Crunching Time

So, you're wondering how the new life -- life sans full-time job for Jacob, plus part-time job for me, plus full-time farming for both and full-time babyness for the bean -- is going?

Well, we're still trying to figure it all out, but predictably, time slowed for a day (that day I got the full three minutes of my conditioning rinse) and then crunched, big time. (I haven't conditioned since.)

We're behind on so many things: planting, transplanting, tilling, plowing, turkey brooder prepping. You name it, we're playing catch up with it. So, the last week has been a flurry of trying to make up for lost time on the farm, me getting to know a new job, both of us trying to figure out who should take Willa when and all of us attempting to stay happy and sane.

The thing is, it's hard to not always feel behind farming. There's always something needing to be done and done yesterday.  And, as luck would have it, the same is true of online journalism. Just because you're done for the day, that doesn't mean your inbox is.

So, we're both awash in a constant stream of to do's, thinking all the while that "if I just catch up on this, I can relax..."

The trick, or so I hope, is finding a way to leave the day when it's time to leave the day, even as the to-do list is growing -- learning to relax, whether you think you're "caught up" or not.

Because, as we know, "caught up" is really just an imaginary state of being.

I'm not sure either of us is mastering -- nay, even learning -- this trick, but it's worth working at.

I'll keep you posted. But until then, some highlights from the first week of our new situation:

150 turkeys and 10 geese arrived by U.S. Post the end of last week.  (I know, right? They still arrive by U.S. Post and I find that quaint and quite amazing, actually.)

Kale is transplanted, with Willa's help.

Willa vomited big time (and all over Daddy) after trying to eat her first piece of grass unbeknownst to either of us. (No picture of this, aren't you glad?) We had a big discussion afterward that our first order of business on the farm is keeping Willa from eating anything she shouldn't.

Because we need to stop this, even if it's totally adorable.

The Rocky Mountain Front came out of its gray-winter-sky hiding place, reminding me why the hell I live here (I'd questioned that a time or two this winter.)

And finally, Willa got to try out a few cool sun hats and as you can see, she's all about them. (Thank you Auntie Trin and Ian for this one!)

In It to Win It

Well, hello new life!

Remember that little (and by little, I mean big) problem I was talking about a few weeks ago? The one about Jacob working full time, me working part time and both of us farming and parenting full time?

And, how maybe, we might not be able to keep up?

And how maybe, just maybe, something might explode?

Well, we fixed it. Lickety split.

Here's how we did it:

a) I started a new off-farm job on Monday (Managing Editor of this very cool site. But, I'll continue to contribute to New West and the Daily Yonder too.)

b) Jacob quit his off-farm job on Tuesday.

And just like that, problem is solved.

Obviously, there is still much to figure out and much (maybe even more) to juggle.

Basically, Jacob just simplified his life and I just complicated mine. But, the thought is that we'll start to spread out our complications evenly between us and that will simplify things for both of us -- him taking Willa part-time, me lightening my farming load, both of us sharing more daily chores, etc.

It's all an effort to focus on the farm, keep all of us closer to home, play a bigger role in our community and spend more time together.

And, while we will certainly miss Breadwinner Jacob (and in particular, his health benefits), we rather prefer Farmer and Daddy Jacob. He's certainly less stressed and definitely happier.

There was much hand-wringing about this decision going on in the background, all of which I'm sure I'll write about later (A preview: you should know by now that health insurance companies suck and for farmers, off-farm jobs -- and whether to take them and how to juggle them and who should work them -- create an inordinate amount of stress and time.) but for now, just to summarize, a few of the emotions rolling around this morning, the first day of the rest of our lives:

• I feel grateful that I can telecommute to awesome jobs doing things I care about,
• apprehensive about balancing all these roles (and about becoming the breadwinner again), but
• so, so, happy to have my parenting and farming partner back at my side, and not commuting and traveling and scrambling, (This morning, he and Willa went for a run and I took a shower. A shower. Like, in the morning, and not with a baby in my arms. I washed my hair and conditioned for the full three minutes before rinsing. A girl could get used to this clean, bouncy hair, let me tell you.)
• hopeful that this will mean we will have more time: more time for each other, more time for our friends, more time for our families, more time for our community. If I've learned anything about time though, I've learned that is expands and contracts in unexpected ways, so even if I think we might have more time, we might not. But, there's nothing wrong with being hopeful.
• nervous, but excited to be relying, even just partly, on the farm for our livelihood. We are, as my friend Jennifer says (yes, you Jennifer), we're in it to win it now and that's a great, terrifying thing.

