This summer was SO much fun! I didn't quite know what to expect going into it because when I was there last summer, it was ALL play. This time, it was going to be WORK and PLAY! Going into it, I knew that I wanted to really learn how Tracey made her garden grow so well. Other than that, I wanted to play with the chickens, maybe set up a little "love shack" so she doesn't have to keep ordering chicks, and become more familiar with the sheep. Tracey also wanted me to work on the website. She hired a lady to do all the actual work, but she needed opinions and ideas to get the new website flowing! Other than that, there are the usual farm chores and things that come up that need to be done. Needless to say, it was a busy summer.
Tracey took this picture about a week before Jake and I left. The zinnias were pretty much pure heaven! Earlier in the summer, a bunch of us were thinning the small seedlings to ensure that each of them would be able to get enough nutrients. We also put a "netting" system up that you're supposed to do with zinnias to ensure they have straight stems. We were happy when they actually started growing that they had straight stems!!! Florists don't generally buy them when they're all wonky and curved so this was a big feat.
On the far right, you can also see a little bit of the sunflowers that Tracey planted for fun. Sunflowers are nice because you don't have to stake them at all; their stems are big enough to carry the weight of the flower. Not only that, but they are SO EASY TO WEED. They can pretty much grow in grass, so we were just weeding them once a week (AKA pulling grass out for like 5 minutes) to make sure they were getting enough sun, water, and to make that bed look overall prettier. It was all SO worth it when these babies started to bloom.
One evening, the boys were playing pickle ball and I was just sitting outside talking with Ashley. We saw the horses and Edward standing like THIS! They were ready for their dinner, but they were posing so perfectly for a picture! We grabbed Ralph's phone and snapped this beauty. Hahaha it is definitely a treasure photo now . . . They are funny!
Girls trip!!!! We went to Bowling Green, KY to pick up Bridge from EFY and made a fun girls trip out of it. We ate at this awesome and random pizza restaurant, went to Zappos TWICE! We mainly had a lot of fun laughing and talking and catching up with each other.
This is what the garden looked like in the BEFORE stage, when we spent hours weeding, thinning, and then putting up the netting. Crazy how much it changes!
Beth and her family were at the farm for a few weeks in the beginning and that was so fun! Her kids are crazy and fun, if you can't tell by the way Lucy's holding that chicken!
We got SO many jobs done this summer (and by we I mainly mean the boys because near the end of the summer I was a lazy pregnant lady). I'm hoping next summer we get to spend at least a little bit of time at the farm. Obviously it's a place that holds a lot of special memories for me. ;)
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