MARBLETOWN – Nothing beats autumn in upstate New York... fields laden with vegetables and trees heavy with ripe fruit, community celebrations marking the harvest with events boasting pumpkin painting, local fare, and — most importantly — honoring the longstanding yet fast reviving and strengthening agricultural traditions of our area.

Last week, such a celebration took place in Pine Bush. This week, the Rondout Valley Growers Association will be hosting their 14th annual Harvest Hoedown, where this year's theme, according to RVGA executive director Deborah Meyer DeWan, is "celebrating our natural heritage by honoring the elder generations of farmers and farms dating back centuries in our community."

Diane Schoonmaker, owner/operator of Flying Change Farm in Accord, is one such farmer, celebrating her family farm's twenty-fifth anniversary this past weekend.

Opening Flying Change in 1991 was the culmination of a lifetime of a passion for animals, horses in particular, and the farming lifestyle. Taking an empty lot on Airport Road in Accord, she and her family transformed it over time into a thriving teaching farm where Schoonmaker works with approximately sixty students to learn how to ride horses with confidence.

"I've struggled to stay small. I don't want to have this big high end barn," Schoonmaker said. "I want to share my heart and passion with my students."

With the infrastructure of the farm in place, and its various barns, paddocks and riding rings well established, it's now Schoonmaker's hope to maintain the intimacy born from the small farm while focusing more on her individual student's needs.

You see farming, as it turns out, runs in her blood.

Schoonmaker is a member of a long line — generations, actually — of a Rondout Valley farming family. Her family has owned and operated Saunderskill Farm in Accord for the past 350 years.

"It was an amazing gift," Schoonmaker said, while also acknowledging sacrifices going back to when she was a girl and Saunderskill was dairy-oriented, and her family owned and ran a second farm in New Paltz. "We didn't see Dad much."

But, she continued, her siblings and she learned work ethics and what it meant to "put in a full day." As a teenager, the farm turned from dairy to produce, , and she was given more responsibilities, including her own truck runs and clients, all the while as she competed in more and more riding competitions.

"It was a lot of work being a farmers' daughter," Schoonmaker recalls.

And today, her life revolves around the elements and farming, including both the seasons, and all that's involved in taking care of horses 365 days a year. Without that experience growing up, she noted, she couldn't do it today.

While active in the RVGA in the past, establishing the organization's scholarship program, Schoonmaker adds how she is also now a member of the Ulster County Horse Council, a division of the NY State Horse Council. Yet her heart stays local, and she's excited about this weekend's big event.

The Rondout Valley Growers Association Harvest Hoedown and Local Food BBQ will be held Saturday, September 24 from 3 to 9 p.m. at the Marbletown Park, otherwise known as Tongore Park, located at 350 Tongore Road, rain or shine. Included in the day's event are a farm to table feast, a "slaw off" and a bake sale, plus local wines, beer and cider as well as family friend activities set to include plenty of tractors, a "Zucchini 500" race for veggies with wheels... and pumpkin painting. While the BBQ will run from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m., there will be live music throughout the day by Rich Hines & the Hillbilly Drifters and a singalong with Creek Iversen & Farm Friends and Kelleigh MacKenzie. In the evening, there will be square dancing to The Shoestring Band, with caller-fiddler Liz Slade.

Advance tickets for it all are available for purchase at local farm stands including Davenport Farms, Saunderskill Market, Kelders, Arrowood Farm and Barthel's, as well as Stone Ridge Wines, the 1850 House and Bywater Bistro in Rosendale, and through the RVGA website, www.rondoutvalleygrowers.org. "Monies raised support our mission to keep local farming strong, as well as our programs on food security," DeWan said. "We work with schools, farms and the greater community to raise awareness."

As well as to fund the agricultural-focused college scholarship program established by Schoonmaker.

"It's a wonderful celebration of the local harvest and farming, made possible by local farmers, chefs, talents, and volunteers from all parts of our community in support of farms and the RVGA," DeWan added, about the event that drew 500 people last year. "It's important to connect with the next generation of farmers, imparting knowledge of where food comes from and the importance agriculture plays in our community."

Earlier this week — on September 22 — was this year's autumn equinox, that time when there is equal day and night hours... and the official end of summer and beginning of fall. Traditionally, for many faiths, this harvest was cause for celebration and thanks, for hospitality and preparation for the long winter ahead. And over the centuries, little has changed.

Like the Harvest Hoedown, there are opportunities throughout our readership area, and beyond, to thank the universe for its bountiful summer offerings... to linger in conversation with friends over a camp fire and to visit a pumpkin patch or simply cook a grand meal with all that's available — from right here.