Sometimes though, you just have to hop on and push off, you know?

One Awesome Mother

Happy Mother's Day, with a special happy to this lady, who never misses an opportunity to dress festively...



and who made all these children possible...



and, who, as I write about in this month's column on the Daily Yonder and New West, made a farmer out of me.

An excerpt:

The big reason I'm farming now is because I want Willa to have the kind of childhood I did, full of sun and wind and dirt and food and flowers, all things my Mom encouraged for me.

She was the one I dug in the dirt with. She was the one I laid in the grass with. She was the one who taught me about perennials and bulbs, peas and potatoes (both how to grow them and how to cream them). She's the one who after a decade of drought, kept the farm – and the farm family – together...

I have respected and valued my mother for many things, but I am long overdue in honoring her for her role in my childhood farm, whether as a farmwife, farm mom or a farmer.

I love you Mom.

And, to the Mamas out there who have taught me how to mother, whether they knew it or not (Renee, Brooke, Trin and Jennifer, I'm talking about you), happy, happy Mother's Day. Thanks for being such spectacular models.

Time to Plant Basil

We're a little behind in the greenhouse. Luckily, Willa is excellent help.

See here Mama, it says basil can be started indoors 4-6 weeks before last frost. But I say we get a start now by putting the seeds directly in my mouth.

Basil is quite possibly my favorite crop. I love to plant it, I love to harvest it, I love to eat it, I love to sell it.

But, it can also be sort of tricky. So, here's a few tips I've gathered over the years:

• Keep seeds warm during germination. One mistake I made my first year was starting too early in the winter and then getting increasingly frustrated when germination was slow. It was because, among other things, the soil wasn't consistently warm enough. Keep that in mind.

• Prune. Once you have at least two sets of "branches" on your plant, start pruning to keep the plant bushing instead of growing tall and leggy. 

• Some people wait to harvest big long stems but I like to harvest young, tender leaves. This does the pruning I mentioned above while giving you nice, bright, tender green leaves ready to toss into salads, pasta and well, in our house, just about anything else. 

• Don't let it flower. Like most others, the minute the plant starts putting its energy into seed production, the leaves get bitter. Another reason to stay on top of the pruning/harvesting.

• Keep the frost imps at bay. Basil will be the very first thing in your garden to blacken at even the threat of frost. When in doubt, cover.

• When preserving, don't be shy with the olive oil. The best way to preserve basil is to process with olive oil or make pesto. If you're doing either, put a nice film of oil on the top of your container -- that's what will seal the green in and keep the black out. 

My favorite varieties are your standard sweet basil, sweet thai basil and Genovese basil. 

I'm dreaming of the first harvest already.

Back to World Domination

Willa's first cold just about wiped us all out this week (seriously, what am I supposed to do with all this snot?), but even as a booger factory with a fever and a hacking cough, Willa proved to have more patience and grace with the whole thing than anyone else in the bunch.

She even put up with being stuffed into this outfit Easter morning.

But Mom, I can't breathe out of my nose.

And, so nice of her, she was willing to share with her cousins, who, despite getting an innovative treatment for higher-level oxygen from their Dr. Dad (depicted below), ended up getting the bug too.

Have I ever mentioned what an amazing Dad my brother is? It's been incredible watching him grow into fatherhood the way he has. I just love this guy.

The Cowgills are on the mend (hopfully the Lowerys are too) and it is so nice to see these little eyes this bright again.

Already, as you can see, we're back to exercises in world domination. (Or maybe she's just connecting to Mother Earth?)

How to Butcher a Pig

We've had some germination issues already in the greenhouse, but after Jacob gave me a few tips (dang!) things seemed to get better. Darn science anyway.

This year, Jacob has entrusted the Prairie Heritage Farm vegetable seedlings to me. Our first year, I was little more than (sometimes) reliable help. Last year, I took on a little more responsibility, but didn't really own any aspect of the operation (mostly on account of me being all knocked up and all.)

This year though, the veggies are mine, all mine. And although Jacob tries very hard to conceal it, I know this scares the living crap out of him.

