Cheep Cheep!

Last weekend we had planned a trip up on Saturday to the property to go visit Grammie and Papa. As you remember, I had spent the afternoon the week before with my mom building a chicken tractor of sorts for her new chicks. She only got a few at the time and so suggested that I take the girls to the feed store that's right down the street and get some more chicks, since they were supposed to get some sexed laying pullets in.

Sophia was pretty sick the night before (I think she threw up more than 10 times in 24 hours!) and so I ended up staying home with her on Friday but then Tommy was there for part of the time too so I took Eleora to the feed store and we picked out some chicks! They were guaranteed 97% female so most likely we got no roosters in the bunch :) Eleora picked out a Barred Rock for hers (Her name is "My Black One") and I had wanted Auracanas and so I picked out one for me (Fluffy) and one for Sophia (Bolt). We also got two Buff Orpingtons (Buffy and Angel) and two Leghorns (Foghorn and Leghorn) and two Rhode Island Reds (Itchy & Scratchy). We got a heat lamp and put out a dish of water for them in a rubbermaid bin. The girl at the feed store was a doll and gave us some extra food since it was Friday and we wouldn't be getting them up to Grammie & Papas house until Saturday... so we got them a little dish of food and some shavings and they were quite comfortable.

Eleora had a blast, of course. Sophia also had lots of fun but she's such a flitterbug that she wasn't as focused... Eleora basically sat next to the chicks all afternoon and then the next morning.

On Saturday the chicks got to ride up between the two carseats in their little rubbermaid bin and so that was some nice extra entertainment for the girls. When we got there, we put them into the cage with the other chicks and they fit right in!

Sophia's investigating...












My girls and their chicks!

























Eleora loves "My Black One"












This is what she did... for hours. Talk about focus!












Ahh she was finally brave enough to hold My Black One on her lap!


















Look at me!













And just because it was so pitiful and cute, this is what I came home to on Thursday. Sophia had already thrown up about 5 times, so he finally just stripped her naked (since he kept changing her clothes) and laid her on him and she passed right out... I've never seen her do that. Poor thing! She woke up later and did the same thing with me for a few hours also up into about 5am Friday morning.













But by Friday night she was feeling like her saucy little self!

5-year plan update

I've got a couple blog posts to do here tonight or in the next few days so bear with me, but I'll try and keep it somewhat topical.

The biggest most exciting thing going on is not only is my husband almost finished with school (not even 2 months left!) but he has had several interviews for a company up in Colville that is looking for a Design Engineer. He's underqualified for the position but the fact is, it's RIGHT up his alley (they mfg wood stoves), it's 20 minutes away from where we want to build our home, and unlike many of their applicants he won't be looking for something else once the economy recovers.

They did put off the hiring for a bit so we won't hear back for another couple months but I am praying hard for this... those of my readers who also pray please pray for us! This job could mean big things, not only getting up there to the property quicker (we were thinking it could take 3-5 years after he's done with school) but the income, if we kept our standard of living the same, could allow us to build a home over a period of a few years with NO MORTGAGE. Of course, that's if things were at optimum conditions but I guess I'm trying to say that it would be AMAZING if we could get up there.

As of right now, my parents are up there and I am so jealous! They have gotten their Maremma sheepdogs, and the dogs are absolute gems. They also have a wire coop full of chicks! My mom and I spent an afternoon building the coop while the girls were napping on a day I happened to have off and she was here for the day. It was a wonderful day.

Which leads me to another topic... my emotional state right now is not very stable. I feel like me working has been unsustainable for so long emotionally and so I'm starting to run short. Kinda like an oil tank (anyone heat with oil?) when you run it and run it and it starts to get low, there's all kinds of stuff at the bottom of the tank that gunks it all up. That's kinda how I feel. I could sure use some prayers to lift my spirits also... it's becoming very difficult for me to drop my kids off with someone else and then go sit at a desk all day long.

A nice sunny weekend part 2

So as far as the rest of the weekend, this is mainly the part that I wish I had pics for. Both Saturday and Sunday were absolutely beautiful, no jacket needed sunny days. You know, it's funny, I think Eleora remembers gardening with me last year because she just jumped right in helping me.

The garden beds had shrunk quite a bit (of course) and I had put a bunch of leaves on them but needed to top them with compost in the spots I was going to plant garlic and onions. Planting garlic in the spring? Yes, I know, you are supposed to plant it in the fall, but I never got around to it and I have been SO burned out from work in the last 9 months or so that I had had zero energy after I get home or on the weekends to do ANYTHING besides try and stay caught up on dishes and laundry (and even that didn't get done).

