Lots and Lots of Work!

Since my last post we have made a lot of progress on the farm...  Hippity Hop Farm is officially born!
We were able to acquire two telephone poles from Geoff's boss, who also let us use the backhoe to put them in!  Thanks Ben!
Here are the photos of us putting up the hop poles a few weeks ago:

That's Geoff in the backhoe digging the first of the holes for the posts to go into.

In goes the pole!

So proud of his work!

Filling in the hole...

Surveying the glory of the poles.  There are three in all to support a 60 foot row of hop plants.

We then measured out our spacing and made a trench to plant the rhizomes in.

Covering up the rhizomes...

Our finished row!  We planted 22 hop rhizomes this year, Tettnang, East Kent Goldings and Cascade hops.

Here they are coming up the next week!

And here we have a hop plant that is about 2-3 weeks past planting date.  As of this morning we had 20/22 emerged! We are relieved they're doing well since the roots lived in the refrigerator so long they started to mold a little.

This week we will receive our order from FarmTek with all of the hardware we need to set up the trellises.  We're so looking forward to having all the infrastructure in place!

We used the backhoe on the same day we put up the hop poles to take out the sod in the new garden area.  Then we hauled two truckloads of bunny manure over and unloaded it on the garden (by hand, oof).  We planted all of the seeds the weekend after the hops went in.  So far we have a little friend who likes to dig up the onions at night... we plan to fence him out ASAP but otherwise the garden is going pretty well.

Sweet corn coming up last week, it is now all up in rows and growing quickly from all the rain we have had!

Our black beans were some of the first things to come up as well, and we now have almost a full row.  The purple beans came up a little later.

The plants in the greenhouse are getting lots of fresh air since we took the cover off the greenhouse a few weeks ago.  It was getting way too hot in there to keep it cool during the day.

We have been eating fresh peas for a week or so now.  The pea plants are as tall as I am almost!

I'm on my third harvest of radishes already, they're so pretty.  I used a tri-colored seed mix from Johnny's for these and I love them!

My giant sea of broccoli plants... I think I may have put them too close together!  They're just starting to form heads this week.  Some critter is eating up all the leaves on these.  Hopefully the fence going up will help.

I found out that I planted way too much lettuce, we are eating salad every day and barely staying ahead of these rows!

Brandywine tomato plant that was transplanted to the greenhouse in late April.  I probably should slap a cage on that!

We have found out very quickly how much work it is to start up a hobby farm!  We have been doing an unbelievable amount of work trying to get everything going.  Up above is a view of the farm from the road, you can see the hop poles in the back to the left of the barn.  The greenhouse and garden are right in front of those.  Upcoming projects, we've got lots!  We plan to re-roof the shed in front of the barn, fence the garden and greenhouse (working on that now), trellis the hops, and start raising meat rabbits!  I'd say we have a busy summer ahead of us... 

Spring Done Sprung

Over the last few months we have been busy brewing a lot of beer!  Since January 1st we have made somewhere around 50 gallons of beer in 10 different batches...  Geoff and I have been really enjoying this hobby, and of course it's benefits (as much beer as we could possibly drink/give away).  Visitors to our house are never wanting for something to drink either, so if you'd like to come visit you know we'd take great care of you ;)  The current brew list includes vanilla java porter, ginger rye ale, chai milk stout, pumpkin pie ale, and soon there will be hazelnut milk stout, cinnamon apple wheat, and a very hoppy pale ale.

Last month we purchased 22 hop rhizomes and are working on getting our hop trellises up!  Hopefully that happens very soon, we are losing time!  Geoff has been working a lot with planting, and I haven't quite figured out how to put in a telephone pole on my own so... we've been a bit delayed.

The greenhouse has become my favorite thing to work on while Geoff is working away from home.  I've been eating some delicious greens out of there for a few weeks now and I was able to harvest a handful of radishes also.  The plants are doing great so far!

This is the garlic, which was the first thing I planted in the greenhouse last fall.  It is waist high on me and getting close to harvest time!  

A sideways shot of the second planting of radishes, there are two more rows planted this week also that aren't up yet.

I don't get why these photos keep being sideways... but OK.  A bunch of the multiplier onions my mom gave us last fall.  

The micro greens mix we've been eating for a month now, still going strong!

Carrots I planted months ago that I thought were lost forever started coming up last week!

My beautiful broccoli plants.  The first bunch I transplanted froze in early April, so I started a bunch more from seed and they all made it!

Snap peas on their trellis are growing very fast!

Recently transplanted brandywine tomatoes, the first transplants froze last week because I was dumb and didn't cover them...

Newly potted basil plants have been living in the hoop house this week since the weather has been warm enough at night.   We will be making oodles of pesto this summer :)

The lone rosemary plant.

Tiny lettuce planted about two weeks ago.

Recently transplanted pepper plant, I only put out two as an experiment...

I'm hoping to get the outdoor garden in in the next couple of weeks... I already feel behind.  The busy time of year is coming up, let's hope the next time I update I'll have a great looking garden!  The plastic has to come off the hoop house pretty soon too, it's getting pretty hot in there during the day now.  

We are toying with the idea of a summer brew party at our place this summer, maybe end of July?  We will have plenty of home brew, venison, and home grown veggies to go around :)  A band would be a great addition and we're working on that.  People would be welcome to come out on a Saturday and camp out, we have plenty of space!  If you're interested in something like this let us know!

Come on Spring!

