Wedding and Cherries

We did it.  We finally got married!  It took us months to actually set the date, and then a week to plan the wedding.  It was perfect, and very low-cost! A friend of mine painstakingly made my dress, and it turned out graceful and beautiful.  The groom's suit was found at the thrift store.  We paid for a photographer with a veggie share, and the dressmaker's work with a work day at her house, home-made cheese, and herbs.  Seating was on home-made benches...boards supported on log sections, covered with a length of unbleached muslin.  My bouquet was collected from my parent's backyard.  A close friend made the cake, her sister did my hair, my sister made the flower decorations, bouquet, and some of the refreshments, and my mom made the rest of the refreshments.  That same sister also played the piano for the ceremony, perched up on the back of my brother's pickup truck.  I rode to the wedding in the back of a Madsen, pedaled by my father.

The ceremony was on land we lease, under a spreading cottonwood tree.  We had no attendants, a friend did the 'marrying', and there was no reception; just a simple dinner with family.   

We did take a short little honeymoon at Allegany State Park, in a rustic cabin beside a babbling brook.

 It was just what we needed...a little break before diving back into work on the houses and garden.  

I do thoroughly enjoy married life!

While my Dear Man and I were busy marrying and making merry, all the plants in our garden were busy growing...and the fruit trees were fruiting!  We recently picked the biggest Chinese Cabbage I've ever seen... 

Such a lovely head...it is very satisfying.

We also have Kohlrabi that is getting too big, broccoli and cauliflower growing to picking size, and cabbages swelling.  Frustratingly, varmints are getting into our fenced-off garden, and doing their best to destroy our crops! 

This spring we discovered four different cherry trees on our land...and they are all loaded with cherries!

And, for a day, with children...

We harvested quite the bounty!  Yum! Yum!

Apple Blossoms!

The apples are in bloom!  Casting their sweet scent abroad and beautifying the view...

Preparations and Plantings

Tomatoes, peppers, broccoli, celery, onions, eggplant, leeks, radicchio, cauliflower, cabbage, and ground cherries.  All these veggies we've started inside on the plant shelf my Dear Man threw together.

Tiny tomatoes...

Baby brassicas...

And the onions were finally planted out in the garden...somewhat overgrown and rootbound, but healthy!

My Man, with help from my brother, turned under the sod in the garden area, and we discovered that most of the ground is saturated with large railroad gravel!  We'll be pulling out rocks for years...but the dirt is lovely!

Pruning season is over, and we got more work done on the trees than we expected!  We did stretch the pruning season in order to get some of the most urgent cuts done...
Now to wait and see how they respond!

On another note...isn't the spring weather lovely, when it isn't pretending to be winter?

The Beginnings of New Beginnings

It is a new experience, planning a whole garden, just for two people.  I'm accustomed to planning the peppers for Mom's big garden (you can read about it here... Wilson Street Urban Farm) and helping out with the rest of it, but planning my own? and for just 2 people?  I'm trying, with plenty of help from my Man...

We started our onions and leeks earlier in March, and they are growing merrily on the mostly-assembled plant shelf with super-bright grow-lights.  

We started celery too, which is also growing...

Last fall we rushed a few garlic bulbs into the ground, and they are starting to grow, but unfortunately the frost heaved them out.  Next year we hopefully will have mulch to keep that from happening.  I don't know if they are salvageable...maybe once the ground thaws we'll be able to shove them back in.

  

On a different note...but not really that different...

My perfect future home with my Dear Man is in a little dilapidated city home (that was free!) at the end of a notorious dead end street in an area of Buffalo that few people want to move to.  The other thing that makes this ideal is the fact that there is a plot of land beside the house...and this plot of land is 6 acres of open grass, old apple trees, and tall cottonwoods.  Surrounding everything are train tracks.  Don't you agree?  Perfection.

The apple trees are old, neglected and in desperate need of tender loving care.  They have many broken and dead branches, and diseased and overcrowded limbs that we are trying to figure out how to start pruning.

The orchard is a little piece of heaven in the congestion of Buffalo for those who love and long for wide open skies... 

Our future garden plot....the orchard is behind the photographer (me).

I think I mentioned the house needs work....but can you see the new life thriving within?

It is amazing, being in the city, but feeling like I am in the country.  

A new chapter is beginning...and spring is coming.  Life is good.

For those with concerns:

The street retains its bad reputation from a few years ago.  Now all the drug houses have been demolished and 'those people' are gone.

What a Long Hot Summer!

For the first time, I am actually looking forward to Autumn!

This summer was the hottest and driest most people can remember.  We had to lug water for the garden nearly every day...in order to actually produce produce.  The heat was great for peppers, tomatoes, eggplant, and some of the other veggies though...
Look at the size of those Lemon Drop pepper plants!!

Since the harvest has been coming in, I have made a few varieties of hot sauce, dried cayenne, dried sweet peppers, smoked varieties of hot peppers, a couple ristras, and sold and eaten lots of fresh peppers.
I even made a connection with a local hot sauce maker to piggyback onto his bottle order to make my hot sauces look professional!
5oz Woozy bottles with Cayenne sauce and The Redheaded Stepchild hot sauce mix!! (we haven't finished making labels...)

I sure do enjoy working with peppers!  Next year I plan on trying some rather unusual types of super-hot peppers...

Something else that has been making this summer busy is my dating/courting someone!  I've been trying to keep up with my responsibilities at home, and do as much as possible with 'My Man'.

Just recently we decided we wanted to get married, so are working on figuring out an appropriate date for that event.

Wow!  It is strange to think, at this time last year, I had no idea this was coming!

