Planting the Water Pipes

Large pipes needed to be laid down in the ground next to the corn field for irrigation. It took several men to haul these pipes and set them down in the ground. Over the next couple of visits, they were buried in the ground.

A couple of the volunteers who helped dig tonight.

Families that Play Together...

We had a delightful family come to the farm tonight. This young family spent time collecting rocks and helped weed the garden. The kids then entertained themselves for a bit using the grow boxes to practice their balancing skills. We love having young families come to the farm!

If You Build It, They Will Come

Remember the popular saying from Fields of Dreams? You know...the one that whispers quietly..."If you build it, they will come." Well, we didn't build a baseball field, but we did build some heavy duty garden trellises to support the squash growth.

An entire row of rebar poles were added to one of the boxes tonight. These poles will support the veggies and allow the vines to climb freely throughout the season.

Mutual Group from Butler West Stake 20th Ward

A wonderful mutual group from the Butler West Stake 20th Ward learned how to plant carrots tonight. Elder Osborne taught the group how to use the dibble (carrot) board to make holes in the soil. The youth had fun jumping on the dibble board to create the holes. We made lots of progress with the carrots tonight thanks to their help.

Here's a picture of the carrot board with all the many wood pieces used to make holes in the soil.

Elder Osborne providing instruction on how to plant the carrot seeds.

Spreading Sunlight

Before our farm duties begin, the service missionaries gather together as a group and one person offers a spiritual thought and prayer. We then review the day's assignments. 

Today's spiritual thought was delivered by Elder White who brought in a vase of tulips to illustrate his message on sunlight. Elder White described how a tulip needs sunlight to grow to full maturity and blossom into the beautiful flower that it has the potential to become. Our Heavenly Father and Savior Jesus Christ are the ultimate sources of light. Because we are His children and are here on this earth, we have a divine light that shines within each of us. We all have tremendous worth and great potential to become more like our Savior.

Elder White explained that as missionaries we have the opportunity to be a ray of sunlight to those who come to volunteer at the farm, and as we go about our every day lives. A kind word to others, or a genuine smile can go a long way to lift someone's heart and bring a little sunshine to their soul. May we all strive to share our sunlight with others and be a shining ray of kindness and love. 

Strong Men at Work

We were blessed to have several men and young men come from the Cottonwood Heights stake on Saturday. We put their strong muscles to good use and had them set up the stakes for the tomato plants. These men worked hard hammering the stakes in place.

This group of young men and their leaders worked hard on getting the wicket poles to bent into their semi-circle shape. 

Bending the poles.

Sister Bolton had been eying a particularly messy area right in front of the shed. The young men got right to work cleaning out the area as their last task of the day. Thank you! It looks so much better.

All nice and clean!

Giving the Transplants a Blue Bath

The lettuce seedlings planted a few weeks ago started to sprout. Tonight's task was to fertilize the seed trays in a special blue potion known as 10-52-10 that helps promote root growth.

Here are all the lettuce varieties we planted along with some cabbage and Brussel sprouts.

One of our service missionary's granddaughter came to help out at the farm tonight. Together they helped fertilize all these veggies.

To make our special blue potion, we took one cup of this 10-52-10 fertilizer and placed it in another bucket.

The bucket was then filled with water.

And the fertilizer water was dumped into a shallow tray.

Elder Haynes provided instruction on how to properly fertilize the plants.

The trays were soaked for about a minute in the fertilizer.

And then they were set back out to dry.