We're both control freaks in our own right, but how we freak out is totally different.

I joke sometimes that farming would be a great relationship boot camp. One half hour herding turkeys with your mate will show you every issue you'll ever encounter in your marriage.

We're still working out the kinks in how to farm together and still like each other at the end of the day. Part of that is learning how to navigate each other's approaches to running a business.

Somedays, Jacob and I couldn't be more different in this regard.

Take for example, recent conversations about my management of the greenhouse. They generally go like this:

Him: (Carefully) Can I say something and you won't take it personally?

Me: You bet! (Words say "You bet!" but tone may say otherwise.)

Him: You're making sure everything is getting enough air, right? And, nothing is dampening off? And, we're on schedule, right?

Me: Of course I am. And no. And yes, of course we are. Of course.

(I then run out to the greenhouse to make sure that I've answered all those questions accurately.)

I haven't read a single book on how to start seedlings. Jacob has read like, one hundred and fifty-five books. (To that, Jacob would say, "Really? One hundred and fifty-five?" See, numbers are generally arbitrary to me -- sometimes only to be used for emphasis. I try to make it clear, which are for emphasis and which are fact, but am not always so good at it. This drives Jacob certifiably insane. A "couple" to him means two. To me, it can mean anywhere from two to 10 -- the fun is guessing by my tone and manner where in that range the "couple" actually is.)

Seriously (and by seriously, I mean literally) this is one of at least 10 shelves filled with books on soil, scythes, greenhouses, farming, homesteading, turkeys. You name it, Jacob has a book about i it.

Jacob keeps feeding me information from the books he's read, written by professionals (pshaw), and giving me tips from years of actual experience working with seedlings.

Meanwhile, I'm working off of feel and instinct with a just little bit of experience sprinkled in.

I know this is a huge limitation on my part, so, while I don't always let him know I'm doing so, I listen to what he has to say and am actually quite often hungry for any wisdom he has to impart.

For his part, even though he doesn't always appear to be happy to hear it, I'm usually the one who tells him it's time to stop researching plans for, say, a new turkey shelter and just put hammer to nail.

Our friend Karen painted a perfect picture of us when she said a few years ago that she had this image of the two of us out on the farm, Jacob sitting on the porch with his nose in a "How to Butcher a Pig" manual and me off in the distance, crouched in the field with a hacksaw to the pig's neck.

Some days, it feels like we're not too far from that. And, maybe that's a good thing.

Sold To the Lady With the Baby

Some of my fondest memories of my Dad when I was growing up involved getting up early on a Saturday morning and sneaking out of the yard (before my Mom could stop us) with a pickup and trailer to head to an auction.

We would wander around in the cold and wind and paw through rusted metal, old costume jewelry, antiques and farm machinery -- stuff we just might need someday.

We'd eat the homemade Sloppy Joes or chili, or whatever was on the auction menu and talk to neighbors. Dad would explain the items I hadn't seen before and tell me stories about how when he was a kid, they used those to...

Last Saturday, Jacob got up early and headed to an auction north of town to check out a manure spreader and a seed cleaner.

Willa and I followed later in the day to join him for a lunch of burgers from our friends from the Land of Grass ranch and by the time we got there, he'd already bought the manure spreader. (See photo of Willa sitting on said manure spreader above. I can't stop posting photos of her in that bonnet. Cannot, absolutely will not, stop.)

We walked around the auction and it was one of those moments where my childhood and my motherhood collide. I sometimes still can't believe I'm back here, going to auctions on windy spring mornings, this time with my daughter and her daddy.

Learning to Multi-Media-Task

The farm's water truck broke down this weekend. Maybe it's still under warranty.

The photos on this blog are about to take a rocket ship to the land of better.

I convinced Jacob recently to let me use his super nice camera every once in awhile (if I took really good care of it -- which I don't do for most things, other than say, Willa).

I've always been a terrible photographer and I'd chalked it up to bad timing, a bad eye and a general lack of patience in getting to know a piece of machinery like a fancy camera.

But, Jacob's camera -- a Canon EOS 20D -- is sparking a hope that all this time, I've been a rotten photographer because I've had sub-par equipment. A girl can hope, anyway.

