Lessons from the Country

Posted on 03/25/2012 by Melissa

There’s no doubt about it. We’re living in the country now. Don’t believe me? Check out our latest acquisition.

Okay, I know buying a book about living in the country doesn’t necessarily mean you live in the country, just like we weren’t actually homesteading just because we used to read books about homesteading (from the comfort of our suburban Burlington house.) But this time I mean it: we’re living in the country now, and boy do we have a bit of learnin’ to do.

I’ve already mentioned some of the things I love about country life (like stargazing, waking up to the birds, and beautiful landscapes). Of course there’s also the fresh air, wide open spaces, quiet solitude, and amazing wildlife. But there are also some challenging things about country living, as we’ve been learning these past few weeks. Here are two of the most recent lessons I’ve learned:

#1 Making Friends in the Country is Hard

Not only are we living on a farm so far from the neighboring properties that you can’t see them from our cottage, but we haven’t yet had many opportunities for meeting new people in the area (other than the awesome Local Food Hub staff). All that will change in about two weeks when the local farmers’ market starts up and we get to interact with more people on a more regular basis. Given that I am occasionally a social butterfly, I’ll admit that I’m chomping at the bit for this day to come!

In the meantime, here are some of our recent ~~friends~~ wary acquaintances:

Though I don’t have good photos of them to include, it’s worth a mention that there are also plenty of spiders, wasps, and mice in our everyday lives. It’s hard to accept them as friends, but I know I do need to accept them as part of country life.

On the cute and cuddly end of the friend spectrum, last month we met one-week-old goats. This is me feeding baby Lucy:

Unfortunately the goats aren’t on our farm so there’s no long-term friend potential there. But we do get to spend a good portion of time each day playing with (and getting jumped on/knocked over/licked by) Sully, the resident farm dog and my new best friend in the making.

(You can learn more about Sully and see more fun photos of him over here on the farm blog.)

#2 We have to Drive Everywhere

Every grocery trip, pizza dinner, farm purchase, plant sale, or night out on the town means a minimum of 6 miles of driving if we’re going to the small town nearby. Most of the time it’s more like 32+ miles because Charlottesville is usually our destination of choice for shops and where we will deliver plants/produce throughout the season.

In Burlington we would often go a week or two without using a car. We walked to the shopping center nearby, biked downtown, and took the bus to work or school. When we did need the car (for a shopping trip to Lowes, for instance, for one of our many home renovation projects), we always made sure to combine errands to save on gas and time. Thankfully this means we’re no strangers to strategically planning our car trips to be as efficient as possible. But it is still strange to me that if I want to go anywhere off-farm, I have no transportation options other than my fuel-inefficient truck, Jenny. My poor (unnamed?) bike is sitting in the corner of our kitchen, quietly weeping. (While I would love to get out for a bike ride for fun one of these days, not only will it will necessitate some advanced planning to find a trail or country roads that are safe for cycling, it will mean leaving behind long farm to-do lists: seedlings that need watering, rows that need weeding, crops that need harvesting. AKA not gonna happen.)

I could have called this lesson “it takes a lot of fuel to get food from farm to table“, because really, that’s one of the bigger lessons we’re learning – not jut about country living, but about agriculture specifically. The fuel use in agriculture is not just on the transportation end – like when I deliver vegetable plants to a natural food store in Charlottesville in the back of Jenny’s cab (above) – but the farm production end as well.

We’ve both logged a lot of time on the farm tractors recently – tilling fields to prepare for planting, transporting things around the farm, random joyrides. Okay, I’m only kidding with that last one. Tractor business is serious business. We’re not super comfortable using all this fuel in the name of food production – something we’re going to continue to question this season as we challenge ourselves to grow with minimal negative impact on the environment. But the one thing I know right now is that the tractors sure provide for some great farm photos:

These two lessons only scratch the surface of what we’ve learned already in our ~6 weeks living in the country, and I have no doubt that there’s plenty more to learn… If only I could find time to write about it all!

