Yard To Table
Hosted by Emmy Award® winners Trevor Crafts and Ellen Scherer Crafts, Yard to Table introduces listeners to the couple's passion for cultivating a delicious life, one yard at a time.
In each episode, Trevor and Ellen offer a delightful blend of practical gardening tips, mouthwatering recipes, and stories from fellow gardeners and food enthusiasts. Whether you're a seasoned gardener or just starting out, Yard to Table is designed to be approachable and inspiring, guiding listeners on how to turn their outdoor spaces into thriving sources of joy.
Tune in for an inspiring mix of practical knowledge and creative energy, sprinkled with expert advice, plenty of laughs, and engaging interviews that celebrate the Yard to Table lifestyle.
Yard To Table
Yard to Table Reflections and Intentions
On this episode of Yard to Table Ellen and Trevor end the year - and this podcast season! - with creating intentions for 2025 for their home and gardens.
And to see what's happening with Ellen and Trevor at Stonebrook House follow @stonebrookhouse on Instagram today!
Well, hello Ellen.
Ellen :Well, hello Trevor.
Trevor:Here we are back at the table for our very last episode
Ellen :of 2024
Trevor:Yes, not, ever,
Ellen :not ever,
Trevor:not ever.
Ellen :No, we're having too much fun. That would be sad. We're having too much fun
Trevor:last episode of 2024
Ellen :it's amazing how quickly that came.
Trevor:We feels like we just did our first episode, but it wasn't our first episode, we're doing quite, quite a lot of a many episodes. That's a word, by the way, quite a lot of a many.
Ellen :It is. It is. It's a good one. It's a new word. Maybe
Trevor:it is. But that's what we're about here. We're about finding joy, creating, creating our joy, coming up with new things. I like that word that I've already forgotten. I don't even know what I just said two minutes ago or seconds ago, as it may be,
Ellen :that's okay. It's also that weird week between holidays and New Year, and we're all a little mushy in the brain. I think during this time,
Trevor:I'm mushy in other places as well, because of what we have been eating, because now that we don't have the amazing bounty of our yard, yes to sustain us, most of it's just cookies. Oh, it's been a lot of cookies. It's cookies and a lot of other things that are equally delicious, totally, but not quite as health filled
Ellen :it is. It's been heavy on the sweets I made the pad Lova on Christmas Eve, which is it has some fruit on it.
Trevor:It has fruit on it, no fruit in it, but at least there was, there was mint, yes, there was yogurt, and yogurt. These are all good things.
Ellen :These are good things on a delicious, crusty meringue. But other than that, there's eggs in that, some protein and sugar from chickens. So yes, we have, when we talk about all of that delicious eating, it tends to have people come up with some intentions around a new year and a new start. But we're not about resolutions here at Stonebrook,
Trevor:no, and still, not a big resolution. Person, no, I'm not. You're much more of a like you said, an intentionality,
Ellen :yes, intentions, hopes and dreams, setting goals,
Trevor:finding our joy,
Ellen :finding joy. Nothing that makes you feel that you're losing, right,
Trevor:like you're failing massively,
Ellen :right? Setting yourself up for disappointment. There's
Trevor:beetles for that, that's that's gonna come, squash cucumber borers, squash borers. We're gonna have a massive disappointment throughout the season. We don't need to start our season with nastiness now.
Ellen :Yeah. So I think, as we reflect in this time, intentions are the are the goal, yes. And thinking about that for 2025, already, oh my gosh. I know it's coming up. And I have intentions for the yard. I have intentions for the table. I love it. Yard end table, all of it, it's just good. I'll start. You can start. So why don't you start? I'll start. So for the yard, my intentions, dreams, some goals coming out of the holidays. I was actually texting with Christina Koether from state of Nomatica in creating a lot of our seasonal displays inside the house, I realized that we don't have enough winter berry on our property. That's we have, like one
Trevor:one tree, yes, which produced close to zero winter berries.