Everyone has a particular mode of creativity that suits them. I've always been a writer, or at one time, a singer (I started college as a vocal performance major, but that's another story). With either singing or writing, there is nothing between me and the expression. It's pure words or pure voice. There is little technical knowledge, like say, learning notes on the saxophone, or the ins and outs of aperture and F-Stops, to filter the expression.

Funny, then, that I've always been attracted to photographers and artists. It's an admiration, I think, of people who can find beauty and emotion and capture it with a tool or a process or material.

Jacob is an amazing photographer, artist and guitar player and his artwork is almost always material- or process-driven: printmaking and sculpture, for example.

In 2008, Jacob put together an incredible show of sculpture for an exhibit he called "Prairie Stories." (Here's the announcement from the show. So very cool.) Each piece was crafted from parts of life on the farm that had "gone back to the earth" -- you might say.

OK, it was a bunch of dead stuff that he dragged home from his seasons farming in Big Sandy and put in our garage. I wasn't happy when I saw it all coming into our yard. A partially mummified coyote? What did I get into here?

But what came out of that garage that winter was truly beautiful and truly inspired. Each piece needs some form of manipulation to experience -- like real live artist books. So, with the shadowbox with the coyote inside, you pulled off little shutters on little windows to reveal pieces of the coyote underneath. This one, which I call "bird" has a long crank in the center that when you move it, the feathers twirl.

Watching Jacob work over the years has pushed me to find a tangible form of creativity that works for me. Writing just doesn't cut it all the time.  It helps me sort through things, good things, complicated things, tough things, sometimes impossible things. But, because of that, it can be emotionally labor intensive and it's really a solitary act. Also, once I started doing it for a living, my relationship with it has proven to be, well, complicated to say the least.

So, I'm loving playing with this camera.

For one, It's something I can do with Willa and is especially enjoyable with Willa in front of the camera. See here:

For two, I like that I don't have to create an expression from scratch. I have light and shapes and colors and timing to guide me.

But most of all, I like the perspective it has revealed in me. It seems to be helping me to see what's in front of me, instead of what's just inside me.

And sometimes, I think, you can learn a lot about what's inside of you by what you see in front of you.
In fact, maybe you can learn even more.

Also, now that I understand depth of field, I can take photos inside my house without you seeing the holy shitshow of clutter and dog hair. If I focus right, it all just gets turned into a lovely background glow.

See that black smudge behind my impossibly cute child? It is actually a pile of potting soil and dog dander. You never would have suspected.

Winter and Discontent

A few weeks ago, Jacob and I were walking to the grocery store with Willa in tow and Jacob sort of non-nonchalantly asks: "So, are you sure you want to live here for the rest of our lives?"

It was a gray, winter day, so cold I had both a Carharrt vest and a down jacket on for the block-and-a-half walk. I was certain Willa's cheeks were getting frost bit, a fear only exasperated by the fact that it was taking us forever to get anywhere because of the death trap that had become our sidewalks after a few weeks of thaw/freeze/snow, thaw/freeze/snow.

The week before, I took the kind of fall that can only be characterized as a total-freaking-yard sale. A feet-flailing, body-horizontal-in-mid-air, grocery-flying, neighbors-running-out-their-front-door kind of fall. (No, Willa wasn't with me. She was safe with her Nana in the car while I unloaded said flying groceries. And yes, I'm really, fine, thank you. I'm pretty sure I broke my hip, but really, I'm fine.)

Jacob's question was more rhetorical than anything, an opportunity to talk about the legally binding buy-sell agreement we were working on for the farm.

It was a "are we ready for this?" kind of question, the kind you might ask yourself before bungee jumping off a bridge, knowing full well you're going to do it -- I mean you're up there and you're strapped in already – but you just need to ask one last time.

A Rustic Little Tart

Yes, I'm referring to an actual tart, like one with fruit in it and whatnot.

(Although, I admit, I wouldn't mind being referred to as a rustic little tart. I'd like to think I'm a little rustic and a little tarty. What a wonderful combination.)

My good friend just popped out an adorable baby girl this week and I know from personal experience that in this take-out-free town, a good meal from a friend is priceless. So, I took dinner over to the new family and for dessert was this lovely tart of a thing.

The new mama, who is a fantastic cook, is the one who first introduced me the rustic tart to begin with. This summer, she brought one to dinner at our place, all peaches and crispy, crunchy and hearty. I was in love.