So anyway, I was shoveling compost from the pile onto the garden spot where I was going to plant my garlic and of course Eleora immediately came over and got her little mint green trowel and started helping me... it was so cute! She loved watching the "warms" wiggle around in the compost and did a great job helping me plant the garlic cloves. I'd saved a couple of the biggest and fattest bulbs from last year so hopefully we'll do OK. Some of them were already starting to sprout in the bag. I do have a few volunteers from last year, must have been some that didn't quite make it up past the compacted leaf mulch. We'll see how those go!

The compost pile itself was pretty meager... I had stopped composting last year (sniff) because the neighbor's dog just loved to dig around in it (jumping the fence, same dog that left a dead SOMETHING - I think it was a mole - in my garden bed). Said neighbor has now moved out and so I am now free to compost again!

Sunday morning I dug out my box of seeds and the girls immediately zoned in on me. Sophia just had fun shaking the packets of peas to hear them rattle, but Eleora was a pretty intent student. Then we went out afterwards and I spread some potting soil for the onion bed (had run out of compost) and she helped me by carefully placing a seed into each hole. She is a very careful gardener... it's funny because last year she wasn't too much older than Sophia but Fia is just too busy running around and climbing on stuff outside to pay attention to what I am doing :) And that is OK, it's nice for them to be independent so that Tommy and I can do our work outside in the yard.

Last year I followed the instructions for onions which say to start them 6 weeks early indoors. Unfortunately, somehow I went wrong and those starts ended up so spindly. I did NOT do well with onions last year so this year I figured, we've been having amazing weather and a very mild winter overall (only an inch or two of snow!) and so I'll plant some seeds to see what happens. If all else fails, I can just get some sets to plant out in early May.

Then of course I completed my garden plan. This year's garden is more of an experiment than anything. I have a couple different kinds of pumpkin that I want to try out, some Litchi tomatoes, and lots of other fun things. I actually did not technically complete it because I don't know which varieties I'll be planting in all but I have it mostly done. I do have a schedule I made out (I even got a planner specifically for my garden this year) and so I can already tell you that next weekend is when I get to start my tomatoes & peppers! I got a soil blocker set this year so hopefully it won't be too hard for me to master it. I hated using the cups I did last year.

I already made my seed order a few months ago but some of those seeds were for "seed bank storage" and I lost the master inventory list that I made so now I get to go through them AGAIN and then I'll know which varieties I can grow. I think we'll have fun this year though! Probably in September I'll be done working so that will give us harvest time.

I'm also currently rooting some grape starts, Concord and Thompson Seedless. Those will be planted up on our family farm up north in a few months, along with a full complement of fruit trees this fall. I've also got some hardy kiwi seeds that I'll be starting so we'll see what will come of that! OH, and I'm also trying my hand at growing pineapples. One thing I would just LOVE is to have a big greenhouse full of tropicals.

When Tommy and I finalize the design for our home up at the property one of the "musts" is an attached greenhouse/sun room where I can grow small tropicals in pots. Did you know you can grow dwarf mango and avocado trees? I must admit working in the finance industry there are certain things that make me feel we have a not-so-firm footing. Specifically, the financial state of this country makes me concerned about the potential of bringing in food from other places. Sometimes that's good (eat local!) but sometimes that might not be fun, since I absolutely love bananas, mangos, avocados, and lots of other tropicals.

So my answer to that is to grow my own! We'll see :) Really, if I had a small greenhouse I could probably do it... we just need to find a good house plan to modify. And of course to pray that Tommy gets a job up north pretty quick when he's done with school.

And so I guess that's it for this post! Haha... Just wait. I sure can't!

Pictures from the Property

3 posts in one day! Oh my!

Ok actually it's really really slow at work today and my mom who is up at the property right now took some pictures and sent them to me. Specifically I asked her to send me pictures of the garlic but she sent me some others, so I thought I'd post them :)

Here's my first compost project. I actually had a whole bunch, about 30 pounds, of old rancid soap that I'd made. I wasn't going to use it, so this was my project to try and compost it. Supposedly soap will compost. As you can see, it's been spread out quite a bit. I imagine the wildlife have been picking through it a bit. I layered it lasagne-style with cardboard, rabbit manure, leaves and the soap. It's kind of an eyesore, but was fun!

