Hello again :-)

What a beautiful day.  The sun is shining today and the warm breeze was so lovely today! 

We got the plastic on our hoop house over the raised beds today, and we were planting radishes and kale.  The green houses are full and running over, literally :-)  Oh the joy of Spring. 

We've been watching the Canadian Geese fly over head, listening to their ever welcome honking, cheering one another to keep going on....

Well I am totally excited to announce that we have secured our Chef for our Farm to Table Dinner Event at The Octagon Barn.  We are please to announce that Andy Fabien, Owner/Executive Chef of The Van Camp House in Port Sanilac has agreed to create the menu, and prepare the meal.  They were just listed in Michigan Travel Idea's on pg. 6 in the Top 10 Restaurants to check out. 

Keep watching for the list of producers and ticket sales to go on!

any questions, don't hesitate to give me a call,

Jean

Hello Again All :-)

It is pouring rain here today.  But with rain comes mud and with softer ground comes life from deep below.  I look so forward to the first signs of daffodil and tulip tips poking thier little noeses through the ground. 

The Canadian Geese are starting to fly in, showing us those 'v's we've all come to expect and look forward to.  Yes and then come all the little birds that say, "spring is coming".  Ahhhhhh, spring.  My favorite time of year.

We've secured the dates, locations and chefs for our Farm To Table Dinner Event's.  We are very happy to working with The Thumb Area Tourism Council on these events.  Here's the scoop;

Dinner #1:

We will have this Event at The Octogan Barn in Gagetown, Mi on Saturday, August 27th, 2011, Time still TBA.  We have secured the Cheff from the Hot Spot "The Van Camp House" in Port Sanilac.  See their listing in Michigan Travel Ideas put out by Midwest Living as one of the Top 10 Restaurnats in The Thumb of Michigan.  Andy Fabien is an awesome Chef.  Some of the producers that will be involved are Hampshire Farms, Bellwether Farm, Island Farms, Cheeky Monkey's Foods, and of course us at The Garden Gate CSA Farm :-)   This event will focus on Producers primarily in the Thumb of Michigan.   We are very excited.  We will keep you posted when tickets are available.

Dinner #2:

We have our second Event to be held at The Historic Govenor Warner's Mansion's Grounds in Downtown Farmington.  The date is set for Friday, September 16th, 2011 AT 6:30PM.   We have secured the Chef's from The Henry Ford Museum, yes you're seeing correct :-)  This event will focus on The Downtown Farmington Farmers & Artisans Farmers Market vendors.  We will keep everyone posted as soon as tickets become available.

If you have any questions please don't hesitate to contact us by phone or email. 

Have a wonderful day and talk soon,

Jean

Hello Again!

The snow fell on us, that's for sure.  We have drifts up to 7' tall next to our barn hill and up against some of our out buildings.  The snow is simply glistening and shows like diamonds lost all around.  There is truly something beautiful about the snow untouched.

We are extremely excited to announce our plans for a Farm to Table Dinner Event.  WE have secured Govenor Warners Beautiful Historic Grounds.  It is scheduled for Friday, September 16th, 2011 at 6:30 pm.  Check out our farms schedules of events.  We have also sesured some of Michigans finest Chefs, TBA with ticket price and other particulars.  OUr goal is to promote all the vendors from our Downtown Farmington Farmers  & Artisans Farmers market.  We will be accepting reservations and will keep you posted.  If you are not on our farms email list, please sign up at ourmail@thegardengatefarm.com . This will keep you posted on all our events, etc.

For those of you who havn't been to our new Winter Farmers Market, check out our web site at www.powerfarmersmarket.com  to see who, what, and where.  Also check out our farms web site at www.thegardengatefarm.com  to see the live broadcast of me on Fox TV2 about our Market. 

Hope to see you all at the market.

Jean

GOOD MORNING!

FINALLY GOT OUT OF THE HOUSE TODAY.  WE ARE SNOWED IN.  12 INCHES OF SNOW & SNOW DRIFTS UP TO 5 FEET!  I JUST CANNOT MAKE MYSELF LIKE WINTER.  IT'S ONLY FOR MY CHILDREN I TRY TO BE HAPPY ABOUT IT.   THEY ABSOLUTELY LOVE TO GO OUT & PLAY.  EVEN OUR 3 YEAR OLD EVAN LOVES IT.  HE'S JUST INTENT ON BEING ONE OF THE BOYS.  HE IS SO SWEET!  

