We’re back in Mac after a whirlwind final visit to Bellingham to pick up the rest of our belongings. I also defended my Master’s thesis (and passed!). While were in town, we had a wonderful dinner with the community at Cedarville Farm (where we used to work). We were sad to leave our friends, but once we arrived back in Oregon Casey and I both realized again how excited we are to be here. Bellingham is a unique place, but we have more opportunities for growth (and, eventually, community) here in the valley.
Since we’ve been back on the farm, we’ve sown more flowers and all of our cucumbers, melons, zucchini, and winter squash. We’ve also been taking care of more business-y types of things: insurance (blah), bank accounts, etc. And, we’re finally acting on our belated realization that the Allis can’t be our ‘everything tractor’ (at least not on this land). So, today we’re investigating the possibility of buying a second tractor. We had been putting this off, hoping we could get through our first season without a real, modern tractor. But we’d be fairly limited. And the money is in the bank for such a purpose—we were just hoping to wait until we had more padding from the summer. We’re fairly attached to our savings account, and it’s disappearing fast. But we’re also slowly getting more and more CSA forms and checks in the mail, and we have money from the Haygrove refund.
I guess it’s true: you have to spend money to make money.
Anyhow, the decision to purchase a tractor is complicated by the fact that everyone is out buying tractors right now. Our choices for used compact tractors are therefore limited, and we’re really scared that we’ll make the wrong decision and buy a dud or something. I’m sure we’ll be fine, but it’s big.
