The plot twists a life takes

One night, Jason and I once had a conversation in the kitchen that I’ve returned to during my lowest points as a farmer. Back in those days, he listened to farming podcasts almost every day, and he’d report back the most interesting stories. His favorite was the Farmer-to-Farmer podcast, hosted by the late Chris Blanchard. The Ruminant was another good one. These podcasts were like fuel in our earliest farming years. Without them, we may not have kept going during the hardest times. That’s because the farmers who shared their stories didn’t just talk of their successes, they also let us peek into past wounds. The hard stuff. The embarrassing stuff. The real stuff. They revealed their failures to us so we might do better, and they showed us we weren’t alone in our struggles.

On that evening in our kitchen, Jason was telling me about Blue Moon Community Farm, in Wisconsin. He’d heard about Blue Moon thanks to Chris’s podcast. The farmer’s name is Kristen, and her story struck a chord with Jason. You see, there were several parallels between her history and our currently unfolding situation. The main similarity was that Kristen spent years working a second job while farming. This dual life has been Jason’s situation every season. By day, he works in local government. By evening and by weekend, he farms. For more than half the year, he works around 90 hours a week in total. From one season to the next, when it just never seemed to get any easier, I thought about Kristen, and what Jason had told me: after seven years, she was able to quit her second job and farm full time.

In less than a week, another CSA season will have come and gone. Season No. 7. And as I write this, Jason is tucked away in his courthouse office, still working for the county. Clearly, he hasn’t made the leap to the farm yet. So why not?

To answer that question, we need to rewind back to when Jason started the farm as a little backyard operation. At that time, he’d just been hired for an entry-level position with the county. The pay was modest, and it was entirely feasible to build a farm that someday matched the income of his full-time job, so this became the goal.

Then, after years of eking by when it came to money, Jason got a major promotion. Now, he was the director of his department, and we could finally catch our breath financially. It seemed foolish to walk away. Besides that, he liked his job and was excited about the new opportunity.

Then, another change came. At that time, I was the managing editor of a local newspaper. After 14 years as a small-town journalist, let me assure you, reporters and editors are motivated by their love of the work and their communities, not by the pay or hours. And the time had come for me to be with my family. In Season 3, I resigned and began life at home and on the farm.

As a one-income family, we found ourselves struggling to get ahead once again. Even the smallest home or car repair, or medical issue, seemed to put us in a bind. We’d never been what you’d call big spenders, and Jason was making a decent income for our part of the country, so what were we doing wrong?

After going through some really rough money patches, we took a ruthless assessment of the situation and our habits. We were brutally honest with ourselves. Upon doing this, we discovered that the answer, as they so often do, was hiding right under our noses.

It was our debt. Plain and simple. We had student loan debt, credit card debt, and car loan debt. We’d bought into the American lie that debt is “normal” your whole life. That it belonged right up there with the main certainties in life: death and taxes. These debt payments and their monthly interest rates were bleeding us dry for years. If you totaled them up, the monthly bill was the clear reason we never felt like we had any money. It was like constantly treading in deep water.

Now that we had a diagnosis of the problem, we drew up a battle plan. We immediately went into what we dubbed a “budget lockdown.” This meant we set a budget at the start of every month, and not a single cent went for anything other than our absolute necessities or paying off bad debt. We applied what’s called the “debt snowball” method. Look it up, it’ll change your life. We also eliminated anything that didn’t reflect the life we wanted to make. We ditched cable TV, unhealthy and pricey meals in restaurants, and useless consumer crap. We made a budget for our life and stuck to it. (Side note: If this interests you, check out the Mr. Money Mustache blog, especially in his early years. I don’t agree with everything he says, but he shoots straight about the toll debt takes. In one post, he wrote that you should think of debt like it’s your head on fire. The mental image of my head engulfed in flames was extremely useful when dealing with spending temptations.)

The student loans were the first to go. Next, credit cards. Then, our car payment. Every time we paid off a debt, we rolled that money into paying off the next one.

After about two years, we were debt free. It felt like we suddenly had wings on our feet.

Now, our monthly bills include: insurances, our house, one cell phone (I haven’t had a cell phone in 15 years), one landline and internet, and electric, plus a few streaming services.