WE HAD TO RESCHEDULE OUR THURSDAY BAY CITY BECAUSE OF ALL THIS SNOW TO FRIDAY.  YOU SHOULD OF ALL GOT THE EMAIL. 

THE SNOW IS PRETTY, ESPECIALLY ON THE EVERGREENS.  I AM TRULY TRYING TO BE POSITIVE HERE! LOL! 

WELL HOPE EVERYONE IS HAVEING A GREAT DAY,  TALK AGAIN SOON!

SINCERELY

JEAN

Greetings from the Farm!

Well December is here and cold she is!

Once again I long for December 20th so I can start my annual countdown to spring!  But in the mean time I'll just go out to the greenhouse to get happy. 

Another market season is done, but we are very excited to be able to start our NEW WINTER FARMERS MARKET.  We've got 17 vendors set up for each of the 8 market days, with a total of over 25 different ones that will switch out through the winter. 

We are now offering Firewood For Sale.  We will take orders for it at the market, via email or by the phone. 

We look forward to seeing all our market friends throught the winter. 

talk again soon!

Hello from the winter wonderland! 

We've had some beautiful, I say that loosely, weather here.  We had a hore frost that lasted 3 days.  There wasn't any direct sunshine to melt it all away.  It was simply stunning. The children have been enjoying going sledding and skating.  Our neighbors across the road have a pond that they go skating as well as one at our school.  The children enjoy winter much more than their mom!  But I guess we all need a break.

Check out the new Web site.  Mark has added all the meat information so it will be much easier for you to do your ordering.  You can still either call us directly or email Jan to place your orders.  Also please make a note of the new email address:  ourmail@thegardengatefarm.com.  Jan has always used her personal address and then sort out all the farm stuff.  She felt this would be a lot easier.  Also if possible, when you send an email, please include a phone number so I can call you back.  Thanks.

CSA & WORK SHARES

We are excited to say that all 40 CSA boxes have a home to go to for this season.  We have already started a waiting list for the 2011 season.  There are 3 people on this.  If you have questions regarding the farm, it is easier for us to answer your questions if call me (Jean) directly.  Jan simpley refers all emails to me, but is not able to answer many of the detail questions you might have. 

WINTER DROP OFFS

We've have been thrilled with the orders we are getting for our products during the winter.  Please remember that Bay City needs to have orders in by Thurs.  5pm and Farmington in by Fri. 5pm.  Any special orders/ cuts of meat need to in by Wed. evening.  We cut pork on Thur. and beef on Fri. 

FARM PICKUP MEAT & EGGS

Please be advised that you can order meat, eggs and honey to be picked up at the Farm.  Please call me for information.

Don't forget we have eggs, Certified Organic honey, and Rabbit available every drop day.  Occassionally we will have chicken.  Call for availability or email. 

GREENHOUSE

I'm so excited to be getting into the greenhouse again.  I'm looking to be in the first week of February to start all the herbs.  Last year I think I started a bit to late (March) and they weren't as large as I would of liked by market.  Small is OK, they definely won't go into transplant shock, but I'd like to see them a bit bigger.  We'll see!  All I know is I just can't wait to get my hands in some warm dirt! 

Well, I guess it's time to sign off till next month.  Hope everyone is enjoying the slower pace of winter.  We look forward to seeing everyone through the winter drop offs thru the winter.  Take care!

Jean

Greetings to all! I guess it's not really winter yet.  not till the 21st.

Yesterday, (Dec. 2) Taylor and her baby pig Losif and I were outside in flip flops, no jackets weeding some of the raised beds.  I pulled out the lettuce stalks that I left go to seed and scattered all the seeds in the beds.  Hopefully we'll have lots of baby lettuces next spring.  Ahhhh, spring,  that's what I look forward to. 

