The past month has been whirlwind of school, sports, and summer abundance! It's such a busy time of year, and there are so many things to be grateful for. We have had grapevines for 5 years and got our first real harvest this year! We've had pear trees for even longer, and this year we finally got pears. It has been so much fun picking and eating food from our yard and garden. Tyler has also grown lots of shiitake mushrooms, and I've cut and dried spearmint, peppermint, and chamomile for tea. We've made crafts with pressed flowers from our walks, and Tyler has made beautiful wood crafts. I gathered and dried lots of mullein flowers earlier this summer, and then infused olive oil with the flowers and garlic to make ear drops. Here are some pictures of our beauty and bounty from this summer.

I haven't had much time for canning, but I have made chicken broth and canned that. I still intend to make tomato sauce if I get a chance to can again, but if not, we'll just feed the leftovers to the pigs and chickens. Nothing goes to waste around here! If you've never used a pressure canner before, it can be intimidating, but it doesn't have to be. It's good to find someone who has used one before that can guide you, but once you've done it a few times you realize that it just makes a lot of noise (there's whistling steam and rattling of weights) With a watchful eye and small adjustments to heat, everything turns out fine. Most pressure canning happens between 10 and 15 pounds of pressure. Here's a picture of my canner while I processed broth. I have one now with a pressure gauge that actually tells me how many pounds of pressure I'm working with. The old fashioned ones were just gauged by the rattle of the weight.

Our Fall CSA starts this month! We'll be making those deliveries very soon so keep an eye out for communication if you signed up for Fall. Tyler has had to put the house addition on the back burner and is busy adding on to the brooder so we can raise enough chickens for the Winter and Spring shares before the grass dies for the year. We have 130 chicks growing now, and 200 more coming soon! We have really struggled to keep up with demand since we started the business and are very excited to expand and have more shares to offer next year. Thanks to everyone who loves our healthy, grass-fed chicken!! It's inspiring to know our work is valued and people love our meat as much as we do.

Happy chickens are tasty chickens!

Sandi