Emerald Aisle Farm Update

Emerald Aisle Farm is a very small working farm.  We are not entirely self sufficient.  The three of us currently living here do not all have the same agenda.  Happiness is the common denominator and a desire to eat with an eye toward our health and energy.

My name is Carmen.  I was widowed in 2005 at the age of 47.   I kept the small farm where I had spent the previous 29 years of my life.  I married John Stevens in September of 2008.  He came to this lifestyle willingly but with postage stamp yard experience for a home lifestyle.  I brought my sick grandson Matt, home with me just before Christmas of 2013.  He too came willingly.

My first goal is to create a steady income that will allow me to keep my farm.  Improving the farm comes later in the list.   If I can keep the farm then those of us who choose to live here have the opportunity to grow vegetables, chickens, and a healthier perspective.  John's goal is to retire so that he might have a stronger relationship with televised sports.  Matt's goal is to survive and find a medication that will help him do that in a way that he too will be able to earn a living.  Matt was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis.  He was sick a very long time before getting medical attention and some of that attention only created bills that went into collections.

The three of us together create a team that makes it appear to us as if the best is yet to come.  John brings a boat, fishing, and excellent cooking to the group.  Matt brings a youthful 19 year old point of view and elasticity of body when the meds are working.  He has embraced his own garden spaces nurturing a nearly black rose that turned out to really be a pale reflection of a sunrise.   His peas are lovingly entwined on the fence and propped with bits of wire and stick so that they may reach for the sky.  He voluntarily feeds the chickens and helps to catch the pigs when they escape.  I bring the farm and an innate resourcefulness that is both an asset and a problem into the equation.  I would make an excellent female McGyver if I had just a little bit more education.  I create possibilities with what appears to be nothing and can take an impossible tangle of junk and come up with more ideas than are reasonable.  I simply make things happen.  I will start and run all manner of equipment without needing or wanting to be an expert.  John has a bit of an eye for pretty and Matt does too.  Matt lines things up in sets and makes things look orderly.  He also can eliminate junk without wondering what that could be turned into.  John sees straight lines, reads gauges, thermometers, & the newspaper.

The farm stand I started last year 1/4 mile off of the paved road draws adventurous customers.  The chickens are too young to lay eggs yet and my dogs act as if every guest is an intruder.  I made $2 yesterday at the farm stand but had a long and enjoyable visit with guests and was able to work on some of the infrastructure.  With Matt helping me this year I can run back into the house and use the computer as needed.

We have added an aquarium to the shared interests category.  All three of us enjoy it, while I do the most cleaning, Matt does most of the feeding and research, and John buys most of the bits that Matt and I cannot afford.  Recently I dragged an old aquarium out of the garden that I had been using as a mini greenhouse.  I had watched John recaulk the first aquarium we rescued so I did it too but not nearly as pretty.  I have made a filter with some things I found under the sink, a juice bottle, charcoal, and a tiny fountain pump.  We separated the aggressive male guppies into it.  When they moped we added one of the two male plecos which cheered them up considerably.

Matt and I set the first aquarium up and watched it grow algae on shells when I decided not to wait for the promised fish shopping trip.  I simply came home after a doctor appointment with six white clouds and two plecos.   Then John took us out and we came home with guppies.  A few days later Matt and I came home with two mollies.  At a Petco sale Matt and I bought another 5 white clouds and 5 neon tetras.   We are back to having only 6 white clouds which works perfectly for the single surviving neon tetra.  One molly died immediately and the 2nd one died within two days after giving birth to over 20 babies.  Everybody now looks happy and healthy and it looks as if we will eventually have guppies and mollies to sell at our farm stand too.

Mushroom Growing on Emerald Aisle Farm

http://www.fungi.com/shop/mushroom-kits.html

There is so much to do to get ready this time of year.  I love it but find that projects line up without dead lines in sight!   

The picture above is copied from Fungi Perfecti.  I have always received my orders quickly and in excellent condition. 

I've been creating a King Stropharia mushroom patch.  I did not have hardwood chips on hand but have been breaking tiny dried maple twigs by hand.  It's time consuming but I know it will be worth it.  I divided the bag of spawn and have added soaked maple twigs to half indoors and the other half I planted outdoors.

I planted H.U.G. mushrooms over two short rows of potatoes.  

I tried both of these mushrooms last year and failed.  The reason for failure on both of them was lack of shade and moisture.   The things that I did different this time:  1. I covered the H.U.G. with straw and soaked it thoroughly.  2. I used one of my raised boxes for the King Stropharia and covered it with a piece of siding after soaking it with water.

Not only did the morel spore I bought from Fungi Perfecti net me a morel, the patch I've been nurturing with scraps from cleaning wild morels grew at least four large morels last year.  I've got my eye on that patch already but nothing is showing yet.  It is too early.

When I purchased the morel spore, I followed the instructions and waited patiently for about 3 years.   A morel popped up more than 50 feet from where I put the spore but it was obviously the kind advertised, not the native tiny little dark ones I find sometimes.  There was just the one.

I purchased shitake spawn and plugged a lot of alder logs.  I laid straw over a patch of my forest and stacked the logs around.  Some kind of predator, maybe ants, have taken the spore away two years in a row.   But I used this same area to drop all scraps from wild morels I brought back from Eastern WA.  Some I just tossed out while others I created a slurry and poured it it directly on the decomposing straw when I saw mycelium growth in the water.  I did not see a single shitake but in the straw I saw the largest morels I've ever picked here in the Puget Sound.

