Is it always this busy?
We had several new volunteers this week to witness how active it can be at the farm. I call it “controlled chaos”. Lucky for us, we have seasoned volunteers and our great team who keep everything moving along smoothly. Let me give you a few examples from this past week.
On Tuesday, we had third and fourth graders from the Waldorf School help us get a plot ready to plant spinach and also harvest Swiss chard. Carrie shared with me the excitement from Clare’s fourth graders who had, in their words, “established a good compost-shuttling system”. Sebastian was so excited that every time he went back to the compost pile, it was like “The Flash!”. Five buckets of compost ready to go. An example of seasoned volunteers!
Wednesday we tackled covering two of our six grow tunnels. Dave Baecher, our friend from MCHPP, led one group on covering our Rimol greenhouse. Carol, Jason, Dylan, Rachel, and Tom were there to assist.
Meanwhile, our friends from Colby Co. Engineering came to cover the second tunnel and install zipper doors on each end. These friends of the farm have been volunteering with us on many occasions, including days of other tunnel construction, so they got right on task. Tom and Burnham were there to answer questions and gather tools. We are so fortunate to have this group who are so generous with their time. Mission accomplished, and they were headed back to work!
While this was happening, we had Celeste, Carol, Jan, Christy, and Aimee in the seedling greenhouse making soil blocks, transplanting plants, and planting seeds! Jan and Aimee took me up on my offer of daffodils.
And that was just Wednesday!
On Friday, the Waldorf 5th graders arrived to plant lettuce and onions in our newly covered greenhouse. These children have been coming with their teacher, Miss Fox, since third grade. I may not know all their names, but I do recognize all their smiling faces. We appreciate their hard work and enthusiasm when they come to G2G. Baby Arden was also hard at work doing what he does best–making us all smile!
Friday also held an invitation for our board members to come experience some time on the farm, meet staff and volunteers, and ask questions about our regenerative farming practices. Martha led some of them on finishing what the 5th graders had started.
Christine, our board president, went into the seedling greenhouse to meet and work with volunteers potting up seedlings into our paper pots.
I passed off some donated cabbage seedlings to Jamie, another board member, who was taking them to Sivi, a former Farm Skills participant. Sivi now grows food for her community and teaches gardening at her community garden plot.
Are you keeping up with all this?
The Fixers were fixing, and Tom was showing off his increasing wardrobe of Mr. Fix-It apparel.
Now we come to Saturday! Genevieve, Carol, and I had 28 volunteers including board members and St. Bart’s Church members, and Farm Skills participants, planting, fertilizing, and seeding!
This past week we planted 266 napa cabbages, 480 lettuces, interplanted 432 onions with the cabbages, and interplanted 720 leeks with the lettuces. Then we seeded 150 feet of hakurei salad turnips and 800 feet of spinach. At the end of a very busy and productive week, we walked the farm observing what we had accomplished, and as I dictated, Genevieve went to the whiteboard to create next week’s to-do list.
Full disclosure: I went home and took a nap!
As I write this week’s farm report, I am reflecting on how the farm touches so many lives in so many ways. Having our board come to participate, observe, and understand what it takes to keep all this going is essential. I need to give acknowledgement to Christine, whose enthusiasm and dedication to this mission inspires all of us. I personally felt that the conversations we had in person at the farm topped any zoom meeting!
We have several board members who volunteer regularly and help me with managerial tasks. Thank you, Cathy McDonald, Barbara Guffin, and Rachel Rousseau.
I need to personally thank one more person on our team, Ellen Rodgers. Ellen, our Managing Director, holds this project together behind the scenes in so many ways. I know my lack of attention to detail towards bookkeeping can drive her crazy! Thanks for your patience, Ellen.
So much to be grateful for,
Theda