In addition to our bills, we budget every month for groceries and gasoline, and if there’s a special occasion, or we anticipate a specific expense, we set money aside for it. It might sound strict, and I suppose it is, but you can’t put a price on the mental and emotional freedom a budget provides.

As of right now, we live on about one-third of our monthly income, and save the other two-thirds.

So, here’s the magical thing about paying off debt and living on a budget: you realize you don’t need nearly as much money as you thought you did. And this breaks the future wide open.

With all debts paid (minus the house, as mentioned), we now had an exact number for what we needed to live on each year, and we could construct a farm budget to fit our needs.

At first, we set our sights on spring of 2022. Jason would quit his day job right before the start of Season 8. But around this time, Jason began thinking about his unique skill set from his years of county work. He’d become an expert grant writer and had multi-million dollar projects under his belt. Walking away from those talents entirely, and parting with something he enjoyed doing and believed was worthwhile to communities, would be just plain foolish. He decided he wanted to continue doing what he loves about his current job, but on his own terms, and, most importantly, on his own time. Thus, his new company was born: Spark Community Capital. So, in what’s been our hardest season, we now had a new challenge to contend with, Jason using vacation days, evenings, and weekends, to propel Spark forward.

Almost immediately, Spark began to reveal its potential. With this development, we felt safe moving the quit date up. Jason informed his employer that he’d like to be done no later than Jan. 1, 2022. Whenever they’ve found his replacement, he’ll continue with the county on a limited, as-needed capacity, helping with a long-term revitalization project in downtown Oil City at 100 Seneca (Cornplanter Square - this project is awesome, check it out). But he’ll be a free agent otherwise.

So do you know what this means?!? Jason will be joining the farm next season!!! It sounds odd to say he’ll be “joining” the farm, since he’s already such a crucial part of the operation, but now he won’t be squeezing his farm work in until the sun goes down, or in many cases, long after it’s set.

Now, you might be thinking, “Won’t you be in the same boat?” What about Spark? Won’t he still be working two jobs? Technically, yes, but Spark will supplement our income and help us continue to build our savings and (finally) start investing. And we’re building schedules for us both that keep Spark time and farm time and my other pursuits in check. No more 90-hour weeks. We’re ready to be the farm family we’ve wanted to be.

Isn’t it interesting, all the turn of events - the plot twists - that make up a life? The best outcomes have happened when we’ve followed our hearts and led with our conscience. That’s why my mind always returned to that conversation in the kitchen, when Jason first told me all about Blue Moon. It was his way of asking me to believe in him, and to believe in us. To trust the process and the hard work and long hours. That conversation was his way of asking me if I was willing to embark on the journey with him. With our destination drawing near, we can see new journeys on the horizon. My answer remains the same. I’m ready. Let’s go.

~ Stella

“ Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

— Mary Oliver, The Summer Day

Come along for a photo tour of the farm!

Our actual farm tour was rained out, so let’s at least take a zip through the gardens with pictures. Come along, friends!

First up, the Big Tunnel. This tunnel was built thanks to a grant. We knew this would be our only shot at a tunnel of this size, so we contributed farm money to go a little bigger. We grow in this unheated tunnel year-around.

The new lean & lower system for vining crops is working in the tunnels. The cherry tomato harvest just started this week. What a difference! Neatly hanging tomato vines let air flow through the plant and make harvesting MUCH easier.

Those are bell peppers on the left. It’s pepper harvesting time in the tunnels now. This is the first season in several years that deer have not completely destroyed the peppers. This is all because of a new 7 1/2-foot deer fence that encloses the gardens. Our home county, Crawford, opened up funding received during the pandemic, and we applied for and received a grant that paid for the fence and landscape fabric. This fence saved our farm, and we’re so grateful.

Here’s the Big Tunnel from another angle. On the right is celery. Since this photo was taken, we filled in the spaces between the celery with fennel.

Here’s the tunnel from the front. The soil rows are seeded with carrots.

This is one of our parsley patches. Many of our CSA newsletter recipes call for parsley, so we like to have a good supply. As you can see, random kale pops up everywhere.

