Chicama Run Farm Blog

Last week was the large Loudoun County Spring Farm Tour.  Besides the wind, it was a perfect weekend for it!  We had over 290 eggs gathered by visitors which is a TON!  What a blast to see some of the kids faces.

Needless to say, we were tired from it – but it was fun.

Right now it seems like we are going non-stop.  We seem to look at the calendar and don’t see too many open days and that’s BEFORE we have to actually harvest anything.  Joe has worked his rear-end off getting stuff in the garden.  This week he travels to PA to get a plastic mulch layer thingy (yep that’s a technical term) so he can get the rest of the gardens done.  He had been doing it by hand but I think it’s just getting to be too much.  I’m not arguing with this at all – heck I personally am not too excited about rolling out plastic!

It’s amazing how fast it all goes.  All the plants are starting to come up, chickens are about to go and get processed.  And low and behold, we went from 70 degrees to 90+ in 7 days!!

Oh, something really new – even if you were just here you haven’t seen it – the top part of the driveway got paved.  1st thing my kids were thinking was that they can now have sidewalk chalk to color all over it.  Yep – that was what I was thinking too…… uh huh   Amazing what they think about.  2nd thought was the scooters and bikes (which I saw races taking place this evening with the scooter and the skate board)… So it wasn’t in the plan, at least for the immediate future, but it happened.

Sales have been decent at the markets.  The kids and I missed the South Riding market today.  I think they were just too tired from watching the guys pave the driveway last night and then getting up early this morning.  The heat didn’t help at all with it.  I was kinda bummed about it, I don’t like to miss markets if I don’t really have it, but at the same time I have to admit it was nice to be home this afternoon and just relax some.  Took care of the animals, kicked back with a book, and watched the kids play in the pool.  Yeah, I got in too, it’s over 90 degrees, I’m in.  Course now I look like a long haired poodle from the humidity, heat and add in the pool water but I’d do it again.  Just a good thing I didn’t have to go anywhere – I can’t even get a hair band around a pony tail at this point!

Oh, the sheep got sheared yesterday!  I’m sure today during the high heat they appreciated it a lot.  Funniest thing (and I promise to embarrass my llama more by posting the pictures)  my big huge proud llama who hangs out with the boys got completely sheared!  I mean naked!  Now the poor guy looks like an alpaca all skinny and such.  It’s really hard not to laugh at him, so I do.  I know I’m mean but wait until you see him I promise you’ll giggle at the very least about his fate for the summer.

The rams went back in with the girls, so hopefully next year we’ll have more lambs earlier.  More for my sanity of not having lambs born in negative degree weather – I’m not sure I could personally take another loss ratio like we had this year, it was tough.  Detaching doesn’t always work that well for me.

Think that’s it…… at least until tomorrow!

You know, this is supposed to be spring. So why the heck is it 90 degrees outside!?

Tomorrow we have another farm tour, so I am straightening up for that (the brooder was gross to say the least) and at the same time getting ready for this big Spring Farm Tour with Loudoun County this weekend. We just don’t know what to expect so are excited and I think anxious at the same time.

Joe is out planting and he’s been laying black plastic mulch (yeah in this heat)….. now he’s on to plant some tomatoes.

I’m sitting for a minute and then I’ll be out mowing the lawn. I moved some of the 2nd batch of broilers to their new coop – but left a couple up here for the tour tomorrow (kinda boring for a kid to see a brooder with no chicks in it!)…. 150 more birds come this week.

On top of all this – we still have regular stuff to do – like taking care of the animals etc. Gotta tell you, the house looks like garbage at the moment! Man I would love to have someone just drop by and clean it!! Just this once so I can forget getting angry and frustrated and actually grossed out walking through my house. Ok, to a lot of people it wouldn’t be considered bad, but I don’t like it to get this dirty. And I know it drives Joe nuts. I don’t like dishes in the sink, on the counter and everywhere else.

Now – I know what you are thinking – “Um, get off your butt, stop blogging, and clean” Well – I would…. but it’s lunch and I do need to eat something, so I figured I’d blog while I was here. Then I’ll empty the dishwasher and load the next set of dishes, then change clothes (I’ve been in jeans all day) and go mow the lawn. Maybe I’ll get a shower today!! Yep, you know it’s exciting when I get to take a good shower! I’m so easy to please

So, in other news….. the Wii system is awesome. What a power trip when I beat Joe at Tennis and it flashes on the screen “YOU WIN”….. “YOU LOSE” And the boxing is excellent – what a workout. I even found out some people out there actually have a “Wii Workout” and I can see it actually working for people. I loved the boxing – not that great at it, but I worked up a sweat! So I’ll be checking it out more. We spent a good part of Mother’s Day playing. It was a lot of fun with the kids playing. We all “went bowling” which was really cool…. and everyone played a round of golf – right in our room! Well worth the $$ we spent on it. Not like some of the other games we’ve played in the past – this was really fun.

Ok – lunch time is over….. I hope to see a lot of you at the Farm Tour this weekend!

Ok, so I got more excited than I had in awhile when I saw the new Nintendo Wii system at Costco today…..come on – I’d been waiting since Christmas for that one. Joe’s first question, “When will we have time to play it?” (sour-puss) And it went in the cart – Happy Mother’s Day!

Yesterday was our first farm tour! I was excited that it went well. I was very nervous. Joe explained it well I think, we are so used to the animals, egg gathering, etc. that some moments we just take it for granted “Yeah that’s a turkey running around…..” I was thrilled that when I came inside I had another booking. So now I’m focusing on trying to get more. It was fun sharing with the kids and parents about the farm. The kids had some great questions and I loved the look on their faces when they were gathering the eggs. It was like an egg hunt all over again for them!

Continue on my bragging here – we were featured in the Loudoun Times Mirror (Thanks Tracy!) An excellent written article about us and I loved the pictures that Elizabeth took!! I ran out and bough 6 extra copies and framed a set to bring with me to the market and brag more there.

So needless to say, it’s been a fun week and busy!! Tons more plants this week at the market – fingers crossed for no rain! Yeah, it rained at South Riding and Alexis and I froze our butts off, at least it was still a decent day.