As much as Headquarters may seem to be in the middle of nowhere, we still get some pretty fabulous visitors.

The other evening, a van pulled into our driveway and out popped our friend Holly and her family, all carrying grocery bags full of plants. And not just any plants, but my favorite kind of plants. The perennial kind that make food.

There was a big healthy lemon balm, 5 raspberry plants and a whole bag piled full of strawberry plants. These were all splits from someone else’s garden in town, given to Holly, and then shared with us.

I got the lemon balm and raspberries into the ground the next day, but I was feeling a little overwhelmed by all the strawberries (in particular, the making of new beds or expanding of old beds to put them in). To the rescue came our next visitor, Mara.

Mara is an old friend of ours from Seattle. She was in Nebraska for a wedding and took the extra drive out to see us (did you know HQ is only an hour outside of Omaha? no joke). Besides the fact that she loves being outside and working in the dirt, Mara is also one of those people who’d always rather be doing something than sitting idle. So we spent the morning together, chatting while she ripped out grass and nettles and I plugged in strawberry plants. A job that might have taken me the day was done in no time.

The end result is a new section of our land is starting to take shape. The flat, sunny area southeast of our house is home to blueberries, asparagus, and now raspberries, strawberries, and hazelnuts. Besides the asparagus, none of it is producing yet. But doesn’t your mouth water just thinking about it?