Our growing season is off to a wonderful start! Our faithful friends at Willow Haven Farm once again donated their extra spring transplants to us, enabling us to plant our largest crop ever.  SO much to plant! 

With COVID19 forcing the closing of the campus, we have certainly missed our student volunteers from Misericordia University this spring. We are grateful to the Nickel and Contardi families for coming over to help. We will not be able to host large groups this summer, so we will have to rely on small groups and families to keep up with the weeding and other chores. Let us know if you’d like to come by for a few hours!

With our hens getting older, it was time to raise a new flock. We have invested in over thirty laying hens that should be giving us eggs this fall. In addition to our dependable Bovan Browns and Barred Rocks, Larry chose some interesting breeds this time - Appenzellers and a Silkie. Quite an interesting looking bunch.
 

We also raised a batch of meat chickens, with a second batch planned for summer. Thank you Matt Nickel and Jacob Schweiger for building the chicken tractors, and Matt and Jes Nickel for helping with the butchering. Peter Maurin would be so pleased to see our “agronomic university” in action. 

On what would be his feast day (May 15), we unveiled an icon of Peter Maurin done by Margaret Willis, the same artist who made the Dorothy Day image for us.  Isn't it amazing! Both are in our chapel.  Prints are available at Maggie's Etsy store. 
 

Carmina hopes to start up her Junior Fiber Guild again this summer, COVID permitting. She has also been asked to start an after-school Fiber Club at Maria Kaupas Academy in Scranton this fall (again, COVID permitting). No sooner had she agreed when Willow Haven Farm called to offer her 15 Jacob sheep fleeces! How providential!

Our most exciting news this month is that we are shepherds again, and we couldn’t be happier! Meet our four ewe lambs - Bev, Petra, Francie and Suzie. They are the grandchildren and great grandchildren of our original sheep, Fern, Ivy, and Rambo. So happy to have sheep on the farm again. It just wasn’t the same without them. 
 

 

Let us keep each other in prayer. We are living through very interesting times. Though uncertain, turbulent, and even violent, we can have confidence in the power of God’s love to overcome all our fears. Jesus experienced all these things on the cross. We hope in His resurrection, His power over hatred and death, which is nothing other than the power of God’s love and mercy. Dorothy Day insisted that we need a “revolution of the heart”.  Unless we genuinely love one another with the love with which God has loved us, we will never find peace. But with God’s love in our hearts - oh, the joy! Oh, the peace!