Category: Uncategorized

Getting back to the farm and a very happy dog

Matt and I were able to get away for a few days and find some very much needed sunshine. While this winter hasn’t been cold per se it was still nice to have some summer feeling sun!

The kids did great without us, but I think this guy missed us by far the most. Booker is pretty well attached to us while we are home on the farm.

Going on rides on the ute and napping in the office are by far his favorite (and possibly only) activities. He leads a very good farm dog life.

So while I’m sure the kids missed us I think Booker wins the missing award. He was like a puppy again jumping up and down to get back to his favorite spots.

Also when we got back we were absolutely freezing…but again…still worth it!!

By the time I’m actually posting this spring has hit and the weather is warming right up. Crops are growing and it’s the time of year where everything needs something in our farm. Whether it’s planting, spraying, hoeing, fertilizing, or just making sure you’re looking at it; spring is always busy. And one more reason we are very thankful we go away a few weeks ago to spend a week doing absolutely nothing!

2026 International Year of the Woman Farmer

This year is International Year of the Woman Farmer and Oregon Department of Agriculture is featuring female farmers from across Oregon all year.

This week I was surprised to be the first featured farmer. Honestly I was surprised just to be nominated and to see I made the list of those who they are highlighting was even more exciting! I am looking forward to see more names on the list throughout the year.

Oregon has a strong tradition of female farmers and I am proud to call many my friends. You can follow along as the department adds more names to the list this year by following Oregon Department of Agriculture’s Facebook page. A big thanks to ODA and to who nominated me. I truly appreciate it!

Feels Like Spring Fertilizing Weather

Sometimes when I walk outside in the morning I can feel in my bones it’s time for a specific task to happen on the farm. It may be the smell of fresh cut grass because it finally dried up enough to get out there on the mower, or the dew, or settled dust, or the temperature of the air. But all those things come together on certain days to just say the season is changing and it’s time to “blank”. Maybe I’m the only that experiences this, but I doubt it. Whether it’s time to harvest, time to feed the crops, time to kill some weeds or prune some trees, that seasonality becomes a part of what you feel when that first morning air hits you.

And of course there are growing degree days to pay attention to, fields to walk, work orders sent from our field men, and of course neighbor farms to watch. But there’s also a rhythm to the seasons that gets ingrained in you when it hits year after year.

This is our fertilizer buggy, it may look fairly Mad Max but she gets the job done!

So this morning as I loaded the kids onto the bus to head to school, all I could think was, “Goodness it feels like spring fertilizing weather out here!” My intuition may be helped by the fact that we have planned to start fertilizing, and also that we had some amazing warm days last week that helped dry out the fields from some pretty deep puddles. But either way, today is a great day to get out there on some finally dry dirt and start feeding our plants so they can get to their job of growing a healthy crop!