Pigeon Peas (Gandules)

In June we planted some Gandules ( pigeon peas)  trees. I love them so much! They not only are a Puerto Rican staple, but they grow very fast. They make great hedges or even shade trees depending how big they grow. You could line your whole property with them. We harvested our first batch a few days ago. I made rice with them. I gave some to my pastor and I have orders in already. My family in the states were the first ones to ask for some. There is nothing like fresh Gandules.

This is what the trees look like. 

This is a typical pot of Spanish Rice with pigeon Peas ( arroz con Gandules)

The little things that matter

My kids are raising their very own chicks this year. They used to help their dad but this time they are on their own.

Here is a great video on how to raise chicks if you don't know anything about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2IN4HIeJEk

Moving ahead to the future

We plan on turning our old house into the farm stand/ general store and eventual garden center. It is going to take some time and effort to get the place up to standard but we are determined. We still need the funding too. gofund.me/44xvis Here is a picture of the house we want to convert.

Feeling at home.

The beds are all set up and picture perfect. I even put the plaque up on the wall our church honored us with this summer. I was really surprised to get it and I was truly honored and felt the love.

The Move

Hey it's been a while!!!! Lot's going on around here. We moved to a new house on our farm and the old one we plan to turn into a business. A wood shop or my farm stand. Although it is away from the road I might be able to make the store work. If I find that it doesn't, it will be my husbands workshop. It is a very nice house and it is bigger. My kids have grown to big for the other house. My daughter just turned 7 and in the old house (a small two bedroom) she was still in her crib and sleeping in my room with my husband and I. The boys all shared one room with a bunk bed. The twins sharing one bunk. My oldest Jean-Luc was on the top bunk. Now we have three bedrooms and the rooms are pretty big. My daughter has bunk beds I found second hand for a steal. My son Jean-Luc was given a bed with frame, foot board and headboard.  So things are coming along nicely.The boys will each have their own bed and no more crib for Naomi. I love my new home and I will post pics.

In our new house harvesting white beans. My new desk for home schooling that I absolutely love. Bedroom pics coming soon.

It ain't easy

Farming is a very difficult way to survive for a small time farmer. We need other ways to make money to make ends meat. I started making and selling jewelry with the help of my mom. She makes Jewelry too. I also have a business plan for a farm stand and I'm trying to raise the money to get that stand built via gofundme.com. My husband is trying to get help from vocational rehab for a wood shop. He qualifies because he is disabled and has been getting medical treatment for about 7 years now. My husband is fighting to get social security and since his back, knees and joints are giving him problems and causing him a lot of pain now he may even need knee surgery, he may finally get social security. That will help us a great deal. But my husband is not the type who likes government assistance, so he would like a wood shop to still be productive if he is able. If you would like to help this family you can buy my Jewelry at
https://www.etsy.com/shop/Gemsell?ref=hdr_shop_menu
Or donate to my farm stand building efforts at
http://www.gofundme.com/44xvis
Thank you for what ever you can give every little bit counts.
Mama farmer, Virginia Toussaint

Keep Going Forward

It's been awhile since I posted last and things can change on a farm in the blink of an eye. We have good news and bad news. I'm a tare off he bandage type of gal, so here goes, last week we had heavy rains and a huge landslide took out about 100 plantains. We were very disappointed! But we heard some of them may still grow through which is good. We are determined not to let this get us down. We planted lettuce this week and transplanted some of our other crops. We planted coffee, cucumbers and 3 kinds of cabbages. The good news is our other crop are doing well (our beans and calabasas, and our tomatoes are starting to fruit. The good news is our cow is giving us about two gallons of milk a day. We have made ricotta cheese with it, our own butter, pudding, cocoa, and milkshakes. It's been great! I still have to make yogurt with it but we need to collect more jelly jars because that is what we make it in. One of our chicken's is sitting on 11 eggs and we hope to get a nice bunch of chicks from her.We want to build a large coop. Most of the coops we built in he past were small because we only kept the chickens in then till the grew to a certain size and the free ranged the and the slept in the woods behind our home.Now we need to separate them from our crops and make them a yard and give hem feed for now till we can fence off a large area for them to graze. Here are some pictures of our milk and other things we made.

Our butter, our milk, and last our Ricotta cheese.