Bloom Where You're Planted Farm

Yesterday was an exciting day, as we harvested the first fruits of this year's labors.  Our county fair is this week so we gathered up our contenders.  We ended up with nine entries between the two of us:  mini pumpkins, small gourds, one large pumpkin, an apple gourd, and the "monsters"--two Green Cushaw squash and two enormous and somewhat freaky-looking snake gourds.  It's fun and exciting to make the first harvest, but man are the pumpkin vines and leaves prickly this time of year!  My legs and arms are a scratchy mess!

Over the weekend Terry built permanent wooden benches on the hayrack.  This should be a safer, more comfortable ride for our guests, not to mention much less messy than the previous straw bale seats.  It's been extremely hot and humid lately, so we've been trying to do projects we can work on in the shade or indoors, including shopping for (almost) all of the rest of the materials we'll need to build the goat pens, chicken enclosures, and a new fence in the barnyard.  Most of the gift shop merchandise is in, including some cute and funny Girl Power/Witchy Woman decor pieces. 

It's crazy how fast it all starts rollin' this time of year!  Watch for our ads (thanks to a grant from Nebraska Tourism) in Lincoln Kids! newspaper, Nebraska Life magazine, and the Omaha-area's "Let's Go" magazine soon.  Those of you who attend the Cass County fair can pick up our new brochures at the Scenic Weeping Water Valley Association's booth.  We'll also be in the parade Saturday evening.

Teachers are starting to think ahead toward fall field trips and our calendar is beginning to fill up.  If you're interested in a field trip, birthday party, or campfire party this fall, call or email us and we'll get you on the schedule.  We hope to see you soon at the farm!

Lots of exciting things have been happening here on the farm!  All of our pumpkins, squash and gourds are in the ground.  We were pleased to be done about a week ahead of our usual schedule.  Planting began on May 15 with the giant pumpkins, hard shell gourds (such as the apple & swan varieties), and a few types of squash with longer growing seasons.  We added a Cushaw squash and Blue Hubbard squash, both which can grow to be quite large.  Our goal is to have a big pile (or piles) of fantastical giant pumpkins and squash for photo ops--now our part is done and Mother Nature takes over!  We hope for plenty of rain and warm temperatures to give all the seeds a good start.  The May 15 seeds are all sprouted and some are starting to put on their third and fourth leaves already.

On May 22 we hosted a field trip/play date for a group from Offutt Air Force Base in Bellevue, NE.  We took them on a hayride to see the horses and everyone enjoyed meeting our calf Alice, who is a month old already.  She is mischievous, ridiculously cute, and growing by the day.

With all the seeds in the ground we used this long Memorial Day weekend, which we usually spend planting, to do some painting on the barns.  The animal barn is done, one of the two wood-sided walls of the big barn is done, and the second side is power-washed and ready for primer.  This second side is the most intimidating, so we may drag our feet a little on getting that one done...J   We'll keep you posted!  Hope to see you soon at the farm!

We started our planting last Thursday (5/28) and finished up on Sunday evening.  This is record time for us -- maybe after six years we're finally getting the hang of it! (KNOCK ON WOOD...I wouldn't want to jinx it for next year!)

We planted four "patches".  One of the two big patches south of the house has all of our specialty colored pumpkin varieties, along with all the gourds and squash.  That should be a fun one to watch.  We planted a new pumpkin variety called "Knucklehead", one new large/bottle-type gourd variety, and three new, very decorative kinds of squash.

We're excited about offering hay rides for the first time this year!  The second large patch to the south will be where we stop to let hayrack riders choose their pumpkins.  It has the small pie pumpkins, the giant Big Max pumpkins, and two Jack-O-Lantern-sized varieties.  I don't know if anyone will choose the giant pumpkins from the field (they weigh 50-150 lbs!) but it should make for some great photo opportunities.

Two more Jack-O-Lantern varieties went into the north patch by the Chicken House.  The small patch by the schoolhouse will again be a U-Pick patch and has pie pumpkins, Turk's Turban squash, and some funky-looking Blue Hubbard squash.

The seedlings should start coming up this week, and then the bug and weed control begins.  It's a labor of love for sure.  We'll grow some good ones for you!

Terry planting in the north patch.  He finished up just before a surprise hail storm hit!

 Rocket gets excited about planting time, too!

The snow is coming down and there's no doubt it's winter outside.  Thankfully I'm inside today and thinking SPRING.  I got out my seed catalogs, last year's leftover seeds, and the list of what we bought in 2008 and sat down to place this season's pumpkin, squash and gourd order.  

There are always the old stand-bys that we order every year.  They're great performers and customer favorites.  That makes up the bulk of my order, but I always like to try a few new varieties each year.  Last summer I ordered the beautiful book "The Compleat Squash" by Amy Goldman.  It is a gorgeous coffee table-style book full of photographs of squashes, pumpkins and gourds.  I found one adorable squash in the book that I ordered online today from an heirloom seed company.  While on that website I found two other interesting squash which I also decided to add.  These, plus a couple of gourd types that we've always wanted to try will round out our new inventory for 2009.

As long as we still get excited when the new seed catalogs arrive, we'll know we're in the right business.  Four months 'til planting time -- yippee!