea if you have young kids, to start with their clothes first. The idea being their clothes might not be as dirty as your own, allowing you to reuse the water to wash your clothes, thus saving water. Set the timer and wait.

3.  Now comes the fun part. Wringing out the clothes. Most wringers can feed in both directions. So if you set up your rinse tub on the wringer side of the washer, you can have the water feed back into either the washer or the tub. My wringer is on the right, so I set the tub on the right, and set the rollers to feed form left to right. A little metal flap closes off the right side under the rollers and all the water wrung from the clothes is diverted back into the washer.

4.   Rinse out the article of clothing in the rinse tub. You can do this a few ways. Push the clothes in and out of the water with your hands or you can get a wash plunger, they look like a metal cone with holes in it on a stick. If you use the wash plunger it acts as an agitator, helping to rinse the clothes easier without getting your hands wet, so to speak.

5. Wring out the clothes again. Set the rollers to feed from right to left and when you feed the clothes through, the water will dump back into the rinse tub. If you are lucky enough to have found a double rinse tub, then you would repeat the rinse and wring step one more time. If you find that that your clothes are a little stiff after they dry, then a second rinse might be a good idea.

6.  Now you are ready to hang your clothes on the line to dry. Open the valve on the washer hose to drain out the water. Take the agitator out of the washer to expose the lint trap and clean that out. Then you can rinse out the washer with clean water and replace agitator and your ready for the next time you use it.

Heres a few quick tips about the wringers. Anything that has snaps on it, like baby t-shirts or pj's, put through the wringer un-snapped. If they go through while done up, the wringer will smush the snaps and they will never stay snapped again. Although clothes with buttons should be done up and put through with part of the clothing folded over the buttons so the wringer won't break or pop the buttons off. Last but not least. Should anything ever get stuck in the wringer, hitting the front of the wringer will engage the emergency release and stop the rollers. My MIL says she remembers her grandmother saying "don't get you tit caught in the wringer". LOL. Well I guess they didn't call  them manglers for nothing.

You can still buy everything I talked about today brand new from Lehman's including the Speed Queen, or just keep you eyes open at garage sales. I picked up mine for $20.00 but I've seen them go for as much as $200. Still not too bad when you consider a new one would set you back an easy $900+.

Its Maple Syrup time....

DH got a few of the taps in before dark and the sap was flowing. I don't know how this year is going to go with the weather the way it's been so far. The rest of this week looks pretty good and hopefully tomorrow we will be cooking down the sap and bottling some syrup. He wants to add more taps tomorrow if the sap is flowing well on the ones he did today.
This is only our second year making maple syrup, but it was enough to get the bug. The whole summer DH has been super protective of the few jars of syrup we made last year. I could see him do the math on how much was left every time I offered a jar to someone or opened one to bake with. This year I hope to get enough made to sell at the farmers markets and to bake with with out giving DH a heart attack. I know some people tapped early and some, like us, are just starting. The weather has been all over the place this winter and more then a few times we wondered if we should start the season early. There is an old saying that you shouldn't tap until after March 1st, so we decided to go with that and we will see very soon if it will pay off. Wish us luck. I will post a few how-to photos with in the next day or two, so check back for those. Meanwhile my friend has e-mailed me a post to add to the blog about why she wanted to be a farmer. Enjoy!

I blame it all on Carla Emery, and the Encyclopedia of Country Living. 

To say that I was fascinated would be an understatement.  I would spend hours reading those green pages, thoroughly engrossed with each and every word and her unique writing style.  She opened a window into my life, a country girl growing up surrounded by women trying to do the exact things Carla was writing about. 

To me a “MOM” grew the food, preserved it, and turned it into a wonderful healthy meal for her family.  She turned yarn into warm blankets, cozy sweaters, and winter proof hats and mittens.  If she was lucky she even had a spinning wheel allowing her to take the fiber from the sheep, goats, or rabbits she raised and spin it into warm yarn to envelop her family.  “MOM” could milk the goats in the morning, and could present soap, lotion, or cheese to her family that evening. Okay, so maybe it does not always happen that quickly…… but you get my point.  She was a superwoman, and that’s exactly what I wanted to do when I grew up.

Well here I am thirty years later; a wife, mother, and farmer.  I am still just as obsessed with the lessons I read about in my childhood.  I am striving to be that Proverb 31 woman, by providing a healthy lifestyle for my family.  We raise or purchase most of our food locally.  We recycle and reuse instead of waste.  We are stewards of our land.  There is a ton of room for improvement and expansion, but we are going forward one step at a time. 

Please join us in our adventure, and learn from both our mistakes and successes.  And if you are lucky enough to find a copy of The Encyclopedia of Country Living, consider yourself warned.  It really could change your life.

How Toad Hall got its name?

No, we are not crazy fans of Wind in the Willows. We came up with this name for the farm mostly because every time it rained, the toads would come out and cover everything. There are so many toads in the summer, you have to watch where you step and sometimes where you drive. Lets just put it this way, if they were frogs, I'd be worried.
Our home is a modest one bedroom, one bathroom with 40 acres. The amount of land makes up for the size of the house. We have a small barn for the horse and a shed my husband is turning into a smithy. We hope to build a small building to use as a sugar shack, outdoor kitchen, honey house, green house, and if I can work it out, a laundry room. My husband calls it the multi purpose building. I think that would be the only thing I would change about the house, it needs a laundry room. In the summer I use an old Speed Queen wringer washer and the old fashioned clothes line. I love that washer. It really does get the clothes cleaner then any modern washer I've used. And talk about fast. It only takes a few minutes to wash the clothes, then I rinse them in and old galvinised double tub and hang them up on the line. There's nothing like the smell of clothes that have been dried on the line.

Planning....

Here it goes. My first official post! I have been up all night working on the garden layout for this year. I am running behind. I like to have this kind of work done before the end of February and here I am, almost a week into March and I am just starting out planning. My husband is trying to remind me that I still have time, but my internal clock (set for planting times, last frost and spring) has had the alarm going off for a while now and it seems I've slept in.
 I am also going to try this new farm tracking software by AgSquared. You can find it at www.agsquared.com. I talked with one of the reps at the Great Lakes Growers convention and liked what they said their program could do. They have teamed up with Jonny's and are offering the first 3 months free. So far its going okay. I was thinking that I would just have to pick the vegetables and herbs I was growing from one of their menus, but all they have is clipart pictures of the veggies and you have to type in all the information for them. I am gonna try and stick with it, but this late in the game, I can't help but feel I just added more work for myself. If all goes as planned their software should help me determine how much we planted and harvested by the end of the season and I can go from there in seeing if I made money at the farmers markets.
Aside from growing more veggies to take to market, I am also trying a few new varieties of veggies that store well. One of the goals for this year is to try some root cellaring. I am currently reading "Root Cellaring, Natural cold storage of fruits and vegetables" by Mike and Nancy Bubel. Their book has been very helpful in determining what varieties keep longer. It is a very interesting book with lots of helpful information.
It looks like I will be getting my seeds again this year mostly from Baker Creek and Johnny's Selected. A few will come from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, and Super Seeds, a new company for us.
I also have been talking to one of my friends who has a small farm about combining certain aspects for our farms to make them more sufficient. I have offered to let her post here and share her ideas on farming. Hopefully this will provide more information in one spot for everyone to learn and get ideas from so stay tuned, we have lots in the works for this year.