farmer girls

Instead of cleaning the house yesterday Emma and I decided to join Autumn & JeNae for some adventures in farmland.

First we headed over to Swank Farms, but unfortunately there’s not much to check out over there unless it’s Halloween.  During Halloween they have these insane corn mazes and all kinds of other activities for kids, but right now there were just a bajillion goats and chickens hanging out.

So we headed over to Casa de Fruta to get some goodies and play around.

After we ate some lunch Emma and Autumn had to do some time in the stockades.  Thanks to Scooby-Doo, Emma knew exactly what these were.

Then we hopped on the train and took a tour of the area.  JeNae & I found the ride to be relaxing and pleasant.  Emma and Autumn thought it was thrilling.

After the train we headed to the second deck of the carousel.

Then it was off to the water wheel and sluice where Emma and Autumn searched for treasure.  In the gift shop you can buy bags of sand that contain crystals & other fun stuff.  The girls found lots of amethyst, quartz, arrowheads and shark teeth.  It was definitely the highlight of the trip.

There’s really only so much sluicing I can watch so I wandered around taking pictures of some interesting stuff.

The place is full of old farming machines that they used back in the day as well as other machines that other farms have donated for display.  This was part of an old fire hose contraption.  I could’ve wandered around and taken pictures of tons of old rusted out machines, but maybe next time!

becoming a locavore

I’ve wanted to sign up for a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and here in Morgan Hill it’s even more tempting because we’re so close to so many farms selling local produce.  If you’ve never heard of CSA let me explain.

Every week a box is delivered to a specific location.  The box contains whatever fruits and veggies are in season at that given time.  You sign up for a membership, pay your dues and pick up your box on that given day.

When I looked into it last year the only one I found (I didn’t really do a very thorough search) delivered once a week and it was $35 a week for what they called a family share. When they broke it down it really seemed like a lot of produce and I wasn’t sure if we could go through that much.  At the time, the only people I knew who lived nearby was my sister and her family and they’re not the biggest veggie consumers so splitting it with them wasn’t really an option.  So I let it pass.

Then a week ago I was talking to one of my friends who was also interested in joining.  It got me thinking about it again.  Then I was looking at Swank Farm’s website and saw they were part of a CSA called Timptations.

Timptations offers both weekly and every other week pick up and they will substitute items for you as well.  Every week they send out an email newsletter listing what will be in that week’s box.  If there’s something there that you know you don’t like then you can choose something off their sub list.  You can also add things to your order off their a la cart menu like olive oil or extra produce.  The portion sizes are a little smaller and they only charge $24 a week.  Perfect for us!

So I was thinking about it when we came across their booth at a local festival this past weekend and it just seemed like fate.  So we signed up for the every other week trial membership for a month and today we picked up our first box!

I was so excited to see what was inside even though I already knew!  Carrying it in from the car I could smell the strawberries and it made me so happy!

So we got strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, cherries, asparagus, broccoli, butter leaf lettuce (both green & red), radishes, English peas and an heirloom tomato plant!  Everything looks and smells wonderful!  I’m not sure yet what to do with the radishes, but I’ll figure something out!  Out of the eleven items eight of them are organic.

I’m hoping this will encourage me to fix us some healthier meals and try new things.  I used to cook a lot.  And not just whatever meals, but I experimented a lot and considered going to culinary school, but I’ve been lazy for awhile and I really need to get back into that.  Here’s hoping this helps.  And it definitely doesn’t hurt that I know we’re supporting our local farmers too!