Ellen :And I didn't want to take it from the bird, a bush. It's like a bush, bushy tree. Yeah, Bush. So of course, now I want to plant you want a lot of winter. I do because that the birds need it. That's a very important source of food for them, native. And also it's just gorgeous in the mantle and in wreath displays and things of that sort.
Trevor:We've done a lot of it, and it really does add that lovely pop of color.
Ellen :I love a red
Trevor:that's listeners, if you know Ellen at all. Red is her spirit color that's very true. And there's a lot of it,
Ellen :and it's holiday, so it's, it's a necessary so Winterberry. And of course, we have our tradition of sharing bayberry candles with our friends and family, and I'd like to plant some bayberry bushes now, I know it takes a lot of babies to actually make a candle. I'm not saying we're going to go into Stonebrook production of candles,
Trevor:even though we talked about that just recently, future intention and we had a whole discussion about how much it takes. It's a lot. A la maple. Yes, it leaves you undeterred.
Ellen :Well, I'm going to start with a couple of bushes, because, again, I think that would be super fun to incorporate into our Yuletide.
Trevor:I'm all about building for Yule for next year, always.
Ellen :And I love having. Seeing that brightness, the bayberries are more of a bluey green kind of color and but I love the idea of having that because this time of year it starts to get a little brown, a little drab, which I'm also very excited that I have the tulip subscription coming from Christina in January. So once a week until our tulips grow, I will have those from her 500 tulips. Yes, think it might be six.
Trevor:Is it six? Oh my gosh. Okay.
Ellen :Well, there are a couple extra ones that looked really cool, so I wanted those. Wanted to plant those. But anyway, so those are my initial thoughts around garden intentions. But then I'm getting into the actual garden of it all. I have some thoughts too. But do you have any
Trevor:Well, our my garden intentions for the yard are also around the space itself. So I've been also thinking about we've had a really interesting idea to do a mural on the wall,
Ellen :yes, and this was the one where we were going to make it something that we could use to show what we were planting.
Trevor:Yeah, so the idea was to sort of create a bigger map on the wall, under our overhang, on the storage barn. On the storage barn, we have this area that we've developed, and we're continuing to build out as our garden workshop and our area to really help with all of the tools. We put that vintage sink in. We've got a lot of different things that we've been building out. A whole new patio back there with some blue stone from the property, vintage blue stone that we got, yep. And then on this big wall is really a huge canvas to be able to play with. We decided that we were going to do a mural of the garland, yeah, basically all the beds, so that we can change it as we change them seasonally, as we rotate the beds. If we're putting garlic in a different space than we put it last year. It's a sort of chalkboardy idea.
Ellen :Well, you know, I had an inspiration from another place for that. I can't claim that that was an original idea that I had, just like in all of this. I was inspired by something I saw somewhere else. Do you remember?
Trevor:Yeah, it was at Beach Plum Parm, that's right, in beautiful Cape May New Jersey. That's right, those, those fine friends down at beach plum they are doing it right. That is, we should try to get them on the podcast.
Ellen :We should, and that is, we should try to beauty in their yard. Yeah, and
Trevor:stay there and then also see if they'll join us.
Ellen :I would love that idea. That's a podcast intention.
Trevor:That is one of our yard to table podcast intentions, I love it to talk to the amazing proprietors of Beach Plum Farm down there
Ellen :absolutely and they had this incredible mural of their lands and their gardens, and they would change it out for when, seasonally, for what they were planting. I think that's just a really lovely way of having this visual of what's going on and and updating it. So we're going to expand upon that for Stonebrook, because
Trevor:good ideas are worth stealing. That's right. That's right. Somebody once said immature artists borrow and mature artists steal.
Ellen :Who is that quote attributed to? I wish I could remember, because I have listeners tell us
Trevor:no clue who said that, but somebody said it probably like Picasso or Einstein, or somebody.
Ellen :Well, I love the idea of the mural and the plot of our land. I love this idea anything else that you had on your garden, yard list of intentions.