Staying Busy on the Farm and Blog

Posted on 03/07/2012 by Melissa

As we’re quickly learning, there’s always something to do on a farm. Winter typically offers some downtime for a farmer compared to the peak season, but there are plenty of things that can ensure busy days even this time of year. For instance, this past week on the farm included time spent: fixing tractors, chicken-tending, buying supplies for a hoop house, designing said hoop house, and building a pea trellis. And of course, lots of seeding.

Because we’re scaling up considerably from last year’s backyard gardens to a one acre plot (about 40 times bigger, in fact), we need to start a lot more seeds than ever before. How many? Well, we’re still figuring that one out – but take my word for it – it’s a lot. Between selling plant starts at spring markets, and planting an acre for our own production, we’ve got our work cut out for us.

We’re thankful that our new venture at the Local Food Hub grants us space in their heated greenhouse – so our babies get off to a good start. Well, except for a scare one night when temps were well below freezing and one of the heaters stopped working. But that’s a story for another time. For now, please allow me to proverbially jump up and down with excitement because… the babies are sprouting!

Yes, we call our seedlings our babies, and yes they require a lot of care, but we are like most parents who feel that their kids are worth it.

In addition to all the babies in the greenhouse, there are already some in the ground as well: the snow peas are just finally beginning to emerge. As you might have guessed by their name, they don’t mind the snow.

One of the other fun things going on around here is that Mark and I both learned to use the tractor. As if learning the safe operation of an important farm tool were’t exciting enough, we each got to do something productive with it during our training: Mark delivered a load of compost to our home garden site, while I tilled up the area where we will soon plant some early spring crops.

That’s a quick roundup of some of the things we’ve been doing on the farm. As for other goings on, you may have noticed a few changes here on the blog (or you may not have noticed… in which case I’ll just tell you). New things around here include:

a (parenthetically) revised blog name to reflect our new status as on hiatus from home renovations
the new blurb about us on the right column of the homepage
there’s finally a short about us page
and a new page telling our story: from garden to farm

I’ve enjoyed the self-reflection necessary to write the story of how we got here – the shared values, inspired passions, and collaborative decisions that brought us to a farm in Virginia. I’ll admit, I’ve been nostalgic for Vermont on occasion. But then I’ll wake up on this farm on a bright sunny day to see daffodils blooming on snow-soaked soil and my whole being says ahhhh that’s why I’m here.

Don’t forget to check out Cottage View Farm’s website for more photos and stories from the field this season.

Feeling at home at Cottage View Farm

Posted on 02/28/2012 by Melissa

We’ve been at the farm exactly two weeks and it’s slowly starting to feel like home. I’ve got a functional work-at-home office, Mark has his stereos and internet TV set up, and we have art on the walls. We even have a decent stock of staples in our kitchen pantry like dried beans, rice, and bread flour.

And we’re starting to get into the swing of things around here.

I get up with the sun, not only because I’m now sleeping without an eye mask (so the light naturally wakes me up), but because my job first thing every morning is to let the chickens out of their coop. By the time I get there – around 6:45am these days – the roosters are already crowing and the hens are waiting by the door. No more lazy sleeping in for me – I’m up with muck boots on before 7am every day. And what a beautiful time of day it is.

We’re also learning a ton about the operations of this existing farm, and planning out our own one-acre plot, which we are calling Cottage View Farm.

Why Cottage View Farm? Well for one thing, the view is great from here.

Our days are taken up by things like seeding plants in the greenhouse, recording germination dates, ordering supplies, calling/emailing restaurants and grocery stores that might want to sell our produce this summer, and other miscellaneous farm planning. We’re also taking time to explore our new town (Scottsville, population: 557) and get up to Charlottesville (~16 miles away) every once in a while.

We also spend a lot of time thanking each other, and the universe, and the Food Hub, for getting us here. And we keep reminding ourselves that this is real. We’re living and working on a real farm, not just our pretend backyard homestead in Burlington. And it is a dream come true.

Personally, I’m in awe of something every day. And I’m trying to make sure I don’t take for granted the newness of it all. Last week, we started thousands of seeds in the greenhouse. Four days ago I saw my first black widow spider. Yesterday we both drove a tractor for the first time. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?