Anyway, yes Taylor has an orphan piglet.  Some friends of ours had a sow that only had two babies, and her's was the only survivor.  Mom died.  So my little Fern has her Wilbur.....   and so for the last week she has been faithfully bottle feeding her baby every 2-3 hours.  He is getting quite big-  nice hams (lol)  it's not funny to her though.  But she has to understand we do not need another boar.

We recently purchased several baby piggies, 2 sows and another boar (which is why we don't need Losif!  Call me mean-  such is life.

COW SHARE-  CERTIFIED ORGANIC GRASS FED SEASONAL RAW MILK

We have some really good Amish friends who are interested in starting a Cow Share program.  We would act like a middle man for them (distributor).  We are currantly working on the contract, pricing, etc.  We are trying to see what kind of inerest there would be out there with our customers.  They have 40 shares availale.  We would deliver it to all our CSA drop sites as well as have it available at the farm.  If you would be interested in finding out more about it please contact me at 810-672-9905 (Jean).  They are Certified Organic and have about 8 cows.  They do everything naturally for the animals, including having the cows bred at the appropriate times and drying them out for the winter which is natural way for the animal.  This is what is meant by a Seasonal Dairy.  There will be no mild in the winter months.  Exact dates will be explained later.  This is just a small amount of info.  more to come. 

WINTER MEAT, EGG, PRODUCE & STUFF WINTER DROP OFFS

Please check out our calender of events.  I just finished putting in all the dates in.  Also watch your email for reminders.  Mark your calenders and try to call the week before.

HOLLY DAYS IN FARMINGTON HILLS- SATURDAY DEC. 5TH & 12TH

Come & see us at the Market in Farmington for some lovely gifts.  We will have my cookbood, our handmade, recycled cloth grocery & book bags,  homemade recycled bookmarks & even Fresh Smoked Dog bones for Fifi & Fido.  We'll of course have a full line of our pork products, beef and eggs.  We will also have lots of our delicious Summer Sausage.  We look forward to seeing you all there.

Well it's getting late and I should sign off. 

Jean

greetings! 

just a short note this evening--- I realized I forgot to put our Ferndale drop off in our listing, so I thought I should do it while I have a couple of minutes.  Got all the raised beds for the garlic weeded and ready to plant tomorrow!  We'll probally have about 3000 cloves  to plant.  We'll do what we can.  I broke all the bulbs up today.  Next year we'll be able to put the Elephant Garlic in the boxes at least once.  It's so big!  It's calling for 72 degrees in Detroit tommorrow.  Hope it comes to us for planting.

We would like to start a drop off point somewhere in the Livonia or/and Dearborn areas.  We make regular deliveris to The Henry Ford and Greenfield Village Restaurants and would be willing to use this area as a drop off.  We would need each drop off point to have at least 6 boxes to be considered.  If anyone is interested and know of some people who want CSA in these areas please give us a call ASAP.

Our 2 tents that were over the produce stand tables got blown away and destroyed the other week.  We were able to get a used canopy from a friend.  The wind can be so distressing sometimes.  We're getting ready to close up the stand for the season-  just to cold and not that much left. 

CSA SHARE UPDATE:

As of 10-20-09 we have 8 shares still available.  If you havn't got your pledge forms in yet,  please do so quickly.  Several people waited last year and were out of luck.  We still have 5 of the Work shares available.

THANKSGIVING/ CHRISTMAS TURKEYS:

We still have 10 turkeys of 45 available.  Call for info 810-672-9905

CHICKENS;

We are taking orders for chickens for the 2010 season.  We will have about 40 chickens available every two weeks starting in Mid June.  We will bring them to market just like this year.  We had such a wonderful response to the chicken we will do more next year.  Please place your orders asap they sell out fast!

Well I guess it's time to sign off.. till next time... happy day

sincerely,  Jean

good morning!

well I just updated our local harvest listing- I can't beleive how long that takes.  At least it's only once or twice a year.  This is a brand new blog.  I enjoy writing so I'm taking advantage of this.  Just want to say we are very pleased with this years markets and are already looking forward to next years.  We only have a couple shares still available (10-13-09) but we still have 5 out of the 10 work shares still open. 

The weather is cold and rainy- we need to get the fields tilled and all the plastic pulled up.  See if I can't write again soon

see you at the market, jean