When Lucy yanked the football out from under him. 2020 was set to be a wonderful year. The first full year of Ron’s retirement and he had lots of plans floating around in his head. Take it from me, it is better when they are just floaters. I break out in a sweat only when I hear him say, “Ginny, sit down and lets talk”. We had one small hiccup in 2019 when our favorite resturaunt and one of our first customers had a kitchen fire. They had to close down for repairs and would not be reopened until sometime in the spring. But that should be just in time for 2020 shiitake season.
Ron found a deal for wheeled metal shelves on the Costco website and ordered 5 of them. He has spent a good deal of time in the internet watching other micro green growers. Everyone of them has a slightly different shelf set up. But most swear by the metal shelves. We are still trying to find the just right set up that works best for us. The metal shelves were only the first step in his planned upgrade.
As with any project we get involved with, setting up the shelves was, shall we say, an adventure. The instructions were straight forward and pretty simple. Four two piece posts, plastic clips and five shelves; assemble accordingly. It took three tries to get it right. Jo, Ron and I set it up the first time. Ron wanted to have six shelves on each set, so we cannibalized one set to feed the others. He wanted to maximize the shelf space in our floor space.
Our first attempt did work but not as easily as they claimed. Each pole has grooves cut into it at equal distances apart. You are supposed to use them to keep the shelves level, counting so that you have the same number of grooves between each shelf. We were done by 8 pm and happy with a job well done.
Ron pondered on it all the next day and that night he and I took it apart again. Definitely a two person job. Halfway to getting it set back up, we stopped and took it apart again. The third time it was done to his satisfaction. Now it should have been easy enough to get the others done. All we had to do was copy what we already did. One or two false starts and we got it done. Then Ron had to run the lights which were another change as we would be going from two lights per shelf to three. Will be interesting to see if our micro greens grow better with the extra light. So that was that. First big change for the year was in process.
Our pink pussy willows are still a struggle for us. We have yet to discover or develop the knack for getting the darn things to stay pink. The expect swears to Ron that all you have to do is pick them, set into water until the turn pink, pull them out and they should stay that way. Well that is not what happens to ours. They promptly return to their grey color. And while still lovely, they are not what we hoping to get. Another thing we have more learning to do on.
Ron decided he needed to add one more item to his list of projects for 2020. Last year he became a procurer of vegetables for our restaurant customers. He is a big advocate of buying local and pushes this when he can to our customers. This year he wants to have his Amish farmers grow more specialized veggies. Potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, beets, radishes and a few others thrown in. As soon as he got in his 2020 seed catalogs, he took them to the chefs for their veggie wish list. Then he was out meeting with the Amish to see what they thought about said list. Once the list was finalized, he placed the seed orders and checked that off his to do list.
Me, I was working on perfecting a recipe for calendula infused shampoo bars. I like the idea of using a shampoo with no chemicals seeping into your scalp or pouring down the drain. You can make your own liquid shampoo, but I am making bars. No risk of spillage involved and much easier to carry with you. I made two different one bar batches last fall and gave them out to friends as Christmas gifts. Do you know a better way of getting happy test subjects? Didn’t work so well for me though. I haven’t heard a single comment back from any of them. Some friends I have. I was not deterred though and did a lot of reading about what oils work best in shampoo bars. A few more attempts and I should have a shampoo bar good enough for Tiny House Farm to add to their product list.
I had some comfrey infused olive oil ready to use so I made a batch of shampoo bars with that. Those were just to play with as we don’t plan to grow comfrey for our use. And then tried non goat’s milk calendula soap. Experimenting with different oils in a variety of amounts is kind of addicting. I also made calendula soap without the goats milk. Just looking for something else that I can contribute to our product line.
We got through February but continued to be distracted and worried about the news of the virus making its way around the world. Like everyone else, we were so hoping that it would not hit us here. We were hopefully planning for our upcoming shiitake inoculation. We were wanted to make changes this year, looking to upgrade in a few ways. So much for all those plans. Mother Nature smacked us and the rest of the world a good one. But we did have other projects that needed our thoughts and plans.
