Satellite Pie

This is the first apple pie of the season. Technically, these apples did not grow on the Oaktown Farm, BUT they did grow a 1/2 mile from here at Sylvie's house. We'll call that the OTF satellite.

The heat wave of last week is very much gone, and we have now planted some red cabbage and another round of lettuce; romaine this time. I still need to sow the sweet pea seeds before the baby gets here and am hoping I get on that this evening.

Happy Fall to you, wherever you happen to be experiencing it.

Calm before the sea change

I have been thinking a lot about life now and life after the baby arrives. What will become of the Oaktown Farm? I hear different things from folks; some say there is no time for anything but raising a human being. Others say you make time for what moves you. Certainly Lottie moves me, and she will demand our time. But the tender fall plants cannot speak for themselves.

This chard I put in yesterday morning, which was not smart. It was one of the hottest days of the year, so they suffered in the unrelenting sun all day. I have lettuce, red cabbage and some flowers to put in, but will wait a few days till this heat wave passes. I think I will also sow some seeds directly in the beds too; more carrots, sweet peas. Those each will be a nice surprise in a few months, full of luscious smells and candy orange flesh.

This year at the OF, unlike last, we have a large number of pumpkin spiders. Really, they are everywhere. And so are their webs. This shot does not capture the beast in all it's girth, but I think the photo is cool (web is to the right). Their main gift to us is catching and eating flies.

So, the clock ticks down, while also winding up. Jennie finishes up work this week, and I am trying to wrap up all my projects at the office so I can be out for several weeks at a moment's notice. We are keeping our evenings free and fiddling with the last of the "prep list". Lottie is working on learning the difference between baby toys and dog toys. We are calm and happy and ready for this sea we sail upon to change.

Tom Tom Club

Summer has been an epic disappointment this year in Oakland. Very few warm days. While the East Coast baked in record heat, we watched our tomatoes struggle for the cruelly rationed sunlight. Our Italian squash produced nothing. Nada. We had two small meals out of the pole beans. And the tomatoes....one of the plants has set no fruit and the other two are *just* starting to have some candy to eat.

Suffice it to say, this has not been the summer of eatin' at the Oaktown Farm. Non edibles are doing fairly well: mexican sage, snapdragons. And I do have some carrot seeds that are sprouting in the back bed under the wisteria. Other than that, it's just us chickens. With the baby close on our heels, there won't be a lot more planting this year, 2010. But I have a hunch there will be a lot of volunteer seeds in the spring. We shall see.

Lottie's in love...Lottie's in luuh-uv....

So Lottie has this new girlfriend, and her name is Pehz, pronounced like the candy dispenser. And while I have not lived with two dogs in over 5 years, I have not missed it. It's a lot of work, somehow. But not really. Or something. They play. Constantly. Like, nonstop. This causes me mild anxiety. Not sure why. Perhaps it is because we don't have a big yard for them to romp in like my past double dog lifestyle. Perhaps it is because I had an incredibly long week at work and I am simply tired and would like some quite time, newspaper in hand, with my feet up. Sadly for Lottie, Pehz in only with us for the weekend, as her mom had to travel unexpectedly to North Carolina and will be back on Tuesday. Luckily for me, there is an end in sight with less dog hair in my mouth.

They are definitely having a good time, despite my mild need for peace and quiet. Maybe I will volunteer to go grocery shopping this afternoon..:)

Summer Half Time

Shockingly, summer is half over. I feel mildly despondent over this, as we have not had very much sunny weather and the tomatoes are offering up a mild sigh of fruit. Partly we are super distracted with the upcoming Baby Abbingsole arrival, and partly we are still learning what this incarnation of the Oaktown Farm can produce.

Also, I can't quite find the time to just sit in the garden and enjoy it. I am training for an ultramarathon in September and the training for it takes an entire weekend day. The next weekend day is spend recovering from said training. Couple that with weeknight shenanigans (birth class, pre-natal yoga, dog walking), and evenings in the luminescence of the carnival lights seem to melt away with the Bay Area fog.

These are german catchflies, which are my new favorite. They sway in the breeze with a certain majesty. I put them in two spots and wish I would have planted more. They re-seed easily, so next Spring we should naturally have a whole carpet-full. Annie's Annuals is a Richmond, CA treasure and is where these are from. We took my Mom there for a garden tour over Mother's Day weekend. Annie has an awesome array of native and non-native annuals and some perennials. It's a must see!

This evening we are having an pack of gals over for some Malaysian spareribs, coconut rice and stir-fried green beans from Oaktown Farm. The ribs rested in a brine for 7 hours prior to going into the smoker for 5 hours. I will let everyone know how they turned out. I did not do a test run, so keep fingers crossed. If it is awesome, I will post the recipe here later in the week.

Mexican marigolds are the final sign off today. Nature's natural pest deterrent.

Limons!

Look at us! We have real California citrus growing here at the Oaktown Farm. We had a scorcher of a day Saturday; hit 92 on the heat meter, and the lemons could not be happier.

Combine that with the never ending lettuce crop (those are Kentucky Wonder Beans climbing in the background) and we are having a very fine mid-June romp.

We also re-planted some snapdragons and laid down an inch layer of compost for all our growing friends. It was enough to make one have to lie down in the hammock beneath the shade of the Jurassic impatiens.

A Mighty Wind

It has been crazy windy all weekend, causing yet another non-work bridge to pass without a true feeling of summer. Regardless, I harvested more fava beans to make room for tomatoes.

I made a salad today with a bit of lettuce from the garden, it was delicious. Ann came over for lunch and we had the greens with brined prawns grilled and tossed with garlic/chili oil. And yummy french bread to sop up the goodness.

Lettuce pray for some warmer weather soon, or the heirloom Miss Lillian's yellow and candy sweet cherry tomatoes I planted today will not be happy here at the Oaktown Farm.

Camera Obscura

We have some sun today, a little breeze and  new iPhone app to play with. Lottie and I slept in after a late-night LOST marathon and are successfully avoiding our garden chores today. Those would include, but not be limited to:

• cleaning the chicken coop
• collecting weeds/grasses in the neighborhood for the gals who use that currently dirty coop
• strengthening the trellis for the Kentucky wonder beans
• watering and fertilizing the indoor palm from our bedroom 

 You might not think farm extends into the house, but it does.

That is the cucumber tower there. Looking mildly artsy. In the foreground on the right are some black-eyed susans, yet to bloom.

This is the view from the garden bench this morning, where I consumed eggs, potatoes and toast. A lovely solo brunch indeed. If you enjoy these pics, and you are enslaved by your iPhone, check it all out here.

Happy May, folks.

Farm at Night

I have dreams. I have visions. And in these dreams and visions, the Oaktown Farm is lit up like a county fair on a hot summer night. Corn dogs! Coke with crushed ice! (Pepsi for some) Tilt-A-Wheel! Funnel cake! 4-H Club! Voila!

We had a big day today. Two hour run in the morning for me and Lottie, yoga for Jennie. Errands up the wahzoo and visits with multiple friends, sharing the news of our impending parenthood. And yet, despite all that, we rallied to hang these lights tonight. I am so happy and thrilled that my Mom will enjoy them this upcoming Mother's Day weekend; a cocktail in hand, laughter in the air. Summer in the city. Bliss.

Is this heaven?

I don't know if it's heaven, but after running 2 hours this morning and making fresh scrambled eggs with veggie sausage and coffee...then sitting in the yard with Lottie; my view from the Adirondack chair can be seen below. You will have to decide for yourself if it is heavenly or not. Enjoy.

Tin can alley

Well we had some big project fun with Geoff on the farm this past weekend. We *finally* put up the sheets of corrugated metal at the top of the wood fence; successfully hiding the ugly chain link that was there before. I am so very happy with it.