This is Caterpillar 2, another unheated high tunnel. We have a total of four unheated tunnels on the farm, and one at home for baby plants. This tunnel has tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant. The tomatoes in here need clipped to the string, but they aren’t the kind that must be pruned.

Here’s the same tunnel, but the other side. Those are eggplants. The flea beetles did a number on them, but they seem to be recovering. This whole tunnel has been covered in straw and grass clippings, twice in some places. As you can see, the grass still pokes up, but this is so much better than past seasons when weeds were unmanageable.

This is one of two potatoes patches. They’re doing very well. We’ve had good luck with potatoes.

Here’s the inside of the other Caterpillar tunnel. That’s squash and kale. There’s another parsley patch in the back, and a few rows of green beans that you can’t see in this photo. We used a combination of straw and landscape fabric in this tunnel. We put the landscape fabric down too early in the spring, and voles kept eating the kale and broccoli transplants. The lesson we learned is to skip landscape fabric in March and April, and use straw. When there’s nothing else for the voles to eat, the landscape fabric just makes it too easy.

Here’s one of our basil patches. This year we’re growing traditional basil and Thai basil.

THIS is Silas’s garden! He’s checking out his cucumbers and jelly melons.

He’s got carrots next to his collards.

Here’s his basil, Swiss chard, and tomatoes. He has his own CSA with three members (his two grandmas and Chef Jason, of ZEST - thanks, Chef!). He says his first share will be going out soon.

Just wanted to show that vole issues aren’t limited to spring. Any empty hole was a vole’s meal. Jason’s transplanted lettuce in these rows a few times. We’re looking into getting a dog who specializes in rodent control.

Here’s one lettuce row. We seed 800 lettuce a week, and transplant the same number.

Here’s Swiss chard.

This is one of our big kale patches. The other patch is in a tunnel, and new kale transplants are a few rows over. We have green curly, red Russian, white Russian, purple, and dinosaur.

The garlic harvest has begun. The wet weather isn’t helping. Hopefully, we’ll have a dry couple of days soon.

The onions are doing well in their straw. We’re very excited for a good onion crop.

Here’s the broccoli. It was one of the first crops put under straw. At the time, we were trying to conserve straw because we only had so many bales. As you can see, these needed more. The plants still did fine. The little bit of a jump on the weeds made a big difference. However, the high temperatures we had before this rainy spell caused them to bolt, meaning they went to seed. Worms and other pests make growing broccoli difficult.

Showing you this in the interest of full disclosure. So, those are peppers under there. We put down straw, but clearly they needed another layer. Under that jungle, the peppers are doing alright, but if we want them to actually produce anything, we need to free them from the weeds. We didn’t put fabric down because we were worried about voles. Well, the voles didn’t find them, and right now, neither can we!

Here’s one squash patch. You can see the fence in this photo. We plant summer squash in several places around the farm to try and evade squash bugs.

Here’s what we call the New Orchard, with apple, nectarine, and cherry trees. The tree line in the background is the Old Orchard. It has towering apple trees. The fruit falls from so high it tends to smash on the ground. Below the Old Orchard are the ruins of an old homestead. There’s a stone spring house and a creek that’s always washing up old crockery.

Here’s the tomato patch in the back corner of the farm.

Buckwheat cover crop - very pretty but needs mowed.

These are watermelons. There’s a third row on the right edge of the photo. Must be a strange gust that cuts through there, because no matter how much we stapled down the fabric, the wind kept whipping it loose.

These rows are seeded for a fall crop of green beans.

We leave the entire southeast corner of the farm wild for pollinators. Nature does amazing things with golden rod, ironweed, and Queen Anne’s lace here.

This isn’t exactly the geographic center of the farm, but it serves as the main entrance, and that strip of grass down the middle divides what we call the Upper Farm from the Lower Farm. The Lower Farm is on a hill.

Here’s the Big Tunnel and the two Cat tunnels.

That row along the tunnel is sunflowers.

This is the Lower Farm. Jason does some direct seeding, but almost everything you see in all these photos was started from seed in our basement and tended to under grow lights by Jason. The process starts for him in early February. I always feel like I should note that he’s worked a full-time off-farm job for all seven seasons. Gardens are a wondrous combination of Mother Nature and man’s own will.