This blog has always been a fun way of keeping a record of our journey together, and I plan to continue it in some form. But we’ll be sharing the majority of our farm-related news and photos on the new website for Cottage View Farm. (It’s still a work in progress right now, and I may do some double-posting on both sites for a while, until I find the right vibe.) One thing you’ll notice if you check it out, Cottage View Farm’s website is a very photo-driven site. We couldn’t help it with such beautiful things to share every day!

Living Our Farm Dream

Posted on 02/17/2012 by Melissa

Today I found myself shoveling chicken manure out of a coop when a curious hen wandered in and looked at me with a cocked head. “I’m just cleaning up your house, boss.” I said with a laugh. Mark, a few hundred yard away, was busy drilling brackets onto a 100’ high tunnel (think small greenhouse), happily dreaming of the tomato plants that will soon inhabit the warm enclosure. All of a sudden it’s as though we’ve found ourselves living other peoples’ lives. And we’re loving it.

Wait. Chickens? Greenhouses? Maybe I should back up and explain a few things.

Then again, maybe not. In my head I planned a long blog post about exactly what we’re doing, where we’re doing it, and the journey of how we got here, but I’ve decided instead to just jump right into it because, well, that’s how life is sometimes. It just goes too fast for you to keep up. Plus, family and friends and facebook followers already know the deal: we’re farming in Virginia for the season thanks to a nonprofit organization called the Local Food Hub.

So, with that non-intro out of the way, let me get back to telling you about living our new farm dream. Every day these days is a brand new adventure, with exciting projects and learning opportunities around every bend. I’m doing my best to approach each one with gratitude and a beginner’s mind. And a journalist’s notebook.

Here’s a quick recap of the past week:

Monday night, our first at the farm, was a bit of an adjustment. I, for one, adjusted my sleep habits – I no longer need a sleep mask to cover my eyes as there is no artificial light coming into our bedroom windows. This may not sound amazing to you, but believe me, I am thrilled with this aspect of country living.

Another nighttime discovery: We can see stars – lots of them! For a girl who grew up not 20 miles from the bright lights of Manhattan, seeing nothing but shining stars at night is an amazing, and unusual, experience.

We awake every morning to birds outside the bedroom window, fluttering about as though it’s almost spring. With daytime temperatures in the 60s most days, they’re probably right. [What a strange non-existent winter it’s been!]

Depending on which direction you look, views out of our cottage windows include over 60 acres of cropland (one acre of which is ours this season!), a greenhouse, a packing shed, educational barn, high tunnels and hoop house structures, and the Blue Ridge mountains in the distance. Yes, this is a working farm. And yes, it is beautiful. We get to watch the sunrise over farm fields, and sunset over an apple orchard. Idyllic is an understatement.

In exchange for renting the cottage, there are a few chores that are required of us each day. First and foremost, remember the chicken-poop scooping? The farm’s ~20 hens provide eggs for the farm’s owners and Local Food Hub staff, and it is now our job to make sure they stay well fed, watered, and generally happy. (Let’s not tell my new charges what happened to our backyard chickens in Burlington.)

We’ve ordered (and received!) most of our seeds for our one-acre plot this season, and will begin planting them in the greenhouse imminently. I can guarantee a longer post about our new seed babies very soon. Make that many, many posts about our many, many babies.

We’ve already been making connections with farmers in the area. On Wednesday we attended an event – one of many educational workshops hosted by the Local Food Hub – on the topic of Financial Management for Small Farms. We learned a ton about everything from direct marketing techniques to farm labor laws to bookkeeping advice. We also connected with some of the Local Food Hub’s partner producer farmers and were even invited to dinner by some other new farmers in the area. An offer I expect to take them up on very soon, now that we’re in major networking (and friend-seeking) mode.

