I hope everyone is doing well. I see I have lots of reading to catch up on.
Life is busy good here on the farm. We just had our annual big, fat, Irish family get together for the Southwest Missouri Celtic Heritage Festival (Sept. 10 & 11) Had a good time with family, saw old friends, met new friends and enjoyed the festival. Sales were enough to cover expenses (gas, food, plus a little bit extra). Peacock feathers as norm were the top seller. I had made a few small bars of goat milk soap and felted wool balls, both sold out. A new item we added this year were our custom designed T's shirts, sold a few of those too.
The highlight of the weekend came when a visitor to our booth (we had a booth in the beastie barn with 2 of our Shetlands boys on display) ask to speak to owner of the sheep. Everyone pointed at me. Low and behold she was an event PR person for the Warrensburg, MO Celtic Festival. She invited the Shetland boys to participate at their 2011 festival. Woot! Looks like we may be traveling with the Shetlands!
We took Jasper our little 6 month old ram lamb and Angus a two yr. old wether. Jasper was the crowd favorite and a little ham. Angus was very selective of when or whom he would allow to touch ... no one in a crowd, nor if they wore brightly colored clothing, especially not if they were hyper children. I can't blame him there, I can't handle hyper children either. The boys were also able to visit with Tammy from Fairlight Farm (their previous human mom). Tammy had a booth and two of her beautiful wethers at the festival also. We were hoping to be able to combine efforts and set the booths up side by side. Didn't work as we had planned, the festival powers that be set the sheep stalls in the middle and our booth areas on opposite sides. We still managed a visit here and there when the foot traffic slowed.
I don't know about you, but I am so ready for Fall, my favorite time of the year. Things begin to slow down, cooler weather arrives and the holidays approach. I don't feel so rushed. Sure there are still the daily chores, milking, feeding, etc. Still lots of house work, yard work and clean up though it just seems to come at a slower pace. I am so ready for slow.
Shearing the Angoras is penciled in for the last weekend of the month. I started working on the breeding groups. Waiting to breed the sheep and Angoras til a bit later, don't want babies in the dead of winter. I did decide to breed Barb and Maybelle (2 dairy does) a bit earlier than planned. We put the buck in with them last week and will take him out on the 26th. That puts us at kidding in Feb. which is OK due to our bringing the bottle babies in the house.
Til next time, have a good one!