Parades, markets, hay and fertilizer

The beginning of the week, Marco and I had another parade. We were in the Cokato Corn Carnival Parade. This was a big one. We were required to show up two hours before the parade to sign in and get in line. We ended up arriving on time and had two hours to wait until the parade began. We put our goat, Lothan, in his kennel atop our trailer (since we were in a shaded area with a nice breeze.) Several princesses, queen candidates and royalty from different towns approached us requesting a picture with Lothan. We eagerly complied and Lothan kept his cool. We tied a red bandana around his neck and he looked so cool. Around 7 pm the parade began! It was much longer than the Darwin parade, snaking through Cokato's mainstreet area for about a mile! Marco drove and I walked beside our float. We didn't hand out massage certificates in this parade, because it wasn't permited. We smiled and waved our way around town and by the time the parade ended our faces hurt.

After the parade, we walked around the Carnival. We figured people may recognize us and we'd have the opportunity to meet and greet. There were several carnival-goers that stopped us and asked us what we were all about. We encouraged them to visit us at the farmer's market on Wednesday. After an hour we made the long drive back home. Cokato is a 20 minute drive from our farm. But with a tractor who's top speed is 13 miles an hour, it took an hour until we pulled into our driveway. Lothan took it all in stride. I have to share this picture. We bought a dog coat not long ago to put on our goats. We wanted Lothan to wear it during the parade, but he was bursting out of it.

On Tuesday I spent the day baking while Marco was at work. I made five loaves of Whole Wheat Molasses Bread, Double Chocolate Bunt Cakes, Lemon Bars, Coconut Bars and mini Apple Pies. I really enjoy baking, so Tuesday was a pleasant day for me. I always bake the farmer's market pastries the day before the market. I used to work at a pastry shop in Chicago and I learned the correct way of preparing, freezing, thawing and selling baked goods; however I don't like the idea of freezing foods if I don't need to. So, I'm able to bake it all up the day before and know that market goers are getting a fresh, delicious product. We've been offering samples of the different pastries we sell, as an incentive for market goers to buy our goods. It worked well on Wednesday, selling out of lemon bars and bunt cakes. We also offer samples of our homemade salsa and that encourages people to buy their own Salsa Kit!

The markets went well. It was a very warm, humid day on Wednesday while at the Cokato farmer's market. We heard from other vendors that the Wednesday of the Corn Carnival is usually very slow. But thankfully we had many people stop by.

We've started attending the Litchfield market earlier in the day. There are more vendors and more market goers in the morning rather than afternoon. We had a good week at the markets.

On Thursday Marco and I put the mower attachment to our tractor. We have plans of opening a new area for the animals to graze in. The first step to fencing it in was going around it and mowing down grass. We need to do that in order to put up fence posts and fencing. Marco took the tractor out and started mowing while I weeded and picked zucchini and cucumbers in our downstairs garden. The next day we picked the mowed grass up to give to the animals to eat. They were very excited for the fresh grass to eat. After we gave them grass, we picked up donkey manure from the barn corral. We put the manure in barrels so we could spread it on the pepper garden. Donkey manure makes great, organic fertilizer.

On Saturday Marco and I put fertilizer on each plant. It was an over-cast, cloudy day and rumor had it that rain was imminent. Marco and I decided to wait on watering the peppers in case it happened to rain. Well, moments after finishing the fertilizing a crack of thunder ushered in a steady, substantial rainfall! Perfect timing! The evening ended with on-and-off rainfall. Such a blessing!