Farm Stay 3: Day 12

Today is the day before the pancake breakfast. The materials for my project just arrived yesterday, and my group member and I are rushing to get things done on time. It is always stressful at this time, but I am trying to stay focused and stay positive.

I think that positivity is a big thing that we work on during farmstay. It is very important to stay positive, because especially with a small group, we see each other all the time, and that can be tricky sometimes.

At the urban campus, we are with fifty-plus people everyday, and we are not generally used to having to spend much time with a select number of our peers. I think it is a great experience, however, and I am very glad our school grants us the opportunity to have experiences such as going to the Land School for three weeks at a time.

-Molly

Farm Stay 3: Day 10

March 7th: Day 10

Today at the Land School, everyone is hurrying to finish their micro-eco projects. While some are on top of all of their work, others are falling behind and need to work hard if they want to finish in time. After finishing our farm chores in the morning, we all enjoyed a nice breakfast, and then we worked on our morning math. After math, we had our morning meeting where we discussed headlines in the news, the weather and did our daily journal. After this we all went to work on our occupations. 

My occupation is studying hydroponics, which is the art of growing plants indoors. Today our group headed out to one of our neighbors farms, where we visited their greenhouse and learned about how they run their farm. Our neighbors run a business that you can sign up for where they will deliver fresh vegetables to you every week. This service is called a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture).

After our visit, we had a nice potato and salad lunch, we then had our english class where we had discussion about the books we are reading: Monkey (Journey To The West) and Samurai Shortstop. After this we had PE, physical expression. We all decided to go sledding, so we all walked out to Strawberry Hill, and had fun sliding down the slippery slopes we all headed back to the homestead to work on our Micro-Eco projects. After this we all did our daily jobs and had some free time. Since today was a DIY Dinner, we all cooked our own meals. I decided to make buttermilk pancakes, which turned out well. While the dinner cleanup crew did their work, we all had free time, but most of us did micro-eco work instead. We then had our study hall time, where we could get all of our work done. About and hour and a half later, we had our evening meeting where we go around in a circle and share stories, and talk about what is on the schedule tomorrow. After that we all got ready for bed and went to sleep.

-William

Farm Stay 3: Day 9

Today is the 9th day of Farmstay; which means that we’re halfway through this amazing experience. Today, the Junior high was supposed to come up to the Land School for a stewardship visit. Unfortunately, they called to cancel because of a snowstorm. It seemed like the Farmstay students had a lot of mixed feelings about the cancellation. We’re so used to our small community and some of us didn’t want our regular friends to join the mix. A lot of the students proposed that we should have a snow day, because the urban campus had a snow day on Monday. At the evening meeting on Monday night, Katie told us that we could cancel ‘Morning Math’ and sleep in. Everyone was quite excited about that announcement.

Academically, today wasn’t a normal day. The staff decided to give us an ‘optional work period’ which means that we had the whole day to work on whatever we wanted, or do things that were not work. There were also a few other options to work for credit, which is where you can choose to do work around the Land School and get paid for it. The whole day was relaxing and fun at the same time; it was a really nice break from a normal day. A big group of us went sledding on Strawberry Hill and had a blast.

After what is known as the ‘school day’ was over, we did our daily jobs and had some free-time while the dinner crew prepared tacos for Taco Tuesday! We ate a delicious meal and started study hall. After study hall, we finished the day with an evening meeting. Today was a fabulous day, but that’s not saying a lot (every day on Farmstay is fabulous). Even though we may only have 9 days left, we can still be excited for more fun.

-Amelia

Join us on Saturday for the Annual Pancake Breakfast!

Join us out at the Land School for the Farm Stay 3 annual Pancake Breakfast! Enjoy delicious pancakes, sausages, and other breakfast foods, while visiting with Farm Stay students, and explore the many crafts and breakfast foods we have for sale. We will have a maple syrup tapping demonstration, along with fresh Land School maple syrup for our pancakes. The event will be held this Saturday, March 10th at the LCS Land School from 8:30 to 12. Hope to see you there!

Farm Stay 3: Day 8

Monday, March 5, 2018

Today is day 8 of Farm Stay. It feels like we have been here much longer than that. Today we had a pretty normal school day. We woke up and either set up breakfast, cleaned up breakfast, or did animal chores in the morning. Then we had a Science lesson where we started our science observation projects.

