My 22nd Birthday!

Yesterday was my first birthday as a college graduate. Wow, I made it 22 years. Since I am living in a new place and living and working with people that I am only familiar with I was worried if it would be much of anything, but it turned out perfect...just the kind of birthday I would hope for. Another girl I work with had her 21st birthday on June 23rd, the day before mine, so we had been planning to celebrate together. We went to Zorbaz, a Minnesota pizza eatery (one of my favorites...yum) and ate nachos, had some "adult beverages,"and ate yummy oreo cake that Emy's mom bought for us. It was a lot of fun. I had to work on my birthday, which was a normal workday filled with its normal stresses and small moments of peace while picking peas in the morning hours. After work my new friends wanted to celebrate my birthday, which I was surprised by because I thought that the night before was the birthday celebration, but at my request we went to Dunn Brothers and drank coffee and played games and hung out. It was perfect, since coffeeshops are one of my favorite places to hang out. Also, on the way to Dunn Brothers we saw a rainbow in the sky, which I deemed my "birthday rainbow" and the sunset was beautiful, a gift from God for my birthday. I also was able to talk with friends and family from different parts of the country and received many birthday wishes on facebook. 

My Birthday sunset!

My Birthday Rainbow!

I am now one year older, and possibly one year wiser (we shall see), and am forever gracious to the Lord for his work in my life and to my parents, who gave me life and I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them. 

When the weeds keep growing

There are a couple key things that make organic growing different from other forms of agriculture. The biggest thing is that organic farmers don't use chemicals on their produce. So the question that I have run into is then "since you can't spray what do you do?," and that's why the organic farmer is valued. The care that goes into organic produce is more intensive. You have to watch your crop and look for all the faulty pieces about it. So instead of spraying the weeds, the weed control starts from the very beginning of the growing season before anything is planted by "tilling" the earth. Really, it is important to break up the soil. Then, when the plant is in the soil you can sometimes take heavy machinery through the crop, but on most occasions you spend your time hand-weeding, wheel-hoeing, and hoeing the crops. 

This is how I spend a lot of my time on the farm, or at least right now. When I first arrived I spent my first day hand-weeding a bed of carrots. One of the also recent arrivals told me that farming can become kind of dull and monotonous. This is very true. Last week a bed of beets took me and two other interns all morning to hand weed. The intern that told me that it was monotonous very shortly after brought out a radio and turned on MPR (Minnesota Public Radio). Other people listen to their ipods while they are working. At first I thought that it would be a good idea to bring my ipod into the field with me, but the other day when I was wheel-hoeing dandelion greens I decided that sometimes no-music isn't so bad. I enjoyed digging my toes into the soil and listening to the birds chirping, the cows grazing, and the wind moving the grass back and forth. It is almost freeing to be there, looking over the miles of fields that cover the land and think about the grand things of creation. 

Reflections of an amateur farmer

Well I have officially reached the one week mark of being on the organic farm. I didn't expect that the farm would  be so big. The farmer, Gary, is running quite the operation. He has 300 shareholders to feed everyweek so he has a lot of vegetables to grow. Everything here is new and different, but exciting at the same time. I harvested vegetables last week that I have never heard of before and I discovered foods that grow in the ground that I had never thought about (Garlic...who knew?). 

Sometimes the work is exciting and other times it can be rather monotonous. My first day I learned how to hand weed and thin carrots and parsnips. This took all afternoon and it took 4 of us to complete the task. Day two was harvesting day. I was surprised that they already had vegetables ready to harvest, but with a greenhouse available it makes growing vegetables available earlier in the season to eat, and with how dry it is the vegetables were ready to come out of the ground. We harvested radishes, salad greens, some bak choi, scallions, and spinach. One Wednesdays we pack all the vegetables to be ready for delivery the next day. This is an assembly line process that includes making boxes, weighing bags of lettuce, and packing the prewashed vegetables into the boxes and into the truck. The truck leaves at midnight and travels to Alexandria, The Twin Cities, and St. Cloud. On Thursday we had a crop walk which is something that all the interns do with the farmer once a week to catch each other up on the progress of the growth, planting, weeding, etc. When we finished I redgy weeded the rest of the day. This craft is a machine that attatches to the back of the tractor that has seats and round claws attatched to handles that dig the dirt up. It makes weeding later on much quicker and easier. On Friday I direct seeded squash and sunflowers into the beds and then I hoe weeded for the rest of the afternoon. Luckily we had Saturday off and I got a chance to see Alexandria and find some (already) favorite local coffeeshops. Today (Monday) I seeded in the greenhouse cabbage, bunched onions, and romaine lettuce. In the afternoon I transplanted watermelons into one of the beds. 

It is amazing how such a craft of farming has been lost on us. The simple task of hoeing was something that I had to be taught. Everything is new to me and the rest of the interns are patient with me as I learn. Luckily many of the skills are not that challenging to acquire. It will be perfecting them that will take time. 

As far as feeling comfortable with this new group of people, it can be challenging at times and other times I am so happy to be surrounded by people who have similar convictions as I do in terms of how our current society is structured. Many times I feel like an odd one out, being one of few, if any, practicing Christians, but it makes it all the more exciting. I am learning to navigate a world different than the Christian college that I just came out of and I am being challenged in my faith as well. But I also feel that I can fit right in with these people who see the world, society, politics, and many other controversial issues similarly to myself, which is a good change from the environment that I had been in previously. 

At nights we read, listen to folk music, cook, and sit around and chat. They are rather resourceful people. It is many a night where people are creating or eating foods that I have always purchased at the grocery stor. Just tonight a couple of my "co-workers" were making homemade pizza dough. Other things that have been made in the kitchen are crackers, ketchup, bagels, applesauce, and much more. I also enjoy purchasing my milk and eggs from the local farmer nearby and participating in the local community, which is one of the many reasons why I am here.  If you are interested in learning more about the farm that I am on go to www.ploughsharefarm.com and remember  to participate in your local community!