One of many jars of strawberry sauce in our pantry

Every year, our family celebrates the Fourth of July with an outing to the pick-your-own strawberry fields in the next town over. In the weeks preceding, the girls and I usually pick the majority of our haul, but we like to go at least once as a family so Karl can share in the stained fingers and sweaty backs, and enjoy the treat of hot berries, fresh from the field.

This year, strawberry season came so early that by the time we got out there, the pickin’s were slim. What were left were hot, jammy berries, nearly cooked by the sun. (Reminding me of the recipe for “Sunshine Strawberry Preserves” that I’ve always found off-putting in my 1964 copy of the Joy of Cooking: Sprinkle sugar on strawberries, heat until boiling, then set in the sun for a few days until they turn to jam.) Between the four of us, we picked ten pounds that were so juicy they left a puddle in the back of the car.

At home, I set to work cleaning berries to make a year’s worth of preserves. I followed a recipe and added sugar and some lemon juice, bringing the mixture to a boil until a thick head of pink foam climbed the sides of the pot. I tested it for sheeting, but no gel. Straying from my recipe, I added a little packaged pectin, but still no gel. Finally, I gave up on getting it to gel and sealed the sauce in jars–the preserves were delicious and I was afraid I’d overcook them if I kept fiddling around.

I’ve consulted several cookbooks, two of whom warn that using over ripe berries will prevent jam from setting. Harold McGee’s explanation of pectin in On Food and Cooking left me with more questions than answers. This Saturday, Master Preserver Allison Duffy will be teaching a workshop on strawberry jam at the farm–I’m hoping she’ll unlock the mystery of pectin! There are still spots left, so contact us if you’re interested in signing up.

Family, Food, Workshops homesteading workshops, pectin, strawberries, strawberry sauce, workshop

Happy Birthday Charlotte!

Charlotte turned 4 last week and was lucky enough to share the celebration with some of her favorite people. Since her birthday falls smack in the middle of strawberry season, we spent the week picking berries for her traditional cake, a three-layer strawberry shortcake. The festivities included goat watching, pea and wild blueberry picking, an ongoing game of croquet (sort of), and a few rounds of marshmallows toasted over our new fire pit. As the party wound down, Cha Cha invited everyone in to meet the newest members of our menagerie, her birthday fish Lucky and Sarah (yes, it’s her favorite name). Happy Birthday, little one!

What do you do at a farm birthday party? Pick peas!

Bea and her blue balloon

Family, cute kids birthday, birthday party

I’m a list maker. Each morning, I sit down with a blank index card and an extra fine Sharpie and map out the day, listing everything I hope to accomplish, from planting nasturtiums to making cheese to scheduling the kids’ dental appointments. I check things off as I go, and savor the evenings when I’ve marked each line–those rare completed cards give me a little lift, even when I find them months later, tucked into cookbooks or used to mark my place in magazines. I’ve learned, since Bea’s birth, that if my list won’t fit on one side of a card, there isn’t a chance I’ll complete it in one day.

This time of year, when the homestead is bustling, the lists keep me sane. I’m still tardy in my email replies and overwhelmed by housework (why must the dog shed so much?), but the act of making a list  helps me prioritize and reminds me what work needs to be done. Very occasionally–not today–I finish it all.

Family lists, work

Sorrel is one of the foods traditionally eaten at Shavuot.

Last night marked the beginning of the two day festival of Shavuot. Like so many Jewish holidays, Shavuot combines Biblical injunction with agricultural celebration: it is both the commemoration of the Revelation at Sinai, during which the Torah was given to the Jewish people, and it is the Festival of the First Fruits, during which the blessings of the first harvest of spring are celebrated. Traditionally, it is a time to rejoice in the many gifts of God–towards our spiritual and our physical sustenance. Homes and synagogues are decorated with branches and flowers; devout Jews stay up all night studying Torah; we eat foods made with milk and honey, both because of the abundance of dairy at this time of year, and because of a passage in the Song of Song: “Knowledge of the Torah is like milk and honey under the tongue.”

On our farm, the house is bedecked with fragrant lilacs and green branches we’ve cleared from the woods. Tonight, we’re making chévre blintzes drizzled with rhubarb sauce for a sweet supper (we’ll post photos and recipes tomorrow!). We’ve just planted sorrel in the garden, and if it looks leafy enough, we’ll harvest some to make schav borscht, a sour, vivid green soup enriched with eggs and sour cream and eaten cold. In our delight at every new leaf that emerges from our soil, we remember that we are blessed.

