Thursday, June 30 was a day with a bit of pressure. With the 4th of July holiday coming up, there was a major shift in the schedule that put pressure on to get the products ready quickly.

We were told to pick all of the tomatoes in Greenhouse 2, so all 4 of us wwoofers started picking with a row. In Greenhouse 2, there are 6 rows of tomatoes. This means that there are 5 aisles with a row on either side and 2 aisles flanking the rows, meaning there are only tomatoes on one side. As is probably apparent, the aisles with tomatoes on both sides take longer to pick. Each one of us took an aisle with rows on either side and started picking. I was so excited to be the first one to move on the the next aisle, so I went for it and took the center aisle with  rows on both sides. That left only the side aisles to do. We all finished our work very quickly. I was impressed with A and J that they were motivated to check our work while I found The Head Farmer and Ellie took the tomatoes to the barn for processing.

The Head Farmer then tasked me with picking the tomatoes in Greenhouse 1 while the other wwoofers picked spinach in the fields. I finished quickly because there were only 2 rows to pick and was then tasked with cleaning all the afid residue off the tomatoes. This is done by “polishing” (as J put it) each tomato with a damp rag. Once A and J were finished picking spinach, they joined me in the tomato polishing. We had a great conversation about liking yourself and what one thinks when they are alone with their thoughts.

We were excused for lunch early because we hadn’t yet been trained on the things that needed to get done, so we got to enjoy over 2 hours off.

After lunch, A and I weeded Greenhouse 1. It was tedious and unexciting. But we were introduced to a new gardening tool. It is a heavy ahd tool with a flat blade like a hoe on one side and a three pronged fork on the other. We have since dubbed it “the tool” because of its versatility and ability to pull up even the most strongly rooted weeds.

While we were weeding, Ellie and J came over and told us we could go milk the cow. We have all wanted to do this, but the opportunity had not presented itself. J and I were the two that got to milk this Thursday. I got the hang of it fairly quickly in my estimation. When milking a cow, one opens their hand and loosely holds the teats. Then one squeezes in a downward motion, pushing the milk out of the teat. And repeat. It’s incredible how difficult it was; it really requires strength in very specific muscles (muscles that I have not developed sufficiently.) After the milking, we were told we could finish up cleaning up and head in.

Ellie and I had been eagerly anticipated the opportunity to make soap. The Farm Mother mixed the lye and water together without us, but then showed us the rest of the process of making soap. We took frozen pig back-fat and carefully trimmed  every scrap of brown off the white fat chunks and placed it in a pan with coconut oil. Then we melted the fats until it was 110 degrees fahrenheit. At that point we added the lye/water mixture (that was fully cooled) to the fats and stirred with an immersion/ stick blender until it was at “trace.” Then we poured it into the molds and left it off to the side to set up for a day before cutting. Then it needs to set up for at least one month before it can be used.

Then Ellie and I had toast with honey and apple as a little treat and went to bed.