spring Archives - MarriedtotheFarm

Get Your Pretty On Review from a Sweatpants Addict!

*Disclaimer: This post may contain affiliate links. See my full disclosure policy for more about this. If you know me well, you probably already know that I’m not a big fan of getting dressed. I love to be comfy. I celebrate days that have nothing on the calendar with a fist punch and a lingering of pajamas. To me, that’s a valid perk of a work-at-home, homeschooling lifestyle. My husband even jokes about how I will survive the day if it’s one that requires me to put a bra on. Well friends, I think that’s actually changing. I’ve purposely waited about 3 months to tell you about this thing I was trying, because I wanted to make sure it was actually going to work. That fact is, it has worked better than I ever dreamed. Dave Ramsey revolutionized our finances and changed our lives. Mario Kondo and her Magic Art of Tidying Up changed the entire mood of our home. This is that level of awesomeness for myself, my wardrobe, my confidence, and my stress level surrounding clothes. I first heard about this program called Get Your Pretty On from Crystal Paine’s Your Blogging Mentor group. Several of the busy

May 31, 2017 apples / asparagus / baby / blueberry bushes / cherries / fence / fruit trees / garden / large family life / peaches / pears / planting / potatoes / pregnancy / spring

VLOG – Large Family Gardening (28 Weeks Pregnant)

This was the first “vlog” I ever shared! It starts with me really short of breath (who else gets like that when you’re pregnant!?) and then I go on to reminisce about life with one or two kids, and finally show you the garden and plant some cherry bushes…

April 7, 2013 Seasons / spring / Tot School

Tot School: Spring theme

Kent was 20 months old. Wow! I’m three weeks behind on Tot School posts again. How does that happen? As I was perusing the web looking for Easter ideas I kept stumbling upon tons of cute flower, bunny, and chick ideas. Sure, they were cute and I wanted to do them, but there are not at all related to Easter in my eyes. Since March 20th is the first day of Spring I decided to do a whole week on the new season. Fun was had! Our tot trays for the week: Do you do anything fun or special to recognize Spring? This post is linked to: Montessori Monday Tot School Gathering Place ~ Week 13

May 22, 2009 cat / cattle / farmers' market / spring / vacation

I Wish I Was A Cow…Or A Cat!

Can you see them? What about now? This is how our two calves spend their days. They aren’t real interested in eating their corn or picking at the hay. They don’t even go wild for the lush green grass like I expected. They mostly lounge around the pasture and sleep in the sun. It is a beautiful sight, and I’m jealous. We don’t have any set plans for the weekend yet. We may head up to the beach tomorrow and get Brian’s Mom’s camper settled in to her lot for the summer. I can hardly wait to get back to the farmer’s market in Port Austin. It is the best one around by far, especially on holiday weekends. Then we have a lot of work to do around home, as usual. What are your plans for this weekend? Is the weather supposed to be nice? I’d love to hear about it. P.S. This just in…he’s trying to help me type with his back feet I guess.

May 18, 2009 farming / no-till farming / planting / soybeans / spring

Planting the Big Fields

Brian planted 40 acres of corn at the end of last week. Sunday we planted 25 or 30 acres of soybeans. Brian helps our neighbor farm in exchange for use of some his equipment. The planter he’s using in these pictures is a “no-till drill”. It actually cuts a path and sticks the seeds in the ground without the field being plowed up every year. Last year we had corn in this field, this year we drilled the soybeans right in. The conservation district in our county even owns a drill that can be rented out. No-till farming is easier on the environment. The fields are not as susceptible to erosion. Plus, the practice saves quite a bit of fuel and time, thus reducing our expenses. Planting can be a one man job most of the time. The picture above shows the bins that hold the seed. Ideally we would have just enough seed to plant the field without too much extra to clean out at the ends. As we near the end of planting I stay on the planter and watch the seed level. One person, or even two, can stay pretty busy shuffling seed from one bin to

April 19, 2009 apples / fruit trees / spring

Fruit Trees!

