Earth Dance, Week #20

Weekly Produce List
Earth Dance Newsletter, August 26, 2010

This is Matt's last week at Earth Dance. He will be finishing up his internship on Friday and heading back to school in La Crosse.  (Make sure you read Matt's thoughts about his experiences.)  I have no idea how we're going to get everything done without him!

Getting started this morning, Matt and Mark bring up the melon harvest.  These will be the first to go into the members' boxes.

Oh my goodness ... when the tomatoes came in this year, they came in big! It took Genna  and Matt four hours to harvest these.

Next, come the purple cabbages, and these go right into the boxes.

After losing all his tomatoes last year to the blight, Norm is all smiles with this year's gorgeous crop!

Matt, Riley and Mark help load a stock tank filled with the potato harvest from the back of the pickup into the bucket on Norm's tractor.

Norm then transports the potatoes over to the washing station, and Genna helps the guys move it off the tractor.

It's Genna's and my job to wash every one of these lovely potatoes and place them in the members' boxes.

Mark joins us in the potato washing and strikes an entertaining 'potato-washing' pose!

Norm pointed out to me how well the grapes are coming on the vines.

When I remember back to my first day in April, one of my first jobs that day was working in the vineyard. There wasn't even a suggestion of green yet at that time ... and now look at the beautiful leaves and fruit!

Matt and Riley work on cleaning up the onions a bit before putting them into the boxes.

While Genna and I were cleaning the potatoes, the guys were up in the cornfield picking this corn.

Riley, Genna and Matt start packing the corn into the members' boxes. 

This picture shows a fabuous find by Laurie!  They are adjustable-length slings that hold an enormous amout of anything you want to pack into them.  As you can see, they came in quite handy for transporting produce from the harvest piles to the member boxes.  Thanks, Laurie!   : )

There were reports from the members that the corn was not so great last week. I can tell you for a fact that it's better this week ... as, at lunchtime, here are Matt and Riley eating it raw, and they said it was delicious! 

Matt joined me for lunch where I sit in the grass by my car, and I finally got to experience the famous bucket of baked goods that his mom always makes for him to bring to the farm each week.  He offered me some wonderful molasses cookies ... and I have to say, "Matt's Mom, you make great cookies!"  Thanks for sharing.   : )

Because I only come one day a week, I miss a lot. Here is something that I found interesting.  In the days since I was here last, the interns had harvested this garlic and hung it to dry for future delivery to the members.  It makes quite a striking picture.

Still more harvesting to do. After lunch, we all went up to harvest squash and cucumbers. What a lovely day ... sunny and low 70s.  Mark drove the pickup, and Genna, Riley, Matt and I rode in the back.

After we finished harvesting, we all came down and spent the rest of the day packing the boxes. Just after 5:00, we finished and loaded the boxes into the cooler.

Genna, happily basking in having successfully finished another packing day.  Mark makes dinner on Wednesdays, and Genna was looking at all those tomatoes, thinking she might make tomato soup Thursday, which is her night to make dinner.  She also thought she and Matt might make some bread and/or a zucchini cake to celebrate his last day.

Thanks for all the hard work and laughs this summer, Matt ... it was sure great getting to know you. Make sure you let us all know when you get that farm of yours started. Oh, and we also want to know when you find that girl who meets all the criteria on your 'list!' Happy Trails....

The Harvest
Sweet corn, cabbage, sage, onion, bell peppers or eggplant (farmer's choice), melon, tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, summer squash.

One of the benefits of my volunteering each Wednesday is getting to bring home some of the overabundance, and this week, it was tomatoes.  I love to make fresh juice, and I couldn't resist juicing up a bunch of these beauties.  Here is a glass of real tomato juice, freshly juiced, straight from the tomato.  Delicious!

Signing off,
Wednesday Special

: )