I am blogging about our crazy life at A Geek In Glasses
We had too many different blogs, one for the farm, one for photography and one for life. I just couldn't keep up...as you can see this one hasn't been update since 2010 pumpkin season.
Follow our farming, pirating, blacksmithing, spinning, parenting, letterboxing, swordfighting, irish step dancing, crafting, collecting and life on my new blog - see you there.
Thursday, December 08, 2011
Wednesday, November 03, 2010
Wonderful Pumpkin Season
Our first year was SUPER!!! The pumpkin season is over now. The patch was successful, we had several different types of pumpkin and squash plus beautiful mums. We worked hard to fight the squash bugs, cucumber beetles, powdery mildew, and wilt. We learned a lot about pumpkins and mums and are 
already planning for next year.
One the agenda for next year we have 9 varieties of garlic to plant, 10 new t
ypes of mums and at least 30 different types of pumpkins and squash. We will continue our attempts to grow seasonal heirloom veggies.
Until then we will continue to post our cleaned fibers and yarns on our etsy site. Our winter will be full of spinning, dyeing and felting.
Enjoy some of our pictures of the pumpkin stand a
nd the small events that we had, such as community day, with pumpkin painting, petting zoo and guess the weight, and the pumpkin carving day.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Awaiting the Mums
Well, we are awaiting the arrival of the mum cuttings. They were to ship on Monday to arrive sometime on Thursday. We spent the afternoon yesterday, gathering the ingredients for our soil-less mix. We found the sand and mulch in bulk, but had to buy bags of the peat moss and some kind of tiny pebble thing. We got everything in town using the farm dump truck. Mike spent 2 two hours last night cleaning the area for dumping then dumped the pile. Once on the ground he mixed all the parts with the skid loader. Then he pushed the pile under the over hang to protect it from the wind and rain. Which was a great idea!!! We were able to fill all of the pots today even though it rained on and off. The pots are stacked and ready to go once the cutting arrive. 
On our walk through the patch today we discovered a pumpkin, an actual pumpkin!!! This patch might have pumpkins after all!! If you can't see it, it's on the left side right at the bottom of the yellow flower!!!
Monday, June 14, 2010
The Pumpkins are Planted and Growing!!!!
Where has the time gone? I know - to the pumpkin patch. We started with the idea of the black plastic mulch and
planting the seedling by cutting holes in the plastic and placing them in the ground. We thought this would be a great way to control weeds from growing up between the plants. We laid three rows of plastic by hand and planted 50 -75 seedlings. This was super hard work, there was a tractor involved to cut the rows, then raking, then rolling the plastic, then more raking to keep the plastic in place. After we finished those three rows, Mike suggests that maybe the place that sold us the plastic has a machine to lay the plastic. I thought, " Are you kidding? Of course we should look into that, why are we doing this by hand?!?" Then we spent a week of trying to rent the equipment, picking it up, it not being there to pick up so we abandoned the whole plastic mulch idea.
These pumpkins need to get in the ground, so we started planting seeds by hand straight into the field. It was just the three of us, Mike, the baby and I. That kid is a trooper. I have never seen a 2 year old so willing and pleasant to just wander around a 3 acre empty field sticking seeds in the ground. It was awesome. We planted, then it rained. We planted more, it rained more. Then it rained and rained. Finally last Friday the final seeds were planted. Who knows if they will grow, who knows if the pumpkins will be on time. Some will be early, some will be late. Oh well, it was our first attempt at something larger than a flower bed so we are learning. I haven't taken any other pictures since May 20th, the pumpkins are really looking better since.
During all of this craziness, I was able to place an order for mums. I searched high and low on how to grow fall mums and the only information I could find was on taking cuttings from your mums. Well I only have 4 mum plants of my own and 3 of them are boring white and the other is pink. So I took the cuttings and planted them in pots, with only 2 colors. That would be a totally lame display - must search harder!!! So Mike purchased the book, "The Growing and Marketing of Fall Mums" by Don Langevin. This book gave us all the information we needed to successfully find a supplier of mum cuttings. I chose www.faribaultgrowersinc.com of Minnesota. They were great to talk to on the phone and the variety was great!!! The mum cuttings are being shipped June 14 ( holy crap that's today!!! ) They should be here by Thursday, then the next adventure will start.
The Giant pumpkins are on the move. It looks like the monster at the house has taken over most of the garden and is growing at a rate of 8 inches a day. There are female blossoms on it now. This picture was taken on June 7. It has grown quite a bit since then!!!
Finally all the sheep and goats have been sheared except for the Pygora, she has a small patch on her back thigh that will not shed off. Oh well, she looks a little frightful.
I am finishing up the Spring Semester of school and this sessions class is on Electronic Production. We needed to create a corporate identity for a company and I chose the pumpkin patch. I'm happy with the project for the class, but Mike thinks the logo needs some tweaking before it's official.
planting the seedling by cutting holes in the plastic and placing them in the ground. We thought this would be a great way to control weeds from growing up between the plants. We laid three rows of plastic by hand and planted 50 -75 seedlings. This was super hard work, there was a tractor involved to cut the rows, then raking, then rolling the plastic, then more raking to keep the plastic in place. After we finished those three rows, Mike suggests that maybe the place that sold us the plastic has a machine to lay the plastic. I thought, " Are you kidding? Of course we should look into that, why are we doing this by hand?!?" Then we spent a week of trying to rent the equipment, picking it up, it not being there to pick up so we abandoned the whole plastic mulch idea.These pumpkins need to get in the ground, so we started planting seeds by hand straight into the field. It was just the three of us, Mike, the baby and I. That kid is a trooper. I have never seen a 2 year old so willing and pleasant to just wander around a 3 acre empty field sticking seeds in the ground. It was awesome. We planted, then it rained. We planted more, it rained more. Then it rained and rained. Finally last Friday the final seeds were planted. Who knows if they will grow, who knows if the pumpkins will be on time. Some will be early, some will be late. Oh well, it was our first attempt at something larger than a flower bed so we are learning. I haven't taken any other pictures since May 20th, the pumpkins are really looking better since.
