On the Fronteir

Yeah, it's been a while. I blame it on the moving, and then the post-work exhaustion. There's nothing like manual labor to remind you how out of shape you are!

So far, I am more than pleased with my new career choice (historic interpreter and farmer for those not in the know.) Its been a blast working with everyone, all of the animals, and all of the period gear!

I have three close co-workers, and then tons of peripheral people (volunteers, the lady that runs the gatehouse, our handyman, my boss, etc.) Heather is the farm wife (now widowed in our farm story since my predecessor left.) she runs just about everything, and is pretty spectacular. Tama is the other farmer with me (my younger, unmarried sister in our tale.) She's a crack up, and we end up doing a lot of our tasks together, and chatting all the while. J-D is the facilities manager (our neighbor on the farm.) He's pretty dang awesome too.

It's only been two weeks so far, but so much has gotten done, and tons more is in the works! Today, we read through all of the apprentice applications for children who want to work on the farm and chose our favorites (we chose 13 new ones, there are 63 total!) Tama and I have also been busy using the draw knives to make new clapboards for the farm house's roof, which is leaking like a sieve. I managed to get the smelliest chicken poop on me, so I had my jeans in the wash and was wearing my petticoat while they ran. Then Tama knocked the wind out of herself with a rogue board, and she recommended that I put my stays on to avoid such a terrible fate. Which led to this spectacular outfit:

I looked just as homeless yesterday when all of my clothes were in the dryer from being rain drenched. I love our dress code.

In crafty news, during the rain day, we got too lazy to do anything big, so Tama and I both made ourselves housewives, which is a fancy 18th century name for a sewing kit. Mine has three parts: two pockets and a pin cushion built into the middle. It's all made from scraps of linen and some raw wool for the pincushion stuffing. Did I mention that the entire bottom shelf in our 7' long fabric closet is free scraps? Yeah. Heaven. Anyway. I also made myself a leather thimble (because why not?) and added a nice chunk of beeswax, some needles, and straight pins. I think now it's time to go 18th century sewing accoutrement shopping... Oh yeah!

There's tons more to talk about it, but is 8:40 and I'm already ready to sleep! And apologies, I'm posting from my phone, and I have no idea what's going on with the pictures. I'm sure y'all are smart enough to figure it out ;-)

<3 Sarah