That’s me!

The summer produce is just starting up.

I thought this looked like a stained-glass window!

We have a whole family of garter snakes that call our straw stack home. The other day, I accidentally tipped over the stack and two snakes rained down. Thankfully they didn’t land on me and they weren’t hurt. When the straw stack is gone, maybe they’ll finally go eat some voles!

Thanks for coming along on this tour. And thanks for supporting the farm and taking an interest in what goes on up here. It means a lot to us.

~ Stella

Tomato progress: High tunnel update & thoughts on fair pricing

Here’s a look at the Big Tunnel, July 3. Last week, we transitioned from almost entirely greens harvests, to picking peas and beans daily. Now, we’re on the verge of full-blown summer produce. It’s the time of year when our arms are constantly in motion from plant to bucket.

This shot doesn’t show it, but there’s a row of peppers along the wall, and we’re hoping to include them in the CSA next week.

Those are cucumber vines in the first row on the left. They’re just starting to produce. Silas cut some for the farmers market last week, and it felt good to set them on the table. We don’t hold back on what we charge for the earliest cukes of the season. Extra work went into having them early, and like everything on this farm, they’re zero spray.

I once overheard a comment at the farmers market that stayed with me. It came from a woman selling no-spray strawberries. When someone mumbled about the price, she said, “My knees told me how much to charge for these.” In other words, she’s paid the cost of weeding and harvesting those berries on her hands and knees. Now, she’s asking a fair price for her labor. I also remember her tone. It was said without a trace of meanness. It was simply a fact.

Her comment comes to mind when holding a half pint of red or black raspberries. They’re slow picking, and my final price decision is made after surveying the map of scratches up my arms and legs.

In our first few seasons, I experienced what many young farmers do: a complete disbelief that anyone will actually want to buy anything from us. Every item was priced with a big dose of trepidation. Like I was scared to sell my own produce! It was mostly me who suffered this complete lack of confidence. Jason was unsure at first, too, but he pushed us to go for a price that was fair to the farm and our family. There were times when I’d throw out a low number, an overly cautious amount, and he’d say, “Now, wait a minute.” And we’d talk about what went into that vegetable - that good, that product - in my hand.

All that said, let me say how grateful we are for all the people who understand what goes into a farm and choose to support local growers. If life came with merit badges, there’d be one for people who buy from local farms, and they could stick it right on their farmers market reusable tote bag.

Alright, let me get my stumpy little legs down from my soapbox. Back to the tunnel. We’re still looking at the photo above all this text. The strip of soil you see was previously lettuce under landscape fabric. The weedless earth beneath the fabric was a snap for Jason to work up with the wheel hoe and rake. He seeded carrots in that space.

The next row is tomatoes. Jason pruned them already, but they need it again. These are doing terrific. We’re so hopeful for a great tomato season!

It looks like he’s running away from a 10-pound vole here, but actually he’s using the wheel hoe.

Above, is the view from the other side of the tunnel. You can see the peppers now a little on the far left.

On the far right, is an empty row that I just cleared. This was lettuce without row cover. Since this photo was taken, Jay prepped the bed and seeded more carrots.

Next up, is a row of celery. The empty spaces between the celery supported Asian greens up until the other day. What a mess those ended up being. Asian greens grow super fast, and they tend to get away from you. I wanted to use them for last week’s CSA recipe, but they were too huge. I spent a hot, humid morning yanking them out and turning them into basically loose leaf Asian greens. Hardly an ideal situation. One of those farm tasks that makes you say, “Whew, glad that’s over.”

After the celery row, is a row of cherry tomatoes. These have just started to turn color. Our fingers are crossed for at least a few tomatoes for the shares next week. Jason just finished pruning and clipping those plants.

We have more tomatoes in one of the Cat tunnels. Those aren’t the kind that need pruning. The other night, I worked on clipping them to the string so Jay could do a little weed trimming in that tunnel. There were hundreds of garden spiders in their webs. They had me on the verge of a nervous breakdown. But after awhile, there were so many, I got used to them and forgot about them … kind of … It was another task joyfully complete.

