Off to the Lawrence County Wool Pool!

News Clip From Lancaster Farming

The news clip says it all if you've never heard of a "wool pool".  In 2020, due to the pandemic most, if not all, of the regional wool pools were canceled. This year folks will be bringing 2 years worth of their sheared fleeces to the pool and we're not sure of the price that we'll be getting.  I'll report back on the results later today! Wool is an international commodity, so that enters into the picture.

Wild Rose Farm - Truck Completely Packed With Fleeces!

Of course, even though the truck is crammed full of fleeces, we still have nicely skirted fleeces available for sale & I have some Rambouillet wool set aside to be sorted for processing into yarn.

 

Lambs Yesterday at Wild Rose Farm ...

 

Wild Rose Farm Rambouillet #565 and Twin Lambs

Lambing has finally drawn to a close here for the year. We have 3 ewes that have had their lambs yesterday and today. We're not sure why there was a little group that waited longer to get bred and essentially at the same time, but here they are!

Wild Rose Farm Rambouillet #574 With Ewe Lamb

There was another lamb born today, but no pictures have been taken yet.  We'll ear tag the 3 lambs above this evening and tomorrow we'll tag the lamb born today.  This little group of sheep doesn't have to worry about cold weather.  They're in the barn with a fan blowing towards the pens! 

Gardening & Grazing!

 

Garden Planted & Protected by Electric Net Fencing!

It's a bit hard to see from this wide shot, but the garden is planted. We'll have to give it a couple of weeks before you can the plants growing and the seeds sprouting.  It's easy to water plants now since they're so small.  Rain & t-storms have been in the forecast all week, but so far nothing has happened right here on the farm so we'll continue to spread the mulch.  There's a curious lamb gazing at the garden ... give it a few seconds and she'll jump back if she touches the fence!

Ewes & Lambs Out Now to Graze

We moved the ewes with the oldest lambs out to pasture.  Snow White is now mixed in with this group watching over things. Not much else going on now & that's a good thing!

Finally, Time for the Garden!

Wild Rose Farm - Garden Plot - Time to Plant!

It was dry enough this spring to get the garden plowed early and then rototilled by our neighbor almost a month ago.  So what's been happening since then?  We had a little cool spell, followed by the Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest.  Then we had rain, followed by our pop up show at the Green Valley Country Store on Memorial Day.  Next were a couple of days with spotty rain.  Finally, we had several warm sunny days to get the plants in!  Not only that, everyone around here was getting in a first cutting of hay.

Mixed Flat of Plants from Randy's Raisings

I had scouted for plants while it was raining & returned a couple of days ago to pick out our selections at Randy's Raisings in Calcutta, Ohio.  "Only" 10 tomato plants this year, 8 pepper plants, spicy globe basil, flat Italian parsley, Antigua Gold marigolds, garlic chives, Greek oregano, & an impulse buy of 3 Sugar Baby watermelons ... haven't grown watermelons in YEARS!  They enjoyed sitting out in the rain overnight.  All of the plants are in the garden now.  Then I stopped at Janoski's Greenhouse & Garden Center today and picked out some marigolds, sage, salvia, Italian oregano and curly parsley to add to the mix.  We're thinking we'll plant the green beans tomorrow since it's looking like possible t-storms for the rest of the week.  Also ... a bonus this year were 2 groups of sunflowers sprouting on their own where they had been planted last year.  The mammoth sunflowers are coming up on one end of the garden and the multi-colored branching sunflowers are on the other end.  Sometimes the healthiest sunflowers come from the self-seeded plants!  We shall see ... 

 
 

Thanks for Stopping on Memorial Day!

 

Wild Rose Farm @ Green Valley Country Store
Memorial Day Market

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Hookstown, PA Memorial Day Parade. About a dozen vendors set up by 8am outside of the Green Valley Country Store. The fire trucks use the road out front as their staging area, so we had to be in, unloaded and out early!  The parade itself was just over a half hour long and was complete with small planes flying overhead.  

Green Valley Country Store Bulldogs Heading to their Float!

The streets started to fill up around 10:30 and that old Western PA tradition of putting out chairs in your spot in front of the house was in full swing!  After the parade, we were busy and there was also a big crowd at the car show on the Hookstown Fair Grounds.  We sold lots of wool yarn AND someone grabbed up that antique butterfly wing serving tray in the background of the previous post!  

American Legion Color Guard Leads Off the Parade

I couldn't leave the booth, but here's a shot of the American Legion leading the parade. That's one of the older historic brick homes in Hookstown ... 

Memorial Day @ Green Valley Country Store!

Wild Rose Farm - Naturally Dyed Wool Yarn
Come See Us @ Green Valley Country Store in Hookstown!

Wild Rose Farm will be set up with other local vendors outside of the Green Valley Country Store in Hookstown, PA on Memorial Day!  If you've never been there (c'mon, really ?!?) it's a bright red building right behind the Hookstown Post Office.  They are a combination farm feed store and general store with their own ice cream & milk, plus meats and all kinds of local artisan food, veggie plants, flowering baskets and handmade items.  Well worth the visit ...  We'll have our wool yarns, combed top, pencil roving, wool quilt batts and spinning fleeces for sale.  We'll probably also have a few selected antique items along, like the enamel green roaster & butterfly wing serving tray that you see in the background behind the yarn above.  Come see the Memorial Day Parade and then stop over for Uncle Sonny's Ice Cream and some yummy soft yarn! 

Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest Pics ...

Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest Raffle Table

The 2021 Waynesburg Sheep & Fiber Fest is in the rearview mirror ... we had a great sunny day and a good turnout.  On the raffle table was an antique flax wheel generously donated by one of our committee members.  We had a very happy winner at the end of the day!  The booths were spread out a bit and we had more vendors who chose to be outside under their own tents rather than in a building. We did miss all of our fleece to shawl contest guild teams, but we expect to have them back next year when we can make more certain plans. 

Wild Rose Farm Naturally Dyed Rambouillet Yarn

There was a new twist this year at the festival. Lost & Found Pharmacy set up next to the raffle tables and offered a skein winding service with the proceeds going to charity.  I took advantage of that and had some superwash skeins wound into balls so now they're ready to go right on the needles. Of all the things that we have going on, there's never enough time to wind the skeins after dyeing into balls, lol.

The "fiber starved" customers were into combed top and several beginning spinners were choosing pencil roving to get started. Note to fleece lovers - the absence of the guild F2S contest teams meant that we have 6 full fleeces left that are available for sale. Contact wildrosefarm at earthlink dot net if you'd like to come out and look at the fleeces!  

Looking forward to the 2022 show!