Yeah yeah, just another forest picture, right? Well yeah, I guess so. But it's a pretty picture, huh! This is actually the spot (I think) where I will be clearing it out and making a meadow that will someday become a farm.

This is the view from our homesite. Isn't it beautiful? This photo was actually taken from down below at the "bench" but it shows the view the best. We'll probably top off or clear out some of those taller trees since there's plenty of woods behind us and that way it will not obstruct the view. I can't wait!

The weekend's work

So we went up to the property for the day on Saturday. Actually, a partial day. Eleora threw up a couple times on the way there and I think it wasn't just carsickness, but I think she had what Sophia had earlier this week. She seemed a bit better but lethargic, practically begged to take a nap later on. We ended up just going home around 3 after she woke up. But in the meantime it was great to tromp around on the property! We went around with my dad and brothers looking at the property lines and discussing home sites. Someday soon we'll need to start actually planning instead of discussing!

My garlic is looking fabulous up there! If you remember, last fall I planted a couple cloves of garlic and mulched them with old leaves. They survived and came up quite nicely. A little shorter than my garlic here, but the winter lasts a bit longer up there than it does down here. I'd say the garlic was at least 6-8 inches tall already. You can see in the pictures that it's definitely doing well. I'm just glad deer don't eat garlic! I did plant 5 cloves and only 4 seem to have come up but that's not bad.
I also had a couple bags of really badly sprouted potatoes. Not really good for anything but planting or composting, so I took them up there and Mom will find a place and plant them. Who knows what will come from that!

So then we came home and had a nice quiet evening. Eleora was feeling better on the way home, as indicated by the near-constant "Old Petonald hadda farm, EIEIO" we heard ;) Fia slept the whole way home. Eleora was still not 100% but at least she was feeling better... though it was an early bedtime for both girls. Eleora didn't even want to read books - she asked to go to bed right away. Weird!

Sunday was a really nice day. I took Eleora to Lowe's in the morning and we got some more annuals for my brick planter, some more shop lights with bulbs, a small charcoal BBQ, a timer for the faucet outside, some grass seed to patch the spot under the spruce tree, etc. It was a nice trip for us and we had fun :) I don't usually go to the chain stores, I prefer going to the locally owned Ace or Big R but Lowe's had these bulbs for the shop lights that supposedly have the same spectrum as sunlight. Same price as regular bulbs, I think around $6.75 for 2 of them. So, we'll try those out and see how we do. I have TONS of potting up to do and STILL didn't get my seeding done.

HOWEVER, in spite of the fact I didn't get my direct seeding done, I did get something major done. I wish I could take pictures but the stupid camera... nuff said. Anyway, my biggest issue was that I didn't have dividers for the square feet on my beds. The thing is, my beds are not perfectly square footed, if that's even a term. They are 3.75'x7.5' and so a couple sections are not quite a foot wide. Because of that, I don't want to "eyeball" each section because I KNOW I'd be off. I was trying to think of the best way to get some dividers, and CHEAP.

What I decided to do was this: I measured out my increments on the beds themselves and marked them. I took my biggest drill bit (about 1/3 inch or so) and drilled holes into the beds about a half inch below the top. I then just threaded and wove my string (got a roll of polyester mason's twine at Lowe's for $1.65) through the holes. It looks neat and tidy, and the best thing - it makes it VERY inconvenient for the cat to use the beds as his LITTER BOX. I'll take a photo as soon as I can because it's VERY cool. Now I have all the beds sectioned off, and my half sections are nicely marked as well. My neighbor commented on how organized I am about this. Well... if anything in my life can be organized I guess it could be this!

Other than that, I still have tons of potting up to do but I'm really trying to be relaxed about it. The truth is we do have a pretty long season here so it isn't like NOW OR DIE. It's ok if it takes me longer. It's OK if I have to wait another week or so to plant carrots. My garden will be fine. This is my first one ever, for crying out loud! The point is to have fun with my girls and to grow good food.

I think all this beautiful weather is mellowing me out :) We also did get some more annuals - I got some white impatiens and some purple alyssum to plant in the brick planter, and then we also got some magenta and purple primroses for the side flowerbed. I think the brick planter is pretty full... it's going to be so gorgeous this summer when everything is grown up. Eleora had fun helping me water in the plants. Then we grilled brats for dinner. All in all, it was a really nice day.