~ Stella

Peas & wildflowers

As I walked toward the peas with my bucket this morning, I was stopped in my tracks by how beautiful the little yellow wildflowers looked beside the green vines. This view is exactly how summer exists in my mind.

~ Stella

Open Farm Day July 11!

We’d love to see you at the farm any time Sunday, July 11, between 2 and 6 p.m. Stay for a few minutes, or hang out and enjoy light refreshments and the birds singing the whole afternoon. It’s free and open to anyone interested in the farm. However, it is a fair weather-only day.

Here’s a tentative schedule:

~ 2:15 p.m. Short farm talk

~ 2:30 p.m. First farm tour

~ 3:30 p.m. Second farm tour

~ 5 p.m. Final farm tour

Find the farm:

We’re 1 mile down Dingman Road, off state Route 27. You’ll see our Plot Twist Farm sign and house. But this is NOT the farm. Keep driving just a few more seconds until you reach a blacktop driveway, on the right, with a sign that says Hickory Hill. If using GPS, look for 9276 Dingman Road, Guys Mills. Go up this drive. A sign will point you toward the farm. You’ll drive through the woods, up a dirt path, and wonder where in the heck you are. This path opens to the farm.

Please note: There’s no bathroom at the farm, but we’ll have shuttle rides to a bathroom several times during the afternoon.

~ Stella

Celery harvest

People are surprised to learn celery grows here. It does quite well. We transplanted celery in early spring in the Big Tunnel.

Celery sold in grocery stores has a reputation for being sprayed. Whatever insects plague farmers on big celery farms have apparently not discovered our tiny celery patch. We have plenty of insects here that gravitate to other produce, but the celery barely had a mark.

We harvested the outer stalks and left the small shoots to grow. This week’s celery harvest is bound for our CSA members.

~ Stella

The first CSA harvest is in! How much did we pick?

We’re packing 55 CSA shares for Lucky Season No. 7. We have 20 half shares and 35 full shares, and the harvest is in for this week’s CSA. They’ll be packed tomorrow morning, and then distributed over three days.

Over the seasons, we’ve learned (sometimes the hard way) there are two keys to a smoother CSA week.

1.) Have a detailed, written plan for the week. When it’s written out, you might look at it and say, “Well, damn.” But you must have a plan in front of you. It’s better than looking around the farm and having that same thought. For the CSA, I make a list a week beforehand of the produce we think will be ready to harvest. Jason’s seeding and planting schedule aims to hit its mark every week, but of course the weather is always a big factor. I plan out what we’re going to harvest down to the exact number of kale leaves. Then, I map out when we’ll harvest. Having a clear plan makes any changes that crop up during the week less painful.

2.) Do. Not. Procrastinate. Never. Don’t do it. No. Do not. We mostly stick to the written plan, but if an opportunity presents itself, we take it. Like, say, the radish pulling went way faster than expected. Okay, then pick some spinach right now instead of tomorrow. We cut greens that store exceptionally well, such as kale and spinach, as early in the week as possible. When cut properly, in the cool of morning or evening, and immediately rinsed and stored in airtight containers in the cooler, they can keep for several weeks, so picking them a few days in advance is perfectly fine. Early on in my farm years, I had the ridiculous mindset that all CSA produce had to be harvested only one day before it’s packed. This is completely foolish. Fresh vegetables store well. Don’t make it harder on yourself than it needs to be.

This is our second season with about 55 members. For our biggest CSA season, we had 75 members. That was when we had a part-time helper. With Jason still working off-farm full time, we decided to keep the CSA around 55. The fact that we sell out every year is a positive indicator for future expansion.

But back to present day. Want to know how much we harvested for this week’s CSA? Here you go:

Kale: 20 pounds (This is 600 big leaves.)

Lettuce heads: About 100

Pea shoots: 7 pounds

Oregano: 4 pounds

Spinach: 6 pounds (This week, the spinach is only going in the full shares. Sometimes we alternate what the half shares and full shares receive. It all just depends on how much is ready to harvest.)

Parsley: 3 pounds

Green onions: Not sure how many. It felt like an eternity’s worth. Darned green onions. A tedious vegetable if there ever was one.

