Can it be spring, finally?

Meet this week’s vegetables:

  • Red leaf lettuce — How grateful are we this year for our two field houses? Very! In this exceptionally wet and cold spring (so say all the old timers), it’s hard to imagine not having our field greenhouses. They’ve been so heartening on the drizzly days when we were once again not working up our fields — meanwhile the greenhouses were full of growing things, including lots and lots of lettuce. You’ve been enjoying some of that lettuce in the recent batches of salad mix, and this week we have heads of red leaf lettuce for your salads!
  • Broccoli — The over-wintered broccoli is on! There’s enough this week for everyone to get some, and there should be more in the coming weeks as well! Hoorah!
  • Cabbage rapini
  • Cabbage
  • Parsnips
  • Potatoes
  • Leeks
  • Garlic

I am sitting here early on Monday evening, writing the newsletter for this week’s CSA share. The door is open, letting sounds, smells and a temperate breeze in from outside. Through the screen door, I can hear sheep bleating, a lawn mower blazing through tall grass, birds singing — the sounds of spring!

Here on the farm, we know better than to take this break in the rain as an “all clear” (truly dry weather can’t be relied on until late June in these parts), but seeing as how this week’s forecasted dry spell is the first we’ve had since February (!), we are rejoicing in the change!

Rusty and I have been taking walks first thing every morning for the last few weeks. When we started this new routine, I thought spring was here and that we’d likely be dry and comfortable more often than not. Instead, we’ve faced some very frigid and cold weather and had to bundle up and brace ourselves most mornings.

Today was a refreshing change from that routine — it was still chilly, but the sun quickly warmed up the air and everything felt different with the promise of the day.

The island feels different today too. When it rains in April, things remain very quiet here. A few days ago, I watched a farmer start up his tractor in the rain and turn his cherry blast sprayer on, seeming just to make sure it’s still working for when the actual spray day arrives. Other than that, there has been almost no ambient noise except the occasional car of a commuter on or off the island.

Today, though, the island woke up. Tractors pulled sprayers through orchards for real, and giant disks were hauled onto the island in preparation for soil dry enough to work. And, of course, lawnmowers came out and filled the air with the noise and smell of cut grass (normally I dislike the sound of lawnmowers, but today it was a welcome change!).

We’re looking forward to doing some actual tractor work later this week. Once we heard about the forecast for the week, we started shifting around our tasks to make Thursday and Friday as clear and open as possible so that we can hopefully begin catching up. The garlic needs to be cultivated; fields need to be disked and tilled; and someday we need to plant the thousands and thousands of plants covering every surface of our hot houses.

Even though it’s been rough, this spring has been good in some ways. As I mentioned previously, Casey and I have been finishing some big household projects that overflowed from our winter plans (we don’t move as fast as we did pre-Rusty, which can make estimating timelines tricky!). Hopefully this week will mark the end of the biggest remaining projects, and Casey is burning the midnight oil to get it mostly done before the fields call him away for good until fall.

But, in the meantime, the rain has, in a way, given him the opportunity to get this far on the projects without making him choose between home projects and farm work. When it’s pouring outside, there is no decision to make, especially with Jesse and Emily taking care of what could be done.

So, this week hopefully will mark a turning point in our season — from trying to juggle farm and home tasks to single-focus on the farm; from wet, cold weather to mixed spring weather (including sun and dry days!); from waiting to working; from anticipation to action. This is our hope for this week, and we eagerly await the gifts the season has in store for us and for all of you! Peas! Carrots! Spring onions! So many treats await all of us!

Enjoy this week’s vegetables!

Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla

P.S. We still have room in our Newberg and Mac CSAs this year! If you have friends or neighbors who are interested, have them check the website: www.oakhillorganics.org. The sign-up deadline has been extended to the end of April!

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