Meanwhile Back at the Farm...

It's favas, favas, and more favas! We had a bumper crop of favas. Here Catherine is shelling while Rick plays golf on his iPad. Oddly enough, I remember a while ago when someone hassled me for playing on my notebook computer at the farm.... I'm glad we've all come to our senses. Farming + gaming = fun!

Nathan came over to help. He said, "I'll shell all these!" 

And he set in with a will. There were a lot to shell. 

What is sometimes called a %$#@-load. Seriously, this is probably 25-30 pounds of shelled favas.

This is ANOTHER bunch. I boiled and peeled and boiled and peeled. I brought some of the peeling work to the farm. Catherine was a fava harvesting champ. She picked and shelled and peeled like crazy. 

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What We're Eating

When confronted with a gazillion favas, Nathan made soup. Lots and lots of soup. I can't believe I didn't take any pictures, but it was probably because we were all too busy eating. Nathan fed the whole farm twice. And speaking of twice, I think every single person went back for seconds. I'll sheepishly admit to fourths. Damn good stuff! He used the favas of course, plus our homegrown onions and garlic. I brought him a ham hock for the first batch, but the meatfree version was just as good. We told him we didn't expect him to feed us all every day... that every OTHER day would be fine.

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We've also harvested our first tomato, on May 23rd. Now, it's a Sungold, so it doesn't really count, but still... Buddy ate the first one. Rick and I shared the second one.

We're also getting the last of the cherries. Here Rick climbs up and picks the topmost bits. After we ate as many as we could, I took the rest home and made mini cherry pies in phyllo cups. Those frozen phyllo shells are great for making a quick snack, and much easier than trying to cut and serve a regular pie. I didn't think to take pix of that either, but folks ate it right up.

Back at my house, I picked all my onions, because the pumpkins are already starting to overrun that space. 

Here I am showing them off. Do these shoes make me look dumpy? lol...

This beauty is from the farm. It's one of the Hamburger Reds, and it's huge! It would take a pretty big hamburger to hold up to a slice of that big boy.

Sarah and Nathan Move In

The Sunday night of the eclipse was also the day the movers showed up with Sarah and Nathan's furniture.

We stacked stuff everywhere.

This little piece looks like it was made for this spot in the kitchen.

Sarah and Nathan can finally sit down!

The other chair works great in the corner, making a nice conversational grouping or a place to curl up with a book.

Eclipse

May 20th was the day of the eclipse. We went to the farm to check it out. Catherine and Anne were clever and had made pinhole cameras.

The light shines through the pinhole in the tinfoil and reflects on the second board. Here you can see just the smallest bite out of the corner.

We all sat around waiting for the sun to get devoured. The light was really strange and magical. Notice we're eating fava bean hummus and home made pitas.

As the eclipse progressed, the cracks between the leaves had the same effect as the pinhole camera, throwing eclipse-shaped shadows on the ground.

Notice how dark it looks. This was around 6 pm, and this time of year, that's a good 2 hours from sunset.

Here you can see the complete "ring of fire" effect. It was wonderful and magical.

By this next picture, the sun had begun to re-emerge.

If you look closely, you can see that the curve of the reflection is different now.

Sarah and Nathan Arrive

Sarah and Nathan have officially arrived! They're mostly moved in and getting used to life in Chico. Right away they start learning to farm properly!

But first, a little catch up. I planted beans in rows 7B and 8B. They are Italian Shelling, Black Turtle, Borlotto, and Green Filet beans. I got those in a couple weeks ago

And they are alread up. This picture was taken a week ago, so they're lots bigger now.

The potatoes are already well up. I put compost and paper straw on them already, and they need it again.

We're getting lots of garlic scapes. I even made scape pesto, which is really good.

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Weather Note
It's summer! And it's getting warmer. It's still been really pleasant, but the temps are up into the high 80s. We had a few drops of rain the other day (blown in from the northeast, which is really weird). It was the remains of a thunderstorm from Lassen area, and it basically just churned up dirt and pollen. All our cars are filthy.
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We've been picking and shelling favas like crazy. There are so many! Rick's holding six pounds of shelled beans here.

I took a basket over to Karen.

Sarah and Nathan are just in time to lend a hand. Nathan picks some.

And Sarah shells them out.

Lots of favas!

I got started on mulching the tomato and pepper patch.

Nathan is so tall that he makes Catherine look petite.

It's rather a full table, but how nice to have more folks around!

Catherine stalks the wild cherry.

They are perfect right now.

Nathan made us a beautiful loaf of bread.

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What We're Eating
Well... besides fava bean hummus on homemade pita with garlic scapes and preserved lemon? Besides homemade bread? Besides ripe cherries right off the tree? I made this quick stir fry with chard, broccoli, onions, garlic, and snow peas and put it over the leftover Jamaican rice and peas. It was delicious.

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Rick's BD

Rick's birthday seemed like the perfect excuse for a party, so we had one at the farm yesterday. Fortunately, the weather, which has been "changeable" at best, decided to cooperate. Lots of great folks came and we had plenty of good food and drinks.

The garden is so lush now that it's hard to take pictures among all the leaves, but that's Lori and Zoe behind Dean.

Keith and Dean relax in the shade.

The farm makes such a great place for a party.

I got a cake from Mims that was utterly delicious.

The glen is in its full glory.

And the arch is spectacular.

Earlier this week, Buddy struck up a conversation with someone buying SN cans, and she gave him one to try. He shared it with us.

He likes it!