FARMER POTLUCK

yesterday, we went to our friend, fellow farmer, mentor... ken's place for an addison county farmer potluck. this was the last one of the season, understandably. these potlucks are informal social gatherings that take place throughout the winter at different farms in addison county. it was fun to have the potluck at ken's farm, tio grains, since he has just moved into his nearly finished house that spencer has helped build.

we met several dairy farmers, a beekeeper, a cheese maker, several grain growers and a few other vegetable farmers. suzanne of singing cedars farm was there. we have met on about a half dozen occasions and i always enjoy crossing paths. i forgot to mention to her that we enjoyed their eggs on the special salad at american flatbread this weekend. by the way, this special salad was amazing... frisee, white asparagus, crumbled hard boiled eggs with a caper dressing.

we arrived late to the party and stayed longer in the afternoon to visit with ken. here is a photo of spencer and ken chatting. ken's farm is located just 15 miles away from the elmer farm and the views are spectacular. neaby his farm, a creek/small river called lemon fare which which beautifully flooded some fields. i like the name of this river.

one last note, i transplanted about half of my rhubarb so far. i divided the plants when i dug them up and i am hoping to get about 20 new plants.

A SUNNY SUNDAY

wow, it was a beautiful day today. we spent the day as a family in burlington. spencer, angus and i headed out in the truck early this morning to pick up our washer and dryer at the house on manhattan drive. it will be so convenient to do laundry at home again and i can't wait to set up a clothesline. while we were at the house in burlington, i was also planning on digging up our rhubarb to transplant at the farm. the buds are starting to emerge but the ground is still frozen. i will give the ground another few sunny days to warm up. i was afraid of damaging the roots. i took a photo of the emerging rhubarb but it wasn't a flattering picture and the plants weren't recognizable. i am excited to bring the rhubarb to the elmer farm because it originally came from divisions of the plants at the intervale community farm where i worked for a couple of years.

the manhattan drive house looks amazing. danielle and benner are doing a great job on finishing up the trim and other projects like putting knobs on the doors. the windows look fabulous since they have been scraped and cleaned. they have made a wonderful home there. i felt like we never got settled when we lived there in part because we knew we were looking for farmland to buy and in part because we weren't completely finished building it. this house will always hold a special place in our hearts because this is where angus was born and spencer worked so hard to build it.

danielle gave me seed she saved from her garden last year. both of the flower varieties she gave me are heirlooms from seed savers exchange, calendula mixture and sea shells cosmos. i am looking forward to adding them to the elmer farm planting schedule.

the photo in this post was taken last night at the farm. it was getting very dark so nothing in the foreground shows except a hint of the greenhouse.