Week 7, Summer 2024
Welcome to week 7 of the summer season! You might notice that this farm journal is being posted one day early, and that’s because tomorrow we embark on a field trip to Knoxville, IL, where we’ll tour a regenerative farm, camp as guests on the beautiful land, and create music together. You’ll hear all about it in next week’s farm journal, so stay tuned for that — but without further ado, here is a reflection on the happenings of this past week.
Friday 7/12:
Friday morning was steeped in abundance as we harvested peas, carrots, okra, beans, cucumbers, and our first bitter melon. In the afternoon, while others relished in trellising tomatoes (okay, mostly Yonah), prepping for the farmers’ market, IPM, and other farm tasks, I cooked up a poetic reflection that was the farm journal from last week — which, if you haven’t read it, I highly encourage you to do so. We also met our lovely guests for the weekend, Patricia’s friend Zari, and Ella and Luisa’s friends Isabelle and Anna Squared. Luisa, Gavi, and I cooked up a lovely Shabbat dinner featuring dumplings, baked sweet potatoes, and roasted radicchio lettuce (which is such a creative and delicious way to eat it). I feel so grateful to have access to such fresh and abundant produce to cook meals that feel like home to me, and have also been engaging in a lot of reflection on the concept of diasporic foods and what it means to connect to both ancestral and current lands through food.
Saturday & Sunday 7/13-7/14:
The weekend was filled with outdoor activities like biking and swimming, farmers’ market shenanigans and whale face-painting, and catching up and hanging out with friends. For Saturday dinner, our guests executed an incredible dinner of pizza made with tomato sauce from our green tomatoes, which we savored over a lively discussion about our solar system and why we see the moon at different positions in the sky each day. On Sunday, we took the second trip of the season to swim in Lake Michigan and watched some dauntless child backhandspring all the way down the sand dunes. In the evening, Yamei came over for dinner, and we discussed how ZA can continue to forge meaningful connections with the larger Sheldon/Watseka community, interspersed with stories of Yamei’s “legendary” cat Meow Meow, who could not be stymied by a sliding window.
Monday 7/15:
On Monday, we harvested garlic and onions for the first time! There’s something about harvesting root vegetables that is so awe-inspiring to me — it’s just incredible to witness the magic that is created in the ground and the product of a whole other world that we get the privilege to receive. We packed a DAF order in the afternoon, and in the evening experienced a storm that finally took down my mushroom yurt and had folks debating whether or not we should head to the basement.
Tuesday 7/16:
On Tuesday morning, we welcomed Zoë back from her birthday weekend in Chicago. After a morning of straw chopping, trellising, and transplanting, Patricia and Acacia formally oriented us over lunch to the midwest phenomenon that is Culver’s, in preparation for our trip to Knoxville this weekend. In the afternoon as a Context Conversation, Ernest shared with us a documentary called “Out Here” about queer farmers, and we reflected on what role queerness plays at ZA and what it means to name it more explicitly, and how people connect to queerness differently in places in which there are fewer queer communities. Luisa executed another incredible art workshop in the evening, and over a dinner of kimchi stew and a green bean and mushroom stir-fry, we leaned into playfulness with silly improv games around the dinner table.
Wednesday 7/17:
On Wednesday morning, Yonah and Zoë took a trip to the Sheldon Food Pantry, and I set to work rebuilding the mushroom yurt that had been tragically taken down by the storms of Monday night. I must admit that I am pretty proud of my final creation, and the pink mushrooms in there seem to really like it too. Zoë and I tackled some weeding in ATR and a tent clean in the afternoon, while others continued with trellising, straining honey, painting the compost toilet, and transplanting.
Thursday 7/18:
On Thursday, we began prepping for our trip to Knoxville this weekend, where we will get to explore what other regenerative farms look like and envision elements we might want to bring to ZA in the long run. In the afternoon, Zoë and I will be inoculating our next generation of Italian and Golden mushrooms, and we’ll also be dancing atop hay bales after work in preparation for Landing next month. Wait…what’s Landing, you say? I’m glad you asked!
Landing is a movement festival that is happening August 9-11 at Zumwalt Acres. A rough schedule for the event, camping information, a lineup of artists and teachers that will be present, and more information can be found in the registration form (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdKcDZKvqNNd2saOagD692kkYE3yhl5mxA4VH1t2zF8TgZ6Ow/viewform?usp=send_form) and on the website (https://landingmovement.squarespace.com/festival). If you’re interested in joining us, be sure to register for the festival, and please reach out if you have any questions, hopes, or dreams!
