Sharing Space
Open gates, growing gardens, and one very enthusiastic puppy
This past Sunday we “opened the gates” at the farm and welcomed our first public tour since we retired our Farm Crawl event back in 2019.
Coordinated and co-hosted by our friends at Mint ’n More, the afternoon brought together longtime farm supporters, sparkling new customers, and folks we were meeting for the very first time. It was one of those perfect spring days to wander the farm, tasting as we went, talking about what we grow and why we grow it, and finishing the afternoon with farm-fresh snacks shared under open skies.
Hosting events on a working farm is always a little complicated. We have to pause the regular, daily work of the farm to get ready for guests. There are weeds we meant to pull, projects half-finished, and a thousand little reminders that farms are living, working places rather than polished backdrops.
But honestly, it’s also incredibly reenergizing.
When you spend every day in a place, it becomes easy to see only the unfinished tasks. I look across the fields and notice weeds, areas that still need mulching, beds waiting to be planted, or infrastructure projects lagging behind schedule.
Visitors experience something entirely different
.They see lush green hills rolling toward the horizon, rows of tidy vegetables stretching nearly out of sight, flowers in bloom, all accompanied by the layered soundtrack of birdsong that has become so familiar to us we sometimes forget to stop and hear it.
Seeing the farm through fresh eyes is a good reminder this time of year, when spring’s endless to-do list threatens to swallow us whole.
Sometimes we need to share a space to fully appreciate it again.
And speaking of things demanding our attention…
Earlier this month, because apparently we weren’t busy enough already, we got a puppy.
Meet Peri - short for Periwinkle, because we are committed to the “blue-themed dog names” tradition around here. My sister has taken to calling her Princess Periwinkle, which honestly is more fitting that she might guess.
Peri is a 12 week-old Jack Russell Terrier/Australian Shepherd cross and she is a ridiculous delight: smart, fearless, wildly enthusiastic, and almost impossibly cute. Which is fortunate, because it’s been seven years since we had a puppy and apparently we had forgotten what that actually means for daily life.
Sky, our resident Blue Heeler/Australian Shepherd farm dog (and supervisor of all things), doesn’t agree that this was a good addition. I didn’t know a dog could communicate such profound disdain with a single facial expression, but Sky is proving otherwise. Thankfully, she does seem to be softening a bit.
The cats remain unconvinced.
Fortunately for them, both cats are currently larger than Peri, so we’re encouraging them to teach her important life lessons while they still can.
Meanwhile, spring planting has fully shifted into high gear.
The crew has been hard at work all month prepping beds and planting baby plants from one end of the farm to the other. Watching the season come together always reminds me a bit of a massive embroidery project: beds prepared and then stitched into the landscape in rows and patterns of endless greens, reds, golds, and purples
.Direct sowing is certainly faster and easier in many cases, but there’s something magical about transplanting season. One morning a bed is bare soil and by afternoon an “instant garden” stretches across the field - tiny plants lined up with all their future potential tucked into them.
We’re now nearing the end of our main-season transplanting push, including the truly enormous task of planting more than 700 tomato plants, which the crew finally wrapped up yesterday.
There may or may not have been actual cheering involved.
Now we just have to get the 600+ dahlias planted!
THE VEGEMAIL STORE IS OPEN!!
At long last - and after many months of work - our new online VegEmail store is finally live
This new system is designed to make local shopping easier and more flexible, bringing together weekly VegEmail ordering along with pantry goods and other farm offerings all in one place.
The order cycle opens Mondays at 5pm and closes Thursdays at noon for Saturday pickup between 10am-noon in Des Moines, Knoxville, or on-farm.
We’re also hoping to launch the shipping-available side of the store, BGF Pantry, within the next few weeks.
Honestly, this project has occupied a huge portion of our winter and spring “off-season” hours, so it feels incredibly satisfying to finally open the digital gates alongside the farm gates this spring.
Important Dates
June 2 – Bounty Box deliveries begin
June 13 – BLOOMS season begins
(BLOOMS members, watch your email for updates!)
The season is fully underway now.
The gates are open. The tomatoes are planted. The fresh crops keep coming. The birds are singing. And one tiny puppy is attempting to be in the center of absolutely all of it.
It’s a beautiful, exhausting, joy-filled season to be sharing.
Best from the farm,
Jill & Sean (and the whole BGF crew)
What a lovely capture of the farm in May! Excited for Bounty Box and Blooms to start!