Radishes: About 3 bushels

Every season, as that first CSA week draws near, I get nervous. We still harvest for local shops and fill website orders every Monday, plus we’ve got to, you know, grow stuff. There are times when the weekly schedule looks totally bananas. There are times when I look around and think, this whole thing is nuts, isn’t it? Are we nuts? Well, maybe it is, and maybe we are, but, we’ve got a plan, and we just need to stick to it. And no procrastinating. No. Never. Huh-uh! Don’t even think about ! ;)

We’re loving the pick-up we bought last fall, even with all its quirks. It’s so easy to load bins in the bed. We’ve still got the Toyota RAV4 and its trailer, but the truck is much easier. That’s the whole lettuce harvest for the CSA this week. It’s about 100 heads. Time to take it home and let it soak before storing it in the cooler in bins.

~ Stella

Tomato progress (lean & lower method) - May 10 & May 29

This year, we’re trying the “lean and lower” system with vining crops in the tunnels. You can read all about that here. Here’s a look at how the tomatoes are doing. First, is a photo from the Big Tunnel taken May 10, 2021.

May 10, 2021: At this point, we only had tomatoes in the tunnels. There’s too much of a frost risk outside. Most of the tomatoes were still too small to clip to the string.

Here’s the same row, about three weeks later. They were all big enough to clip, and some of them now have two clips. So far so good.

May 29, 2021: Many even have blossoms.

~ Stella

Weeding beans with the wheel hoe & collinear hoe

The beans in the high tunnel germinated well, and outpaced the weeds for a time. (This is likely thanks to new 1-inch water line. I’ll write about that very soon because we’ve noticed a huge difference.)

When the beans were about 2 to 3 inches tall, we pushed a wheel hoe between each row and down the pathways. This tool does a fantastic job of uprooting relatively small to medium weeds.

After working over the beds with a wheel hoe, we used a collinear hoe to get in close to the baby beans. A collinear hoe has a long, thin blade that’s collinear to the earth. It’s a precise tool, unlike traditional, heavy, clunky hoes. It is one of our favorite tools. The hoe linked above also lets you stand upright. If you have a home garden, you may want to consider a collinear hoe.

But a word of caution. While wheel and collinear hoes are wonderful tools, you have to pace yourself, just like with any garden task. If you don’t, you risk injury. Slow and steady wins the race against weeds.

We also weeded these beans at least twice by hand, mainly to pluck out stubborn grass. To keep the grass from taking root again, we remove it by the bucketful. (All those clipped bits of grass are from when Jason used the weed trimmer along the sides of the tunnel.)

In the past, we’ve basically gone through this same process only to have deer mow down every last bean. The only beans that would survive were the ones that happened to be weedy enough that the deer didn’t notice them. What a relief to go through all this work and know they’re protected in the deer fence.

~ Stella

Growing cilantro

This is the farm’s cilantro patch. The coriander plant thrives in cooler weather.

We’re starting the CSA in the second week of June, and this cilantro will probably be ready to cut then. We’ll clear-cut the mature stems, leaving short stubble that will produce a new batch.

Cilantro is the herb name for the plant’s leaves. The plant itself is coriander, and its seeds are the spice of the same name. The entire plant is edible, including the roots. Cilantro leaves and stems are best fresh, since the flavor all but vanishes when dried.

Jason starts cilantro from seed in the basement, under grow lights, and we transplant the little clumps in very early spring. Cilantro thrives in cold weather, while heat makes it prone to bolt, or go to seed.

Some cooking websites say cilantro doesn’t store well. This definitely is not the case with fresh-cut stems. We cut cilantro when it’s cool, in early morning, before the plant absorbs field heat. If you put the cool stems and leaves (unwashed) in a baggie or container with a good seal, they’ll last for plenty long. Just wash before use, and chop the leaves and stems together.

While cilantro calls to mind salsa and guacamole, it adds another layer to many dishes, like a bowl of pho. However, not everyone is a fan. Some people appear to have a genetic aversion to the herb, and it smells like soap to them.

Coriander seems to have been grown by the Greeks since at least the second millennium BC. The plant journeyed to the Americas in the 1600s.

~ Stella