Our New Alpaca Farm Store

Well it finally arrived last Friday.  Here are a few pics of it delivered & being unloaded from the trailer. This building is 12 ft. x 24 ft.

The next couple of pics shows how he moved the building from the road to the pad of gravel and sand for the building.

 Now the building is ready for us to get it ready for a store. The inside is unfinished . We have left it this way for now. We plan to work on it this winter once we decide how we want it to look. I am thinking of tongue & groove cedar.  It will not have electricity. We are installing a sun tunnel, which really brings in a lot of light when the sun is shining. When the sun is not shining I purchased RV LED lights that run on a battery. I also have an inverter that will run the cash register and open sign. We also have a flexible solar panel to help keep the battery charged.  Green is good! The next pics are a few of what I have inside the store.

 

I also have a lot of knitting needles which I am working on putting up on a display.  We also sell pasture raised eggs. Next year we will add fresh produce to our store. We do not have a "Grand Opening Date" set as of today. At this time we will have the store open for private tours that we offer here at the ranch.  Also weekends or days that we are here and are available. We will place signage on the roads and announce it via social media for the time being. With that being said, this Friday & Saturday is National Alpaca Farm Days. We did not plan an Open House this year. But we will be down at the barnyard working on projects. The fall weather is beautiful here and the colors are starting to turn. So if you are out for a drive and want to stop by and visit the store, alpacas, goats, chickens, turkeys, dogs and of course us, please do.  Just follow the signs. No particular hours. Have a great weekend!

We are back!

Hi Everyone,
A  long time with no posts. It is a very long story.  I changed over to Google apps and when I did that I could no longer access this blog as it is a "personal" blog.  I became frustrated with it and just let it slide for most of this year. I am also working on a new web page with a blog built in, so I will eventually be just blogging there. I do not have time to maintain two different blogs with the ranch, fiber arts, shows and other things that I do. I do manage to tweet & Facebook pics of the animals here at the ranch. I love my smartphone as it makes it simple and easy to do some of these tasks.

Here is quick update as to what has happened here at the ranch this year. We have two new female crias born this year.  Lady Liberty & Dimples. Here is a current picture of them.

 

I am currently working on canning foods. Some from our garden, but not much this year as the deer devastated it. So I have been buying locally from my neighbors and attending the farmers market to buy what I need. I am currently working on tomatoes. Ran into a problem though as my pressure canner was leaking during processing. I managed to order a seal for it online and it will be here today. I was afraid it would not get here soon enough to finish canning the tomatoes before they spoiled.  So far I have canned spaghetti sauce, diced tomatoes & green chillies, and will be doing tomato & basil soup. Anything left will be canned as stewed tomatoes. I also have canned pickled beets and fresh dill pickles. Next after tomatoes will be applesauce.

Our goats are doing good. Sadly we did lose Eva, one of our does this spring due to complications with the delivery of her kids.  We do have some of our dwarf goats ready to kid any day. I will be glad to get back into milking again. We also welcomed a 3 new Nigerian & Nigerian/cross dwarf does to the ranch. Here is a pic of them.

We are also currently working on a farm store here at the ranch. I will blog about that in my next post. It is supposed to be here Friday. We had it custom built and it is being delivered finished here to the ranch.

I will also plan a post of all of my fiber projects that I have been working on or finished this summer.

It sure is nice to be blogging again.