I have used this same straw covered area to toss the scraps from my chantrelles.  Every time I rehydrate my home dried mushrooms I save the water a few days and toss it into the straw area too.  If it works to grow chantrelles in that area I will be out of control with joy.

Black Hollyhock in front of red crocosmia on Emerald Aisle Farm

I brought my grandson Matt home with me in mid December.  He is 19 and had been struggling with bloody diarrhea for about three months.  He called me to buy his meds for his first colonoscopy.   Of course I said yes and when I saw him asked if he wanted to come home with me,  he nodded tearfully and here we are.  

Matt is 5'10" and had weighed more than 146 lbs at the beginning of 2013.

After the colonoscopy he was prescribed Lialda.  His weight continued to plummet.  The bloody diarrhea continued. After he weighed in at 113 he didn't want to do that any more so I let him quit but still monitored his blood pressure and heart rate. I finally just told him to pay as close attention to his body as he could and choose what made him vomit.  He'd been vomiting from the time I brought him home but I wasn't surprised when he thought it might be the Lialda.  (We got it for $207 for one week worth.  The doctor's office gave him 3 weeks of samples in addition to that and he'd been taking it for nearly three weeks.)  As soon as he stopped taking it, the vomiting stopped.  I continued to feed him broth and other nutritious but nonfiberous foods at two hour intervals and he started gaining weight.

He had no medical coverage, no job, and had stopped trying to do his school work.  So I picked up paperwork and filled it out for him.  We went to DSHS and to the Franciscan Health System. Things are looking up for him but he certainly doesn't get enough money from DSHS to pay for his eating habit.  I'm not complaining.  He is well worth any effort I've put out on him.  He will have doctor bills for a few years to come.  

After a CTE scan which was complicated because he vomited everything that went in him, Dr. Steven Larson sent a prescription for Prednisone to our pharmacy.  We had been told that we probably would have our answer on Monday but we had the prescription by 2:00 PM on Friday.  Thank you Dr. Larson!

The diagnosis is Ulcerative Colitis.  He is ill enough to be classified as disabled--at least for one year.  During this year my plan is to give him emotional and financial support to heal, explore meal preparations that can be divided and frozen for later, finish his high school education, and help him find a way to make a living while living with Ulcerative Colitis.  

I would love to have him here on the farm and will continue to work toward getting a trailer or motor home to start his adult life with.  If living on the farm doesn't work out for him he could move on with the least amount of stress.  I dream of him healthy and strong and in control of his disease.  

I am confident that he will be able to manage his condition given the time to learn and pay attention to himself.  It is simply a matter of time.  He has already built a very large recipe box at allrecipes.com!

He is eager in mind if not body to be my partner this year in running my farm stand.  He's certain he can sit behind a counter and call me if a customer needs me, thus freeing me up to work my small farm.  I'm looking forward to starting my second year of Emerald Aisle Farm stand in February.  We will be open about two weeks before Valentine's Day.  We haven't decided exactly when.   

I think we'll make a good team.  

John, my second husband, does some work around here too, but his thoughts are mostly of getting through the day at work.  He is a 56 year old groundskeeper for a local school district.  The job takes enough out of him that he only wants to garden as a hobby.  He does most of the cooking in our household and you can see the meals he cooks for me at carmensdinner.blogspot.com.  I don't post repeats if I can help it. He has opened his arms to Matt too.  He does the grocery shopping and has made a personal commitment toward Matt gaining at least 15 lbs.

This morning Matt weighed 129 lbs! Yes!

We are looking forward to a successful and happy year with Emerald Aisle Farm.

Last Farm Stand Day before Christmas

I know this picture does not look like Christmas but these are what we are giving any kids that show up with customers today.  There is something in each one- different thing in each.  Of interest only to young children.

I am sitting in my farm stand listening to Christmas music and catching up on my signs and labels and learning more about advertising and what I can do.

Holiday Farm Stand Emerald Aisle Farm

1 dram with dropper fragrance and essential oils.  Smell the coffee between bottles to clear your nose.

Our holiday farm stand in the travel trailer

Heidi's Bitty Beads.  She takes broken jewelry and turns them into lovely bits.

This scale gives you an idea of what a bar of soap will cost.  We sell it by the ounce.  I weigh out with a more accurate scale in your favor.  You see the large bars of Soap for the Soul, sunburn relief, and coco butter balm.

Today is a great day but...

I came here to update my blog only to find that I can't show you any pictures from this computer.  The frustrations with my laptop are not driving me crazy but close.  I hot wire it every day and then I hook up a USB keyboard so that I might type using all the letters and numbers available to me.  Today  neither keyboard works.:-(  I will play doctor on it later.

What made today such a great day that I am willing to blog even if I don't have pictures and have to sit next to a hot wood stove in the basement?  Several things.

First I did not have to set up my farm stand outside.  I just unlocked the door to the travel trailer and turned the lights on.

Next I had time to finish working on the labels to my farm made cologne and the bagged catnip.

One pair of customers shared a lot of new and innovative information with me and I hope to learn about YELP tonight after I make my laptop work!

A new customer came by and I was able to share my idea of a string of farm stands on or very near Pine Road.  It would be very cool if customers could do a "Farm Hop" and visit several cottage industries all within a few miles of each other on the same day.   She makes interesting creations too and she lives way off the road too!

And when my husband came home he brought my signs in off the road!  Awesome.

Sigh of pleasure and contentment.