The summer solstice was yesterday and it hardly felt like summer beyond the early sunrise and the late sunset. The weather has been unseasonably cool and low humidity, something I recall from my Wisconsin childhood but that feels unfamiliar in Nebraska - I welcome the mild weather with open arms!
Our crops are generally planted at this point in the season, some later than planned, but everything growing well. We will start a few more successions of zucchini, cucumbers, sunflowers and fall crops like beets and scallions. June is a nice respite between the busy planting season of April and May and the heavy harvest season to come. Flowers are beginning to bloom and here are a few of the things I've noticed with wonder lately:
- The fireflies are scintillating in the field across from our home (a word I directly connect to this magical quilting video I saw in my early 20s) - one night in particular, I went to get the mail after our kids had fallen asleep and to my surprise, the fireflies were lighting up the trees like Christmas lights! The other night, as we sat at the end of our driveway watching the fireflies, an owl swooped past us, silently on the wind - we all gasped in excitement!
- We saw a sun halo—a perfect ring of rainbow surrounding the sun—with a bright sundog stretching upward beside it. Perfection!
- We've watched sparrows picking seeds from the lilacs, orioles and wrens gathering tufts of cat fur our farm cats have shed, and goldfinches balancing on dandelion stems, eating the seeds before they drift away on the wind.
- Last fall we planted the Fall Maximum Mix in our U-pick garden. This spring it's been a joy to watch surprise flowers emerge—poppies, larkspur, baby's breath, and others I wasn't expecting. I'm accustomed to carefully planting individual seeds and transplanting each one with intention. Sowing a seed mix brought back the feeling of my earliest days of gardening, when every unfamiliar seedling was a mystery waiting to reveal itself.
- In early May, our family took paddleboards—generously gifted by a neighbor who was moving—to Lake Cunningham. As the sun dipped behind the trees, the lake came alive with dragonflies, birds, and frogs. As we rounded a bend, we spotted a bird none of us recognized. Our daughter and I paddled quietly toward it until we drifted within a respectful distance. It remained completely focused on the water below. We noticed its broad face, red eyes, long feather tufts, white facial stripe, and golden-orange feet gripping a piece of driftwood. Then it lifted effortlessly into the air, leaving us with just enough of an impression to hurry home and reach for our bird guide: the elusive a Black-crowned Night Heron.
- This morning, I saw a peak of purple on the tops of our anise hyssop as they get ready to bloom. I love the way this time of year moves from mostly green to a spectrum of colors.
As I wrote this list, I realized that nearly every one of my favorite memories from this spring happened outside, far from a screen. Running a farm means much of our work happens in the garden, with our hands in the soil. But running a business means plenty of time behind a computer. Add in television and the endless scroll of social media, and it's easy to spend more of our lives looking at a screen than looking at the world around us.
Yet every evening there's a field of fireflies flickering in the dark. Somewhere nearby, an owl is preparing for its nightly flight. Flowers are opening, birds are building nests, and there's almost certainly something beautiful happening just outside your door.