By March 8 we knew our hopes about the virus were in vain as NY Governor Cuomo called for all that could; to work from home . One by one our customers advised that they were not going to be ordering any mirco greens from us. On March 14 I started working from home. This was to last until further notice. As I have never been a huge fan of working from home, I was not happy. I really, really need the interaction with people during work. It is so much harder to ask a question or get someone’s opinion on an issue by email of IM. But I am so grateful that my job can be done at home. Losing my income was not something we had to worry about. That is a blessing that too many Americans did not have over the past two months.
Such a odd thing this is. Getting up everyday and going to work at a table in my house. It is all so wrong. No dashing out of house in the nick of time for work. No driving and no worry about the roads or weather outside. Also no annoyance that someone had parked in my parking spot. I have used the same spot for the past 15 years. I think should entitle me to squatter’s rights. don’t you? The only worry I have to deal with is whether my internet connection will stay up for the entire 8 hours. It feels as though I am on vacation but am not. All sorts of stories out there of people baking up a storm, buying up all the yeast in the world, or learning a new skill, but I feel kinda of stuck. We have been holdup in the house most of the time since mid-March. Rain and cold here in upstate NY prevented us from making even small work trips out to the farm. Because neither Ron nor I are spring chickens and we have both have pre-existing conditions; the rule of the day is stay home. Stay away from everyone. We don’t want to get this virus, but also don’t want to give it to anyone else. Jo is our major concern. She works overnights at our local Walmart. And I have never been happier that she works that shift. Her customer contacts are very limited which makes her safer.
All this “down time” has resulted in thoughts of how we can improve our processes. And, sadly revealed more things that need to be done. We have already spent hours and hours picking rocks from our field and dumping them onto a few sections of the path to our southern end.
It is clear that we have a lot more rock moving in our future. Two additional years of 4 wheeler trips there and back have taken a toll. It is even hard to walk through this. As we have two lovely and large piles of already picked rocks sitting along side our field, all we have to do is toss them into our wagon and haul them across the steam. I foresee a road building party in our future. Adhering to social distancing guidelines of course. Along with a house painting party and a juneberry planting one. Yes, Ron has actually ordered juneberries for us to plant this fall. And we still need to have a garbage picking party on THF. Every rain we have reveals more junk left behind by previous owners.
Ron and I went out to the farm in early April to work on our elderberries and lavender. We had to trim back the elderberries to keep them healthy and strong. We brought home some “sticks” for me to plant in hopes that we would get new bushes from them.
They seem to be doing well and should be better once the snow finally ends for the year. We are going to use three of these to replace bushes that we have lost, but the others; we hope to sell. We are keeping them here at the house so I can watch over them. I will have to find a safer place though. At least one squirrel did some digging at them. I assume the critter was looking for stashed but forgotten nuts.
We also cut planting “sticks” from our pink pussy willows (insert giggle here). Those are still in our frig waiting for us to make a decision on. Do we plant them so we can sell them as already established or sell them as bare root? Though you can root them in water, from the research I have done it seems best to start them directly in dirt. Supposedly they will be stronger if started this way. BUT if you do root them in water, you really need to save the water. There is a natural growth hormone in pussy willows and it will infuse the water they sit in. You can then use this water to root other plants. No need for any rooting powder. Ron is a huge fan of being able to use the one thing in two different ways. A twofer he calls it.
I am keeping myself busy and involved with THF by working on product and supply inventory. Finding out what we have in stock and what we need to buy. Or in my case, need to make. I have Ron pondering labels for my shampoo bars and watching for a sale on the size he wants to use. He wants those bars to stand out from our calendula soap. Right now, that means a different looking label.
When our area does begin the process of opening back up we will need to be ready for our customers. But we are fully aware that this will be a long and difficult process. It will take some time before things are back to being anything like normal. We are going to have to roll with the punches making sure we are able to duck when we can. The uncertainty of it all is going to be the hardest to deal with. There is so much that will be beyond our control. But we are going to get through it; all of us will. We just have to take care of ourselves, our families and each other.