This week we also took some steps forward in our marketing efforts for our new endeavor. We’ve applied to be in two local farmers’ markets this upcoming season so we can sell our produce directly to consumers in the area. One of the stricter “producer-only” markets (only people who grow their own food can sell at the market) required us to have a signature from an Ag Extension agent as proof that we are actually growing our own food. We met our local agent – Cathy – on Thursday. There wasn’t much to show her as nothing’s in the ground yet – heck, the ground isn’t even tilled up in our plot. But I guess we had trustworthy faces because she signed the application. That doesn’t mean we’re in the market yet – we’re probably on a pretty long waiting list of farmers who want to sell at the downtown Charlottesville market, but we’ve made an important connection to the world of extension offices.

We’re talking a lot about crop planning, recordkeeping, and organization for our farm plot. I have a lot of things to say on these topics, and most of them start with the words “I hope” as in “I hope we can plan out a good schedule for our crops and keep good records this season.” And, “I hope we aren’t too late getting our onion seeds planted tomorrow.” Here’s to hoping!

In addition to all the new experiences on the farm, we’ve also made time this week for two live music shows, volunteering at a plant nursery (including shopping for $60-worth of baby fruit trees), and exploring the local area a bit.

In sum, we’re loving our new farm home. True, it’s a big change from being homeowners renovating our house for the past sixteen months to being renters living on leased farmland. In the big picture this is only a temporary landing place for us and yet I’m feeling more settled and grounded than I have in a long time. We’ve found ourselves throughout this week commenting on how surreal the experience feels. How beautiful our surroundings are. How comfortable and inspired we feel on a farm. I can’t think of any place I’d rather spend this growing season (~nine months) as we put our energy into learning everything we can about small-scale sustainable farming practices, growing our own diverse acre plot, and basking in the beauty of this place.

It’s a hard life, but somebody’s got to do it!

Market Research (Literally)

Posted on 02/07/2012 by Melissa

We set out to do some research this weekend. Market research.

I don’t mean stock markets or commodity markets or global economic markets. I mean farmers’ markets. But since the word ‘market’ has a certain association with charts and words like “securities”, I’ve included the following graph to ease into the conversation. (As for securities, farmers’ markets improve the food security of a community, which is the main security I’m concerned with.)

We wanted to visit farmers’ markets for many reasons.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to an outdoor winter market. Back when I lived in NYC, I was used to year-round markets like the Greenmarket at Union Square, where I worked for the Hawthorne Valley Farmstand. The hardy people of Vermont, meanwhile, typically find indoor spaces to host winter farmers’ markets, if a town is lucky enough to have one at all. The last market I attended was in Burlington in October, so I was craving a little market time.
We wanted to see what is being sold in VA in the winter. We already knew what variety could be found at summer farmers’ markets, but winter was another story.
We wanted to scope out ideas for how to set up our own farmers’ market stand. Sorry for the tease, but the details about our market stand are TBA right now. Mostly because we don’t know the details ourselves.
We love day trips. ‘Nuff said.
And then there are all the usual reasons for visiting farmers’ markets: Supporting local farmers, getting fresh produce, sampling cheese and jams and baked goods, people-watching, etc.

While I had ambitious goals of hitting every farmers’ market within a 100-mile radius this weekend, we actually only made it to six. This was not entirely our fault. First of all, there aren’t many places that have year-round markets. Also, winter markets tend to have shorter hours, making it harder to make the rounds to multiple markets far away from each other. And, as always, we wanted to be conscious of how much gas we were using. There’s also the excuse that we didn’t dress appropriately: it was way colder than we had predicted (even though a certain someone has a weather channel app on his phone).

The six markets we went to were:

We got a lot from the markets.

Tangible takeaways: apples, onions, arugula (grown in an unheated greenhouse), a variety pack of delicious fresh mushrooms, and a croissant.