Well I've certainly been slacking off on the whole blogging thing...
Now that the holidays are well over I feel like updating again!
We spent Christmas with our families in Wayland and Rockford, and received many vegetable and hop gardening books from friends and family.  We have been spending lots of time researching in preparation for our first growing season!

Here is our little family at my parents' house on Christmas :)

And the family portrait for the year, it was a small Christmas celebration this year but still nice.

The only way to get the dog in the picture was to hold up a treat for her...

For Christmas Geoff and I got a new couch (who cares right?), and a BREWING KIT!  We started with our first batch, a milk stout, on New Year's day.  It is due to be finished in a week or two so I'll have to let you know later how that turns out.  We figure if we're going to be growing hops we'd better know how to use them!

We've also been trying to get to know the local beer scene here a little better.  Here we are on a recent trip to Mount Pleasant Brewing Co.  I had a peanut butter stout that was pretty decent, and Geoff had a Hobo's Breath Brown ale that he really liked.

The greenhouse is actually starting to be fun now!  Since I got it built it's been just sitting there making me anxious to plant in it.  In the last couple of weeks I've been preparing my soil for planting in the beginning of February.  The garlic I planted in the fall has started to come up!  I also have broccoli started in the house along with peas which haven't come up yet.

Next month I hope to post pictures of new veggies growing in the greenhouse :)

Geoff has been working on cleaning out the mess that was left in the barn by the last inhabitants.  There was a giant mound of hay, lumber and other junk out there making our space useless.  Since the beginning of January he has made a lot of progress in there, and plans to make a disc golf course indoors.

Here's hoping everyone had a great holiday season!

THE GREENHOUSE IS DONE!!!
Check it out!
Designed and built by Geoff and I almost entirely of salvaged materials!  We did have to buy some bolts and a little plastic, but this baby cost us under $100!

 On Sunday I got a surge of motivation/frustration and decided it was getting DONE!  Angel helped watch me work for hours in the yard!

 The view from the back, it's 18 feet long and 12 feet wide.

 The door came from the old Cheney house, and all the wood was found in the barn/along the road

The view from the front door!

 Angel displaying her work...

I'm so excited that it's done!
Also... Geoff wanted me to put this gem on the blog:  I don't know how to move the video over here so here's a link. https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10102665668470834

Yet another month has flown by!  Last month we had a great time at Wheatland Music Festival!  Thanks dad for the tickets!

Geoff moved in last month on the 21st, and started his new job the same day!  He has been working a LOT of hours and we haven't had much time to do anything for a while...  50+ hours a week has taken it's toll.  He has been harvesting sugar beets and corn, learning the mechanics of semi trucks and lots of stuff about farming.

Up until Becky and Duncan's wedding we were super busy, Geoff with writing the ceremony, and I with wedding showers, bachelorette party and helping set up for the wedding itself.  The wedding went really well, Geoff did a great job marrying them!  The ceremony was lots of fun and we are both relieved our duties are over! :)  We can't believe we forgot to get a picture of us at the wedding, I guess we were really busy!

Angel celebrated her 9th birthday this month!  She had a great time celebrating at Becky and Duncan's wedding.

I've been out bow hunting a fair amount and have seen quite a few deer.  I only had one day that I had a shot at anything and it was a big buck!  I hit him and tracked him for hours and never found him :(  Since then it's been hard to get in the woods with all the rain, I'm still hoping to get at least one deer this year though.

The greenhouse has FINALLY seen some progress:

Last Saturday we built all the trusses and erected them.  That was quite a bit of work as the plans I drew up were just a hair off, so I wound up having to figure out angles and lengths on the fly, and then just duplicate them.  The first one turned out a little wonky, but the rest were near perfect.  This week I started putting in a brick platform at the entry door, and put on a couple more horizontal pieces to support the plastic from tearing through at the corners.  The plastic needs to be on by the weekend, so we have a bit more work to do to close in the ends and all the gaps at the bottom by then, but we are making fast progress on it.  It may be too late to plant this year, I'm not sure.  I'm sure my mom will tell me though!  

I planted garlic there this month as well, our first crop is in the ground!  Here's hoping it grows well!

Geoff really wants to put up a video of us performing Love Shack at the Ithaca Winery... maybe next time!  Now you have something to look forward to?

Wow!  It's been a busy month for us both!  I have been working way too much in my opinion because of the harvest coming in and Geoff has been stressed out with his transition to living here.

We have made some progress on the greenhouse, but not enough.  We tore up all the sod in the greenhouse and shook the dirt out of it, which was pretty backbreaking but totally worth it.  My garden wizard mom lent us her broadfork, which made it possible to lift the sod out and shake the good dirt and worm castings out while getting rid of all the nasty quack grass rhizomes.

The finished product looked really awesome!  I got a load of bunny manure on labor day weekend and put a layer on top of the dirt.  As soon as we get the trusses up, we will be ready to plant.  We had better get them up SOON though, we are quickly running out of time.

We also picked up a bunch of really nice local garlic at the farmer's market and plan to plant it soon.  Our first crops will soon be in the ground!

The same weekend we tore up the sod we had a bonfire fueled by the old house:

The last couple of weekends have been busy with Wheatland Music Festival and a friend's wedding, and this weekend Geoff makes the move!  He got a job here with a friend who has a crop farming business and will be starting right away.  We are very excited and just a little stressed!  In the meantime all of the corn around the house has come down and I'm getting ready for bow-season.  We are both preparing for our good friends' wedding, which Geoff will be officiating and I will be maid of honor in!  We are both REALLY hoping things calm down soon!