Another Growing Season in the Books

Our next-door neighbor, Mike, and I left around 8 am Thursday to go get pork. Mike’s property backs up onto our pig pasture and he feeds our pigs scraps over the fence. He also bought half a hog from us this year. He offered to drive his truck up to the processor and help me haul boxes of frozen pork back here. We probably could have gotten it all into his truck, but I drove the station wagon. The processor is halfway to Spokane and I did not want to have to make two trips.

I love this time of year. The drive was lovely. Tourists are mostly gone and the fall colors are coming out. The processor was ready for us and had all the boxes labeled and ready to load. I asked to be put on their schedule for next fall. I don’t know if we’ll do pigs again, but if we do, we will have a processing date in late September or early October. We used to do that with our first processor until they went out of business with no warning.

I am glad to have all of that sorted. And with all of this cool and rainy weather, I am ready to stay inside and sew.

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I missed setup for market, but other members did a wonderful job getting all the items placed for sale. The quilts are laid out over the pews in our church sanctuary:

We started doing this at last year’s sale and it works very well. Besides being a dramatic focal point, it frees up space for other items in the fellowship hall:

We had quite a rush as soon as the doors opened; in fact, I had people stopping me in the parking lot as I was walking in at 9:30 because they wanted to know if we were open yet. (We opened at 10 am.) Business was brisk until well after lunchtime, when we got a break. Smaller items seemed to be selling better than quilts. I expected that. Quilts are a ton of work and we price ours accordingly. Also, I think that people have a lot less money to spend right now thanks to rampant inflation. All of my potholders went quickly—they usually do—and the majority of my canvas grocery bags.

Trying to figure out what will sell is tricky and not worth the extra effort because every year is different. I think it makes more sense just to make a variety of items and have fun doing it. I am trying to concentrate on making items that other people don’t—I have a serger and an industrial Juki, so I probably will continue to make items like canvas grocery bags.

I sat in the Christmas decor area—unfortunately, we have to keep an eye out that items don’t walk out the door—and worked on a prayer shawl. This is usually a good time to do some visiting and catch up with people I haven’t seen in a while.

Market is open today, as well, from 10-4. I’m teaching, but will come by after class to help clean up. And then I expect to come home and fall into bed, exhausted, LOL. I think I will be able to get in some serious sewing time this week. though. It’s time to make pants.