Intangible takeaways a.k.a. what we learned:

Think big. Many farms have a presence at more than just one weekend market. I assume they are either huge farms, have many employees, or both. In some cases, farmers are coming from far away, and it makes sense to just send one truck to drop off goods at two markets for the day. Which means you’ve got to…
Drive a lot. Signs announcing farms from West Virginia and Pennsylvania were not uncommon. I suppose we shouldn’t have been surprised. Our farmer friends in Burlington drove 300 miles to NYC once a week to sell at the aforementioned Union Square Greenmarket. It’s all about reaching the target customer. It just so happens that a lot of customers happen to be in heavily populated (and typically wealthier) neighborhoods near DC rather than podunk country towns.
Green is the new black. Salad greens are all the rage this time of year. People are starved for local greens in the winter. So much so that apparently ~~some~~ many people are willing to spend $5 on a head of lettuce. Really?
It’s not what you’ve got, it’s how you display it. We loved comparing displays of different vendors. We even snapped photos (with permission) of the ones we really liked, and came up with a lot of ideas for our future farmstand.

We really liked the burlap bag tablecloth look above, for instance. (Though I might try to straighten them out so they’re all the same length, but that’s just me.)

All in all, it was a successful weekend of research that offered lots of food for thought. Know of a good market in the area we should check out? Let us know!

PS – You may notice I added a new page to the site. That’s right, my 101 goals are now up for your viewing pleasure. Now I have no excuse not to get moving on them!

How Hardy Are We?

Posted on 02/01/2012 by Melissa

We’re pretty hardy people.

In the winter we ~~keep~~ kept our thermostat between 57-63. (Actually, before we lived together, Mark set his apartment thermostat to 52.) We ~~enjoy~~ enjoyed cold weather activities like snowshoeing (me), snowboarding (Mark) and shoveling snow (well, I enjoy shoveling snow; I’m not sure Mark actually enjoys it, though he did a lot of it last year). Friends and family outside of Vermont think we’re a little crazy to keep our heat so low and to embrace the winter as a pleasurable experience, but believe me, it’s not crazy where we ~~are~~ were.

If we’re so hardy, why did we leave Vermont?

Because it’s all about the plants. The plants we want to grow are not quite as hardy. For instance, one year I tried to grow artichokes. Major fail. They grew into beautiful healthy plants, but never produced the bud/choke/edible part. Previous years of tomato plantings were such failures that last year Mark gave up trying to grow full sized tomatoes and grew only cherries instead. I don’t think I’ve ever seen heat-loving peppers grow in Vermont. Okay, I’m kidding with that last one. Sort-of.

When grown in the right climate, artichoke plants are pretty cool looking, and delicious

The truth is, the short growing season in Vermont certainly presents some challenges in terms of the crops and varieties available. Don’t get me wrong, many fruits and vegetables can be grown in Vermont, and the state has plenty of successful farmers, like our friends at the Intervale for instance, other farms surrounding Burlington, or elsewhere in the state. I give them a lot of credit. Vermont presents many challenges to farmers. You have to select cold-tolerant plants, extend the growing season with hoop houses and other techniques, and trudge out in the snow to take care of farm chores and animals in the winter. The short season also makes it difficult to recover when storms like Irene come through and ravage farms during the peak growing season.

While the challenges of farming in Vermont are not insurmountable, we did realize we’re not as hardy as we thought. When we began looking at land to suit our small farm/homestead dreams, we realized that we could have a big advantage over the growing season if we took our dream a little further south. How far south? Oh, about two zones.

When I think about farming in Vermont here’s the image that comes to mind for me:

You’ll notice lots of blues and some purple in that map – colors that generally indicate brrrrrr. In terms of these USDA Plant Hardiness Zones, Burlington is typically a 5a. Not horrible, but not ideal for those of us who want to grow a large variety of heat-loving plants.

Take a look at the zones where we plan to farm this season, near Charlottesville, Virginia:

In amongst all those beautiful earthy green colors you’ll find Charlottesville: squarely in Zone 7a – two full zones warmer than Burlington!

What does this mean? It means it’s snowing in Vermont right now as we’re headed out for a bike ride in Virginia. It means Mark can grow his beloved tomatoes to full ripeness – and sweetness – without worrying that a frost in May or September will thwart his efforts. It means harvesting fresh greens throughout the winter. It means we’ll be planting in the ground in Virginia in a few weeks, just as greenhouses in Vermont are starting to wake up from hibernation. It means more outdoor farmers’ markets throughout the year. It means, overall, more fresh local food more of the time.

