It has been a whirlwind of activity on our little hilltop the past couple weeks. Last Friday, Audra taught a flower arranging class for all of our flower subscription members and our brides for this season. With the help of Old Oaks Vintage Rentals, Audra transformed the Lexington Community Center into a floral masterpiece. It was a pretty amazing night, and hopefully the first of many endeavors to provide education to our customers, in addition to flowers and food.
The following day we hosted our annual open house. It was an incredible, humbling experience. We had people come from all over to see our farm, talk to us about this lifestyle that we’ve chosen, and to buy flowers and vegetables. Our farm was bustling with activity and energy, and we loved every exhausting second of it. We had old friends travel from many hours away to see us, we had numerous people who found us through Facebook or through this blog come to meet us. We even had a fellow grower drive from south of Carbondale to get ideas for her own flower farm plans. Afterwards we were able to celebrate with all the friends and family who make the pursuit of this dream possible. Like I said, humbling.
A few days later we attended our first farmer’s market, the Wednesday evening market at Downs. We had never gone to this market before, but we’re so glad that we did. It’s a spectacular little market with loyal and enthusiastic customers. We can’t wait to go back this week.
It’s obviously a lot more work to foster all these relationships with our customers, but there is such a simple, profound satisfaction in knowing the the literal fruits of our labor are going to bring beauty to someone’s kitchen table or are going in their pots of boiling water to feed their family that night. People often ask us if we’re having fun with this stuff anymore. The simple answer is, well, no, not really. Most of the time it’s just a lot of really, really hard work. But I keep coming back to this: There’s a difference between fun and fulfilling. This farm is not all that fun sometimes, but the labor is certainly fulfilling. And don’t get me wrong, we’re having some fun around here too.
Some of our favorites growing on the farm right now include:
Flowers: Sunflowers, Nicotiana, Snapdragons, and Ammi Dara (black Queen Anne’s Lace)
Vegetables: Kale, Green Beans, and Zephyr summer squash
The farm stand will be open all day tomorrow, so stop by if you want some fresh veggies or flowers for your 4th of July celebrations. For the rest of the season, the farm stand will be open every Wednesday and Friday. Enjoy the holiday tomorrow, ya’ll!