It makes the farm feel more private and brighter in the afternoons. We shall see if it makes the whole area tick up a notch in overall temperature. That could be swell for the tomatoes.

You really have to see it to believe it! The end goal is to string some white lights up that would fall in front of the metal and reflect off at night while we sit in the yard licking our BBQ fingers and sipping summer coolers. That is my dream. Photos to follow..:)

Sunny day!

Fava bean craziness below, with a shot of the fleur bed, and ending
with broccoli going to seed. We are finally attracting some bees this
year! Even the wisteria is budding. I think tonight may be our 2010
BBQ kick-off! Ruth is in town from Brooklyn, so why not?

Three hens-a-laying!

Exciting, as all three gals worked hard today!!

Does this count?

I don't usually post photos of stuff we are growing inside the farmhouse, but I couldn't pass this up!

 

This orchid has not bloomed in over 5 years! Very exciting week for Oaktown Farm! 

Enjoy!

Ruff edge

Lottie with chard. This was taken on Sunday when the sun
actually cameout. Rain again today. I know I should not
complain to youeastcoasters about this kind of thing,
but I caaan't stand it!

Cabbage is getting close.
I see a stir fry in it's future; maybe some slaw.

The collard bed is slowly being fed to the chickens. I need to let the dirt rest for a few weeks before putting down summer squash and I think maybe cucumber this year. The fava plants are getting huge! I had to stake them off to enable the later crop of chard to get sunshine (when available).

Still only eggs from one hen. Either the other two are younger than Beulah, or they are adverse to sharing a laying box. Everything I have read says they don't mind sharing, but I gots no evidence of that here on the Oaktown Farm. I may have to build more boxes in the coming weeks if more eggs are not forthcoming. We have breakfasts to eat around here for darn sake!

Sitting up fresh!

Great welcome home from our trip...fresh, fried and delicious.

First Egg!

We have better photos on the mighty digi-cam, but I
wanted to get a quick post out there about our gal Beulah
laying the first Oaktown Farm egg!

It was delicious.

More pics in a few days.

Click here for chicken haircuts

Bursting with vitamins!

From our farm to our table! This lovely lady from the brassicaceae
family will be riding shotgun with some brown rice and smoked
porkchops this evening. Yippee for the first non-chard harvest of the winter season!

Animales de Miercoles

This innocent looking creature scratched my arm this morning after a flight of fancy over the picket fence and into the neat rows of collards. And then she pecked the iPhone as I took the picture at the bottom of this post. May I not contract chicken scratch fever. Pray for me.

Ashes to ashes and compost to compost

It is amazing what a little mushroom compost can do. Here we have two different kinds of mushrooms flourishing on the Oaktown Farm. One in fact, is it's own little sub-forest beneath the broccoli forest.



And the other is simply a mushroom beast.



I wonder if these are edible, but am guessing not. Although there was a third variety in the chicken run that the girls feasted on and as I've said before, they lived to tell the tale. I don't think I will be making a red sauce with Oaktown Farm mushrooms anytime soon, but it sure is fun watching them thrive in the beds with all the rain we have had. In a few weeks I will turn them into the soil and let them go back from whence they came.

Happy New Year, mostly

The lack of posts has not been for lack of farm happenings, it's just that one of the farm's grandmothers broke her leg the day after Christmas and it has put a damper in our blog mojo.
But, we're back!



We have fava beans on the left there, with some chard on the right. Luckily a co-worker of Jennie's gave her some fava bean seeds and we got a good early start on these gals this year. We've had plenty of rain that has allowed us not to have to turn the hose on cept' to water the chickens.



That there is Gladys eyeing some weeds I am offering for a breakfast snack. Besides not seeming to enjoy the cooler Northern California weather, the chickens are all doing very well. We expect to get some eggs towards the end of the month. Maybe my birthday cake can be baked with Oaktown Farm eggs!

We have had enough rain this season so far to also start a little mushroom side project. Although we are not eating these, the chickens have and lived to tell the tale.