2003-11-07 - 8:03 a.m.
From time to time someone will come by during the sale season and ask,"You only sell stuff a few months of the year so what do you do during the rest of the year? I guess you get to take it easy." . They actually believe we do nothing in the off season. I sure wish that was the case. Right now leaf season is starting and for the next month we will be cleaning up the leaves in the orchard and yard. The muscadines are about to shed their leaves and if you just leave them they will kill the grass.
Getting up leaves can be a frustrating task. We just got done the other day getting everything raked and mowed and looking out the window this morning it looks like we never did a thing. The orchard is surrounded by trees and one side is always covered with leaves depending which way the wind blows. We haul lots of them to the garden to mulch with but there always seems to be a never ending supply.
Over the last week I've been hauling tomato cages from my friends house just down the road. He grew more tomato plants each year than I did and sold his tomatoes from his house about 2 miles down the road from us. We both grew the same variety and if I would sell out during the day I would send folks to him and vice versa. We're good friends and it used to tickle us when a customer would say mine were better than his or his were better than mine. We would just grin, weigh up the tomatoes and take the money. He's decided to retire and move to north Goergia and frankly I'll be sad to see him go. I'm also a little worried. He sold as many tomatoes as I did and I'm afraid I'll be overwhelmed next year. I'm planning to grow more tomatoes but not twice as many. That's why I've been getting the cages. He called me and asked if I wanted them. I started to say no but got to thinking I had better plant more tomatoes and I better get some. So don't worry there's plenty to do and I doubt I'll get bored.