Sick days

So yesterday I ended up taking the day off work to stay home with Sophia who was sick. She's feeling much better now but the really fun part of staying home with a sick kid (especially when they sleep a lot) is doing all the domestic stuff I don't normally get to do! It's weird how much more fulfilled I am when I can spend a day doing that, rather than working, even though I really do love my job. So all in all, I have to say I really do enjoy when I'm forced to take a sick day for the kids.

So yesterday we did a little grocery shopping, and the store had some annuals there so I was able to plant some shade loving annuals in my brick planter railing that surrounds the patio. I got some alyssum, lobelia and pansies. My sweet peas are coming up very nicely.

I also was able to get laundry done, clean up the house and make a home-cooked meal. Sure was nice! I'd been lamenting to Tommy about how lately I've lost my cooking inspiration. I don't know if it's just being out of practice but even on the weekends when I'm home to cook, I go for the quick things like grilled cheese, etc. It's like I can never think of anything to cook or even anything to buy groceries to cook. So we talked about it, he refreshed me on a couple things I used to make a lot that he misses. One was my potato corn chowder, so I made that yesterday. I made it with kielbasa sausage, potatoes, corn, celery and of course garlic & onion in homemade chicken stock. It was excellent (I also bought some french bread at the store, didn't have time to make my own bread for the meal) and I'm currently eating some leftovers for lunch.

We're going to the Property on Saturday for a day trip. I've got a bunch of sprouted potatoes in the basement that are beyond use but I'll take them there, plant them, and who knows! I'm not sure if the deer will eat the potatoes but it's either that or the compost pile, so we might as well experiment and see what happens. I also am dying to check on the garlic I planted last fall. The stuff I planted here is growing like crazy. The Inchelium Red variety that I had is actually native to that area. It was found on the Colville Indian reservation, and our property is about a 10 minute drive from the city of Colville.

Growing for Market

I got my first Growing for Market magazine yesterday! It came with a cool book with lots of ideas of how to increase your income for market year-round. I haven't looked at it yet, carefully set it aside for tonight. Tommy (hopefully) will be going out tonight to see a friend and so that leaves me with my magazine and a hot cup of tea :)

I keep thinking that soon I'm going to actually start working on my business plan. I think I might want to keep track of everything I put into the garden, even though it's going to be mostly for home use, but that's where everything will come from. Even just a one or two page plan at this point I think will help me stay organized and focused. I have so many ideas and they are just all over the place, so it would be good to get them all down on paper and think up some sort of timeframe.

Phoenix Oyster Mushrooms

My mom and I decided to cultivate some edible mushrooms up on our property. The acreage has been selectively logged and so there are all these piles of wastewood all over. We'll try and use as much firewood as we can from them, but there is so much fallen dead wood that it would take forever. So I thought it would be fun to do mushrooms!

I just ordered some spawn for the Phoenix Oyster mushroom. The logs are mostly conifer types, and those do well on the softwoods. I ordered from Fungi.com and I also decided to get a couple ounces of their MycoGrow to mix in with my seed starting mix this year.

Here's the description from the website:

This member of the Tree Oyster family thrives on conifer stumps and logs, especially spruces and fir; after incubating the logs may be partially buried, vertically-oriented, to conserve water during fruiting. This species enjoys warm climates, producing large, white-beige mushrooms.

The cool thing about Oyster mushrooms is that they are very difficult to ship, therefore any locally produced mushrooms would fetch a premium price. We won't be selling any for a while, but it will be a good option for us when the time comes if we're able to grow them. We also might try Chicken Of The Woods. I'd love to grow shiitakes but they need oak trees and I have none.

more ordering and Wola cuteness

This morning I used the $25 off $25 GardensAlive coupon my mom got me. I got a floating row cover, long enough to cover 3 of my beds, some organic houseplant fertilizer (for my plants at work) and some soil inoculant. I'm sure my soil in the beds is fine, with all the compost, manure, leaves, etc, that's in there (and I plan on moving my worms into the garden beds when it warms up a bit also) but for the started plants I wanted to get some mycorrhizae into the starter mix. I hope this will work!

This morning when we were going out to the truck Wola was walking on the hard packed snow in the yard like she always does. When I came to get her she said "Careful, don't fall down and get owies!" She's so cute when she copies us... :)

Garden planning for 2009

So I've started to formulate my plan for what I am going to plant. I even have a little sketch on graph paper of what plants go in which place in my garden. I'm doing square foot gardening combined with intensive planting, companion planting and sheet composting. I have roughly 165 square feet to plant.

