Day One of "Getting Stitched on the Farm July 2010" Class

After the color portion of the class and lunch, we moved onto some edge treatments (steeking and fringing) and then onto creative embroidery. I love teaching embroidery to knitters because it is a technique that can totally change the way someone looks at their craft. Every one progressed at amazing speed.

Before we knew it, it was almost 4:00 and I still had more stitches to teach. I ramped up the pace and by the end of the day, the swatches looked like this. Aren't they beautiful? Some of them will be turned into little bags. Some will probably be kept as keepsakes of the weekend.


It was then time for our hayride. We all climbed aboard the hay wagon. A hayride isn't the most exciting thing to do but there is just something fun about riding on the back of an open wagon, sitting on scratchy bales, hanging on as we climbed the hills, and bouncing around as we hit the uneven ruts. We went past our neighbors' farm where they process the wild blueberries. It's almost like riding in a convertible.


Our Border Collies love a good hayride so they rode along too.


The tractor climbed up higher and higher until we were at the "top of our world". From this spot, you can see down to Springfield and beyond into CT.


Everyone looks pretty happy, don't they?


Then we headed up to "East Hill" where we checked out the wild blueberry field that is being harvested over the next few weeks.


We headed back to our farmhouse as the light was getting low in the sky. This petunia was glowing an unbelievably neonish color.


We ate another fabulous Linda-cooked meal featuring our Leyden Glen Lamb. We sat on the new porch and feasted on grilled leg of lamb, fresh shucked corn, just dug potatoes, swiss chard from the garden, and a lovely lemon pudding cake to celebrate Student Laura's birthday.

More tomorrow.....