The Preston Farmer’s Market season is over for 2024, bringing to an end our first go at selling to the public and introducing our business to the local community. It was an exciting summer being admitted to the market, then becoming familiar to those who frequent it in support of their neighborhood economy. It was a wonderful time for us getting to know others in our community, and in some cases, regular customers who visited our booth several times of the summer! Thank you all for coming and for the friendship extended to us from Market guests as well as our fellow vendors!
Now we are preparing for next season, working on strategies, new products, and plans for more markets locally as well around the valley. We learned a lot during the market days this summer and are also organizing our home environment for the running of our business. Meanwhile, the home-based shop will open up again soon, and we will continue to offer items for sale online, as well as education and collaboration.
As an example of our continuing efforts in education, tomorrow we will be teaching a drop spindle class to a half a dozen 8–16-year-olds involved in 4H. We are really looking forward to meeting the kids and working through a three-part course starting with an introduction to fibers, spinning, and finally making an item of their choice, such as a bookmark, or ornament, which are meant to really show the texture of the fiber in the yarn they have created. There is nothing as exciting for a teacher as meeting an enthusiastic learner and being there to help them learn a new skill. We really feel that the skills taught in our classes put kids in touch with their creative nature, the history of how textiles were once made, and the dexterity of their hands as they learn to work with them to make something useful out of a medium as natural as fiber. We really hope to open them up to seeing a world beyond screens and catered content and helping them to learn to be the creative minds of tomorrow.