oh dear me

It's been almost too long.  I have even forgotten how to write.  Oh well.  The picture speaks for itself.

We are still here :) just plugging away at it all.  Today we dug potatoes.  We found two 5 gallon buckets full which really is our most yet.   Not as many as the carrots though this year .. we pulled four 5 gallon buckets of carrots!  Greg dug a mini root cellar for them in the back of the house.  It's quite a sight.  There will lie the fermented veggies and carrots.  The carrots are packed with sand and already there. 

Luna took a break from it all to snuggle Susan (above).  This girl loves loves loves chickens so much.

xo

RIP Chick chick

You were a really sweet hen. 
We thought you might be a rooster you were so tough. 
Thank you for living with us awhile.
Hope you know how much we love you.

It's that time again to dabble in miracles. Time for little baby plants in paper envelopes to be strewn across the table alongside permanent markers, wooden labels, & bags of potting soil.  Time for lacinto kale to meet green cabbage - officially and for the first time  - all over again.  It's a really good time of year.  A time when knowing replaces hope as you see the little white sproutlets and green leaves.  So far we've got a head start on a bunch of brassicas, tomatoes, some herbs, sweet and hot peppers.  I also started some zinnia seeds I am not sure will sprout and a mystery flower I had saved the seed head of years ago.

This year I am planning to can tomatoes again so I started something like 30 Roma plants.  I have made a few tomato manifestos to help me get psyched up for what could be quite the saucy year: I WILL have energy to spare come harvest time for these lovelies.  There WILL be lots of time scheduled for farm chores end of August/beginning September so as to allow for success of manifesto #1.  These are my tomato declarations.  Romas from here to there.  Roma tomatoes everywhere.

A special SoliLuna thank you to my dear sweet honey of a husband who made us this plant stand.  Let it be known that he also went to pick up the borrowed lights AND checked to see if the bulbs worked AND went and got new bulbs when he realized two were bunk AND installed it all and had it all pretty for my seedlings last weekend.  You're a keeper dude. 

Luna made a list of what she would like to grow in "her" garden this year.  Of course, she isn't out there starting any new beds, so we'll see how this goes.  I want to help her follow through with this so I photographed her list.  Phonetically spelled for the most part until she started reading the labels on the packets.  Punkin-heads in all sizes live in this house.

Even the Cinderella variety...

good bye shiva boy

I just realized that I didn't mention our Shiva boy here and our mini day of the dead here at Sol i Luna Farm this past July.  Our little guy went to spirit & his body found its way to a hole in our field on a hot summer day.  I cried and cried.  It was pain I was surprised to feel - my heart tore open wide to remember and realize that he was gone gone and also that we all can go go,  just - like - that.  Death is the *most* extreme in it's alteration.  One minute alive and breathing -- with the possibilty of anything and then the next moment existing in one choice only, to decay or preserve.  I have never known the death angel to come to me in threes like it did that day.  First - Luna finds Little One, feathers still & lying on her side in the coop - Meg helps us take her out ... there is much wailing ... all are shocked.  Walking up from the coop to the house I notice that Second - the 8 foot sunflower in front of the house has keeled over - minutes before it had been vibrant and strong & now not even wilted but destiny decided.  By the time I was sitting processing the Third - that Shiva had died at the vet's following a difficult surgery, the leaves of the mammoth were wilted and we had a multiple burial to tend to.

I wrapped little grey bodies in muslin ... lovingly ... I wailed and howled ... unleashing such sobs ... and I was the only one.  My husband and daughter so stoic, so strong, so present and thankfully able to dig graves and lift dead bodies and lay them down to rest eternal.  We all gathered flowers - we spoke our piece and made peace as we could.  It was beautiful and I was numb as the sun set on a really really hard day just as it always does.

And low behold, then it rose the next day. 
What a miracle that we can face death and live life.

thank you little sweet boy for all that you were to us.
thank you for loving popcorn and being such a good friend to Rutabega.
he misses you still sometimes and so do I.
thank you for being such a trooper, moving cross country and to so many states as we figured our life out.
I remember you when you would catch butterflies in mid-air and the time you jumped into the bowl of popcorn while we were watching a movie...
I will always be grateful for knowing you and loving you.
I wish that you had been able to go here at home but I trust that all went with divine grace.

and I continue to love and trust.

xo

little treasure

the little girls are laying!

for weeks we have been waiting -- hoping -- wishing. we are some serious chicken afficianados over here so this little tiny egg has been anticipated with great love. it was found this morning by little hands and celebrated by all. thank you long tail feathers (we think) you are a baby chicken no more and this is by far the cutest egg we've ever seen.

with gratitude,

sol(i)luna

to little one

r
you were the loving-est chicken we ever knew.
thanks to you, our heart space grew.
we'll miss you and we'll wonder why
you left to roam in fields of sky.

thank you for coming, a being so kind,
I'll always remember your trust and find
your death has also been a gift,
such beauty is in knowing this.
you remind us life is while we live
why not choose love - it's ours to give.

I only have one last wish, please,
come visit my little one in her dreams.

with deep gratitude and unending love, love, love...

the child in summer