Our garden has been the biggest project this year by far. Even as we work into October we have been enjoying a few strawberries while harvesting herbs and veggies from the garden. The rabbits continue to eat plenty of kale but as the moisture levels increase we have been harvesting, dehydrating and storing herbs by the arm loads to beat the mold. (Thank you, Lord for the abundance!)
We have been using the herbs in a number of oils, enjoyed plenty of tea, made some supplement capsules, Lil Miss made herself some special hair oil, and we are planning more tincture combinations.  Additionally, we are harvesting enough to add to animal feeds throughout the winter months.
We have also taken down our hoop house (mold city-my poor tomatoes!) and will be relegating it's use (in a dryer area of the property) to hay storage, while it's former home becomes the new berry patch. Raspberries and Marion berries will be filling in a substantial area, creating an edible garden hedge, while our expanding strawberry bed will be moving to their past location. We are so pleased that the strawberries have produced many runners for our expansion and Miss Judy, also needing to thin her plot, is generously passing more our way. What a blessing!
Additionally, we have been extending our hugelkultur to completely run the dry paddock and nearly connect with our first h.k. This will be the new home for our fruit trees and squash for next year - a beginning food forest! It will hopefully be a far better area for the trees to actually get enough sun to fruit! Certainly the abundance of mineral rich compost and continual moisture from rotten logs will add to the growth potential. We sincerely hope next year will be our best harvest yet!

Hopefully this will give you a general idea for making your own hugelkultur beds! They are a superior sustainable approach and with the wacky weather, will make it much easier to ensure our berries have plenty of moisture during the trying months of summer. Those dead wood chunks act as sponges, slowly releasing minerals and water into the soil only the searching roots will find tucked underneath the soil.

Remember the swarm of bees we brought home and an extracted hive Dad carefully removed from an abandoned church building; only to have them both swarm again and leave? Both bee families have settled high in two different very tall trees. The hive from town in our neighbor's tree bordering our garden and the other, in the woods - both with easy access to an abundance of flowering plants and several clean springs for water. They know how to pick the perfect location!
Although we cannot harvest the honey, we are blessed to have them happily pollinate all they want and it is a treat to hear their harmonious hum as they bumble about the gardens and native plants, even late into the season.

I couldn't capture, with Dad's phone, all the humming on this large Sedum as there were far more than each photo shows...How many bees can you find?

To accompany these items we will also offer some of Jr. Farmer's newest creations....
Hand turned crochet hooks!
He has been enjoying several wood working projects and wanted to make special pieces for this event, including his popular wood buttons.
Lil' Miss has been carding more of her beautiful fiber batts with fall flare so you can create in even more color schemes!
Tech, with his Notably Notched creations, is offering some of his carvings that took blue ribbons at the fair, for anyone who may be looking for the perfect enhancement to their craft room or a unique gift!
All of this means you have plenty of amazing options for beautiful, hand-made creations! Everyone is contributing and we look forward to being able to see so many new and known faces to chat and share fiber related fun!

We hope to see you there!



To learn more check out our post here and you can take a peak at last years event with a little video Tech did below: