"In Early June the world of leaf and blade and Flowers explode, and every sunset is different."

sshillfarms
Jun 13, 2023
3 min read

The title of this blog is a quote by John Steinbeck. It seems to perfectly capture my feelings on the month of June. The full heat of summer has not yet hit, and you don't have to restrict your outside time to mornings and late evenings. But it's also not so cool that you need jackets! And the sunsets....ahhh they are amazing! So beautiful have they been I have a hard time not overwhelming my social media with their beauty.

June began as a rougher month this year if I am being honest. We went 3 weeks with only 3/10th of an inch of rain, for a good garden you need roughly 1" a week. the 3/10 came all at once in the middle of the 3 weeks. Then the temperatures soared and we began having record heat. A bit scary when your trying to get a market farm going! But we didn't cave and began praying for rain and kept on going. Memorial Day weekend we took the kids on a mini vacation for a few days. Came back to some of the Ranununculus and anemone, blown open, and while they weren't able to be harvested for bouquets, their beauty was completely enjoyed here on the farm. Then came rain and cooler weather, and while we are still dryer then usual the rain has been about 7/10th every week just when we are really needing it.

First Market was a success, it was in Albany which was a nice way to get our toes wet before jumping into Maryville. We have been utterly blown away with the kindness of people! There is something so humbling and inspiring to arrive at a market and people waiting for you to get set up so they can buy your produce! Or to have someone come up the week after buying flowers and say that they still look amazing, sends my heart to cloud nine!

Our oldest daughter has thus far been my assistant in set up and helper at the markets. She may not admit it but I know she is loving it.

Maryville's first market we had an amazing day, when we left, we only had 7 things left and none were perishable! I was very nervous to do farmers markets, they were so out of my comfort zone, but honestly, I love them! The people who have booths and the customers have both been amazing! As a new farmer (I mean I grew up on a farm but new to us) I was more than a bit nervous that other booths would feel we were outsiders or intruders, but they have all been so very welcoming!

So what's next? Weeding, haha, lots of weeding. We will continue to be at the Albany Markets on Thursday evenings, and Maryville on Saturday Mornings. We are currently in a lull between our spring flowers and our summer blooms. Once that ends my sister-in-law in Colorado has volunteered to be my tester of shipping flowers. If we are successful, we are hoping to add that to this website as an option to ship fresh cut, never sprayed, bouquets anywhere in the continental USA.

As a side note, the bees are doing great, but we will not have honey until November when I harvest. It's the least invasive to the bees to do it then. Because the summer bees have died and there are far fewer winter bees. This will also be when I shrink the size of their hive to give them the best chance of making it through winter. But I will blog about that in more detail in a few months.