I know.  I tend to gush over the spring time but, I just LOVE it!  Being out in the warm sun and watching everything start to come to life is very therapeutic for me. After a long grey winter, the vision of ever flower, clean green field, sounds of the birds and ooh the smell!

This spring has made my heart skip a few beats however. The warm week in March was like a defibrilator. It got me started and then reality set in again…it was only March. Now we are in May and everything is as it should be.

The strawberries are showing their pretty white blossoms: (which means we are looking at about mid June for strawberries to be ready)

Blossoms!

Our peas have popped their heads out of the ground.

Grant checking the progress of the new peas.

And even the brand new strawberries (next year’s crop) have started to look like plants. (You can barely see them when they are first put into the ground) There are distinct rows of green…look closely now.

Next year's crop starting to grow.

Also, I am so excited that Ken got to planting sweet corn this year! We just couldn’t get it in the ground last spring for all of the rain! I can hardly wait!

Planting sweet corn.

Yum!

Most of all, I can’t wait to see all of your familiar faces and how much all of your kids have grown over the winter…(ahem..future employees!)

Everyone has been asking me if  it’s going to be an early strawberry season. The answer is it’s too early to tell! Yes, we have taken off the straw a month earlier than usual however, the weather has since went back to more normal seasonal temperatures and so the plants have slowed down their growing too. The answer is still up to Mother Nature!

The earliest year on record for Paulridge Farm (Ken’s parents) has been opening on the 9th of June, and that has only happened once in about 35 years! Our normal aim is for around Father’s Day or mid-June. There have also been years when the farm has opened a little later in June, around the 24th, 25th.

The quick answer is: check back and we’ll keep you posted! Until then, we will keep dreaming of strawberry shortcake and the grinning strawberry stained faces of our kids coming from the field!

One happy customer!

After a not so harsh winter break, and a fantastic holiday in New York City with our good friends Carmel and Craig, our batteries have been fully re-charched and we’re back in the swing of things for another season!

The unseasonably warm weather really got us moving starting with our apple trees! They all of a sudden came to life when we thought we had another couple of weeks to finish pruning them!

Apple trees coming to life in mid-March!

We managed to get it all done though. Grant and Lilly had a great time “camping” in the orchard while Ken and I spent several days finishing the task.

Grant and Lilly spending their days 'camping" in the apple orchard.

This picture makes me smile. The countless hours spent in this ten dollar tent (thanks Grandma!) were priceless. I hope that they will remember some of these fun times.

I have to admit that I always wonder if what I am doing to the trees will help or not. It really does seem counter intuitive as one of our friends pointed out. Taking snips of wonderfully tall branches OFF of the tree to encourage it to grow and make stronger limbs! I am learning as I go thanks to a few lessons early on from Phil and some good books and you tube videos. Time will tell but we do seem to be encouraging some lovely looking trees in the orchard. Some trees are getting so tall now that I just about need a ladder to reach the top branches even with the help of the telescopic pruning shears!

If you have never had the pleasure of this task, here are some the tools of the trade:

Pruning tools: (from top) pruning shears, telescopic handle shears and a folding pruning saw.

Even though Ken’s grandfather operated an apple orchard in Napanee for nearly twenty years, Ken would have been in school for most of the pruning days so pruning an entire orchard is an education. Every year is a lesson and proof of the previous year’s actions. Even though Ken has tried to get a good deal of pruning in, it is also time for taking the straw off of the strawberries!

Luckily, it has been relatively dry this past week so he has been able to get out and do it!

A field of strawberries before the straw is taken off.

Ken removing the straw from the strawberry field.

Signs of life under the straw!

And there is a sigh of relief as there are some signs of life under the straw.

Well, the year is just about finished and we are feeling at peace and well rested (not to mention fed). Ken finished chopping the straw on to the strawberry plants the morning of December 24th so we were able to truly relax and enjoy the holiday.

We have many happy memories of this past season and look forward to creating many more in the year(s) to come. As each year has passed, I have been  growing an appreciation for all of the new friends that our business has allowed us to connect with. One of our dreams is to make this farm feel like everyone’s family farm, just a natural place to bring the kids for an afternoon or slip out for a few minutes to pick up some fresh berries for supper. With each year that passes I know that my dream is being validated when I recount all of the wonderful people that I have met through the farm. I keep thinking that I couldn’t love what I do any more and then I remember that we also get to be our own bosses, work where we live, raise our family in a wholsome and true way, enjoy the bounty of our land and have an abundance of interesting people visit us.

Here are two great examples of the cool things/people that happened at the farm this year:

The "Sinderollas" posing for a fall photo shoot. Credit for the photo to Cat London (http://www.catlondon.ca/photography.html).

Congratulations Beckie and Jeff Ponte!

Even though we just finished covering the strawberries for a long winters rest, I can’t help dreaming of the fragrance of strawberries in the warm June wind and creating a new crop of memories.

Have a safe and peaceful winter!  We look forward to seeing you in the spring!

I love the fall! Well actually, I could hold on to the warm days and nights of summer however, the flavours of apples, squash and pumpkin are what I dream of.

This is the first year we have had our apple trees in production and I am having so much fun tasting the different kinds of apples every couple of days to see how sweet they have become.

As the days get shorter and the nights get cooler, warm apple pie, crisp and cider are what I crave. The smell of something baking with apples and cinnamon make the house smell glorious and my stomach grumble and mouth water.

My good friend Jill recently dropped off some tasty treats that she made and a handy little contraption she found at Loblaws and think I’ve found my new favourite fall treat to make with apples!

The mold.

