An Update from Virginia
While the world was shutting down and people were distancing themselves from one another, I found myself standing under a canopy of green leaves in a tall forest, holding a basket full of wild golden morel mushrooms. I watched Brother Micah Connors bending on his knees to dig ramps (a variety of wild onion) out of the dark woodland soil. The travails of the world felt far away while we were surrounded by those lush woods and songs of birds.
We strongly felt in our hearts to seek out the natural provisions in the forest. We began reading books and doing a lot of research about identifying wild plants and foraging for food. It turns out that our Virginia woods are teeming with edible plants!
Flowers such as redbuds and black locust blooms are not only beautiful, but very tasty and a good source of vitamins. Wild greens such as chickweed, dandelion, watercress, garlic mustard, and wild garlic provide welcomed fresh salads after a lengthy brown winter. As an extra benefit, they began to grow long before the garden greens are ready.
The morel mushrooms are by far my favorite woodland edible. The locals call them dryland fish, or hickory chickens. If you collect enough of them you can have a hearty meal.
And in all of this we got such a tangible picture of how we are cared for in the smallest details. We heard the song of love and provision resounding in the piles of morels and around the fire as we roasted venison and cattail shoots. Our eyes have been opened to see a garden where before were weeds and nameless plants.
Community Buildings
Over the past four years, we have purchased several buildings in the town of Nickelsville. They all are works in progress and we are excited about their potential.
Heritage Square. This building is the Virginia equivalent of the Craft Village in Waco. It houses church offices, the pottery studio, a sign and sculpture business, a woodworking shop, Heritage Virginia Mills, and a warehouse for BCS tractors. Brothers and sisters can be found here at all hours of the day working on various projects.
Townhouse. Formerly an old home converted into a restaurant, the Townhouse is where we sometimes have our meetings and fellowship meals, since it has a fully stocked industrial kitchen. Precious times have been had in this place.
Sugar Maple Inn. One of the oldest structures in town, the Inn was built around 1910. We have guests from all over the world stay there.
Block Building/General Store. This building is connected to the Townhouse by a deck and was once a general store and a bank. It still has the original safe inside, just like the Pie Safe Bakery in Idaho. This building is currently used for storage.
Laundromat. This building used to be the town laundromat. It sits directly across the road from the Block Building and next to the Sugar Maple Inn. We are still planning for how to use it. Right now it is also storage.
Bush Mill. This water-wheel powered gristmill, built in the 1800s, is located just 1.5 miles from town. A local civic club operates it once a year on “Bush Mill Day.”
Our fellowship does not own the Bush Mill, but we are allowed to maintain it and run it on weekends in the summer (at least during normal summers). We can also use it for our different events.
Shared Gardens
As a community, we feel the need for true sustainability in every area of our lives. Part of this vision is to grow a garden together. In the past, we had separate homestead gardens. Starting in 2020, we all came together to grow our bigger crops jointly (in addition to the gardens at our homes). It has been wonderful in so many ways.
Few sights are more beautiful than seeing people working in the garden, laughing and sharing gardening advice, stories and simply their time with one another.
We now have nearly two acres of shared gardens. They overflow with vegetables: green beans, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, garlic, cabbage, squash, okra, sweet potatoes, beets, corn, and lettuce. We love diversity, and have planted several varieties of each.
One of our favorite harvests has been sweet sugar snap peas. Sister Lindsay happened upon a variety of sweet pea in a seed catalog that we had never tried, so she ordered the variety as an experiment.
And what a success! We picked and ate the crunchy little pods
for weeks. Those plants just kept producing more and more and we never got tired of them. There was even enough left over to gather ten pounds of seeds for next year.
Community Growth
Our fellowship continues to grow. Brother Doyle and Sister Janet Borman arrived in April, planning to stay for two months only. They are still here and are we glad!
Brother Kevin Borman and his family arrived shortly after. Brother Jedediah and Sister Paula McAllister came in July.
Brother Kevin came to Virginia with the aspiration of planting gardens specifically for saving seeds, which he and his family have done. Already, there are 3 1/2 acres of seed gardens brimming with vegetables.
Another project that the Bormans have helped us push forward is farming with our horses. They have worked with our Suffolk mares, training them to pull the cultivator and our wagon. This is a longstanding dream coming true.
The list of sustainability needs is extensive, but the next big project is our community greenhouse. A greenhouse is essential for us to produce food over the winter and extend our summer garden season. We have set ourselves the deadline of having the greenhouse finished by the end of autumn.
To our brothers and sisters all over the world, much love from Nickelsville!
