Hooray for the Farm Stand!

For starters, I’d like to apologize for not updating the blog more often. Despite my best laid plans, finding time to sit down and write about what we’re doing on the farm has been difficult. I have a really good excuse though! Most every moment that I’m not picking, planting, weeding, seeding, or selling at a farmer’s market, I’m working at the Farm Stand. And let me tell you, the Farm Stand is a wonderful way to spend my time! Jeff and I really wanted to open a stand as a way of making the things we grow more accessible to the people and families who live in the neighborhoods surrounding the farm. We expected that it would be fairly successful, but anticipated that it would be slow going in this, it’s first season. Boy, were we wrong! Every day that we’re open, more people stop by and get so excited about what they find. Our clientele is growing quickly and with our growing popularity, Jeff and I are afire with ideas of new things to grow, programs to launch, events to hold.

The Farm Stand has rekindled my enthusiasm for growing food in the way that we do. I am so excited that our farm is becoming a part of the daily lives of people all over Santa Rosa. The thing I enjoy most is that our Farm Stand customers are all different. We have parents shopping with their kids who use the Stand as an opportunity to talk about how veggies are grown and to plan dinner together. We have folks who live in retirement communities and come stock up on tomatoes to share with their friends and neighbors. We have people who are shopping for special dinner parties and people who are simply shopping for that night’s dinner. We have caterers and chefs, the affluent and the not so affluent, those who really care about where veggies are grown and those who stop mostly because it’s convenient. All of these different people have one thing in common though – they all go home with our clean, fresh-picked, delicious fruits and veggies. I love that folks all over Santa Rosa (and probably beyond) enjoy the fruits of our labor. Making healthy, local food accessible and convenient to people from all walks of life is incredibly gratifying and makes all the hard work worthwhile.

So, in sum, THANK YOU for supporting us. Your encouragement, patronage, enthusiasm, and smiling faces are the fuel that we need to keep going and growing. Keep sending the feedback, ideas, and requests, because we’re constantly planning what’s next.