week 22: burger night

this week on the little dream farm

What a farm week it was!

Here’s a few things we had going on:

• Run-in shed cleaning: Chris fully cleans out the donkey’s run-in shed every few months. It’s such a dirty job. He removes all the pine bedding, moves it to the overhang part of the shed to reuse and recycle as much as we can, then cleans the concrete floor, sprinkles it with garden lime to keep down bacteria and bugs, and lays down fresh bedding. Here’s what Maxy looks like when the new fresh bedding gets laid down and they roll and sleep in it in pure joy.

  

  The pine-chip-spotted donkey—a rare sighting! 🤓

• Grass raking for mulch: I’ve been having to mow every 4-6 days with all the rain we’ve been getting, so this time around we raked up a bunch of grass into wagons and heavily mulched all the borders of the Big Garden. We’ll keep adding grass mulch to the beds around all the plants to keep down on weed pressure this year.

• Planting, planting, planting: if you ever order plants online, the best time to order is right at the tail end of each planting season—everything goes on mega sale. I ordered a row of all new Dahlias from four different places (Flowerwell Farm in NY, Bluestone Perennials in OH, and Longfield Gardens in NJ, Eden Brothers in NC) Begonias for our hanging baskets, Elephant Ears for pots and garden beds, and Astilbe for our shade gardens to accompany the Hostas. I also picked up a bunch of perennial plants from Honest Weight Food Co-Op in Albany, NY—if you’re local to the area, they have an incredible selection of $3.99 pots…can’t beat that for grown-on perennials! I even ordered a few Bearded Irises that will ship in the fall…can’t wait for those lovelies to arrive. Our guest bathroom floor was covered in boxes of tubers and bulbs and roots and plants until I was able to get outside Friday night and Saturday in the rain to do most of the planting.

• Seed Starting: I rigged up quite the seed starting contraption in our master bathroom tub this week! Grow mat on the floor of the tub. A clothing rack standing in the tub. Grow lights suspended from clothing hangers, and seed trays on the mats. We’ve got 100 seedlings going at the moment on just that one little mat—a bunch of flowers and veggies—and of course, Mr. Buist has been stopping in the bathroom every now and then to check on his little baby seedlings. This cat LOVES plants. Heck…he just loves absolutely everything!

  

  Something I’m always repeating to myself here on the farm is “If you want it to happen you’ll find a way.” This is a prime example of making it work with what we’ve got!

• Donkey hoof care: our farrier, Shawn, came by Friday to work on the donkey’s hooves. He let us know that he and his family sold their home here and are planning to move to Florida later this summer. It’s amazing for them and a huge bummer for us—Shawn has been such an asset and a key player on Maxy’s care team through these last few years. Luckily, we know a farrier who lives just down the road who we hope will be able to help us out. He’s already met Molly-Max and Dominic as he’s delivered some hay for the boys when we needed it in a pinch before we had the truck. Their family has a massive farm and produces a ton of hay and straw, they do maple sugaring for maple syrup, they grow and produce their own wheat and oats which is unique to this region, they grow and sell perennial plants, and they participate in a bunch of farmer’s markets in the area—all really impressive stuff! Here’s their site in case you’re local or just curious to check them out.

• The 2025 edible garden is up and running: It took us two days of prepping the Big Garden to get the fences, center grass patch, weeds, wood borders, and growing trellises ready for this years edible garden. We’ve still got a handful of fruit starts to grab and plant and then we’re also planting a bunch of things from seed this year—our first time growing food from seed directly in the ground. Friday it was a hot, sunny day, and we spent the late afternoon getting a ton of plants into the ground.

  • Tomatoes

  • Peppers

  • Kale

  • Salad mixes

  • Beets

  • Broccoli

  • Cauliflower

  • Cabbage

  • Onions

  • Green Beans

  • Edamame

  • Squash

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And now for the real reason we’re all here: Burger Night!

A night to remember!

I met and made a new friend a few weeks ago and she invited Chris and I to her family’s annual Burger Night—something they started back in 2017. Her family runs a beef operation a few towns over and started getting together a bunch of farmers and producers in the area each year in the spring to bring various farmers together and celebrate the start of a new season.

The rain came in steady and in unrelenting droves yesterday while a system hung over our region all day long. That never stops farmers, though, and I told my new friend last night it probably helped the amazing turnout of this year’s Burger Night because nobody had the excuse that they needed to be on their farm getting work done!

They strung up lights in their equipment barn, set out picnic tables and Adirondack chairs, placed buckets where there were small leaks in the metal roof, and brought in a few heaters to warm everybody up. They churned out burgers from the grill under a tent and laid down wood boards to avoid walking in the mud. The kids had a blast outside playing in the rain in the walking paths they mow through their fields, and everybody made do—some people brought their own bottles of wine or beer and glassware to drink, some brought their own plates and utensils to keep down on waste. There was a compost bucket alongside the trash and recycling.

Not only were the burgers fabulous—but a bunch of people brought sides and dishes and things to share. My new friend also makes ice cream and she’d whipped up a bunch of batches of different flavors for everyone to enjoy—Maple, Nutella, Sweet Cream, and Blueberry…Chris and I had a small scoop of each and they were all out of this world!

We chatted with friends we knew, we introduced ourselves to people we didn’t, and we had a fabulous night overall.

Burger Night was a blast!

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It appears the rain has finally passed and it looks like we’re getting our last mild day of the season—mid-50s today…70s and 80s this week. We’re going to get to put those new mini split units to the test for the first time this week and I’m thrilled for the warmer temps as it’ll make the gardens absolutely start taking off!!

In the Dahlia Patch, I’ve now planted hundreds of tubers in 10 33-foot-long rows. As of Friday, there were 19 popping up out of the soil…a great indication after all the rain and cold temps the tubers were planted in two weeks ago.

That’ll do it for this week from here on the Little Dream Farm. From Chris and I, we hope you had a wonderful week, that you’re enjoying the weekend, and that that the week ahead is good to you.

We’ll catch you back here next week same time, same place, same channel.