Trevor:The other thing I really wanted to do, just because it's getting a little wobbly, is between the peonies in the center of our garden, we have a an old blue stone pathway, and it's kind of as the frost heave continues to sort of push things around here and there. I really think it's getting a little too wide, I agree. So I need to sort of just tighten up the screws little loosey goosey,
Ellen :yeah, make it a little more compact
Trevor:and correct. Yes, we've taken some other areas out. We added a whole section in of pasta on the side next to one of our barns, and out of that came a lot of stone. Yes, when we dug up that small little area
Ellen :Any time you dig in Connecticut, anytime you're gonna get some stone, national crop of Connecticut is rock, that's right, and lots of it also planted some giant Allium over there.
Trevor:Oh, that's the giant Allium patch, that's right,
Ellen :yes, I cant wait
Trevor:one of the other intentions we'll have for those alliums is to dry them.
Ellen :Yes. That is also an inspiration, aka steel to steel from Christina, that's right, she did it, although she did give me permission to be telling me how to dry them.
Trevor:That doesnt count. Really, I would prefer to just have this essentially be, I don't
Ellen :know who said this quote, but imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. We know that's out there. Someone said it,
Trevor:somebody did say it. That's true. I think Lionel Trilling was the one. Have said the immature artists borrow quote, oh,
Ellen :that renown inker, Lionel, Trilling, anybody anyway? Any background on that one? Do
Trevor:you see? None, none at all. It's a that's a straight Google lookup. But I've said it a lot. I love it. Oh, no wait, Picasso might have said it also. I said, Picasso. You did, I think I said, I said, Picasso or Einstein, one of the other, close, anyway, yes. So that's, that's the goal is to try to make things a little bit tidier. We have so many different stone walls, outcroppings, patios, it's amazing, and it's wonderful, but it is a constant need of maintenance throughout our different systems to just try to keep it up and have things not fall down all the time.
Ellen :We like it a little wild, but it needs to be maintained wild,
Trevor:correct. It's a little bit more tidy than it, than than messy,
Ellen :yeah. And the other fun part this time of year is really thinking about the laying out of the garden, what we want to plant in 2025 what we're going to put in those beds, things that were successful from this year. Obviously, we had an amazing we talked about this amazing year for tomatoes. More always for me, how do I fit more flowers in?
Trevor:I think we need to build a whole nother section for you, just for flowers,
Ellen :yes, and kitchen herbs, I want to have a separate bed up by the house, a little closer to the house for some kitchen herbs. That's another intention, because we have a great patch, obviously, in the garden, but just even being able to walk out and grab some will be is just when you're busy and you're fast, you know, that's a that's a good thing to have.
Trevor:But I think the intention should be the opposite. We should probably try to put the kitchen herbs further away to get us more time in the garden as much as possible.
Ellen :And really, I mean, that is what we have now, and it's wonderful. But, you know, too many herbs can you have too many herbs? I don't think you can really commute. I don't think you can. So, yeah, that like that idea. That'll be fun to start to think about that, how it all lays out and have some more ongoing flower fireworks going on out in the yard. Flower fireworks, yeah, we have a really good succession of things that bloom on the property, but I really want to take a look at that some more and see if there's some other places we can put some things as well that are going to bring some pops of color and joy all over because that's my favorite.
Trevor:I want to work on those Bee balm, Bee Balm is a good one. I'm gonna work on those tree peonies, the yellow ones that we have. Oh my God, those are so gorgeous. And maybe find another spot for them that they can be a little bit more visible. They're just kind of off in the corner. And that's, that's they need to be have like a spotlight pointed on them all the time
Ellen :That yellow orange color is so unique and beautiful, you don't expect it from a peony or traditional? Yeah, I would say a modern peony. What people see? Obviously, that coral color, like people love the pinks, but this is a yellow, the tinge of orange. It's gorgeous. It's like a dinner plate. It's just huge and beautiful. So yes, obviously for me, always more flowers, just
Trevor:flowers in general, flowers everywhere. The 600 tulips is not enough, because it only lasts for so long.
Ellen :That's right. I have nothing to say. 600 maybe next year be 1000 I don't know,
Trevor:1000 tulips?