Now, don’t take this as a value judgement. I’m not saying Virginia is better than Vermont, even from a local food or farming perspective. Vermont still has advantages like the most farmers markets per capita of any state. And many more local cheese producers. (Boy do they love their cheese in the Green Mountain State!) And tons of helpful resources for new farmers that come from the University of Vermont’s Ag Extension. And Virginia will definitely have its challenges I’m sure – like more pests and diseases due to the lack of a hard frost to kill ’em off each year.

I’m still sad to have left Vermont. I’ll admit that I haven’t yet fallen in love with my new state. But I am excited about the possibilities for growing new things in a warmer zone. I mean, how could I not be excited about growing our own tea (camellia sinensis), or peanuts, or peaches? The possibilities seem endless right now as we start placing our seed orders. Don’t worry, we’re ordering plenty of artichokes and tomatoes. Oh yes.

A New Year, A New State

Posted on 01/01/2012 by Melissa

Happy New Year to all!

We arrived at Mark’s parents’ place close to midnight last night, just in time to ring in the new year in our new state, the other V state – Virginia. We’re here to start a new journey, to get away from Vermont’s harsh winters (though so far this season the winter has been a joke) and to find an opportunity to farm together.

I for one haven’t fully processed What This All Means. That we’ve packed up most of our stuff and moved our lives over 500 miles away from my beloved Burlington, Vermont. That our stuff is now divided among various vehicles and relatives’ houses, in boxes and bags and scattered piles. That we’re homeless, in a way, with no place to put down roots. That, for the time being, we have no clarity about what the future holds.

Despite all this uncertainty, there are a few things that I do know:

1) I’m not yet done with Burlington. I will be back.
2) I’ll never really feel homeless as long as I have my guy, my partner, my inspiration, at my side.
3) We may not have the details figured out yet, but we’re on our way. We’re on our path toward a simple life, toward a farm, toward a new adventure.
3) Where there is movement, there is life. Where there is life, there is hope.
4) I find the excerpt below (taken from a friend’s blog) to be particularly touching and meaningful at the start of the new year.

Each lifetime is the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
For some there are more pieces.
For others the puzzle is more difficult to assemble.

But know this. No one has within themselves
all the pieces to their puzzle…

Everyone carries with them at least one and probably
many pieces to someone else’s puzzle.
Sometimes they know it.
Sometimes they don’t.

And when you present your piece
which is worthless to you
to another, whether you know it or not,
whether they know it or not,
you are a messenger from the Most High.

from On Angels and Messengers by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner

I’m a Junkie

Posted on 09/21/2011 by Melissa

I’m a junkie. An event junkie.

Last weekend we went to the Monticello Harvest Festival in Charlottesville, VA. This festival was part hippie fest (think: barefoot children in dreads & drum circles), part ag fair (think: farm animals on display) and part educational workshops and presentations (think: conference breakout sessions).

No, these are not our gardens. These are the gardens at Thomas Jefferson's Monticello.

I’ve been a junkie for events like this for as long as I can remember. In college I used to attend conferences, lectures, and festivals like it was my job (I was a campus sustainability education intern, so I guess attending environmental conferences was my job, sort of). When I traveled solo for 3 months in 2006, my itinerary was based on where and when the best conferences were happening. Even when I was a kid I remember going to Health Expos with my mom at Nassau Coliseum, listening to lectures about detoxing and nutrition. I’m not sure whether I enjoyed the free schwag (think: pens, stickers and the occasional cool bag) more back then or now. (Probably now. When you’re a kid you’re always getting free stuff. As an adult who actually pays for things, it’s a treat to get a free keychain or stress ball even if it does have the name of some business on it.)

We had been looking forward to the Harvest Festival for months, despite the fact that it meant leaving ~~our~~ my beloved Vermont during the height of the harvest season. (It pains me to not know the state of our home gardens, to be missing the beginning of the fall foliage season up there.) You see, we’re on a bit of a knowledge kick right now. As aspiring farmers, we know that now is the time to learn skills that we’ll need to be successful food producers in the future. And with VA on a short list of locations for our agricultural adventures, we really wanted to come to this event to connect with this community.

