Rain falls gentely almost every day, in the afternoon or night time. We are in raining season again.

Terry works on the new farm most time, I work on this farm. Sonny helped to  throw fertilizer last time, he helped with this job again last week.

He is as tall as me now, can carry some weight, and likes to show me his strength. I let him taking his own speed to do the job, I value more of his trying to help than the amount of fertilizer he threw. First morning, he did three bags, I did ten bags. He said to me,” Mom, you are awesome, you are so fast.” I told him that I had more practice. Second morning, we finished the job, but had four bags left; that means we didn’t use enough for the farm. Third morning, I used up those four bags at the area where Sonny did the job, it was his off day from farm work.

I started my Perennial peanut ground cover project last year. This plants grow low, don’t climbing on trees, build nitrogen in the soil, sounds great to me for our farm. I started on one acre flat area with more soil. Digging a small hole for one seed, about two feet apart. It took me some time to plant the whole area, Sonny helped me at weekend. But only 20% of seeds came through, weeds grew faster than peanut, at the end, not many peanuts are doing well.

After coffee season which is dry season, most weeds died down, only the peanut patches were healthy green. Finally I got some time to attend it, hand weeded those patches. I took these two photo at below this March.

Slowly we got some rain, these peanut patches took off, it spread out fast and wide. At the same time, weeds grew again, I tried to keep up with weeding this time. I used a sickle to dig out clump root of weeds, pull out young weeds, throw weeds into a big bucket, then dump the weed underneath banana trees. Often I worked 4 or 5 hours in the morning, 2 or 3 hours more at late afternoon if it’s not raining. I spent so much time squatting or kneeling when I was weeding, my knees and back started getting ache. Now I understand, why a person complain about pain of joints when they get older. I have a jar of  home made comfrey salve from Joni, some nights I rub a little on pain area before go to bed, next morning I feel much better.

It’s a simple job, but require a lot of time. I’m enjoy doing it, when I see the peanut cover more and more ground, image the land and coffee trees getting happier, it gives me a big satisfaction. Half acre of my first experiment area look like the three photo at below now.

Other half of acre look  like the picture below.

I had Sonny helped me to plant more peanut on empty spots between patches this March, it grow very well now.

The plants have yellow flower, it’s edible, has light sweet taste, I tasted it. The plants flower year-around, bees were busy and happy, I could hear their buzz when I was pulling weeds.

Planting Perennial peanut as ground cover on our farm was my idea, my project; Terry didn’t involve, he worked very hard on our new farm, six days a week. Two months ago, he spent two mornings pulling weeds with me, saw how well the plants growing.

He said to me, ” at beginning, I worried how determined are you with your project, are you going to be persistent with it? Now I think you did great, it looks so nice. I’m so proud of you.”

I was surprise to hear he said so, because I didn’t catch any hint of his doubt, he didn’t express any negative opinion about it in this whole time. Instead, he gave me a little encourage, let me do it all in my way by myself. I’m very happy to hear his complement, but the strongest feeling it give me is gratitude, for the way he treated me, let me try to carry out my idea by myself. There is the presence of his love, love with wisdom behind the whole thing. I’ll remember this, will try my best to love him and Sonny in the same way in the future.

My goal is planting this ground cover on rest of farm. Terry suggested planting smaller area at a time, so I can keep up weeding these areas. It might take me several years to complete this project, but I think I can do it.

Coffee season is here again, we are struggling with lack of coffee pickers as usual. Kathy is the only one who committed to pick coffee with me. Christi has several farms to work on, couldn’t come to help this year.

We started our first round of picking in August, when two pickers who picked for us before showed up, and asked to pick coffee. I picked with them, took us 7 days to finish the first round.

We picked the second round in September, Kathy was back from her trip, I got in contact with Juan, whose parents helped us for years as long as they had time, his parents went back to Mexico as their visa expired this year. Juan said that his uncle and he would try to help us even they have regular job, and bring more pickers when they can find. So it only took 4 days for second round of picking, there were 10 pickers for 2 days.

The third round, coffee beans came ripe so fast, it was a big round, we couldn’t keep up with it. Luckily Juan and his uncle came most of picking days, they can pick twice as much as we do. Just had these two men picking in the farm, I imaged there were 3 Kathy and 3 Susan picking coffee. Kathy laughed at my imagination. We finished this round last Sunday morning, it took us 16 days, and we’ve got half of our crop already.

