The farm is FINALLY starting to feel like a real farm. We have made so much progress on key pieces of infrastructure in the last month that I still find myself looking around in wonder.
We had another amazing AmeriCorps NCCC team out this year, for 2 ½ weeks, and the progress that they made has surpassed every expectation that I had for them.
They build us a washing/packing shed (really a pole barn) from scratch. This included augering holes, mixing and pouring concrete, setting posts, building a roof, and putting on roofing panels. It will be a bustling station on the farm, where we bring freshly harvested fruits and vegetables to get washed, cooled down, and put into boxes and crates for delivery to food banks.
They cleared an entire hill of blackberries, and led community members in the planting of 16 grapes, 70 raspberries, and 75 blueberries on the farm.
They built the frame for our greenhouse, including learning how to frame the end-walls out with lumber (shout out to Robin from Public Health for leading all the construction work)! It will be skinned with plastic soon,and we can have an indoor classroom space, as well as a place to start seeds for the field.
They painted and decorated a shed kit that is our new office on farm. We had our first official meeting in it yesterday, and I can’t wait to finish the interior, and have a contemplative and productive weatherproof space on the farm.
In addition to the NCCC, we have been working with an amazing fence contractor from the Auburn Rotary Club, who is incredibly close to finishing our deer/elk fence. It really defines the space and helps in feel like a functioning farm (in addition to keeping pesky animals out of our vegetables).
All in all, I am still kind of in awe of how far we have come since last year at this time. Last April, we had no buildings, no beds built, and just a dream on paper. It is my supreme delight to see that dream start to come to life, little by little.
