Time for the midsummer slog

This time of the season always feels like a bit of an uphill battle. Most of the fall seedlings are in the ground and lots of crops are coming into their peak harvest periods, yet it feels like the little tasks get away from us and the crops that aren't faring so hot stare us down. Because the farm is quite young and we're still building soil health and tackling perennial weeds, soil-borne diseases, and pests, it's disheartening to watch crops suffer and know that our harvest yields will be much lower than anticipated. For this and other reasons, August easily

feels like the most tiring month of the growing season, and the drive to wake up and march out to the field and get to work is waning after many months of planning, planting and weeding. But, it happens every year, and somehow we muster up the energy to get the jobs done. What keeps me going are the little things - harvesting beautiful ripe tomatoes, feeding beans to my dog while I harvest (she can't get enough - that's her in the photo), and when it's the perfect temperature outside (in my opinion this is 23 degrees, sunny, with a light breeze). We're also trying to take more time off these days to enjoy Summer off the farm, which is easy to miss if we keep our heads down.

I don't have many new updates to share (other than it was Becka's Birthday last week!), but I'd like to offer some recipe inspiration for your summer meals:

- We often find ourselves gravitating to a variation of this smashed cucumber salad at lunch time for a quick and flavourful bite. I've really been gravitating towards Chinese-influenced flavours this summer.

- Along similar lines, here's a simple ginger-sesame coleslaw (made with cabbage).

I'll leave you with a photo of Becka in the beans today - beans are definitely a big win for us this year. As much as we dislike harvesting them (there is no ergonomic way to harvest bush beans, I've tried all the positions), they are thriving! We hope you're enjoying them.