And we’re so glad we did! With names like Pursuing the Small Farm Dream, The Joy of Hobby Farming, and Backyard Fruit Growing, it’s as though they created the conference just for us.

Take a look at this partial list of workshops. Just like every good conference I’ve ever been to, I wished I could have cloned myself so I could attend all of the workshops at the same time!

I took pages and pages of notes about how to graft fruit trees, how to create a business plan for a small farm, lists of resources and contacts. We learned about businesses and organizations that exist to help new farmers succeed – like the Food Hub in Charlottesville, which connects farmers to institutions and restaurants through a wholesale distribution market. We tried samples of heirloom tomatoes and various fermented foods and other products created – mostly – by young, passionate entrepreneurs. At the vendor and exhibitor tables we networked and gathered information (and schwag, of course). We listened to inspirational, engaging people talk about the challenges and successes they’ve had, humbly offering up their advice for others to learn from their experiences. We spread the word that we were looking for ideas for our new farm project, and the positive responses we received were overwhelming.

Of course, I’ve learned that friendly people aren’t hard to find in Virginia, but this was more than just friendly. Oh, you want to start a farm. How lovely. This was an enthusiastic, passionate, whole-hearted Yes, you should do this! If I were looking for affirmation from the universe that starting a farm business in Virginia was what I wanted to do, I found it at that festival.

(Ahem. Dear Vermont, this is hypothetically speaking, of course.)

We made new friends and re-connected with folks we already knew. Wait. You already know people in Charlottesville? We apparently did a good job of meeting the right folks during our visit in the spring – at this festival we saw not one, not two, but three people we met six months ago. As Oprah Winfrey once said, “Surround yourself only with people who are going to take you higher.” I’d like to think we’re doing well by Oprah.

My Our love of events is about all of these things. The networking, the sharing, the people, the excited energy. As we left the harvest festival on Saturday, driving away from Monticello amidst breathtaking mountain views, we were filled to the brim with three I’s: information, inspiration, and ideas.

We’re not even done processing all those I’s from this past weekend, but it’s already time to plan for more: the upcoming three-day Mother Earth News Fair in Seven Springs, PA. With two weekends in a row chock-full of workshops, we’re bound to have a fourth I to consider: the implications for our future as farmers.

When I grow up I want to be a Farmer

Posted on 03/22/2011 by Melissa

Last week we were at my mom’s house relishing two things: 1) that we were still on vacation and 2) that there was no snow on the ground on Long Island.

It was a perfect March day: cool, but warm enough to be in t-shirts for most of the day. The sun, peeking in and out through the clouds, beckoned us outdoors and we gladly obliged.

I went into the backyard to change the water in the birdbath – my self-appointed chore for as long as I can remember. Mark came outside to take a look at my mom’s compost bin and see how the contents were faring now that the deep winter freeze is over. (Can I just say: I love that my boyfriend is dorky about compost!)

Mark and I dug and turned the grass, spread compost, and planted seeds at my mom's new garden

A few hours later, my mom’s backyard was almost entirely transformed: a 10’x10′ patch of grass was turned into new garden beds, outlined with old bricks, topped with beautiful compost.

You might say we went overboard. Or, you might say we didn’t go far enough in this project, our latest Lawn-to-Garden conversion, since there is obviously still a bit of lawn remaining.

All credit for this project goes to Mark who immediately saw the potential: people who want more garden space + underutilized resource-intensive lawn + perfectly aged compost + two able bodies = backyard garden. These days he can’t see a lawn without noting what a waste of space it is. We were pleasantly surprised that my mom and her partner agreed. We left some lawn at their request; a full lawn conversion would have taken more time than we had that day anyway.

It was our first time digging in the soil in months, and it made me realize how much I’ve truly missed it. All of it: sinking my hands into dirt, picking up worms, planning out garden beds, being outside all day, using back muscles that have gone weak over the winter, ending the day with blackened fingernails.

