Laffing Horse Crafts

If you’ve been reading along you know that we moved from Colorado t Arkansas early in 2007. You even know why – water!

There were other reasons, though. Jen fell in love with the Ozark Folk Center and wanted to be a part of that (and since she’s been hired as the Crafts Director, there’s no chance she’s not going to be a HUGE part of it!) and we discovered that there’s is a huge community of artisans and crafters out here. You can’t harly throw a stick without hitting someone involved in the fiber arts, wood working, painting, pottery, blacksmithing, soap making, candle making, quilting, etc. Not that you’d want to throw a stick! Especially not when said stick could be turned into a crochet hook or carved into a broom handle.

One part of that community is the Off the Beaten Path Studio Tour. This is nicely organized group of local artisans that has a yearly (mid-September) self-guided tour of the artists at work in their lair… er, studio.

I’m happy to say that after one of the most grueling jurying processes I’ve ever endured, we’ve been accepted into this group.

See you in September!

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Soon to be followed by a day in the life… maybe with a sequel called a month in the life. How about a year or decade? C’mon people! Keep up!

I am working two days a week through October at the Ozark Folk Center as a bodger (in October, I’ll be working up to 4 days per week). This is going to be great fun and a nice replacement to the missing Renaissance Festival routine… no tights, though… bib overalls, anyone? Not only will I be turning wood on a foot powered lathe and recreating a character from the history of the Ozarks, but I’ll be able to sell my turned items. Sherman, the other bodger, makes and sell thousands of really wonderful tops each year. Of course, I’ll be selling fiber arts related stuff as well as some candlesticks and goblets… maybe I’ll have a broom or two with turned handles… maybe not.

Our lease states that I’m supposed to be working on the property a bit. I plan on spending one day per week doing that… fixing a roof here, repairing a water line there, building a new barn… y’know. Part of that time will be spent fencing pastures and part of that time will be spent getting the vineyard back in order.

I want to spend about two days making brooms and two days in the woodshop. We’ll see how that goes and I’ll adjust based on demand.

Then I’ll spend my weekend fishing in the pond and swimming at the swimmin’ hole and hiking the trails.

Lessee…

2 days at the Ozark Folk Center
2 days in the woodshop
2 days making brooms
1 day working on the property
2 days relaxing
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9 days

Yep… that’s about right! Especially if each of those days is about 36 hours long.

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We finished with the tornado (I know, it’s been a month, but something like that don’t leave your mind easy), and the blizzard (with company and the flu).

Then there was the flood… which came while I was attending Folk School and Jeanette was dancing like mad during her first week as Crafts Director.

It’s OK… we got soggy, and like all the other disasters that have come through here in the past month we were inconvenienced… nothing more.

Folk School was loads of fun and a welcome break from the weather (for us in the broom making class anyways… the woodcarving teacher’s house was near flooded and his students spent part of a day volunteering to move some stuff out of harms wayand the blacksmiths were standing ankle deep in water… no fire worries, right?).

What’d I learn? Why how to make brooms of course (and that I really need to invest in an umbrella).

I’ve written a page over under other stuff just for the brooms if you want more information.

Next year blacksmithing and tinsmithing and¬† basketmaking… by then I’ll need the basket as I’ll be a case Meanwhile, it’s back to the woodshop to carve some more crochet hooks and smooth out some more knitting needles, maybe turn a few spindles and build a loom or two.

Stay tuned!

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We survived the tornadoes!

We were without power for about seven days, but I managed to get the generator running and we didn’t suffer too much. Not to say that it wasn’t rough! Lena’s newest cat, Hawkeye, came down with a virus that the vet couldn’t treat and we had to watch him waste away and die. He’s now buried with Meese, Rosemary’s ashes, and Jude on Foxbriar Farm.

Then Spring appeared to arrive. Buds and blossoms on the trees – even a couple in full leaf! Daffodils were springing up everywhere. Just beautiful.