Compare with last year’s weather at this time, it seems we had more rain this year. Too wet, ripe coffee bean can’t hang on the tree very well. I always gently pick from lower part, pick around the tree, then bend the tree; otherwise, too many beans end up on the ground. Kathy worked so hard, she inspired me to work hard too; even when it was raining, we wore raincoats picking in the rain. Some good weather afternoons, we picked until it’s dark.

I bought iPod before coffee season, I enjoyed it when I worked in the farm, music or podcast. One day, we listened to TED TALK on the way home from beach. It was talking about a few minutes of silence in our daily life is very important. I agree with it. Sometimes I couldn’t stand any music or podcast, turn off my device was the only way to calm me down. So most of my picking days, I didn’t carry iPod with me. I found this was the first time I enjoyed my quiet picking time, peace in my heart, one day went by very fast. At the end of the day, I didn’t even feel tired, except the joints of my hands felt sore. I didn’t even worry about losing some coffee on the ground, because we couldn’t picking fast enough. What I cared about was that, we are trying our best to bring as much coffee as possible to drying deck from the field. I didn’t stress out for some coffee beans on the ground, not in my basket.

We even had Sonny picking with us at his fall break, 5 days, about 200 pounds. He made some money, bought a book for himself.

Kathy and Susan

Terry

It has been long time since my last post, we’ve been very busy with our works, even I’d like to share some of our stories, but I chose, went to bed early.

Kathy and Cal helped me to finish picking the last round of coffee. As soon as we striped the trees, I started pruning, Cal chopped most of branches and piled beside the road, Terry helped me and Cal. Chipping was a easy job, Terry and Cal fed the chipper, I spread the wood chips in the farm.

Last month we milled our new crop, it’s smallest crop ever, don’t know why. But green coffee looks very good.

We had two rounds of coffee blossom, second one was bigger. We were so busy, I didn’t even have time for my morning walking, I took these pictures when I was working. I’m always happy to take a few minutes to admire their beauty.

We leased another small abandoned farm from Kamehameha School, we’ve worked on the land almost one month, had a big progress.

Drive way before we cleared it.

After we cleared the land.

It’s spring break right now, we had Sonny to work with us. He earns some money for his work, he’s trying to save some money for a new computer.

We started our coffee harvest in August.

Before we started picking, we talked to our picking crew man and found out that he didn’t have any seasonal pickers from mainland this year, he wouldn’t be able to help us very much. We decided picking the first round by ourselves, hoped to find some pickers later.

Kathy, our friend, is the first committed helper. Nick and Kathy are our very good friends, they had been married over 40 years and had a happy marriage. Nick past away this April, we worried about Kathy at beginning, didn’t know how she would handle her life to be alone. But she showed us all of our worries were not necessary, with all of their happy life memories, she faces the future life with such positive attitude. A very good example for anyone who lose their life companion, I’ll remember this.

One day, after we quit picking, we loaded up our truck with coffee bags, drove home.  Kathy’s truck was parked outside of our drive way, it’s a new truck which Nick had chosen and bought for Kathy a few years ago, so she wouldn’t have a vehicle problem for years. When we were slowly approaching our drive way, Kathy, sat next to me, said:” I always shocked to see my truck parked there, the first instinct thinking is, Oh, Nick is here? ” When we were passing her truck, she said with a little cheery voice,” Love you, darling.” There is no sadness, see the truck like seeing Nick in person. I realize how wonderful and deep their love is !

She and Nick used to take care a coffee farm over 15 years, they enjoyed their farming life very much. Later years, with Nick’s health issues, they had to give up farming. Now she is alone, she was looking forward to help us picking coffee before we even started our harvesting season.

We usually start to pick around 7:30am, 50 minutes lunch break, work until 5pm. I was worrying about she works too long and might fall on our rocky land. On second day picking, it was very hot in the afternoon. After 3pm, I asked her a few times, was she tired, did she want to quit? Her answers were always no. At 4pm, I told her the time, she said,” we still can pick another hour, right ?” Of course, we worked to 5 o’clock. She is a hard working lady, I can see how much she enjoys working in the farm. I’m so grateful that Kathy stayed with us and picked coffee beside me, helped us getting through the first round.

