THE SEPTEMBER GARDEN.

The garden is an amazingly strange place right now....cool nights and hot days mean that we have an abundance of fall AND summer vegetables. The second patch of tomatoes finally kicked on (about 200 plants!), the eggplant are doing great, the muskmelons are ripening.  BUT - our fall garden is doing great as well! We are already harvesting kale, lettuce, and arugula - and the pumpkins and winter squash are ready as well. We got all the butternut harvested last week, and we took a little sampling from the sweet potato patch yesterday. After the trauma of last year, it has been a blessing of a season for us.- Hannah.

RITUAL NUMBER ONE.

For the most part, Wendell is nocturnal.  The majority of his days are spent sleeping off his night's adventures, so it's rare that we'll actually see much of him between the hours of breakfast and dinner...with one exception. After lunch every weekday, Hannah, Wendell and I all take a walk to the mailbox, and when we call for him around that time––"Come on, Goof!"––he comes running out from under the house, out from our neighbor's pasture, or sometimes just out of nowhere, and excitedly joins us on our walk.This long walk to the mailbox has become our first family ritual, and I think we all cherish it equally. Wendell bounds down the road, joyfully bouncing in and out of the woods, throwing his whole body back and forth as he wags his enormous tail. Hannah and I hold hands, occasionally throwing sticks for Wendell to chase (until he gets bored with that and chases our shoes). When we get to our box and grab the mail, we all turn around and head back together, as a family.It's such a lovely event, and it's one of my favorite parts of every day. I like to imagine ourselves making this same walk, at this same time, when we have children, when those children grow up, and when we're old and it takes up the better part of the day. Not that Bugtussle hasn't felt like home since I first laid eyes on it, but adding this ritual has solidified that feeling for me. We live here now, with the ritual to prove it.- Jesse.

BUTTERNUT SQUASH.

I must admit, it's been a pretty great all-around growing season for us and we continue to reap a generous return on our labor. In late July we planted our butternut patch and this past week, we harvested a solid ton or more of food—some 1,100 squash. It's always such an amazing sight to see that much of one vegetable together—it's a profound amount of food. What we harvested will feed over fifty families this winter, and we'll probably be eating butternut squash in some form all the way until we plant it again next summer. It was nearly dark by the time we were hauling them into the upper loft of the barn, stacking them carefully where they will sit while they cure. Lets just hope the barn floor holds! 

FOR DANDY.

Dandy is very very sick. Eric stayed home from Nashville today, trying his best to help her and her new calf. Everyone please send all your prayers and good thoughts today to this cow. *UPDATE* Dandy passed away on Saturday. Her calf is doing well as we continue to bottle feed him.