Then one of the two occupation groups that are studying hydroponics went out Slippery Hill Farm where they grow greens and herbs. Hydroponics is a way of growing plants in water with added nutrients but without soil. We left at 9:30 and got back around 12:00. They are a local Wisconsin farm that uses the method of Hydroponics to grow their produce. It was very interesting to see what went into making food that we eat. It was also amazing to see what we have been studying in the past week come to life. They were very kind and explained everything that they did that went into making Hydroponic food. They even showed us how they packaged their food.

For lunch we had calzones that the other occupation group had made. We went on a hike with our mentor group and ate lunch outside. We eat with our mentor groups every Monday. After lunch we had Micro Eco where we worked on our products that we are going to have at the Pancake Breakfast. Then we had creative expression. Everyone has a personal odyssey of something that we want to do every day. We got a chance to do that one thing during Creative expression. Then we did our daily jobs and either had free time or were on dinner crew. We had a very delicious meal of Brussels sprouts, pasta, and salad. Then we had Study Hall where we get a chance to do some of our homework. Next it is evening meeting and then off to bed!

Freya 

Farm Stay 3: Day 6

Sunday, March 4, 2018

On Saturday, we all went out to Prairie Farm High School to attend the Green Skills Learning Event. It is a local event with the purpose of educating people on traditional and environmentally friendly skills for farming, living, cooking, and more.

We arrived at the school around 9:00 AM. The event was blocked in four different sessions throughout the day, each with their own lineup of classes and activities. In the first session, just about all of us went to a talk given by two Amish men who lived in the area. They went over their lifestyle and discussed common questions about Amish people. I found it extremely interesting and definitely now have a better understanding of who they are.

In the next session I went to a class on Tiny Homes and Rocket Stoves. The first half was a talk by a woman who had built and lived in a tiny home for three years. She and her husband had purchased a school bus and converted it into an efficient and cozy living space. One of the main points in her talk about this was her rocket stove, which we got a 45 minute presentation on afterwards. A rocket stove is a J shaped wood-fired stove capable of cooking and heating very efficiently. The reason it is so efficient is, because of the unique shape, it can burn wood very effectively. We learned that smoke is just wasted energy from the wood, and a rocket stove burns so hot that it emits no smoke. Learning about the tiny homes and rocket stoves was very interesting, and ideas I had never thought about.

After the second session it was lunch time. They provided us with chili and tortilla chips, and a lot of people bought delicious doughnuts an Amish group was selling.

I went to a talk about minimizing your home’s energy consumption in the third session. It was very interesting, and extremely surprising to see how much energy is wasted for no reason. However, the presentation was directed towards homeowners, so not super beneficial to me.

The final session included a class on brewing Kombucha, which many of us went to knowing that we would get samples. Two women walked us through the making of Kombucha, which included multiple samples. The live tutorial was very thorough, but not something I will be attempting anytime soon. The Kombucha we got to sample was great, and I grabbed a bit at their stand later.

We soon departed, stuffed with new information and lots of good food. It was another successful day out here in the bush - hopefully with many more to come.

-Peter

Farm Stay 3: Day 4

Today is day four of Farmstay, and it feels like forever. A certain routine has developed, with the occasional intro to a new class. From doing farm chores to hollowing out the snow fort to sledding on strawberry hill we are kept constantly exhausted.

After waking up at 7:00 this morning my group and I ate breakfast, and set out to do the farm chores. We fed the chickens and collected eggs, and fed the llama and sheep. It is my personal goal this farmstay to hug the llama. When we came back it was time for the community meeting, where among other thing we discussed leadership, and what thing have been going well on the Farmstay. At 10:00 we went into the woods across the road to tap maple trees. Then at 12:00 we had lunch. After an hour of quiet time, we went sledding, then at 3:00 we worked on our Micro Economy projects, which we will sell at the Pancake Breakfast. After cleaning out the Homestead, we ate Make-your-own Pizzas from the wood-fired oven. Then after watching a movie at 9:00 we held our nightly community meeting and went to bed at 10:00

Liam