Ellen :There is nothing better than looking out in the dreariness of late February, early March, and seeing this riot of color in the garden that is, those tulips,
Trevor:maybe one of the things we should think about doing is work on the greenhouse a little bit.
Ellen :Now, the list is getting long. We haven't even talked about the table intentions.
Trevor:Oh, the table intentions are getting real. Dear friends, we have some we have some very major happenings. Big Table intentions,
Ellen :yeah, tell us a little bit about that. Mr. TC,
Trevor:well, we at Stonebrook have decided to redo the kitchen.
Ellen :Dun, dun, dun.
Trevor:At Stonebrook now that redoing the kitchen is also basically moving the kitchen entirely from the room which it is currently in in the center of the house, another room which is currently a dining room in the house,
Ellen :which was originally, we think, bedrooms, a bedroom,
Trevor:yeah, which was then converted into an office, offices, which was then sort of just a big table put in and turned into a Dining Room, right?
Ellen :Not real, functional space, no air conditioning, because you didn't need that in Connecticut in 1930 Correct? You do now.
Trevor:It's a much warmer place here than it used to be, but I think that the new kitchen is going to have some lovely features.
Ellen :Yes, we're not going to share all of them yet. We're not going to share them. No, oh, we're going to save them. That's going to be part of some upcoming content.
Trevor:Because I think the some of the I will just say that some of the preservation of said plants may benefit from our new space.
Ellen :Our goal with this renovation is to ensure that we're keeping we always said when we purchased this. Property that we were going to be stewards of this we're not a historic home. We're not registered as a registered historical The home has deep, abiding history in our town, and obviously Alice Delmar, who who owned the home and poured so much love into it, we really want, in this time that it's our home to be putting that same love and attention into it so that it continues to age as beautifully as it has with all the previous owners that have had it before. We're number four only, right?
Trevor:We are the fourth owners of the home, yes, since it was done created in 1932 Yeah.
Ellen :So it is exciting and also a big responsibility to make sure that things we're doing are in character with the house and of its history and but it's also exciting. It feels like a real opportunity. And I know we're nervous we're up to the chat, but we're excited about it as well.
Trevor:We are also crazy people, we are addicted to production, so this should seem like a totally normal process for us,
Ellen :and we're fully prepared that any amount of months they say it's going to be will be double that.
Trevor:I better not be double, because it'll be Christmas that will be sitting here having another late year podcast in our next season, and saying, well, the kitchen's still not done yet, which I would really like it to be done by then.
Ellen :yes. That is, that is, we'll say that is a resolution. You don't like them, but in this, in this circumstance, to have a resolution for real pairing, we're preparing for it. And if anyone has any ideas around how you peacefully manage a kitchen renovation for a family, please give us all your tips. We are here to receive them gratefully, but we're trying to do some things. We're prepared. We were very we've talked about this a lot. We were very intentional in our preserving of the garden this year and creating some healthy dishes that are in our freezer. So that was also with this idea of the renovation and be able to pull things up that were going to be easy to reheat our freezers. Yes, multiple freezers.
Trevor:Thanks to Genee, we've got so many, multiple freezers.
Ellen :So it is that'll be, that's a big one, That's right.
Trevor:yeah, that's gonna be, that's gonna take a big impact on our table in 2025, and I'm gonna make a table, an actual table,
Ellen :yeah, talk a little bit about that.
Trevor:I have decided we have a beautiful beach tree that has sadly passed on in the front of the property, which was kind of on its last legs when we started here. Yeah, we did everything we could. Yeah, we did everything we could, but it things age and pass on. And it's 100 plus years so, but it is tall and straight and gorgeous. So it will be turning into our new dining room table, which is very exciting, not all of it, by the way, because that's a lot that would be a very thick dining room table. And I know I have a propensity to take large, humongous pieces of wood that also need to be moved by crane.
Ellen :And listeners, he's referencing a mantle that was built in our home in California, basically on the arrival of our daughter so we could hang our Christmas stockings. Large.
