Fiber Camps

This summer's fiber camps were very different.  For one thing, we had more varied ages but not on the young side.  This time we had a mother/daughter duo, a grandmother, and a great grandmother who started knitting again after 40 something or was it 60 years.

We had SO much fun.

Our New Toy

Wednesday was the farmers market, Tuesday our new tractor came.  Today, I bushhoged the lower upper pasture- another chore checked off the list.

The exciting thing about this tractor is that it has a front bucket and a BACKHOE.  I have thought backhoes were really cool since I was about 5 maybe.  It was sad to sell the big blue Ford tractor but one can have too many tractors (not spinning wheels but tractors, yes).  Having a bucket and a backhoe makes more projects possible.  I think that is a good thing.  We shall see.

John scraped the driveway to his garage.  That had been completely covered over in weeds.  I want to dig the puddle pond a little bigger, John wants to make steps down to his garage,  he is also going to dig out the fire pit and make it nice.  I want to rearrange some soil by the compost pile and dig out some poison ivy.  I would also like to level some areas in the barnyard.  We may need to make a list with priorities.

Catching Up take *%(&$ (Farmers Market)

With SO much time between blogs I could title them all Catching up. Maybe I will just do several at once and release them a few days apart.

I always find that it is easier if I start with yesterday and work my way back.  Yesterday, I went back to the farmers market after being away for two weeks with fiber camps going on.  It was a hot day with just enough breeze to be comfortable most of the time.  Lots of people coming through and again many interesting conversations.  It is fun when there are so many people interested in what I do.

Yesterday's theme at my booth was "the insulating properties of wool".  Wool is not just for winter.  I wet felted some sleeves for milk bottles because so many people get their milk share every week.  This was a suggestion from a couple of customers.  I tested them on the front porch in the shade with two bottles of water next to each other, one with a sleeve and one without.  After an hour, the one with the sleeve was almost 10 degrees cooler than the one without and only slightly warmer than when I put the sleeve on.  Unfortunately, the milk people came by with very brief conversations about something else.  At least I won't have to make more before next week.  Who would think that on a hot day the best seller would be dryer balls.

I have been in the research and development phase of farmers market products for awhile and have finally decided what it is that I want to bring to the market.  For the most part, I will be producing "fun functionals".  (pictures soon)

I put some mulch fleece on one of the potted lavender plants that one of my market buddies was selling and a few minutes later a master gardener that was going to be doing an herb workshop came over and bought an ounce to give her students with  their take away herb plants.  (future customers)

I am not making millions yet but John loves it when I come home and tell him I made a lot of great contacts.