Our harvest looked a little bit different this year. In light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic we are pushing back our plans to have our open house celebration. Next year we hope to welcome everyone to our farm and have friends and family come aid us in harvesting the lavender. This year‘s harvest proved our most difficult and not because the of the plants. Amanda was limited in her ability to help as she is 8 months pregnant and relegated to sorting the lavender that Doreen is able to harvest. she did manage one weekend of weeding while 6 months pregnant and did some pruning at 7 months...but Doreen has taken over the bulk of the weeding, pruning, and harvesting of all of this year’s lavender.
On top of caring for the lavender, Doreen and Manny have been trying their hand at produce. They stocked the garden that was begun earlier this spring with tomatoes, peppers, broccoli, lettuce, brussel sprouts, butternut squash, zucchini and basil - all of which have taken off (see our earlier post on the garden we began during quarantine for photos and details)! Aside from the garden, they also planted 27 grapevines to begin their very own vineyard (see our prohibition era post).
but back to the lavender...this year we have three varieties growing: angustifolia, phenomenal, and a local hybrid. We are excited to see how the 110 new hybrids do as they should bloom throughout the season, unlike the phenomenals, which only bloom once.
We are also working on our lavender based products and preparing the lavender workshop for its debut, which we are pushing to next year.