I am going to order all my seeds except potatoes from Baker Creek this year. Potatoes I'll probably get from Seed Saver's Exchange. I like Baker Creek a lot - they have a good selection but not too much that overwhelms me. Since I want to be a market gardener, I want to try out some varieties that I think will be good for markets. I was, though, having problems restraining myself... I had to pare down the order quite a bit. I'm sure every other gardener reading this will understand! But besides the selection, I like them because they are committed to not selling any genetically modified seed - it's all untreated, open pollinated and heirlooms. In addition, they even do GMO testing on all their seeds that are more subsceptible to GMO contamination. Corn is a big one - corn pollen can travel for miles on the wind... and unfortunately, if the corn you have been saving seed from for years becomes contaminated by GMO pollen from a farmer who is miles and miles away, you are all the sudden liable and could be sued by Monsanto for copyright infringement. I know it sounds nuts... but sadly enough it has happened and put more than one small farmer out of business.

So I decided that I'm just going to buy seeds this year and I'm going to build a grow rack for my basement to start all my long-season plants like peppers, tomatoes, melons, etc. Considering the fact that I'll only use one or two of each, and I'll end up with about 20-30 seeds, I'm going to plant ALL of them and sell the extras on craigslist. I do plan on selling plant starts as a part of my business plan in the long run anyway. I thought about buying a soil blocker but I think I'm just going to fold newspaper pots origami-style and sell them in those. They decompose in the soil and are free!

I'm not sure what I'm going to use for my soil mix - I know I'll use compost, worm castings, leaf mold, mycorrhizae inoculant, and then maybe soil-less starting mix and throw it all together. I'll build my rack out of some costco wire shelving and it should fit 8 flats for 1 shelf. So we'll see how that goes!

So far, here's my plant list:
Blue Lake Bush Beans
Purple Sprouting Broccoli
regular head broccoli
Amarillo Carrot (Yellow)
Cosmic Purple Carrot
Snow White Carrot
Shin Kuroda Carrot (orange baby type)
Richmond Green Apple Cucumber
Snow's Fancy Pickling Cucumber
Rocky Top Salad Mix
Million Dollar Melon (green fleshed)
Charentais Melon (orange fleshed)
Flat of Italy onion
Australian Brown onion
Crimson Forest Scallion (red)
Oregon Sugar Pod Peas
Purple Jalapeno
Quadrato bell pepper (yellow)
Mini Red Stuffer peppers
White Hailstone Radish
Early Globe Radish
Chinese Red Meat Radish
Purple Plum Radish
Bloomsdale Spinach
Jarrahdale Pumpkin (pie type)
Dad's Sunset tomato (orange)
Principe Borghese tomato (red paste type)
Siletz tomato (early red type)
Land Race Currant Tomato (tiny cherry type)
Tomatillo Verde
Genovese Basil
Oregano
Flatleaf Parsley
Parsley Root
Chives
Borage
Slow-bold Cilantro
Orange Hawaii Marigold
Empress of India Nasturtium
Blue Reflections Sweet Pea

Phew! That's a lot of seeds! That's the order I plan, I'll actually place it later and we'll see what I end up getting, since I'm sure some of these will be out of stock.

Trip up to the property

On Saturday we went for a day trip up to the property. My parents and my sister both have trailers up there and were camping, but I didn't want to stay since it would get cold and T had a lot of homework to finish. Eleora had a blast up there! I took a bunch of pictures of the place so that you could see the future place. The parcel I chose is more wooded, and so I'll be doing a lot of clearing out, but it's absolutely perfect.

Here we are on our property! Sophia was asleep when we took the picture, so she isn't in it. Isn't it a beautiful view? I can't wait to look out my kitchen window and see that! So basically, to reiterate... my parents bought this 120 acre piece of land and each of us siblings has chosen a parcel and we will buy it from them and build on it. Most of us are planning on living there full-time at some point except the youngest, she's still not sure. It's a gorgeous spot, and the beauty is that we each liked a different piece and so there was no arguing about which spot. Each of us will have 20 acres and so plenty of space around us but we'll still be close by each other.