My order from the Conservation District came in on Friday. I took advantage of the 70 degree temps (!!!) yesterday and planted them. I put them on our sideyard near the one pear tree I planted last year. Now we have 1 pear, 1 peach, 1 cherry, and 2 apple trees there. I still need to add another pear and another peach. I also got in touch with a neighbor who graciously came and showed me how to prune our older trees. We take care of the empty house across the road and there are a few apple trees in the yard. I picked a lot of apple from the trees last year and wanted to prune them back nicely. I didn’t do a lot because it is quite late for pruning but at least now I have a better idea on how to do it. My nice neighbor gave me a recipe for tree spray and recommended I use it repeatedly throughout the season. He insists that he tried organic methods with his and was not happy with the results. What are you thoughts on this? I hate the idea of spraying them but it did make for a

April 8, 2009 garden / lettuce / onions / peas / planting / spring

Planting Onions!

This should by no means be taken as a tutorial since I am planting onions this year for the very first time. I wasn’t even going to post about it until I saw that little paper bag sitting next to the freshly planted row and thought what a cute picture that would make. We don’t eat many onions, just a few in casseroles and such, so I probably didn’t need to plant any. Our good friend Rob shared some of his last year and is growing plenty again this year. These ones just caught my eye in line at the feed store so I picked up a couple bags. I figure it can’t hurt to learn a new skill. The paper that came with the onion sets had decent directions: plant 2-3″ apart just deep enough to cover the tops in rows 12″ apart. Thin later to 4″ apart, then harvest in July or August when tops dry and fall over. I pretty much followed the directions except went about 4″ apart right from the start. I’ve never been one to “thin” plants out, I just can’t bring myself to pull up the little buggers just when they get going.

April 1, 2009 fruit trees / garden / garlic / mulch / spring / strawberries

Spring has sprung – here!!!

I’ve been watching jealously as one by one my fellow bloggers have posted pictures of their first spring shoots. Now I can finally join in the fun!! Farm mom inspired me to plant garlic for the first time last fall. I have not yet removed the thick layer of straw that covered the planted cloves all winter. Today I went out to inspect the patch and guess what – the garlic is already growing even through all that mulch! I still didn’t remove it but I pulled back a good section and found several sturdy looking sprouts. How exciting! Then I wandered over to my strawberries. I planted them last spring in a big metal pot that we found when we tore out the bushes around our house. I neglectfully forgot to mulch them over the winter so was prepared to find them dead this spring. They are more durable than I expected. I found several fresh green plants making their start already. Mmmm, I can’t wait for that first batch of jam. I planted two pear trees last spring as well. One tree didn’t even live through the summer but the other is doing well. Check out the little

March 27, 2009 farming / forward contracting / harvest / planting / spring

My Take On Forward Contracting

This is a little more technical than most of my posts and refers to grain farming. Not sure how many readers raise grain but this is something I learned about that I’d like to share. So basically, we grow the corn, we take it to the elevator, and then we either sell it right away (if prices are good) or we start to incur storage costs on it and don’t sell it until prices come back up. Supposedly, this is the first year in the last 10 where a farmer didn’t make money by storing grain until after the 1st of the year. Of course that would happen during our first harvest year, why not!? So since we are beginning field work and need $$$ to buy fertilizer and seed, we really need the money from last year’s corn. Plus, we don’t want to pay to store it much longer. However, prices are still low enough that I’m not convinced they will even cover the cost of growing that corn. So, there is another option available: forward contracting. Basically, we sell the corn today and a check is mailed to us. The check is for the current price ($3.42/bushel) times

March 16, 2009 garden / heirloom seeds / planting / spring / starting seeds

I Started My Seeds!

I’m not exactly sure if this was the right time to do it, but I did it. The weather will never be exactly right in Michigan anyway. Here’s what I started on Sunday: Snapdragons – 9 cellsBaby Dolls – 9 cellsPing Tung eggplant – 9 cellsLong Purple eggplant – 9 cellsAmish Paste tomatoes – 36 cells I used equal parts of peat moss, vermiculite, and perlite as a starting mixture. The plastic cells and trays are being reused from last year. I’ll be starting another batch of tomatoes in a few weeks as well as some other flowers, my herbs, broccoli, and some others I’ve forgotten. Right now I have the tray down by our corn burner to stay warm. This next goal is to get Brian to hang up my new lights so the seedlings can go under there once they sprout. It feels like spring it finally here!