“It’s crazy! They take out the pits! They take out the seeds! It is delicious! It is so good!” Dragon sipped fresh juice as the machine whirred on its next batch.

“Tell me why you like making apple juice.”

“It’s fun watching.” Dragon put down his glass and stood on a stool assuming his observing stance - hands on knees, all the better to peer into the moving parts of the juicing machine.

“Because it is fun looking at this.” Bean pointed to the extruding pulp/skin/seeds from the rotating arm. She pushed the plunger down. “I like doing this.”

“I like the watching the stuff - the detritus coming out.”

English Major Momma point!

This seems apparent to note - but plants, like children, change.

Like well cared for children, well cared for plants grow with vigor and joy.

Like curious courageous children, plants do not like staying within lines, following other’s ideas of decorum and placement.

In other words, my new favorite toy is an electric hedge trimmer.

In late March 2019, we planted a grove of locust sticks for our coppicing woodlot. The sticks were as tall as my knee. Three years later some are 15 feet tall, 8 inches around, and we are in full coppice mode. This is what we have learned so far.

When we first settled in our home I wrote a small series entitled “Farm Beginnings.” Having been informed very kindly by a farmer that we have a homestead not a farm – I am entitling this Homesteading middles.

My father, when he was alive, loved to do silly poems. Ahem:

Homesteading middles

Rhymes with giggles