Terry’s wrists pain bothered him too much after a couple of hours picking, a result of long years hard working with hands. I told him to stop picking, since I had Kathy picking with me. He could be the cook, so he cooked lunch and delivered the meal to us in the field. At weekend, Sonny and Cal helped too.

Kathy enjoys her coffee picking time.

There usually are not many ripe coffee at first round picking, but with more and more coffee cherry getting ripe in the farm, I knew only me and Kathy couldn’t handle the whole farm. We kept asking around, checked on Craig’s list, called every coffee picker we used before, but there seems had no hope to find any pickers.

One day, I was waiting for Sonny in car at his school’s parking lot, engine was off, radio was on. I was leaning on steering wheel, looked out my right side window, listening to the music on NPR. A vehicle pulled up and parked right next to my left side, I didn’t turn around right away, was feeling a little down because we couldn’t find any picker. When the school bell rang, I turned off the car, saw a  young woman standing outside of my door, getting her child out from her car’s back seat. I didn’t know her, but I had seen her before on mango pickle-ling days. I guessed she is a local, words came out from me without filtering through my brain. “Hi, by any chance, you have a coffee farm and use coffee picker too?” I don’t remember what she said, but I said:” If you know any coffee pickers, please let me know, we could use some help.”

She told me that her husband is a Mexican, he knows some coffee pickers, she could ask him then call me back. I wrote down our phone number on a piece of paper, and told her, my husband’s name is Terry, and I’m Susan. She asked,” Are you the Dakine Coffee Bean?” I said,” Yes. How do you know it?” She said:” Oh, I’m Barry’s daughter, Christi.” Barry helped us two years ago and house-sat our place when we went to mainland last summer.

That evening, Christi phoned and told us that they couldn’t find any available pickers right then, but she and her best friend Mari could come to help.  That is how I met Christi and Mari, two strong young women, the best helpers I could ever dream of.

Christi and Mari both have three daughters, elder two girls go to Honaunau school, youngest one stays with them. At weekend, they had the girls came to pick coffee with them. Sonny is elder than them, but they all knew him since he was in student council  last year. Now they had the chance to play with him, became his friends, the big boy from higher grade. Christi told me how excited the girls were, after their first day’s picking with Sonny.

Sonny is the eldest one, he carried a hook to bring down coffee branch, so the younger ones can reach, they picked from same tree. They talked, laughed, made a lot of happy noise, sounds like a big flock of chirping birds, made the farm so alive.

We don’t really want the kids picking a long hours, so we set a goal for them, five school kids filled up three buckets together, then they can quit and go to our house play and watch TV. They finished their goal before noon on the first day, each one made $9.00.

I remember how horrible thing coffee picking was to Sonny last year. Now he likes it as long as he picks with his friends, and he can make some money. He looked forward the weekend coffee picking time with his friends, I like this change of him very much too.

Kathy and I amazed by Christi and Mari, they always picked more coffee than us, even they each have one toddler to take care while they picking.

They both are very caring moms. They put a water proof blanket on the ground; big umbrella to protect the girls from sun or rain; toys, food and iPad keep the girls content. They set up the place where the girls can see them, move the site along as they picking. Every time when the girls are crying for mom, they go to them, pick them up, hug them and tell them mom love you. Their kids must have the security with mom’s love, they are very easy become happy and content again. Many times, they just need a couple of minutes attention from their mom, and they always get it.

Christi can pick more than two bags a day.

Sophie get riding in Mari’s coffee basket.

With Kathy, Christi and Mari’s help, we got through our second and third round of picking. At the end of the day, I drove our truck to pick up coffee bags. Christi and Mari are younger than me, they tried to stop me when I tried to pick up a small bag by myself, not even one third of a bag. They are not bigger than me, but saw how they could pick up the bags, I know they are definitely stronger than me. Together, we loaded and unloaded the truck, nobody was just standing around, not helping. We are similar type of women, not shame to work hard like this, actually enjoy it. So we worked very well together, our picking were clean, very comfortable energy. With these three wonderful women working with me, I had good energy to work and happy every day. they inspired me, made me realize I can do more things if I have to, or If I want to.

We just finished our fourth round of picking last Saturday. Our regular picking crew family came to help since they had some time. I called Christi, she was happy we had some helpers, she had her farm to take care. She told me to call her whenever we need help. How lucky I am to meet a such nice person.

