Fall Markets & Winter Gardens

Well it's been a while since my last post. For this I must apologize. I've been spending quite a bit of time outside and haven't been turning on my computer as much. Good for farming, not so good for keeping up w/ the blog ;) Anyhow, I'll try to catch up with what's been going on.

September, October, and November have been a time for going to market. Working with the Carmel Valley Co-op (http://www.carmelvalleycoop.org/) we've been trying to get to as many markets and craft faires as we could. So a lot of time has been spent preparing for and going to these events. To the right is a photo at the local village market. We had a great spread, with essential oils, soaps, dried bunches and sachets. It is always enjoyable to get out in the sunshine and talk to people about lavender.

The home garden has been another focus these last couple of months. Next spring I plan to expand the garden. So I've been preparing a new field for growing vegetables. Fortunately I finished tilling the field and sewed a cover crop just before my tiller blew up. Unfortunately, my tiller blew up. Threw a rod right through the side of the crank case. Anyone have a spare 5hp motor they want to sell? Oh well, I have a month or so to get it fixed before it gets critical. That's the breaks when working with equipment with "personality" :) I'm still getting good carrots and peppers. If you can believe it, it's December and we haven't got a frost yet. So even my tomatoes are still going, albeit very slowly. Everything else I've turned under. I've sewn turnips, cabbage, and fava, radishes and lettuce amongst others. The little plants are all doing fine. Tonight Daniella made a Bulgarian meal from our garden tomatoes and peppers called paprikash. Yum!

December is a busy month. I'm working on my distillery, making it a bit more comfortable for year round use. Also, I'm distilling essential oil from lavender grown by a local winery (more on this later). And of course, being the Holiday season, I have been spending time organizing the local Santa's Parade. Santa comes in on helicopter to a crowd of screaming kids. (http://www.santaflyin.org/)

What fun is that!