Category Archives: Co-op

Container Gardening Fans Read This…

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We have come up with a wonderful product for all of those Container Gardening folks out there. It is our new Natural Growers Pack.

What is it and what does it do you may ask? It is a water retention and fertilizer system that is made from 100% all natural and organic materials. When you container garden or grow house plants, you are always faced with watering your plants..even if you are on vacation. Using our pack limits the need to constantly be watering your plants as the natural sheep wool acts as a sponge absorbing water and holding it for longer than just soil. The added bonus..you get a pack of sheep manure compost to add to your soil as a natural fertilizer.

These are all of the supplies you need to use this pack:

The contents of the pack, a container, your plant or seeds, plus soil.

Start with an empty large to extra large container. Line the bottom of the container with the enclosed sheep wool. Now take the wonderfully rich in nutrients package of sheep manure compost and blend it with your soil..place in your container on top of the sheep wool. Add your plant. Water. That’s it..easy peasy!

It is a wonderful system for container vegetable gardening. By using this all natural system you eliminate the need to continuously fertilize your plants too. Your container tomato plants will be the envy of the neighborhood!

The Natural Growers pack is available in our ETSY store, through Fall Line Farms Co-op, Local Roots Co-op, The Great Big Greenhouse in Richmond, VA and more locations are coming soon as we fill orders. You, of course, can buy them direct through me and we will have them at local Farmer’s Markets this Spring and summer.

Do something good for your plants and make Mother Nature smile at the same time..oh yes, and each time you purchase/use one of these Natural Growers Packs you are supporting a small family owned sustainable farm business!

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Winter Yesterday..Spring Today

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Isn’t it amazing how unpredictable the weather really can be? Yesterday we had a beautiful snowfall in the morning, followed by a sunny afternoon and ending with another brief snowfall before evening. In a single days time, the pastures are turning green and those Spring flowers that were not already blooming are today showing signs of bloom. We’ve had thunderstorms in February and a steady flow of rainfall this Winter..all will serve the ground well for the growing season. While we need to get the earth tilled to start the gardens, the ground is actually too wet. This will postpone that early harvest we always shoot for but a late harvest is just as beneficial.

We have taken some time off from selling through our local Co-op’s and Winter Farmer’s Markets while we’ve reworked our farm. There will be a lot of changes to some of the products we have sold for years and we are adding a lot of new. We started selling our farm products in our ETSY store. It is slow going but we have had some sales. I’ve started working on the plans for offering workshops throughout Spring and Summer. There are so many things that a person can do to live a more sustainable lifestyle and hopefully these workshops will generate interest from those who are anxious to learn.

That’s all for now. I always promise that I will be better about keep up with Blog posts, let’s see if this time I can really do it!!

 

It’s Been A Long Time Again!

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It’s coming down to the end of Spring around here. Let me update you on what has been going on at the farm.

Early Spring brought us the joys of lamb and kid births. So many little ones making it exciting and a little confusing too. We almost lost one of our ewes at lambing. Seems her little (gigantic) lamb didn’t want to come out easily and then we discovered she had been physically exhausted to the point that she gave up. We are very happy to say, she is doing fantastic now and so is “Wil” her lamb.

Then there was “Bella”! She was not really a surprise but I had miscalculated her due date of arrival. She and her Mom “Barga” are doing very well. The breeding that produced her was very accidental, which has now led to a 3/4 Angora x 1/4 Alpine Dairy kid. Her fiber is glorious!

We had a broody hen hatch 13 eggs and have 12, 3 month old chicks now.

We have since hatched another 11 chicks which are growing strong..and to our surprise, some of them are actually HENS!

The most exciting addition we’ve made to the farm this Spring are our Coturnix Quail. With the chickens, ducks and now quail we are rapidly becoming an “Egg Farm”.

These quail are actually mature and laying eggs within 8 weeks from their hatching and the health benefits from eating their eggs is amazing. There are now 36 of these little ones here and growing. This is the first week we’ve listed their eggs on our local co-op.

Aside from all of this we’ve just been working on the farm. Cleaning, growing, painting, sheep shearing and more.

Since the loss of Mom, I feel like I’ve been spending a lot of my time recreating pretty much my whole life (not just the farm). I am devoting much more of my time to the sheep and working again with fiber. We are working on a Virginia Grown/USA Grown organic yarn line as well as a line of naturally dyed yarns. Both of these projects are slow moving as it is quite expensive to have all of the fiber processed and natural dying can also be very expensive. Another thing I am doing is participating in special events to share (and sell) our fibers grown here on the farm.

Wow, I’m tired just writing! Until next time…

It Always Seems Like I’m Getting Ready!

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With the two events of last week behind me, I am getting ready for the first deliveries for the Co-op Winter Season. I’m also getting ready for a second attempt at the Fall Festival at Brookview Farm. Saturday’s event was rained out, so they are going to try again this coming Saturday. Several of my customers have placed sizable orders in anticipation of early Holiday shoppers..so I’m getting those ready too. Yes, I feel like I’m always getting ready! I’ve reduced my milkings to once a day now that the girls have been bred, so I’m only making soap and lotion every other day. Thankfully, I have a good bit of milk frozen, so we should make it through the season easily. Another words…order, order, order!

I feel so fortunate to have been part of the Wisteria Faire last week. There are so many nice things to say about the event starting with Mother and Daughters that put it together. They had done such a beautiful and efficient job in the planning stage that all went off without a hitch. This event was at two private homes which was really kind of neat. My booth was set up on the front porch of the daughters’ home..want to talk about a captive audience, everyone had to walk by me on the way into the house..so everyone saw me. We sold a nice mix of goats milk products and fiber items. It was so nice to see people buy yarn for Christmas gifts. The first day was a little slow, but that gave me time to work on a spinning order that I have. It was just wonderful and an email today let me know that there will probably be another in the Spring! Yeah!

You will notice that I have a new tab at the top of my Blog for the Co-op. My intention with this page is to list weekly, in detail, what we have listed on the Co-op. I think some of the reason why our sales are so very low may have to do with members not knowing exactly what it is they would be purchasing from us. Hopefully, this will help..we’ll see. Feedback on this will be appreciated, this is why I have left Comments open on the new page.

Well I must go do round two battle with Verizon (the phone Co.) over our internet. So far today they have eaten about 2 hours of my time with no resolution. Since I have nothing else to do today (HA) my patience is wearing mighty thin!

Shipment Updates & Co-op

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For people who are waiting on shipments from us, they will go out this week. Sorry for the delay. It’s been a bit nuts here trying to get CSA orders shipped and dealing with soap cure time being off schedule but we’re getting it under control.

There are many of you who follow this blog that are members in the Fall Line Farms Co-op and have been our devoted customers since it began last November. I wanted to let you know that we will no longer be participating in the Co-op as a Producer. There many reasons why and this is not the venue to explain but I did want to let you all know that you can always order our products direct from us and delivery to the Richmond Virginia area will be free. Also, you can stop by the retail outlets we have  and find our full line of products, except the Wool/Alpaca Socks, they would need to be ordered direct through us. Email us breezehillfarm@verizon.net for a list of retail outlets or any questions you may have.

I will keep you all updated on events that we will be participating in between now and Christmas. You already know what great gifts our goats milk soap, lotions and socks make – and they don’t break the bank! Please know how much we value your business and want to keep as many of you as customers as we can.

Speaking of products and business, I need to get to work on making soap and lotion today. Orders are backing up again.