While looking for Shavuot craft ideas for our girls, I stumbled upon this passage, from Israel Kasovich’s out-of-print 1929 memoir, The Days of Our Years: Personal and General Reminiscence (1859-1929). His words inspire us at the holiday, connecting our homestead to millennia of Jewish farmers who’ve come before us. With them, Karl and I are proud to have our heads in the Torah and our hands in the earth.

Our first holiday on the farm was Shavuot. All around us was a sea of verdure and everything was in bloom. I told my children that this holiday commemorates the giving of the Torah to the children of Israel at Sinai–a Torah which teaches us to live in fair and brotherly terms with our fellowmen; and who could do this so well as the farmer with his unique mode of life? I described to them how our ancestors, the Jewish farmers of Palestine, used to go to Jerusalem for Shavuot, bearing the fairest fruits as offerings to the Temple; how the hills of Judea would resound with the sweet Hebrew songs of the brave, proud Jewish farmers; and how the priests and leading men of Jerusalem would come out to meet their brothers, whose labor fed the whole nation, and escort them with great pomp to the Temple. And I related to them how, when I was a little boy and went on the eve of Shavuot to other men’s fields to pluck some blades of grass and twigs with which to decorate our house for the holiday, gentile peasant boys threw stones and set their dogs at me. And now we were living in a free country among our own green fields and woods, and I was proud to hold our Torah in one hand and a plow in the other.

-Israel Kasovich

Agriculture, Family, Judaism Holiday, Israel Kasovich, Jewish, shavuot

Margaret and Charlotte enjoy a camp fire in our new fire pit, constructed out of boulders and rocks excavated from the garden.

It was a great weekend, and we got much accomplished. Not our entire list, but enough to feel pretty good about our work. The biggest and most satisfying accomplishment of the weekend by far was the construction, inaugural lighting, and marshmallow toasting over our new fire pit. Earth and rock was moved, arms and backs bruised and sore, but when it was all said and done, the joy the kids took in roasting marshmallows made it all worthwhile.

Charlotte enjoys her first toasted marshmallow. Bea looks on with anticipation.

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Family, Garden, cute kids chores, firepit, hoop houses, marshmellows, permaculture, skillshare, work

Sarah put on her dandelioned best for Bea’s party on Sunday

There isn’t a weekend that goes by now that I don’t wish had at least one extra day in it, and really two extra days: one to get a little bit more stuff done around the farm, and one just to recover. This past weekend was jam packed with parties and cakes, and we were able to squeeze some farm work in there as well.

Brooke’s amazing bridal shower cake/cupcake creation

On Saturday, Margaret and the girls headed down to Massachusetts for a bridal shower. If we ever open that bakery we’ve been talking about, our 11-year-old cousin Brooke will be our first hire for sure. Check out the cake and cupcakes she cooked up and decorated!

While the girls were in Mass., I headed North to the Fedco tree sale, where I picked up 3 new pear saplings, two apple saplings, and four high bush blueberries. I love the Fedco Tree Sale, but what I loved about it especially this year was picking up our pre-ordered trees seeing “Ten Apple Farm” written on the six foot tall paper bags containing the saplings, next to dozens of other bags with the names of other small farms and homesteads, each one clever, or sweet, or poignant. It was a great reminder that we are a small part of a greater movement taking place, with many people striving to make new (and old) connections to the land, to their food, and find a better way to live. The trees are sitting in our basement, roots wrapped in wet newspaper and sawdust, waiting to get put in the ground. We’ll write more about the trees and planting when we do get them in, later this week if all goes well.

The big event of the weekend was Bea’s 2nd birthday party. If there’s one thing we do well, it’s throw a kid’s birthday party. With birthdays in April and June, Charlotte and Bea will always be blessed to have some number of baby farm animals around for their parties, and so will never be wanting for a petting zoo. Between the baby goats romping around the yard, the the baby chicks in the backhouse, and all the kids taking it all in, with cupcakes no less, it was a day overflowing with cuteness.

