It’s time for an update on the garden, our new chicks and Father’s Day sewing!
Our property looks VERY lush compared to when we moved here in March. Above is now and the photo below is from March.
It’s so exciting to see the greenery fill in as we continue to ‘discover’ plants we hadn’t yet noticed and get to know our land.
The veggie garden is giving us a nice daily salad but isn’t even close to providing all the vegetables we need this summer…that will be my goal for next year’s garden and in the meantime we have plenty of wonderful local sources for produce. (I don’t have photos of the various places I talk about in the following paragraphs so I’ve interspersed ones of our property instead!)
We’ve been shopping at the farm stand run by the man who used to own this very property 6 years ago. He operates a larger market garden now that is only a short 5 minute drive away.
We’ve also been loving the farmer’s market. It is more of a mixed market than the one we frequented in the Comox Valley. This one has pottery, sewing, weaving and plants along with produce making it lots of fun to peruse!
Our most recent source for veggies began last week. Noah and I headed to the farmer’s cooperative between naps to volunteer a couple of hours picking peas, carrots and garlic scapes. I’ve been excited to do this because we walk by the farm every day with our dog and the owners are very friendly and mentioned that they have work and volunteer opportunities. What a great way to learn about growing and meet like minded people in the community!
I tried to go without Noah while Matt watched him a couple of weeks ago but, since Noah would have none of that, Isabelle, who is one of the farmers, told me she used to just bring her kids along when she began to farm. So I loaded Noah in the ergo on my back and he enjoyed watching the other people picking and chatting for 1 hour 45 min. It was so nice to hang out with adults (and veggies)! They surprised me by giving me a paper bag of ‘farmer food’ (veggies that weren’t able to sell for one reason or another) as I left and we’ve enjoyed some delicious meals using them since! Matt joked that it’s more cost effective than if I were to get a part time job because he’s able to focus on Thread Theory while I’m gone (rather than childcare) and we have fewer reasons to go to the grocery store and spend money. Plus I won’t be worried if Noah wants to stay home and play and we miss a planned volunteer day! Anyways, I’m wanting to do it more for the sense of community than the produce anyways.
In other news, our chicks arrived! They were hatched by the kindergarten class in the elementary school where my mom is the principle. Thanks, Mom, for setting this up for us and for sending exciting photo updates each time an egg hatched! Unfortunately, something went wrong during fertilization or incubation and only four of the fifteen eggs hatched. These four chicks are so lovely though!
They are amber, black, and classic butter yellow. I love the variety of colours! We ended up buying four more chicks yesterday (Blue Australorps) to keep our first four company.
My last two snippets of news are somewhat linked. A while ago I mentioned my baby sleeping woes on the blog and many of you emailed and commented with commiseration, tips and your own stories. It was such a relief to feel supported by other moms! I sifted through all the advice to try to find something that matched our situation and was thrilled to receive an email from Erin of Tuesday Stitches patterns and Maternity Sewing. She said that the Sleep Lady Shuffle was a life saver for her. I’d already read pretty much every other sleep book out there so I figured, what the heck, may as well read that one too! We began the shuffle last weekend and low and behold, Noah’s sleep has improved for the first time since he was born!!! Until now it had been steadily getting worse so I am over the moon. Even better, the shuffle allows Matt to take the reigns and I suddenly have entire free evenings and only need to wake for a couple feedings. Its really mind boggling how much this has changed my life…I can garden and work all evening, have alone time, and sleep more than 45 min stretches all while knowing my baby is resting better than he has for months and will be happier in the morning. So, THANK YOU, Erin and everyone for your support. I think the result of your tips will be an increase in pattern production rate at last (and a far happier mom and baby)!
Finally, my last related tidbit: I sewed a shirt for my dad thanks to Noah’s newly rested levels of patience! He played with my fabric scraps happily while I cut and played with his dad while I sewed. It’s the Nice & Easy Tee by Hot Patterns (available in our shop) in superfine merino wool. I think it’ll be a nice base layer for him while skiing in the winter and sailing in the summer. It ended up a bit big but my mom says she can bring it in at the side seams and my dad likes the comfort of it being roomy.
Well, I hope you all have a great weekend and a happy Father’s Day! Matt’s requested a sleep in and French toast. Are you sewing anything for your dad for Father’s Day? Our PDF patterns are 25% off until end of day Sunday! You could even let him choose his preferred design on the day-of so you don’t need to marathon sew this weekend.
