The early years!

The shop was being built. I was laying in bed taking my as usual afternoon nap, that had become normal during my several weeks into being pregnant with sage. The year 2005. I could hear the hammers pounding away as the walls of my farmstore were being built. It was very exciting to dream about having a enclosed space to sell my goods. Sage was born in January of 2006 and the fall before was a fun time to pull together all the details of building the farm store.

I had received a grant to build my farm store, after completing a 6 month” tilling the soil” program. I finished a business plan and hired some marketing people and a artist to design a logo, the program labeled “farms for maine future” has been a pivotal program in getting our farm up and running and then ultimately the farmstore built. Kenya was 10 years old and gil was 5, they were so excited in the propect of setting up and running a farmstore with all the products that we would make from what we grow. Kenya would practice shop keeping in the house when we had family gatherings at the holidays. She sold cartons of eggs filled with plastic toy eggs, and then she moved on to milk shakes and then once she had the experience and was comfortable she became the winterberry farm store shop keeper. Gil became efficient at animal care pretty fast, so Kenya could focus on helping me with sage and running the farmstore. Those were the early years, I found myself thinking of this most cherished time recently, I am re organizing the farmstore photo album and as I went through each of those photos I found myself reminiscing of those very special early years. Of starting a farm, being pregnant with sage and raising gil and kenya and building my farm store.

We were so busy with life, and plans and growing, we laughed a lot and we took lots of quick swim breaks in the lake. Many ice cream stops at our local ice cream shop in the village. And then they grew up. They entertained our apprentices, as they learned many different cultures as our apprentices have come from all over the world. They would play music together at the camp fires as we sat under the full moon.

Those were the early years, now we are transforming into the growing up years. As we all grow up we are happy to have experienced farm life in those early years.

Farmer Mary