Castle Farms Craft Show

Join us this Saturday or Sunday at Castle Farms in Charlevoix for the Royal Craft Show.

Hours are 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM on Saturday and 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM on Sunday.

If you want to buy something unique and creative for Christmas gifts,
Castle Farms is the place to be.
There will be over 125 artists and craftsmen, with all kinds of handmade items.

We will offer our usual mixes,
plus some very pretty Christmas cookie cutters with our sugar cookie mixes.

We look forward to seeing you this weekend!

10,000 down, 10,000 to go

I am not sure when it officially happened, but we sold over 10,000 mixes so far this year. Exact total is 10,762! Yippee!

Last year, the official 10,000 mixes sold date was September 17. Looks like we are a month ahead of schedule.

We are still working on the 20,000 goal for 2011!

Thank you to all of you who purchased mixes at the Farmers Markets, on the web, or at a local gift or food store. We appreciate you!

We love our "funny little business!"

Double D Day

Friday is Double D Day.

First, we celebrate "Doggie of the Week."

This Doggie of the Week came from the Northport Farmers Market,
a few weeks ago.

Meet Joey, the very shy dachshund who did not want to be photographed.
He is still cute, even if he did not want to smile.

Friday is also "Doughnut Day!"

My market neighbor Melissa Drake from Cherry Beach Orchards
walks a block to Barb's Bakery in Northport
and brings back a yummy custard filled chocolate doughnut for me.

Every few days, while we are at the other Farmers Markets,
we talk about "Doughnut Day"
in anticipation of the Friday Farmers Market.

I confess, we do not really "talk" about it.
We yell "Friday Doughnut Day!" when we discuss the event.

It is the little things that amuse me!!!

Ingredients

In case you want to know what goes into your chocolate mixes, here it is!

Sugar on the left, cocoa on the right and chocolate chips on top.

More ingredients go into each mix, but this is a good start!

The kitchen smells so good when Michael mixes chocolate!

Today, Michael is making me two kinds of chocolate cake to taste test for new recipes.
This is my birthday cake.
I have to work as Director of Taste Testing even on my birthday,
but what a great job it is!
I will let you know the results.

Doggie of the Week

Finally, I am getting to our First Annual Doggie of the Week program. We see so many wonderful dogs (and their owners) at the Farm Markets, so we decided to show you as many of them as we can.

Here are the first two of many doggies. Welcome Chelsea and Trevi. I introduced Trevi last week, when we were celebrating Stuart and Susie's anniversary.

Chelsea and Trevi have their PFDs on. When they jump off of boats, Stuart and Susie always have them wear these, as it is easier for helping them get into the boat. I think they are adorable.

If you come to Northport or Frankfort Farm Markets, Michael and I will be there, camera ready, to make your pup a blog star!

We Saw It Again!

We were still working, so outside we went to see the International Space Station again!

It was so amazing!

It passed through the Big Dipper, and made us feel so small
when we saw the tiny space station in an enormous group of stars.

God does good work!

International Space Station

Guess what we saw this evening? The International Space Station!

It is traveling at more than 17,000 miles per hour.

It is over 220 miles up in space.

It takes 92 minutes to orbit the earth,
so if we are still working later this evening,
we will get to see it again.

Michael thought he saw a sign in the window
that asked if we could set out a plate of root beer cookies for the next pass by.

He is baking them now, just in case they can pick them up!

Home Grown Tomatoes

As soon as the tomatoes are ripe in our garden, I start singing one of my favorite songs.

Check out this link and sing along!

http://youtu.be/g0C4FOL1qIw

Goat Stampede

Have you ever been to a goat stampede? We have! Michael and I went to the Northwestern Michigan Fair tonight to watch the goat stampede. It was hysterical! Lots of children and their goats got their evening exercise in the arena. On the count of three, the children ran and the goats followed...except for a few of the goats who would rather stay in one spot, all four feet firmly planted in the ground. One baby goat cried all the way. She was adorable, but so scared!

If you have never been to a goat stampede, we highly recommend it!

Happy Anniversary to the Brontman's

Happy Anniversary to Stuart and Susan Brontman! They are a lovely couple with two great daughters and two adorable dogs (I have not met the newest member of the family - Trevi, who is pictured above, playing with Pluto).

Stuart surprised Susan with a weekend up north to celebrate their anniversary. It was a great weekend to be here.

The Brontman family spend as much time as they can in northern Michigan, and I get the privilege of seeing them at several farm markets when they are in the area. They love our mixes and I love sending them home with Michael's latest inventions.

Farm markets are so much fun. We meet the nicest people there!

Hope Stuart and Susan have a wonderful day!

Salads

We just heard that the average American family eats 36 salads per year, or about one salad every ten days.

Boy, are we different than the average family! Michael and I eat a salad almost every night. We may miss one salad every ten days, instead of eat one every ten days like everyone else.

Since June, we have eaten salads fresh from our garden. First, the spinach, then the leaf lettuce, with the second run of spinach almost ready to eat. Now we have carrots, peas, squash and beans. Soon, we will enjoy our tomatoes, corn on the cob and cucumbers. If a veggie was not ready from our garden, we could always pick up something fresh from the farmers markets!

Dare to be different and try a salad every night! It tastes so good and is so good for you!