water, trash, and strawberries

I've been repeating this again and again, like a stuck soundtrack -- my flower fields need water. Dane County, where I live, is experiencing a Moderate Drought, which is better than a Severe Drought or Extreme Drought, but worse than Abnormally Dry. Typically, June is our wet month (in competition with August for THE wettest month). This year? Dry as a potato chip. So I need to water.

I'm up early. Not because I want to be up early, but because my surgically improved leg dictates my waking hours and today it decided that I should be up in time for the sunrise. But of course, there is no good sunrise to observe because we are also getting a day of Canadian fire smoke and haze. The air quality is poor enough that we close all the windows. It doesn't feel bad out there, but the readings are miserable, so we take precautions.

(Walk to barn: hen can't reach the berries; hen goes for the flowers)

(Back to the farmhouse: cat, keeping tabs on burrowing animal)

(close-up)

And we eat breakfast in the kitchen. Hazy and cool. We skip the porch today.

And then I water. I cover the Big Bed and the driveway bed today. As I water, I also pause to spot weed. In all, I spend a good three hours on tending just those two fields. But it feels just a little bit nice: the spring blooms are mostly a thing of the past and we're in that exciting moment just before the summer colors fill the spaces (where there is no shade! Ed!). I see the first lily buds. I redirect some of the climbing vines. It's all rather satisfying.

Ed has a meeting with his machining people. He comes home with a question -- hey gorgeous, want a plastic red Adirondack chair?

It appears that the nearby town of Dunn is having a "dump out your old useless stuff" day. People have been piling trash and broken down furniture at the curb for pickup. Ed is forever interested in what people are throwing away and he spotted a cheap (but not unattractive!) chair that he thought I may like.

We drive out, checking out other trash piles along the way. Normally, I'm not keen on adding junk to our junk by picking up other people's junk, but honestly, a bright red chair somewhere in the farmette fields just seems so ridiculously appealing, (This in addition to another plastic chair that he picked up on his own yesterday -- I already scrubbed down this one and put it in the courtyard.)

And by the time I'm done with the chair project, it's time for us to go to the local farmers market. I haven't been going the past weeks, because it's in the hours that I typically have Snowdrop, but the girl is happily ensconced in a summer program on campus this month and so I am free to tag along with Ed (who is a regular, taking our eggs and rhubarb to the various vendors there).

We head out on Ed's motorbike and in retrospect, I think this was a mistake. I knew I could climb on behind him without issue, but what really feels uncomfortable still is a sustained bend in the knee and the passenger on a motorbike has to keep that knee at an angle, or else! 

I am, unfortunately, very familiar with doing something fun with a leg that still refuses to feel anywhere near normal.

The market itself is lively and fun. 

It's the beginning of strawberry season!

Having said that, I'll add that we are (thus far) having a very wimpy strawberry season. Cold weather stunted many berries and we're are seeing that now in small fruits, with a very subdued red color. Still, the flavor is very nice.

Our fruit season here is, in general, very short. You start thinking of what to do with all those fragile berries and before you know it the season is done. Ditto with cherries. Blueberries last a little while longer, but really, it all seems terribly brief to me. 

(we drop off some more rhubarb here and pick up a blueberry lemon cake)

After the market, we ride over still further, to pick up our monthly CSA produce box. I have tremendous guilt for not supporting our farmers with a more consistent pick up. When the pandemic struck, we were so grateful for a weekly box of fresh produce! But after two years, we cut back to every other week. And now this year, I decided to just do a once-a-month pick up. Selecting veggies at the market is much easier if you want to be the boss of your own kitchen and in charge of planning the week's menu. I love my farmers, but I also love sticking with endless asparagus when it's asparagus season and peas when it's pea season. Still, today's box was lovely: beautiful (if sandy) lettuces, radishes, kohlrabi, baby boo chow, a Napa cabbage, some herbs and a little box of... strawberries!

We are rich with local foods. 

The haze is lifting. The temps are warming up. It's a beautiful time to be thinking about gardens and berries and all the growing things around us!