I couldn’t help but be reminded of being a child playing in that same backyard, and in the pebbles that had once been in our driveway. Had you asked me in kindergarten what I wanted to be when I grew up, I’d have said I wanted to be a farmer. I later set my indecisive sights on being either an actress, a scientist, a teacher or an artist. I’m now back to wanting to be a farmer, or something darn close.

My definition of ‘farming’ has changed, of course. No longer am I a little girl raking driveway pebbles into rows of imaginary crops. Now I’m digging up the grasses, breaking ground, starting new life…

Comparing the “V” states

Posted on 03/13/2011 by Melissa

There were things growing in Virginia!

Typically people like to ‘relax’ on vacations, but Mark and I don’t really know what that means, so we didn’t plan any time for that on this trip. Hence, I haven’t had any time to write since the beginning of the trip. We also haven’t had any time for many of the other things I thought this ‘vacation’ would include: a lot of reading, hiking, yoga, live music, and the weekend Indian buffet (though the buffet is still good on a weekday!).

What did we do all this time? Mostly we spent our time comparing Virginia to Vermont, and specifically Charlottesville to Burlington.

There are many demographic similarities between the two cities, things Mark presented in advance as reasons he thought I’d like C’ville: it’s a progressive, young, college town of approximately 40,000 people, most of whom seem to have an interest in health, outdoor activities, good food, local beer and hip music. There are the geo-topical similarities such as the proximity to mountains and the general beauty of natural landscapes all around.

Downtown Charlottesville

There are also the silly similarities, such as the fact that town names like Montpelier and Richmond exist in the two states, both of which start with the letter “V”. And that Charlottesville and Burlington both have downtown pedestrian malls with lots of independent funky shops.

While we were busy making our own comparisons between the state we currently call home and the state we may one day call home, interesting little synchronicities started popping up. There are VA/VT connections everywhere. We met multiple people who had gone to school in Vermont, others whose daughter, friend, or neighbor had moved to Vermont. Others still whose friends were up there on a ski vacation while we were taking a break from the snow. It might be a stretch to say that Virginia is a sister state to Vermont, but at times it felt like it.

A community garden plot in Charlottesville. Notice the red clay everywhere. Also notice the lack of snow.

While we were researching the local food scene we bumped into another similarity: the supportive culture for local agriculture. We visited the Charlottesville area Local Food Hub, a food and farming organization that seeks to provide distribution and marketing assistance for local farmers and educate new young farmers. It was modeled, in part, on Burlington’s Intervale Center – an organization that manages an area of over 350 acres of farmland within the city of Burlington. Currently about 15 farms, ranging in size from ½ acre to 10 acres, call the Intervale home, as does the Tommy Thompson community gardens where Mark and I have two adjacent garden plots.

Both organizations see the importance in educating young farmers, creating new markets, celebrating community, and sharing resources (farm tools, storage, food processing, and distribution markets to name a few).

We were excited to learn about the C’ville area’s interest in supporting local agriculture, which, given the compacted clay soil throughout the area, was slightly surprising. Of course, like Vermont,Virginia has a long agricultural history, and I should have known that the sweeping local food movement would have touched this beautiful mid-Atlantic state. If this trip did anything, it opened my eyes to the fact that Vermont isn’t entirely on its own in the local food bubble. Charlottesville appears to be another beacon of hope.

Burlingtonians fought the snow while we were in Virginia

In all of our comparing, we also found tons of ways in which the two areas differ. Most notably to us at the time was the utter lack of snow in Virginia. During our trip, Burlington received a record March snowfall (more than 2′ in 24 hours!), Virginia temps were in the 50s and 60s, usually warm enough for us to go without a jacket. I’m not sure why I brought thermal pants on this trip?

I’ve already mentioned the other main relevant difference: the soil quality. Our Vermont home has wonderful sandy/loamy soil, considered by some to be the perfect soil. The red Virginia clay scares me. Yet again, hope springs eternal: the farms, vineyards, and daffodils almost everywhere we went proved that it ain’t as bad as it looks!