Fall is here again, and with it, weekends are jam-packed full of events as long as the mild weather prevails. Or straight through until Christmas, as it seems some years. I try not to overload my schedule, with about as much success as my attempts to not overeat at the Royal Buffet. Between work and family obligations, there are plenty of venues to split my time. 

Very recently, I’ve begun to receive a few more invitations for our farm to participate in some of these events as a vendor. While we cannot attend most of these, there was one this past week that worked out. The Hawley Harvest Hoedown was set to occur Saturday and Sunday throughout the borough of Hawley. Since we were not prepared with the proper permitting to sell our food there, I decided it would be nice to just bring some of our farm elements to let folks know who we are and where we do our thing.

For starters, I rolled our old Allis-Chalmers model G onto the trailer, and we brought that out to do photos. I don’t know who had a better time, the kids getting to sit on that tractor, or me getting to spark their smiles by telling them they could indeed sit on said tractor. Maybe next time we can do some tractor rides, but little guys and big guys alike came by to check out the old orange iron and get their picture taken with it. 

Another big draw (pun intended) was the coloring pages we brought. My absolute favorite artist drew these pages especially for our event; they featured different aspects of our farm. (You may have heard of her; she’s the cool cat who puts this newspaper together.) We had pictures of our logo, which features our mascot, Daisy the Goat; a cow out in a field; a vegetable plot; and even some cured meat hanging in a meat locker. We had kids come by to color the pages, but I would have to say the popular picture by nearly double the rest was the one of the cow. 

My wife and I found it amusing that the most popular color the cow was adorned with was the color blue. Now, if any of you know my wife, you know she is very scientific. She works for extension as a livestock educator, and so when she saw all the kids coloring their cows blue, she couldn’t help herself. 

Before you get concerned that she was stomping on anyone’s imagination or fun, let me explain. The moment she saw the first blue cow of the day, she immediately started a conversation with the otherwise focused six-year-old about why some cows look blue. “Did you know that there is a cow called a blue roan that looks blue because it has closely knitted black and white hairs that make it appear blue?” This was the line that erupted from my wife every time the blue crayon made an appearance. So if you happen to be the parent of a child who is asking about blue cows—it might be my wife’s fault. 

In all, it turned out to be a halfway relaxing time for my wife and me, despite technically working the event all day. It was nice to be able to sit and talk to folks who had questions about the butcher shop, the vegetables and about farming in general. There were lots of nice folks from Hawley, whom we hope to see in the future at the farm—but if not, it was a pleasure to make their acquaintance at the Hawley Hoedown.

The way out here it’s not all about making money, and it is a privilege to share what we do and the way we live with those curious about it all. And if anyone wants to try their hand at coloring a blue cow or any of our other coloring pages, feel free to email me at hillsteadfarmllc@gmail.com or stop by the store for a copy. We don’t discriminate by the age of the colorer.