Moo-ving right along, there came a cow. A wee li’l two-year old bred Dexter heifer was brought down to the farm courtesy of my Mother-in-law. She had promised Lena a cow, I am told, back when Lena was much younger and Jen was still managing dairies. We had sold our old horse trailer (a massive steel and wood four-horse slant load bumper pull) for about half what it is worth (thanks, Mr. We’re-having-no-economy-problems) because we figured we’re not moving again (at least not for a long long long long time – touch wood) and when / if we move, we’ll need something smaller. Come and visit us in the valley and you’ll understand – and wonder how we ever got the old trailer down here in the first place! So, we had the cow delivered… and he arrived pulling a huge trailer and got his trailer stuck. We got him out, but it involved a little bit of digging and the removal of a small sweetgum tree.

Then the rains came! We got more than five inches of rain in 12 hours accompanied by thunder and lightning that literally shook the house. Turns out that some of that lightning struck the valley’s water system and caused some serious damage. We’re on spring water and aren’t directly affected, but we are now going to be supplying the rest of the valley with water via a sort of bucket brigade for a while. The bucket brigade won’t get water to my shop or the other ‘upper’ buildings, though. Gotta do some serious repairs up there. Turns out that the architects that put in the water system about 25 years ago were real geniuses… thin-wall PVC suitable for sewer lines without glue half-covered in concrete. We can’t even get in and replace the small broken part¬† which split during a freeze without tearing out the junction that feeds the entire valley (my house and one other excepted because of the spring). our other option is to find the lines behind the junctions and bypass the mess. Neither option is inexpensive or easy.

Then the snows came. We got around four to six inches the day before my in-laws were to show up. We tried to warn them off, saying the roads were miserable and slickery, but they’re from Colorado and were used to the roads. They got here in time to watch another record-breaking snow fall. They’re here to stay for a while. No problem, we all get along… however, they brought a hitchhiker name of Stomach Flu – just call me the Retching crud – with them.

Meanwhile, the snow kept coming down. A thick, wet, heavy snow that – around 9 p.m. the second day – started taking down trees and branches. In a huge blue-green flash of light right outside our living room window – kinda eerily pretty, really – we lost our phone and internet and power to several branches and one tree that fell across the lines.

I also got to thwart the spirit of Darwin as I took pity on a couple of true geniuses that decided to travel to a friends house that they had not traveled to before at 10 p.m. in a two-wheel-drive car during a near-white-out snowstorm at the bottom of a valley that’s hard to get to on a good day with a couple gallons of gas and no cell phone or radio (not that cell phones and radios work down here – they don’t, but you can walk ’til they do). In other words, they were stuck with no gas in a snowbank and they didn’t even know where they were. I did what I could to get ‘em comfy… just wouldn’t do to wake up to corpses in my driveway! Must have worked as they came back the next day with a truck and managed to get the car pulled a couple miles down the road before it slid off again taking the truck with it. But it’s not in my driveway this time.

The snow not only took out trees – I’ve had to saw through several to get down the road – but the temporary shelter we built for the cow collapsed without injuring the cow and had to be erected again. We also had to put braces under rafters on our aging barn.

My Mother-in-law was ill the day after their arrival and and my Aunt-in-law (?) followed the next day. However, my Mother-in-law recovered in a day and Aunt did not… her illness just got worse and worse until we decided, yesterday, to try the roads into town to get her to the hospital. While I’m driving to town, Jen’s lying in bed with the crud which, thus far (touch wood A LOT) has proven to be gender specific. Jen’s recovered and Lena has it now. Aunt, it turns out was also over the flu and the bug just happened to hit as a couple kidney stones decided to announce themselves. Talk about adding insult to injury! But the doctors decided not to keep her overnight after transporting her to a better (not recently partially flattened by a tornado) hospital about 40 more miles away. So, there I am again, driving to town, through town and on to the next town. Got home about 11 p.m.

For entertainment, we got to watch the linemen make pretty pretty sparks while hooking the cables back up. That is not a job I would even contemplate wanting to think about having. Besides, they wouldn’t let me try out the bucket lift.

Today, we get a visit from our ‘Landlord.’ The pres. of the organization the manages the land trust we are currently leasing a portion of. This was expected… the events preceding this was not.

Tomorrow, the jury committee for a local arts show is coming to tour our studios.

I’m so in need of a vacation! I think I’ll go get a job in town so I can have some time off… wait, that won’t work, I already did that and start training for it next week after the two club meetings.

After reading back over this, I am starting to feel that my scatter-brainedness is justified…

Wait… what was I saying?

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