It’s the last day of May and slightly chilly out. We’ve received a fair amount of rain in the last week, so our plants are very happy. Some are sprouting up and out bold and strong. Others have yet to show any sign of life. A few are alive but struggling. We are tentatively weeding around them, trying our best not to pull up something that we might have planted.
We enjoyed a pleasant Memorial Day weekend visiting some friends up north. On the way back, we followed an enticing billboard to the Kelley farm (http://www.mnhs.org/places/sites/ohkf/), an operational 1860s homestead run by the Minnesota Historical Society. We were promptly put to work hoeing a row for planting pumpkins. Aubrey’s favorite part of the farm was the water pump. I enjoyed listening in as a woman in the house taught children how to bake a current cake, sew a tick, and check on the canned goods in the cellar. There were sheep grazing in the yard, oxen pulling a cart, chickens pecking about, and horses and pigs in their pens.
Farm visits are becoming a regular part of our excursions, along with libraries and yarn shops. Trevor has been scoping out yarn shops around Minnesota for selling his yarn. A few shops carry it currently, but he’s hoping to soon expand to Cannon Falls, Dover, and Winona, and after that to the Twin Cities, Duluth, and any where else we might drive to on a regular basis. He’s found that he prefers the method of selling through shops instead of online, and so has focused his efforts that direction. A farm in Wisconsin has been our steady wool supplier.
I’ve started going up to the Zumbrota Public Library in the afternoons for a summer internship. I will be doing a mix of projects and general desk work, basically expanding my library experience. So far I’ve highly enjoyed the calm but vibrant energy of their small town library.
We are excited for the weekly art/music/food market that takes place in downtown Rochester every Thursday in the summer (http://www.downtownrochestermn.com/news-events/default.aspx). I hate to post without any pictures, so here’s one taken a few months back of Aubrey in a new farm-themed T-shirt. (The farm featured on the shirt is fictional, but it makes her happy to wear it anyways.)
Angie Gustafson 