Christi and Mari came to pick coffee, were not because they had lots of time, they both are very busy with their own life. They came is because we needed help, they just wanted to lend a hand, even we just met. I’m so fortunate to know them and Kathy, they are so generous and kind, and they showed me how strong a woman could be.

We finished our coffee harvesting season in early January, got a couple to strip the trees and they helped to prune a part of our farm. I showed Callum how to prune, and two of us pruned the rest of the farm. Terry chopped some of the branches, but his wrist pain bothers him if he does too much. He saw a wood chipper at a friend’s place and found out the machine works very good with coffee branches. So he ordered one and the machine arrived after we finished pruning.

One day morning we got the new machine, Terry couldn’t wait any longer to use the machine, he tested it that afternoon near our house. I was roasting coffee and could see him from window, I took these two pictures when he was working. He is very happy with the machine, it’s perfect size for coffee branches.

Later we worked three more days, each time was about 4 hours, Callum and I did the most of feeding the machine, Terry dragged the branches to us. It’s really loud when the machine is running, we have to wear ear plugs to protect our ears. And wearing hat or head cloth, chips and dusts covered our body at the end of the work.

Coffee branches were piled by the road.

After chipped the coffee branch piles.

After we chipped up these branches, we spent sometime to spread out the chip piles on the land.

Then we had cloudy and raining days for a week, coffee trees are happy again and started another big round of blossom.

The ground was still wet, so we threw fertilizer and got the job done. Finally, we can relax, take a break and do something else.

I planted these orchids on jacaranda tree trunk a few years ago, that was the only time I touched the plant, the plant just grow itself and having a big blossom.

Pineapple flower

Our lives have been very busy since we got back from our summer trip.

We sprayed BotanicGuard once in July as soon as we got our life routine back. Then we noticed that some coffee was ripe and need to be picked, that was end of July, we started our first round picking.

It was so early, we couldn’t get help from our picking crew, most of them still on the mainland. Terry, Sonny and I picked the first 7 days without any help, we were slow but we cleaned up some areas. Through a friend, we met a couple who used to take care 15 acres of coffee farm, we paid them 1 dollar per pound for this first round. They are wonderful people and excellent pickers, they picked over 300 pounds a day between them, and Terry and I only picked 80 pounds together. I couldn’t imagine how they can picking so fast, hope they didn’t make a mess of the farm. One day, I went to lower garden, walked through the area they picked. It was nice clean, no broken branches, bamboo poles prop up some branches after they picked. I  was really pleased by their work.

We picked second and third round of coffee in August and September, Beatrice and her husband helped us on second round, our picking crew came to help us at the end of third round. We just finished our fourth round, it was a big round, our picking crew were too busy to finish the job, we had to do it ourselves, it took us long time to finish this round. It started on 13th of October, ended on 7th of November. Our pickers picked two days and they told us they couldn’t come back in a week, so we started picking ourselves. If Beatrice and her husband helped us, it wouldn’t take this long, but their lives caught into some other issues, they couldn’t come. Luckily we had some friends who came to help on their off days, even we were not fast pickers but we got some coffee harvested. Now we can have a break for a couple of weeks before next round picking.

Wet coffee on drying deck.

We usually let coffee dry on deck for a few days, then load them into drying machine, it is not only to dry coffee but also kill the CBB living in coffee beans. Terry picked these ripe Hawaii chilli pepper, they will get dried with coffee at the same time.

School started in August, we signed up swimming practice for Sonny, he had to practice one hour every afternoon, and we took a few trips to different swimming pools for swim meets on the island.

Meanwhile, Terry’s grandnephew Callum came to live with us, check out the island life style and help out with farm works. So far he likes here, and found a steady job in our neighborhood, works five days a week, he doesn’t see himself move away for a while.

Sonny likes to have a big brother living in our house, another person to hang round except parents.

Terry and I both are very happy to have Callum around, he take over some labor intense jobs, like empty trailer with coffee skin, spray BotanicGuard. Callum and I threw last round of fertilizer in September, we did the whole farm in one day, the last hour it was pouring, we were soaking wet and tired. I was so exhausted, all I could do was watching movies on coach at the end of the day. We’ll take 2 days to do this job next time, make it a litel easier.

I told Callum many times, how great we can have him in the house, we all benefit from him been here.