Hello family, friends, and patrons! I hope everyone’s summer is going well so far. It's been hot the past couple of weeks but we have had a few nice bouts of rain and cool weather which has made this summer quite pleasant. It's busy as usual around here and we have our workload cut out for us the rest of the year, but all the work definitely pays off in the end to be able to produce such awesome food in an amazing place for amazing folks.

Good day fellow patrons! We hope everyone is having a pleasant summer and getting ready for an amazing second half of the year. As usual, it is slammed busy around the farm and we have many things going on ranging from our day to day cow, pig, chicken, and duck chores to clearing land for fence lines and thinning the woods after the pigs are moved. We are also working on building projects around the farm from outbuildings to prepping for the barn raising in the fall to securing our heat for the winter by cutting, chopping and stacking wood. If you use wood to heat your home like we do during the chilly months, you better have already started preparing your wood stacks for the winter. Before you know it, winter will arrive and the stoves will be ready to fire up. It's a horrible feeling when you run out of wood and have to go out in the cold and cut and gather wet wood for the stove. It is totally worth the extra time planning and taking proactive measures to be prepared for the winter weather. It is actually worth way more to take time to plan more than just your winters. This is something that I have been working on personally in my life and I think it is worth sharing a few words on this week: Ways to strategize on finding balance throughout all aspects of your life.

Hey! It's Angela writing to you all this week. We are very sorry we did not get a newsletter out last time and will try to ensure that we stay consistent with the newsletter being sent out every two weeks. It has been extremely busy here and this heat has been especially taxing on us. As I'm sure many of you are experiencing as well, summer is filled with family activities, graduations, wedding, etc. It is difficult for us to leave the farm with the farm work we have so we are grateful to have Graham Fogwell as a farm partner from Fogwell Family Farm. He is fully trained up and able to temporarily manage our farm chores so that we can take short trips for family events. Brian's sister graduated a few weeks ago in Williamsburg so we were able to go to that. This weekend we spent one quick day at Lake Gaston visiting Brian's family. Next weekend Brian's sister is having a one year birthday party for her son. Normally we would have to decline most all of these invitations as the animals must be tended to on a daily basis. But having Graham here has allowed us to enjoy these events even just for one night out of town. Below is a cute picture of Brian and Willow on a raft at the lake this weekend!