Hellooooo August! Another few weeks have passed, and another month is upon us. The days are still hotter than hell, but growing shorter with each rising moon; and the nights are cooling off a little more with each passing day. Hard to believe we're in the last official month of summer, but things won't slow down on the farm until well into late fall.
The last few weeks have welcomed a handful of new veggies to our farmer's stand and CSA shares, including zucchini, squash, beets, cherry tomatoes, garlic, carrots, and broccoli to name a few! With a full-staff and some extra helping hands from our awesome volunteers, working members and a spattering of community groups, we've been able to tackle the weeds and at least make harvesting our veggies a mostly thistle-free experience (although there are still plenty out there). Our greens aren't doing too hot right now (pun-intended) thanks to an over-abundance of warm, sunny days - but we're still indulging in smaller harvests of arugula, spinach, lettuce mix, mustards, and braising greens when not tantalized and stuffed to the brim by the aforementioned hard-crop goods.
Between the long days, short nights, "irrigation irritations," goat-milking shenanigans, farmer's markets, stupendous group lunches, the occasional Friday-night volunteer shift at the Co-Op, and the ever-growing "fertile crescent" farmer's tan on my low back, I'm still finding a smattering of time to get out and enjoy this beautiful place. Although I haven't been trail running as much as I'd like (let's just say the thought of a leisurely run to shake off the 10-12+ hour day when it's still 80 fricking degrees out at 8pm hasn't been of great appeal recently...), climbing seems to be the weekly sunday-funday activity, whilst an attempted mountain bike ride may have left more permanent scars than originally anticipated (let's also just say that a heavily rutted-out and eroded single track, up a fairly steep grade, on a bike you've never ridden before, for someone who doesn't quite yet have the hang of unclipping from her pedals in less than one second is NOT the ideal first ride for someone who already had pre-existing reservations about the sport of mountain biking...lol).
And the highlight of the summer (thus far) came this weekend when my sister and brother came up to Bozeman for a quick visit, which was truly awesome albeit far too short.
With Erika just recently moving back to the States from a 2-year teaching stint in Honduras and soon embarking on her next adventure of living&teaching abroad in France, and Graham juggling an aerospace internship in Salt Lake for the summer while finishing up his Master's at Purdue the rest of the year, it's not often that the three of us get to spend much time together; so it was a real treat to have them come visit me in beautiful Big Sky Country! Aside from seeing and staying at the farm, we managed to pack in a sunset hike up one of the local peaks in the Bridgers, a full day of climbing at Bozeman Pass (Erika's second time ever on the rock), and a handful of hilarious sibling moments caught on camera that only the Johnson kids could be capable of producing. My heart is beyond full after such a great 48hrs, and I've definitely added a few smile wrinkles to my face :) Good times, fo sho!
And last but not least, I can't keep the cat in the bag any longer: I am officially heading back to Colorado for the winter, as last week I accepted a job with Steamboat PowderCats (http://www.steamboatpowdercats.com/)! I had refrained from mentioning to pretty much anyone that knows me that I'd even applied for the gig back in May because I really hadn't expected to get the job - but dreams apparently can become reality and I'm beyond excited to not only be returning to Steamboat (at least seasonally for now), but also for such an awesome, awesome job. Yay skiing! How it fits into the bigger picture of my life is still a bit of a mystery, but as Søren Kierkegaard once said, "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards."
Cheers to the journey, my dear friends! And to following your bliss, always :)
With love,
B
The last few weeks have welcomed a handful of new veggies to our farmer's stand and CSA shares, including zucchini, squash, beets, cherry tomatoes, garlic, carrots, and broccoli to name a few! With a full-staff and some extra helping hands from our awesome volunteers, working members and a spattering of community groups, we've been able to tackle the weeds and at least make harvesting our veggies a mostly thistle-free experience (although there are still plenty out there). Our greens aren't doing too hot right now (pun-intended) thanks to an over-abundance of warm, sunny days - but we're still indulging in smaller harvests of arugula, spinach, lettuce mix, mustards, and braising greens when not tantalized and stuffed to the brim by the aforementioned hard-crop goods.
Between the long days, short nights, "irrigation irritations," goat-milking shenanigans, farmer's markets, stupendous group lunches, the occasional Friday-night volunteer shift at the Co-Op, and the ever-growing "fertile crescent" farmer's tan on my low back, I'm still finding a smattering of time to get out and enjoy this beautiful place. Although I haven't been trail running as much as I'd like (let's just say the thought of a leisurely run to shake off the 10-12+ hour day when it's still 80 fricking degrees out at 8pm hasn't been of great appeal recently...), climbing seems to be the weekly sunday-funday activity, whilst an attempted mountain bike ride may have left more permanent scars than originally anticipated (let's also just say that a heavily rutted-out and eroded single track, up a fairly steep grade, on a bike you've never ridden before, for someone who doesn't quite yet have the hang of unclipping from her pedals in less than one second is NOT the ideal first ride for someone who already had pre-existing reservations about the sport of mountain biking...lol).
And the highlight of the summer (thus far) came this weekend when my sister and brother came up to Bozeman for a quick visit, which was truly awesome albeit far too short.
With Erika just recently moving back to the States from a 2-year teaching stint in Honduras and soon embarking on her next adventure of living&teaching abroad in France, and Graham juggling an aerospace internship in Salt Lake for the summer while finishing up his Master's at Purdue the rest of the year, it's not often that the three of us get to spend much time together; so it was a real treat to have them come visit me in beautiful Big Sky Country! Aside from seeing and staying at the farm, we managed to pack in a sunset hike up one of the local peaks in the Bridgers, a full day of climbing at Bozeman Pass (Erika's second time ever on the rock), and a handful of hilarious sibling moments caught on camera that only the Johnson kids could be capable of producing. My heart is beyond full after such a great 48hrs, and I've definitely added a few smile wrinkles to my face :) Good times, fo sho!And last but not least, I can't keep the cat in the bag any longer: I am officially heading back to Colorado for the winter, as last week I accepted a job with Steamboat PowderCats (http://www.steamboatpowdercats.com/)! I had refrained from mentioning to pretty much anyone that knows me that I'd even applied for the gig back in May because I really hadn't expected to get the job - but dreams apparently can become reality and I'm beyond excited to not only be returning to Steamboat (at least seasonally for now), but also for such an awesome, awesome job. Yay skiing! How it fits into the bigger picture of my life is still a bit of a mystery, but as Søren Kierkegaard once said, "Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards."
Cheers to the journey, my dear friends! And to following your bliss, always :)
With love,
B
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