Firstly, anything Jill makes is good…we often refer to her as Martha (she even made our wedding cake). I was a little nervous to try and replicate Jill’s treats as Ken is a very discerning judge (his mom is also a hard act to follow) however all in all I think that the process was a success!

All you need is some puff pastry, a few apples, a few spices, sugar and the mold (found at Loblaws)

The only thing I changed in the recipe was the type of apples, as we don’t grow Granny Smith I used some Mac’s and I think that these little babies turned out just fine!

Puff pastry is loaded into each side, filling spooned into the middle and the mold is pressed together.

Going in to the oven...

Coming out...aren't they cute!

Approved by Ken (official pie tester)

Now I just need to figure out how to change the apple into a pumpkin…..

Well it’s finally that time of year again! The CORN MAZE is OPEN for business! Each year we have fun creating a new challenge for the young and young at heart! We entertain many guests on week-ends in September and October and school kids during the week days. This year’s theme is Ancient Egypt. The weather is perfect for the opening week-end as is often the case in September. I’m sure we’ll be wearing shorts for a few week-ends yet!

This year is a bit odd to me as, not only is the corn maze open but an unexpected surprise as well…RASPBERRIES! We don’t actually grow fall bearing raspberries, our summer bearing raspberries are actually fruiting. I took these pictures this morning because I just can’t believe how nice they are right now:

Picture taken Friday September 9th, 2011

Look at the white berries still to ripen!

I guess we get to hold on to summer for a little longer!

We had the honour of being interviewed by Josephine Matyas back in May for the June/July issue of Kinston Life Magazine (see link for article). The pictures for the article were shot by Scott Adamson. We were thrilled to get some of the extra shots from the photo shoot today, as a gift from him! What a considerate surprise! After such a busy time of year, I often feel like I never see my kids and now we have these beautiful memories! We will be framing them to hang on our wall soon! Thanks again Scott!

Many of you may have thought that we have gone away on vacation…not true! (Well maybe a mini overnight to Montreal) The farm is always closed in August, that is, at least for a few more years until we have our blueberries in production!  Anyway, we have been keeping busy renovating the strawberries, combining wheat, baling straw, weeding, cutting grass, cleaning up, fixing, painting and generally changing things around to prepare for the fall season!

Straw cut and laying in wind rows after combining the wheat. Ready to be baled.

Big square bales being produced for later use on the strawberry patch.

A field of finished bales waiting to be picked up and stacked, ready to be chopped onto the strawberries for the winter.

It  feels like August is busier than June and July in a way as there is a whole new set of things to be tackled. The main one being the corn maze! We have been very luck to have one of our students (now graduated and a certified teacher!) design the maze for us for the past several years. Chris has been with us since the first year that we opened. It has been fun not only watching him grow and evolve but to have him try his hand each year at a new and more challenging design for the maze. It is especially tricky for him as we usually change the location, size and shape of the maze each year on him! (crop rotation purposes). There have also been a few years that cutting the maze was truly challenging as we didn’t get to cutting it before the corn was taller than us! This year though, with his help the maze has been cut, luckily while it was an appropriate height.

Discussing the next move while cutting the maze. (Ok..this is a picture from a couple of years ago because I keep forgetting to take a better one!)

Things really start to look a little more like fall around here (yes, I know it’s still summer!) with the changing of the pumpkins from tiny green globes to signs of orange and other colours and patterns.

Pumpkin starting to show signs of orange.

One of our new varieties this year..."knuckle head". Notice all the cool warts forming!

An unusual looking mini pumpkin.

Our apple trees are also starting to show signs of promise.

Some red starting to appear on the apples.

We will be offering pre-picked apples only this year due to the limited number of trees and varieties. We do hope to offer pick-your-own in the future….everything just takes time to grow!

I know you all think that I’m probably a little nuts for a)running out in the pouring rain to take pictures and b)blogging about it however, today’s soaking has put Ken and I in a fantastic mood!  I don’t like to complain but, boy has it been dry! With every day that has gone by, we have just watched our poor crops wilt in the afternoon heat or just completely come to a halt. So, with today’s rain comes JOY! There is still a little hope to get those pumpkins going, the corn taller, the strawberries, raspberries and blueberries to not give up. There is one small sacrifice though, the force of the rain did knock the last of the ripe raspberries off the canes, as we expected, and our season is now offically finished.

Pumpkins in the background soaking up the rain!

Ruth (Ken’s mom) even called first thing this morning to congratulate us on the great rain we were getting! The whole family tends to watch the radar and frequently check the weather sites as it’s usually the topic of conversation.

Puddles forming on the driveway during one of the beautiful showers today!

Ken is quite happy as we are about to start combining wheat this week and is only to pleased to have to wait a few days to start when ordinarily, he would be itching to get going, he noted that we actually need a rain to help “harden off” of wheat for harvesting.

And lastly, “lake Ken” as we have dubbed it, is full again! (Ok…it’s just the big puddle that was formed by the tires of the big tractor) We never thought we would be so appreciative of water after the spring weather, but here we are, hard to please farmers, happy as ever!

"Lake Ken"

Here are some images from around the farm this past week.

A double rainbow.

Fresh picked raspberries and beans for sale.

If you look closely, you can see how covered in yellow pollen this little honey bee is.

Pumpkins! They're small but still growing!

Pumpkin blossom.

Our blueberry plants.

Yes..they even have a few blueberries...sorry everyone, Ken and I picked the whole field and probably got about 10 L total!

Cattle corn field growing for the fall corn maze.

Chicory growing wild, it's always such a pretty colour!

...up close

One of the wheat fields...we should be harvesting it in a couple of days!

So many beautiful butterflies lately.