Sam Wickham

August- Studying Ergonomy

Out of all the tools on the farm, these two bodies of ours are most heavily used...more than the tractor, our hoes, harvest shears...I guess it goes without saying but they are the knives in our set that are most favored: worn handles, edges widdled and withering from

Blame it on the Heat Exhaustion

On one of these 90's-degree days we've been having, I finished weeding a bed in the field midday and felt the itch to write.  Welp...blame it on the heat exhaustion but I wrote about farming in heat waves again...but more in a survival guide

The Summer Wall

Every year it comes...we hit a wall.  We push and push since back in April and you know?  I feel pretty great that we made it to mid-July before we hit it hard. It's only natural that when you wake up with the sun and work or

A Summer Week in Pictures

Fireworks at sunset...not a bad way to kick off the weekA Monday morning Wholesale harvest with my friend Jupiter the wee toadTuesday: Weeding in the wet fieldWednesday: Tomatoes are officially on the menuThursday...early Thai basil harvest...one of the best perfumes grown on the farm. Just in time

July-The Craft of It

A few weeks ago, I headed to a little cottage on Lake Huron with our two babes.  Running off to the nostalgia of coastal Michigan...a place where Rich and I hatched a farm, setting our creative energies free for the first time in that way...it stirred up my

Farming the Heat Waves

A mild and fair spring can catch you with your pants down if you're not careful.  At market this spring when a good friend to the farm checked up on the start to our season...I told him that it felt like we had gotten away with something.

Soulstice

I'm not quite sure how summer solstice isn't a federal holiday...what a time to celebrate!!  It's the day that we are tilted the furthest toward the sun in our northern hemisphere.  We have the most daylight hours to work with of any day

How to Quit Your Job and Start Farming

How to's are for dummies ;P.  I suppose the best that a how-to can offer is inspiration, but they are certainly not to be understood as framework.  In fact, as an impressionable greenhorn, how-to's sort of became their own barrier to entry into farming for a

The Thing About Farmers Market...

Farmers Market season has come again.  Rich and I have been working weekend farmers markets since 2011.  Pack up, drive to town, set up, peddle goods, break down, drive back to the farm, unload, tend to what you've missed all day on the farm. Throughout the last ten

June: The Stability of Summer

Thank God for our busy season.  This is the season we are essentially maintenance man and woman...sustaining the plants we've brought to life in the garden, making sure everyone has their basic needs met, and fixing what breaks.  The domesticated living souls on the farm, be it

We'll See You in November

Somewhere in the midst of May, the days of the week begin to blur.  The last few springs I've wondered if I should send out a memo to all the people in my life that text messages are likely to get lost in the mix and that my

Planting with the Glow Worms

This week I realized that our hive is buzzing with an energy that won't decelerate until we turn our calendar to October.  On Tuesday I spent my first night of the year in shorts and a tshirt until the sun was well below the horizon with the plants.

Stay at Home, Mom

If a kid is lucky enough to have a good mom, I'm pretty sure they have this plea running through their head: "stay at home, mom".  I grew up in a pack raised by a 'stay-at-home mom'...a woman who was putting in more

May: A Retired Dream

In our fledgling farm years, I wanted to be everything for everyone...I was determined to raise all species of pastured and woodland livestock on a piece of land, allowing them to intermingle with the living system...a mutually beneficial experience.  They would graze amongst fruit trees interplanted with flowers.

Bumper Cars

May is coming 'round the mountain and that's about the time that we get caught in the current of our season.  Though there was snow accumulation last Monday, we have been busy getting the farm engine started since early March.  It reminds me of the gradual progression

The Threat of a Midwestern Spring

Earlier this week I was reading my current fling of a book: All the Light We Cannot See, attempting to curb my anxiety over the raging wind.  It hissed and screeched, testing the solidity of our mighty 100-year old fortress.  I imagine its joints ache during those windstorms of 30-40

Slim Pickings-Early April on the Farm

When the tips of the grass start to green and all of town is talking about spring and all the spring things, that's just about when we get the most interest in our produce that we get all year.  Chefs and home cooks alike are just absolutely burning

Why we grow vegetables

Out of all the things in the world we could do with the farm, why do we grow annual vegetables?  No-we are not vegans.  And no-we do not think vegetables are THE answer to climate change.  Well, let's start at the very beginning, it's a very

Someone Once Did Me a Kindness

I remember watching Pay It Forward in class during the Catholic schoolgirl chapter of my life.  We digested the movie as a group, hearkening back to Matthew chapter 7...the home of  the Golden Rule in the bible: In everything, do to others what you would have them do to

March: Resuscitation

Could there BE a more welcome time for the return of the sun?  The promise that the greening of spring brings is invaluable, especially while our world weathers a rather tumultuous time.  Remember the first March of the coronavirus pandemic?  If it was bound to strike, I was so grateful

Country Culture

If someone gives you their morel foraging spot, there's not much more to give.  Like a good fishing hole, it's a place tucked away from the world and full of treasures to be found.  The other week, I crossed the field and hopped the fence to

Couples Farming

I've met more than one person who thinks Rich and I are crazy for working, living, raising hellions, and sharing one bathroom together.  But that's the only way we have existed since crossing paths...morning to sunset with each other.  Like stars, we collided at the

Wards of Old Man Winter

The lamp over the leather couch is on and it's nearly noon.  Soon enough this will be unthinkable when the farmhouse is well lit by summer sun.  Thick clouds are blanketing the sky, and somewhere within those fluffy masses, ice particles are accumulating hastily.  Snow will fall again

The Remedy: A Quiet Life

I remember the first year we started Foxhole, I got the chance to sit down with the produce manager of our local market in Dayton, a potentially big account for us.  I was amped up and primed as if I was heading into a big game...clean flannel shirt, chinos,

A Week Without Rich

A lot of people ask how we do what we do: farm for a living with no crew and two little ones to keep up with.  The answer is that we rely HEAVILY on our synergy.  It's a very specific and unique life we live and it'