Since then I've tried a few recipes (this one from Food & Wine and this one from America's Test Kitchen) and I've combined them to create the following recipe which, if I do say so myself, is pretty delicious, and impossibly simple.

Home Again: We're All Just Renting

As some of you know, I've been writing a monthly column, called Home Again for two awesome online publications: The Daily Yonder and New West (my alma-mater as you might call it.)

It's my dream job, this writing/farming/mothering thing. So, I feel super duper lucky to have not only outlets for this writing (personal essays are hard to find homes for) but also two really great editors to work with.

This month's essay -- about my childhood farm and our new farm and what it means to really "own" a piece of ground -- is up on the Daily Yonder and will be tomorrow morning on New West.

It was an emotional, but satisfying one to write. Hope you like it.

Slipknot With A Side of Bananas

I had some work to bang out on Sunday, so feeding Willa breakfast (normally my job) fell to Jacob while I planned to take a circular saw to some plywood (normally his job).

I showed him where the banana masher is, handed him her bib and scooted out the door, with just a twinge of nervousness (I'm sure the same twinge he felt with me out there with a circular saw.)

"Oh, and," I said. "She likes to listen to Natalie Merchant during breakfast."

I just barely heard him as I stepped out.

"No she doesn't," he said. "You do.

She likes Slipknot.  Don't you Willa."

Sometimes, you just have to hand them off and hold your breath, you know?

Empty, Full, Empty, Full

Sometimes, if you're too busy to get the message on your own, it punches you in the face.

I'm surprised I don't have a black eye today.

Wednesday night, J and I and Willa spent a few hours roaming around the farm I grew up on (here's a piece that explains why this is a big deal). I'd heard it was on the market and called the agent to make an appointment to see the place. At first, I just wanted Jacob to see it. I mean, he's been hearing stories for years and had no topographical context in which to place his wife's childhood. He had to see it. And, I wanted to see it for myself. Maybe I need closure or something.

But, then I started thinking about it as a real possibility for our farm. It's the right size, the right place, the right buildings, the right options.

What a rabbit hole that became. I'll write more about it in a few days, when I've had a little more time to process but for now,  I'm just not sure how to describe how I felt, standing in front of that old house, wind whipping -- past, present and future colliding.

That night, whether it was all the juice from the farm visit or just part of my all-night diner gig (Willa has decided that nursing every hour and a half in the middle of the night is totally acceptable for a 6-month-old), I couldn't sleep. So, I got up at 3 a.m. to go through the photos from the trip and send a few off to my editor for my next Home Again column on The Daily Yonder and New West.

What ensued is why I'm surprised I'm not black and blue.

Six Months

Six months seems but a blip. And never have six months gone by as fast as they just did.

But my God, how a life can change in six months.

This little bean, buttercream breath and all, goes from this:

To this:

When little ones are so little, dew still on them, people keep telling you it gets better. The first months are so very sweet, but also so very tough. They're hard to understand, they're hard to hold, they're hard to feed and even hard to snuggle. Everything is careful and hushed.

You're just getting to know each other and that dance can be a delicate -- and sometimes lonely -- one.

So people tell you it will get better -- that there will come a day when this little bean becomes a friend, a tiny pal, a person you want to talk to, sing with, do anything for a giggle. I didn't know what they meant until now.


Giggly Willa from conradcowgills on Vimeo.

The 'Womb'

That's what I call our greenhouse. It's where we start the season, warm and cozy and ripe for fertility -- or so we hope.

It's also where, even when it's -24 out and you can't remember what something green and growing looks like, you learn all over again to trust.

Some of life's most powerful lessons have smacked me in the face in the greenhouse, like:

• Fertility isn't something you can control, either in the greenhouse "womb" or your own. Read more on this here. 

• Over sow and under cover.  The more seeds you scatter and the less soil you put on top, the better. That is to say: Give your self ample chances and don't put too much dirt in the way of growth.

(By the way, a seed starting tip from J: the planting depth of a seed is always twice the thickness of the seed. And, make sure your seed has good contact with the soil -- meaning, don't be afraid to push the seed in a little.)

 

• Don't be afraid to thin. If you want something to grow big and strong, give it room, even if that means cutting off a few other things.

(For me, lately this means learning to thin out the parts of my life that are crowding the more important ones.)