I didn't end up taking any bike trips this year, and haven't ridden as much as I would have hoped.  I even got my driver's license...

  I am not getting a car, though.  No way!  Bicycles are the way to go!

The milk supply I was using for cheesemaking stopped, since the farmer ended up with calves...but hopefully this winter I'll be able to start that up again.

Sorry it has been so long since I posted....I'll try to post more regularly, but I really can't promise anything....especially when my life is busy with unblogworthy stuff...

I'm a Farmer Pirate!

Well, I haven't talked much about the things I do at home in Buffalo, but the time has come!  

I am involved in a co-operative for urban gardeners/farmers called Farmer Pirates.  My family runs the Wilson Street Urban Farm, and we work together with other budding gardening operations on the East Side of Buffalo.  Our goal is to bring good food and the awareness of nutritional and environmental issues to city-dwellers.  Unfortunately the urban soils have been so neglected and abused that it is very difficult to grow in them.  The solution to this is huge amounts of soil amendments, the most important of which is compost.  We are unable to obtain the amounts of compost we need, since we have inadequate equipment.  You can help us raise the money to buy the tools we need!  Just go to Farmer Pirates Compost Program and you can donate...

What have I been Doing?

I'm sorry, it has been a very long time since I posted anything.  I haven't been doing any interesting cycling-related activities.  

I have just been regularly riding across town for various reasons.  My ankles healed completely, and now I am sure to remember the correct height for my saddle, to avoid any other such mishaps.  My knee doesn't give me trouble, unless I exert it more than normal without stretching.  

A local cycling group recently advertised my canvas bags to those on their mailing list!  I haven't gotten any responses, but it is a first step...

A fellow bicycling traveler who decided to stop in Buffalo contacted me through Warmshowers, and now we are making a bicycle bag for her bike together!

I've been renovating a room in the basement to turn into a cheese cave, for aging cheese.  It has been a lot of work, but it is nearly done.  

Just recently I was the happy recipient of a supply of milk for cheesemaking.  The farmer gives me milk, and I give him some of the cheese I make!  A pretty swell deal for me I think!

I got my first shipment of milk last Thursday, and made Gouda, Neufchatel, and Ricotta out of the three gallons.  Neufchatel is similar to cream cheese; just made with more milk than cream.  

Here's what the Gouda looks like...and for some reason there are holes in the surface...I guess the curd was more firm that it should have been.

Another project I've wanted to get started is repairing a fiddle.  I was able to buy a damaged fiddle off Craigslist, and now have to figure out how to fix it up.  I'll get some books from the library on repairing violins, buy some tools and supplies, and carefully try to make it sound like a quality instrument.  This will be my first time repairing an instrument, and I'm hoping to do well and learn a lot!

Here's the project as she looks now...

So there you go, these are a few of the things I've been doing while not updating my blog.  

Life really is a journey into the unknown.  I had no idea at the beginning of the year that I would be able to get back into making cheese.  Not in my wilder dreams did I think I would get good milk for cheese making  in exchange for just some of the product.  You never know what will happen, what opportunities will present themselves.  Always be open to the unexpected, it is probably the beginning to a great story.

I could use this blog to document all the random adventures of my life, or I could keep it focused on cycling.  You, my readers, help me decide!  Focus on cycling, or allow for any adventure life throws at me?

The Ride to Allegany

Family and friends were planning a vacation at Allegany State Park, so my brother Willie and I decided we wanted to ride, instead of drive there.  It was a little over 70 miles, and predominantly uphill.  We left shortly after 7:30am.  Getting out of Buffalo was terrible!  We had to traverse rather busy shoulder-less 4 and 6-lane highways.  Thankfully most drivers were nice and gave us room.  Once out of the city and suburbs we were in farming country for a bit.

We witnessed a group of workers harvesting cabbage...

Then we got on route 75, or Sisson Highway...which took us through a variety of areas...from farms to hunting cabins.  It was very low-traffic and we enjoyed riding it.  

There were a lot of tanker trucks hauling manure, but they didn't bother us at all...they didn't even smell very bad!

We paused for a snack at one point and I documented the

Short trip!

Today my brother and I decided to take a relatively short bike trip just for the fun of it.  I wanted to get out of the city...if we could manage it.  I looked on google maps to see if I could find the shortest route into the more rural areas.  I discovered a nice bike path about 15 miles from us...mainly surrounded by fields and trees!  My brother thought it looked like a nice idea too...so there we went.  On the way there we checked out a short bike lane along the railway.  It was pleasant, for being  in the city and along the train tracks. 

Here is our route...

View Larger Map

One thing I miss about spring-time in the country is the Spring Peepers. I had the treat of listening to them in various places on the trail.  I also enjoyed the quietness...  

The sound of traffic was faint and there was only a very occasional small plane flying nearby.  The sounds to be heard were only birds, Spring Peepers, the whir of the tires, swish of my pants, and click of the freewheel.

Since it is still early spring the landscape is pretty drab....but I did get to see some little yellow flowers and some brightly colored Red-osier Dogwood!  

The path...quietly winding into the stark bareness of trees at end of winter...





The day was beautiful...sunshine and gentle breezes all the way!  Unfortunately that meant our pale winter skin got a little over-exposed to the sun...we both got pretty red.

We ate sitting on some big rocks beside this body of water.  If you look closely, you may be able to see the yellow flowers beside my brother's front wheel...






My lunch!  I had stale-ish peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with water.

My steed at the edge of open fields...I miss the wideness of farming country...

It was a fun trip, and good preparation for upcoming longer ones...