Display Benches

Here is one of the display benches I made. The other one doesn't have the elevated center, just a table. I loved making them! Just have to wait a few weeks for the wood to dry more so I can put a stain on to protect the wood.

And my mom conned me into making one of these for her. "Garden Art." I really enjoyed making this too. I was really happy with how it turned out. Both projects were good things to do when it was so cold outside. May make some more garden art and sell them alongside my flowers.


Another project I am working on is putting up some drip irrigation for the hanging baskets I will grow this year. Just starting to put it all together but it doesn't seem like it will be difficult at all. I will put up some pictures when I get farther along.

Soon it will be time to start the flowers again. I will receive my hanging basket flower cuttings the beginning of February, and start the seeds the middle/end of January.

You don't even understand all the hanging basket pot choices...getting that figured out now. Sometimes the choices are overwhelming.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

Planning

So I have been contemplating what flowers I wanted to grow this year for a few months now. I would sit down on my couch at home and look at all the catalogs (SO MANY! Look above), and I would just get overwhelmed. So much stuff I really liked but had to narrow it down since I only have so much space. After many lists, then many changes, finally I have sent my order in!!! It feels like such a relief and I feel good about the flowers I have chosen.

I'm going to do some seed flowers still but I am branching out and will try...what are they called?...vegetative cuttings. The cuttings are pieces taken from plant stock instead of started from seed. The flower companies stick them and get the cuttings growing roots, then they send them out to places like me. Then we grow them to full size. I'm excited about them because there is so much more selection of colors, types of plants. Plus they tell me they grow much more vigorously and full of even more flowers. Can't wait to learn a lot this year.

Even just ordering the plugs was a huge learning experience to me. You can't order directly from the grower/propogator, instead you have to order through a broker. Then there are all these things to know, like how many trays fit in a box when you order, the minimum amount of trays you need to order, a phytotoxicity fee if you order from places outside the state....etc, etc :) The lady who works for the broker company has been good to talk to because she use to own her own nursery. She has lots of information that has helped me.

I will also be growing lots of hanging baskets this year. She helped me figure out how to get a whole bunch of baskets to fit in my greenhouse.

Can't wait to see how this coming year goes!

More mums! You guys sick of seeing these yet!?

More mum pictures. All colors are getting into bloom now. I am really loving the yellow colored mum. The color just pops out of the foliage.

I love this!

Here is a two year old chrysanthemum. This is at my aunt's house. I just can't stop looking at it, I think it is so beautiful. Just wanted to share it with you all!

Nothing too exciting has been happening here on the farm. Lots of u-pick apple customers. We are also preparing a 2 1/2 acres field to plant blueberries. That is about it. :)

Chrysanthemums

Red Chrysanthemums! Showing color!

The reds are ready for purchase anytime. Soon to be ready will be other colors - white, orange, purple, and yellow.
Chrysanthemums are perennials and will come back for multiple years if it's a normal winter. If you plant them in a good place, next year they will grow to be huge. My aunt has some that are 2 ft across and when she planted them the year before they were the size above!



I love the cute button-like flowers.

Come to our farm to pick one up if you're interested! They will be 5.99 apiece.

And this is just a picture I added for no reason. Just liked the flowers lined up with the cart.

Things around here are slowing down. Well actually, our u-pick apples are just starting up. Galas are ready now, and Jonagolds are next. We sell them for $8 for a 5 gallon buckets...it's around 40 cents a pound I think. Nice apples. Lots more varieties coming.

Other than that though, our blueberries are done for the season. We just picked the last picking yesterday with a machine (first time for us!). Those blueberries will be made into dried blueberries and sold at stores like Costco.
We still have a few fields of corn to harvest but that is in about 3 weeks.
It's crazy to be so busy and now it's pretty low key around here. Now is when a person really has to muster up their motivation!

I am also working on figuring out what I will grow next year for the flower business. It has been so overwhelming so far because there is so many companies to possibly order from and so many flowers I like :) Will tried to get that all narrowed down hopefully in the next few weeks.

Happy almost Fall!

Peaches, Mums and Sunflowers!

Those peaches caught your attention didn't they!? I know my mouth is watering right now. When I get home, I will be cutting them up and feasting on some and freezing the rest.




It's interesting the difference in the varieties. The one above is more of a shorter round growth habit and the bottom one likes the spread out a little more.



You can see some buds forming on this one variety.


Thought I would add this sunflower picture because they are huge. Never expected that when I planted them but they are very pretty. Just enjoying the scenery :)

Additional "What we've been up to" pictures.

A picture taken today of how the mums are growing. They've grown a lot huh?