This all came about because when I was young, we lived out in the semi-country on a little acreage. There were several houses all grouped together, my cousins in one. I remember that time so well, and I had such a wonderful life when we lived there... catching tadpoles, eating peas from the garden, playing in the mud, swinging on the rope swing, running around with the dog, you name it. I wanted that life for my children! As we all began to discuss things we realized that all of us siblings wanted the same thing for our kids. So we decided that we would all move up there, giving each other enough space to do their own thing, but being close enough that our kids could grow up together. It's important to me that my kids grow up in the country, and I'm excited for the day that we can move up there. If we're lucky, we might be able to get up there in about 5 years or so.

The northwest view
This is a flat "bench" area that is right north of the homesite. The homesite overlooks the valley, but right below is a longish flat area that will be perfect for greenhouses or maybe an orchard someday.

This is the southwest view of the place You can see the bench down below a bit - it's the lighter, un-shaded area before the trees start.Looking back down the driveway
The southwest view
This is the campsite that will someday be the homesite.


I brought up a couple cloves of my garlic to plant. The soil up there is fantastic! We'll see what happens.

Here's me with my little helper planting the garlicShe's bringing leaves over to the garlic to mulch it. Isn't she cute?
And the mulched pile. I planted the garlic all within about a square foot (5 cloves) and then I stuck the stick up to mark the spot. With the leaf mulch it ended up looking like a shallow grave... :)

This is actually directly south of where our home will be located - at the highest point on the bluff.
Partly cleared area - this will all be a part of my growing space someday. Right by the second tree on the left is where I planted my garlic.
Our new wheels! It's a Honda CR-V, we just got it on Friday. It sure is nice to drive a vehicle that isn't all rickety and feeling like it will fall apart any minute! Thank you, Granddad!
Eleora loved the swing - the men put in a playground for the kids since we have so many young kids in our family. It's a really great thing for them when we are all camping up there!
She also had fun in the dirt

Here's Eleora planting wildflower seeds with her Grammie :) Oh, and Snick the dog...

This is actually a photo of what will be my brother's parcel, but it was a cool picture so I wanted to include it.
And here's the pasture - the closest part will be my brother's and then further along will be my parents' part - the parcels run parallel to each other.


So there you have it! It'll be nice to take pictures in the springtime - all the grass is brown and dying right now but the place is so gorgeous in the springtime - everything greens right up and there's so many flowers everywhere!

Who is Uncle Dutch?

Uncle Dutch was actually my Grandfather. Otto "Dutch" Noetzelman was born in 1921 in Kearney, Nebraska. His parents, Rudolph and Anna Noetzelmann, were German immigrants who had settled on a farm (N Lazy A) in Lewellen, Nebraska. The youngest of nine children, Otto was 21 years younger than his oldest sibling, Ed.

Granddad left the farm in 1940 and went out into the world. He married a beautiful woman, Jeanne, and together they had two children, one of whom is my father, Jim. Otto served in the Navy as a pilot and retired with the rank of Commander in 1967. He lived a full life and I loved him very much. He passed away in April of this year, and I miss him. Most of his nieces and nephews called him "Uncle Dutch," and so have I named my farm.

A few years ago, I came across a property listing for acreage in NE WA. I was mostly just "window shopping," since I was nowhere near being able to buy property at the time, not to mention I lived in Colorado at the time. The property listing was so beautiful that I emailed it to my mother, who also likes to "window shop" properties.

Oddly enough, my parents ended up buying that acreage. Each of my three siblings have come behind the venture and we all want to have our own part in what has now become the "new" N Lazy A Ranch. In a few years, Tommy & I will buy 20 of the 120 acres they purchased and we will end up living on that property. One of my dreams is to be able to support our family through sustainable agriculture. The parcel of land we have picked out is beautiful, the soil is rich and dark, and it is perfect for what I had in mind. I may just do market gardening, or we may do a CSA. Tommy may be involved, or he may work full-time. But one thing I did know, I was going to have a mini-farm.

I decided to name my farm after Granddad not only because I loved him very much but also because the legacy of the original N Lazy A farm came from him, and while he never went back in to farming, I will never forget the tomatoes he grew in his yard when I was a small child. He was a big impact to my life and I wanted to remember him in my own way. N Lazy A will be the overall name for the property, but Uncle Dutch Farms will be the name for my farm within N Lazy A.

Of course, more pictures are good, right? Here are some pictures of the original N Lazy A.

hay!

The farmhouse

Granddad with the pigs

Granddad in the veggies at age 2