A True Family Farm




When our boys help in the gardens they represent the fifth generation of the family to work the soil on Kimker Hill. Four generations still live on the farm today. Strong family bonds and a deep love and respect for the earth influence all of our farm practices.

Our gardens provide us with the best and purest of food, matchless beauty, and the ultimate earth science classroom for our homeschooled boys.

Sustainability is a popular buzz word among small scale agriculture. To us it means giving more than you take. Putting back what you use. Remembering that this beautiful earth will last forever and it's our commision to care for. In our gardens we try hard to follow these ideals and work with the earth's design, not against it.



Friday, August 29, 2008

Hi Everybody!

Well, we're ready for a big weekend at the market! I've been busy making lots of pickles this week. Our cucumbers are producing very well now. Earlier in the week I made 55 pints of Bread & Butter Pickles and today I made lots of Spicy Dill Pickles and Old-Fashioned Dill Pickles. I'll be sampling tomorrow! Come try them out!

I'll also have lots of fresh produce: tomatoes, assorted beans, cucumbers, peppers, basil, parsley, mint, swiss chard, eggplant and several varieties of squash.

Hope to see you there! I've got to get to bed now.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

We've finally got ripe tomatoes!

Hip, hip, hooray! Last weekend we got our first ripe tomatoes. Today was the first market we had enough to bring some with us. If you we're fortunate enough to get some of them I hope you're enjoying them as much as we are!

We've been enjoying them all week, just eating them fresh, making salads, salsa and tomato sauce. I especially like snacking on the new Jelly Beans and Yellow Pear varieties.

Last night Danny grilled pizzas for us. They were fantastic! We tried something new for us. I used my Pizza Dough Mix, spread out really, really thin on stainless steel cookie sheets. Then, Danny made a pesto sauce with lots of fresh basil, garlic and olive oil and we spread it on the dough. We topped it with sliced onions, sliced tomatoes, green peppers, mushrooms and black olives. We covered it all with shredded mozzarella and he grilled it until the dough was crispy and the cheese was melted. It was so delicious. My mom said it was the best pizza she's ever eaten!

We've also been enjoying lots of fresh beans. We have 4 varieties this summer, Fortex green beans, Purple Royalty beans, Long-Red Chinese Noodle beans and Marvel of Venice yellow beans. They're all stringless varieties of pole beans. Danny's been grilling them, too. He tosses them with olive oil, minced garlic, italian seasoning and coarse seasalt. They look so pretty when they're finished.

It's so nice to have lots of fresh produce again. We finally feel like we've recovered from the storm. We have lots of cucumbers, eggplant, several varieties of squash, swiss chard, peppers, basil and of course all the varieties of tomatoes.

Monday I'll be starting on more dill pickles and peach preserves.

I'll try to get some pictures posted soon.