Yesterday was the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year. At 48 degrees latitude, our daylight hours are incredibly long during this season. Yesterday, we enjoyed more than 16 hours of daylight, with the sun setting at 9:44 p.m. I cherish this stretch of summer when the days seem to go on forever.
We have anemones blooming in the high tunnel, dahlias putting on about a foot of growth, and sweet peas that are nearly four feet tall. Our goal was to fill the tunnel with their fragrance, and it's coming together beautifully. We celebrated our first sweet pea bloom just two days ago.
We continue to expand our growing spaces with new raised beds planted with native flowers to attract beneficial insects to help keep pests under control. We also added a tomato greenhouse! We have 24 tomato plants growing in a small greenhouse built mostly from reused materials we had around the farm, with the exception of four windows. This year, we started all of our cherry tomatoes in seed snails—a fun growing experiment—and they are thriving.
We've also added purple onions, scallions, acorn squash, and cucumbers to our vegetable garden. The purple onions (the Redwing variety from Territorial Seed) and acorn squash have both stored exceptionally well. In fact, we used our last purple onion just last month from the crop we harvested in September 2025.
The flower seedlings got off to a slow start this year due to late frosts, but they're finally beginning to take off with the warm temperatures and extended daylight. Today's project is setting up netting to encourage long, straight stems for our bouquets and floral designs.
Our early peonies are in full bloom, and the second succession is preparing to open. While I try not to rush the season, I can't help feeling excited for more growth and rows filled with blooms ready for harvest.
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Happy Summer Solstice, friends!
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