October 9, 2009

In addition to adopting a tree and having your olive oil delivered, we are excited to announce you now have the option to purchase our extra virgin olive oil directly from a select few locations here in Austin!  We will be adding a few more locations in the next few months to help spread the word about our delicious olive oil and our Adopt an Olive Tree Program.

• Southwest Bistro, located in the Hyatt Regency downtown, has 250ml bottles of our extra virgin olive oil for sale in their lobby store and at the entrance to the restaurant on the second floor of the hotel.

• The Oasis on Lake Travis has 500ml bottles of extra virgin olive oil for sale in their gift shop

• Faraday's Kitchen Store in Lakeway has 500ml bottles of our extra virgin olive oil for sale in their food section.

We now have a rendering of what our mill house will look like.  You can see it below.  Just as we’ve done with the orchard, we have tried to make this architectural design fit within the environment we’re creating in the hill country.  The colors of the stone and the paint will blend perfectly with the natural terrain and our beautiful olive trees.  We plan to begin construction of the mill house in the spring to have it open for summer tours in 2010.  Keep watching for more updates in the future.

July 11, 2009

There are great things happening at the orchard this summer.  We are so excited to have each of the first four sections of our orchard completely planted.  The trees are looking wonderful, and the tiny white blooms have turned into shiny green olives.  We will have a nice crop our first year, and we cannot wait to taste the fruits of our labor! 

All through June, Michael and David were assisted by some of our family members to plant trees, irrigate, and begin the weed control process.  Talon Hobbs , my grandson, came down from Alaska and earned a farmers tan and a few blisters as he spent most of his time at the orchard with a shovel or a weed eater.  Family friends Ryan Hovelskeland and Kyle Reese also put in some quality time to help us transplant some of our young trees into larger pots, a process that will promote better growth and stabilization.  Other family members who put in some time to help out were Nicole (David’s wife and my daughter), Nathan (David & Nicole’s son), Genna (Michael’s daughter), Heather, Jaden, River, Jessica, Charlie, Jamie, Ashley, Kaden, Justin, Kimble, Konoa, Cara, and Sharon .  You can view some photos of the family at the orchard on our blog.

The emphasis at the orchard right now is split between weed control and continuing to build the stone entrance and fence. The weed barrier we are applying works great, but it is a time consuming process.  The stone entrance and fence are bringing us closer to our grand vision for the Tuscan Style mill house, gift shop, outdoor kitchen and patio.

Finally, Michael has been making delicious tea with the leaves from our olive trees.  Look for our special blend olive tea as well as the all natural olive oil lotion that Jessica has created to be available for purchase soon.

Thanks for visiting!  We hope you’ll visit our website, blog, and flickr page for news, new features, photos, and updates.  Cara has done a wonderful job with our website and she continues to improve and update the site.