Trevor:That's a big one, which we talked about, but I think it's a it's a lesson, but there is a moderation. I work on it. I'm going to work on it. That's an intention. We still need to have a large enough place table, place settings so that we can have a nice, big dinner party in our new dining room, which is also coming with this renovation. That's right. Also I have to be able to make sure that I can move said pieces, and I have a portable sawmill that is coming that will help to mill this right on site, and hopefully cranes will be less needed than I think they will. Is that your march project? That's the February Mark March project. February March. I love it. Yeah, that's gonna be exciting. I'm excited some kiln drying may be needed and some but it'll be lovely, 12 foot boards and so
Ellen :incredible it'll be from the property, which is from here. Well, so many of the things that were in the house when Alice built it, or things that were made from the land around us, or on the land around us, from iron forging to glass black, get into iron Forge. Oh, I know you're gonna get into iron forger. I need some hooks in the new way to oblige you. Yes, I know. So that is also Wow. Our list is getting long.
Trevor:It's a long but that's why these are intentions, resolutions. You can't peg me on needing everything
Ellen :and I think this is the important part about the resolution versus intention conversation, when you focus on something has to be done. We all have things that we have to do. The list as an adult is endless, but when you're setting goals and dreams, flexibility in these things is really important to not steal your joy in the process. Because. That's the fun part. Is imagining all the things the way you want them to be, and putting the work into making it happen. But it doesn't have to all happen overnight, something you and I sometimes have trouble with, by the way,
Trevor:sometimes have trouble with? That's like our number one trouble. That's our primarynumero uno problem. Why is this? This is not a psychology podcast, but it is true. I think that's the thing, that it's the journey and enjoying the journey along the way. Because if you do look back, and we even we look back on our year at Stonebrook, just this year, incredible year of vegetables and growing and
Ellen :work around the property that the patio outside the storage walkway, we reappointed all of the stone in the back decks that was this year, right beginning of this year,
Trevor:yeah. I mean, we just did a lot of work. We did all over the property. We started this amazing podcast, yeah, we met a lot of amazing people. We really did. We interviewed a lot of really fantastic friends,
Ellen :and oh my gosh, we're not gonna talk about it yet, but on our podcast, intentions for 2025 we have some incredible people lined up.
Trevor:Yeah, we have some amazing guests that are very exciting. We've got some field trips. We've got some we're taking it to a whole new level. All sorts of folks are going to come around and join us.
Ellen :But I think you bring up an important point, and as we're closing out 2024 and looking at 2025 an intention that I have for us and our family is to also make sure that we're making time for rest and to breathe and to enjoy this incredible life that we've built together
Trevor:that is just needed more than anything else. I think,
Ellen :yeah, I think we all need that a little bit, don't we?
Trevor:I think so. I mean, that's kind of why we moved here, that's why we started this podcast. That's why we spend so much time in the garden, because we're trying to find those moments, because life is incredibly hectic. There is so much to do. Yeah, being an adult is hard. Yes, maybe we realize that out there, being an adult is incredibly challenging parenting.
Ellen :Working, add a child to it. gardening.
Trevor:Oh my goodness, yeah, it's a lot. So I think trying to find those moments of joy and happiness and rest is well said. We need more of that.
Ellen :Yeah. So I think that's an intention I have, for sure, good intention, create the spaces for those moments to be able to happen. Because if you're not intentional about creating those spaces,
Trevor:life will run over you roughshod and fill every second of your day with nonsense.
Ellen :well, I've really loved every minute of doing this podcast this year, and I'm so glad that was our intention to do in 2024
Trevor:and we did it and we did it. So that was an intention. That's a check mark, realizedcheck yay.
Ellen :And I can't wait to see what comes up in
Trevor:2025 it's gonna be lots of good stuff. We can't wait.
Ellen :Thanks for being with us and having a seat at our table.
Trevor:Yard to Table is a production of Macrocosm Entertainment. Don't forget to rate us and subscribe anywhere you listen to podcasts and for tips and more information, follow us on Instagram@Stonebrookhouse.
