Grower's Academy

Patrick and I are thoroughly enjoying Grower's Academy, sponsored by VT Earthworks and Virginia Cooperative Extension. We are being challenged and inspired. So far we have attended two sessions, the first challenging us to consider forming better, more comprehensive business plans, and the second instructing us in production planning for developing seedlings, transplants and crops for market production.

Plenty of detailed instruction that will help us improve. Opportunities to journal and process.

One of our first activities was to sketch out our vision of idea of success on the farm. The lecturer encouraged us to write our ideas out in any form we wish, even haiku if that was our style! After writing a page outline of all the things I envisioned for our farm, I couldn't help myself. A haiku fell out onto the paper.

Here it is:

Success on the Farm

Lush waving grasses
Cushion satisfied workers
Eating summer feast.

Here is the long version:

*feed our family (and a few families more) a well-balanced diet 12 months of the year with food we raised ourselves or bartered locally
*pay ourselves a decent wage, enough to pay modest bills and go to the dentist occasionally
*run multiple industries that are individually driven (by different family members), that coordinate beautifully
*improve pastures and livestock via intensive grazing
*maintain buildings, fences
*improve woods and waterways

So I know I am not a poet, but I enjoyed the exercise! And I hope that as we are taught and inspired, our idea of success will be tweaked and improved. I desire for our farm operation, messy, imperfect and certainly rough around the edges, to reflect God's goodness and love to my family and to the world around us.