Above is Juan and Jonathon working hard after a day of running the crew of blueberry pickers. They look like they are working hard, right?! Washing the picking buckets is a daily chore we have to do at the end of the day...food safety!

Below is the combine I was talking about yesterday.

What we have been up to around here...

Our blueberries! Ready to pick. This was a few weeks ago. This field is all picked now. It's kind of sad feeling walking through a field that has been picked clean. You work all year for the berries and they are gone so fast. But that is the goal and it's also a relief to have them all picked safe and sound.

Some of the hard work.



We are also selling our own berries at a stand along 99E in Brooks. We are still open if anyone is interested. Wed thru Sat's 10-6pm. We are just north of Brooks on 99E about a 1/4 mile. We sell the berries in flats like this and in smaller clamshells. We also sell Sweetheart cherries...the dark red kind that taste amazing. And we do u-pick blueberries.



This is a picture of our 2 year old field...a variety that is very new to the blueberry industry called Liberty. We will pick it for the first time this year. You can't really tell from the picture but these things are huge.

We have a lady that buys our berries to sell them at her fruit stand and this is part of a load that she ordered. Do you see why I get burnt out on blueberries :)

Picture of our corn that we were irrigating. This was taken from the combine window.

My view from the combine. Harvesting grass seed. We just finished for the summer so I now have a life again. It is a fun couple of weeks though...sitting all day in the A/C listening to 1190 KEX :)

Controls inside the combine. I need to post some pictures of the outside of this machine just in case someone doesn't know what a combine is! I took some on my dad's camera so I will have to hunt those down tomorrow.

And this is from today.... Had to take a picture of the temperature and how much I am sweating! :)

And my mums are doing well. Compared to the last posted picture they have grown a lot. I will have to post some pictures of them also. No more bird damage since we put a net over the whole area. Thank goodness.

The chrysanthemum project in full swing.

The mum cuttings arrived. Thought it was interesting how they were packed. There are 50 rooted cuttings in each of the plastic bags.

Here are all the variety tags.

Mum rooted cutting.


Right after the cuttings were potted up....waiting to get watered and fertilized in. Mums need lots of fertilizer. They are very heavy feeders. Have to fertilize every watering with water soluble fertilizer.

Getting laid out all nice.

So all the pots are planted and sitting pretty out there waiting to grow. The next morning though I find a whole bunch of the baby plants pulled out entirely, and some had all the leaves eaten off. So frustrating. So I put up a small fence not sure what type of animal it was. The next morning I come out again and more pots are ruined. So on the 4th of July James and I are out there putting a net over the top. We discovered that it was birds that were causing the damage. Did I mention that I hate birds!? Losing 50 pots out of 300 was hard to take. So the net has helped a lot but a bird or two seems to still find their way in sometimes. Plus it's hard to get to the pots now with a short net over the top....will have to raise it later.

Cutting with the leaves eaten off.

Here is the whole section that I lost.

Always seems like I learn something every day around here....always experimenting. Lots of trial and error.
Will keep you posted!

Our Big Memorial Weekend Adventure

So we decided this last weekend that we would try to sell our flowers along 99E. Our farm has a field just north of Brooks so we figured we would park it there.
So we loaded up our trailer with flowers.

And made some signs.

And we sat and waited! It was such a beautiful day out.


James said he was getting fried like a turkey. I think this was about the 5th application of sunscreen for him in one day :)


Enjoying myself! :)

James' beloved hanging basket. If no one bought it on the last day, he was going to bring it home. A man bought it 10 minutes before we closed on Monday :) We were glad to sell it but James was in mourning a little :)

We had a very successful weekend! It was so nice to see everyone coming and enjoying our flowers and taking some home! We sold quite a bit. It is almost sad to see the greenhouse practically empty but very calming too :)

For those who are still interested in flowers, we do still have red petunias, pink petunias with a white center, Verbena Serenity Mix, Pink Echinacea and 2 kinds of Salvia--Marble Arch Mix (pinks and whites) and the dwarf Vista red. Plus many kinds of herbs left-thyme, spearmint, little leaf basil, parsley and chives.
If you want to see pictures of these, go back to older posts and there is a list of them with their pictures alongside. We also still have some planters available.

James and I are pretty ridiculous because we were sitting on the couch last night already looking at the seed catalogs for next year :) He has been reading the Ball Redbook too that is a big thick detailed book on how to grow flowers.

We are also thinking of growing pot chrysanthemums for sale this fall. That is a work in progress though. We are in the research stage right now.

Thanks to you all that have been reading the blog all season! It was definitely a fun journey this year.
And of course, we still want to hear suggestions of what you want to see us grow next year!

May take a break in posting for awhile. But if we decide to grow mums, I'll be back :)

Thank you all!