During all of this craziness, I was able to place an order for mums. I searched high and low on how to grow fall mums and the only information I could find was on taking cuttings from your mums. Well I only have 4 mum plants of my own and 3 of them are boring white and the other is pink. So I took the cuttings and planted them in pots, with only 2 colors. That would be a totally lame display - must search harder!!! So Mike purchased the book, "The Growing and Marketing of Fall Mums" by Don Langevin. This book gave us all the information we needed to successfully find a supplier of mum cuttings. I chose www.faribaultgrowersinc.com of Minnesota. They were great to talk to on the phone and the variety was great!!! The mum cuttings are being shipped June 14 ( holy crap that's today!!! ) They should be here by Thursday, then the next adventure will start.
The Giant pumpkins are on the move. It looks like the monster at the house has taken over most of the garden and is growing at a rate of 8 inches a day. There are female blossoms on it now. This picture was taken on June 7. It has grown quite a bit since then!!!
Finally all the sheep and goats have been sheared except for the Pygora, she has a small patch on her back thigh that will not shed off. Oh well, she looks a little frightful.
I am finishing up the Spring Semester of school and this sessions class is on Electronic Production. We needed to create a corporate identity for a company and I chose the pumpkin patch. I'm happy with the project for the class, but Mike thinks the logo needs some tweaking before it's official.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Natural Grass Mower
There are a hundred and one things to do today and the only thing I did was sit in the middle of my yard, surround by the goats, enjoying the warm breeze. I held the new baby kitten as Meow ( our daughter's cat) sat by my feet. All I could hear in my head was," with two cats in the yard, life used to be so hard, Now everything is easy cause of you and our..." Oh how I love Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. I have never been more at ease.
We invested in a portable electric fence for the front yard. We staked off an area with some shade and left the three older goats go to town on the high grass. The goats seemed to enjoy the change of scenery and liked grazing on the tall grass. If we move the fence around we might never have to use the mower again.
Also, the weather finally worked with us and we were able to do our May Pole dance and spring celebration.
Plus - Our local FFA (Future Farmers of America) and the 4-H had an auction to benefit the two programs last night. We enjoy going to help out the organizations and to score a couple of good deals. We ended up getting a rain water barrel. We have an open top barrel, but this one has a spigot and a leaf screen on top. Just the right thing to collect rain water to water the giant pumpkins. We also picked up a bag of feed for the animals, a garden hoe, and a great cow hide looking lamp shade.
We invested in a portable electric fence for the front yard. We staked off an area with some shade and left the three older goats go to town on the high grass. The goats seemed to enjoy the change of scenery and liked grazing on the tall grass. If we move the fence around we might never have to use the mower again.
Also, the weather finally worked with us and we were able to do our May Pole dance and spring celebration.
Plus - Our local FFA (Future Farmers of America) and the 4-H had an auction to benefit the two programs last night. We enjoy going to help out the organizations and to score a couple of good deals. We ended up getting a rain water barrel. We have an open top barrel, but this one has a spigot and a leaf screen on top. Just the right thing to collect rain water to water the giant pumpkins. We also picked up a bag of feed for the animals, a garden hoe, and a great cow hide looking lamp shade.
Pumpkin Patch tilled under
Finally we had nice enough weather to disk the field under. The field had not been plowed in over a decade so the turf was hard to turn over. Mike ended up driving the tractor for the first time.
They ended up finding an attachment to dig rows so that the black plastic mulch can be laid down and then the dirt be pushed back onto it. Once that is done we intend on punching holes in the plastic to plant the seedlings.
They ended up finding an attachment to dig rows so that the black plastic mulch can be laid down and then the dirt be pushed back onto it. Once that is done we intend on punching holes in the plastic to plant the seedlings.
Friday, May 14, 2010
The Savvy Photographer is having a give-a-way
Again not farm related but the weather has been so frightful that I have been working on my images lately and wanted to share this with everyone too.
Hey photographers and digital scrappers, Savvy is giving away the Beach House Collection Templates to a lucky winner! To enter just spread the word about Savvy and then post your comments to their blog. http://thesavvyphotographer.blogspot.com/
Hey photographers and digital scrappers, Savvy is giving away the Beach House Collection Templates to a lucky winner! To enter just spread the word about Savvy and then post your comments to their blog. http://thesavvyphotographer.blogspot.com/
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Textures by nicholeV photography plus patch progress
I took this picture during the day of rock removal from the pumpkin patch. We placed the baby on the the trash can for safe keeping as the skid loader moved rocks from the soon to be planted area.
I thought it was an interesting scene as the storm rolled in on us. The sky was dark and in the place she was sitting there was no background except for sky.
I used a texture from nicholeV photography on this image. I added a border that I did over top. I really love this image, with my baby and her pink cowboy boots.
I love nicholeV photography
I know this is not a farm topic, but still a big part of my life is my photography and I just wanted to profess my love of nicholeV photography and the super awesome textures and actions offered on the website. I fell in love with textures last fall and I can't get enough of them. I think that textures makes the pictures have an old time feel.
This is site is an inspiration to me and the images are fantastic. Check it out!! www.nicholeV.com
This is site is an inspiration to me and the images are fantastic. Check it out!! www.nicholeV.com
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