Bea and Connor feed Lily and Nadine

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Events, Family, cute kids birthday, cake, cupcakes, garland, Goats, kids, party

Bea, Charlotte & Flora in their Eastover finery

Last Sunday marked the fourth annual Eastover luncheon, hosted by the incomparable Leslie Oster at Aurora Provisions. In the midst of our farm bustle, this brief escape (on a weekend, no less!) is my favorite rite of spring: celebrating the season with great food, friends and conversation. We’re a multi-faith group–Eastover = Easter + Passover–and in the years that Leslie has organized it, Eastover has grown from a dozen guests to four times that. New babies have arrived (welcome Violet and Victoria!), new friendships have blossomed, but through it all there are a few constants: the kick-off hunt for chocolate eggs, the beautiful spring flowers on each table, and the centerpiece, the food: tender lamb and sweet parsnips from Broadturn, Sam’s Asian slaw, Kamala’s outrageous coconut-chocolate macaroons, I could go on and on. This year’s menu included grilled Arctic char, quinoa and beet salad, Leon’s famed lamb stew, a layered almond-chocolate-meringue torte, and flourless chocolate and honey cake, among many other treats.

It was a glorious afternoon, made even more so by its contrast to the rest of our day: Karl had awoken at 5, done chores, and spent the next four hours mucking out the large goat pen. We traded off at 10 (when my cake came out of the oven), and he cleaned up while I took a turn with the pitch fork. After the party, I changed back into my grubbies and finished up, while Karl raked out the perennial beds and the girls played in the sprinkler. A fine, full day. Happy Spring! Read more…

Events, Family, Food, cute kids celebration, Easter, Eastover, Food, goat pens, Passover, spring

While they’re not quite ready for full barn duties, Charlotte and Bea are learning to start their days with chores. Ours is a family farm, and we encourage the girls not only because we want them to learn responsibility, but also because it’s just fun to work together. Watching them, intent on their respective goat kids, reminds me why, when my hands are blistered and my back aches, I keep shoveling or tilling or planting or doing whatever is my day’s project. It’s one of those simple and profound lessons of parenthood: I want to be as good an example for them as they are for me.

Family, Goats, cute kids children, chores, kids, parenthood, work

Charlotte models her new "sleeping dress"

I’m not much of a seamstress. I do alright with hand sewing, especially when I’m working with a forgiving fabric like fleece, but I get impatient with patterns (or rather, with my clumsy attempts to follow them), and when I decide to dust off the machine, my ambition generally sets me up for failure. It’s always been this way, ever since my 7th grade home-ec class, when a set of festive holiday pillows became so frustrating that I stopped halfway; somewhere, my mom has two red and green pillows, bedecked with holly, that read “NO.”

Anyway, lately I’ve been so inspired by Amanda Blake Soule’s new book, Handmade Home, that I’ve braved my anxiety, set up my sewing machine next to the wood stove in the living room, and begun to work on all kinds of projects. The girls now have a set of fluttery purple flags hanging from their ceiling, my office is newly curtained, and the rest, well, they’re Valentine’s presents, so they’ll have to remain secret for a few more days.

In the middle of this sewing frenzy, my favorite monkey pajamas finally frayed through. On a whim, I took out my scissors and pins, and pulled together a Charlotte-sized nightgown. Don’t be fooled–it took a lot of seam-ripping, and in tight spots I turned off the machine and pulled out my thimble. But it’s wearable, and Charlotte is delighted. She’s been so happy twirling in her monkeys that I’m tempted to clothe the whole family in my pajama scraps!

Crafts, Family Crafts, Family, pajamas, recycling, sewing

Beatrice and Charlotte embrace their eye pillows

As Karl mentioned in an earlier post, I spent the end of December and the beginning of January laid low by pneumonia. I’m generally pretty healthy–rarely under the weather, much less incapacitated by fever and racking cough–and the experience was jarring. I’m an active person, and it was strange to be sedentary. Family and friends pitched in so that I could lie in bed, sleeping, drinking tea and reading Batya Gur’s mystery novels. Except for the coughing and sweating and weird, fizzy sound of my breathing, it was kind of a treat at first. After the third day, however, I was frustrated and ready to be productive again. My body had to stay in bed for another week and a half, but my mind wandered, and around the Feast of the Epiphany (January 6), I had one: I’m simply not very good at resting. I’m good at sleeping, but between the humans and the critters and the various projects I take on, sleep is usually just a nightly collapse, not a mindful, restorative pause. I’m determined, in this new year, to change that.

To that end, I’m beginning 2010 with a resolution to make time for more: more rest, more quiet, more of all kinds of things that bring me pleasure and a sense of balance. These aren’t the big things–our family has already made the choice to slow down and nurture each other and our little patch of earth. Rather, these are the small details that are pressed so far into the margins that they often fall off the page.

I’ve been writing down the things that I want to put more energy into, and I welcome suggestions, especially if there’s something that’s helped bring balance to you. Here’s what I have so far:

Margaret’s List of More

Crafts, Family balance, epiphany, lists, resolutions, rest