You guys, let me show you something unbelievable.

Last night, the Plotted and Pieced Blouse (I admit: it’s my favorite piece in the collection) hit #1 on Ravelry. Never, ever, ever would I have dreamt it.

The response to my Findley Dappled book has been wildly exciting and totally incredible. I’ve spent today and yesterday being absolutely worthless– reading the wonderful comments you’ve left on the blog, counting up my ravelry hearts like a miser, going through your wonderful emails and facebook comments and tweets, and being a verklempt little kittenhead.

I will express myself through animal pictures.

At first, I was slack-jawed. Utterly shocked.

Then, I blushed. Powerfully. I was shy, nervous, and a little embarrassed for being as proud as I am.

Because, in my heart, I feel like this!

I have never in my life received such a heartwarming gift as this litany of positivity. People who don’t even know me– strangers!– are saying nice things about me! On the internet! I’m not being sarcastic!

And this is all the sweeter, because I know exactly how hard everyone worked to put this book together. Susan took an enormous chance on me when she asked me, back in the summer, if I’d write a book of lace patterns. Zac did all my farm chores while I sketched, swatched, and scribbled my way through the fall. I’ve promised multiple firstborns (mine. That’s probably a problem.) to my patient, long-suffering, wind-swift Test Knitters. Alison taught me how to actually write a pattern, with her red Mark-Changes pen of Technical Editing. Joel’s photographs are so beautiful that they shocked me– I had no idea my designs looked that good! And Lauria did everything (as in: EVERY. THING.) in between.

I am beyond pleased, and so happy that you all like it. I can’t wait for you to be able to start knitting– I have a feeling I’m going to be overwhelmed all over again.

This post is cross-posted on my blog, just in case, you know, you want to start reading it.

 Actually, you’ve already met him– and he’s the newest member of the JMF family!

About two weeks ago, Susan sent Zac and I an email from the road. She was staying with her friend Shirra and her family, and had fallen in love with their dog, Jack. Would we be okay if he came to the farm to live with us?

I think we both wrote back “YES!” without asking the other first. Ever since she’d written the original blog post about him, we’d been wishing that he could come live at the farm (Zac and I both grew up with Australian Shepherds as family dogs, and love them to pieces).

So, this past weekend, Shirra drove down with Jack and spent a few days with us at the farm. We learned all about him over those few days. Plus, he was able to get comfortable with us, while still having his mom around.

All of us are absolutely in love with him. He’s truly the calmest, most at-peace dog I’ve ever met (not just “calm, for an Aussie”, he’s calm, period). He’s affectionate and obedient, playful and loyal. I already cannot imagine life without him– it feels right, having him here.

I want to end by saying thank you to the Stones, who have given us their beautiful, lovely Jack. I just hope we can love him as well as you all have!

Do you know who Karen and Chris Watson are? I’ll tell you. They are a mother and daughter from the Garden State who decided this year that instead of getting each other Christmas presents, they would come together and sponsor hay for an entire week on the farm. What’s even more special is that they are doing this in memory of a very close friend of theirs, Loretta Glatz, who passed away from breast cancer on December 31, 2010.

From Karen, “She was a terrific friend, mom and grandmother. She was like a 2nd mom to me. I will miss her laugh the most. I want to do it as a remembrance of her life bringing good to others, especially animals that are close to my heart.”

Their donation will provide hay for both pastures for a week, is a great way to support the farm, and we want to thank them very much and express our sorrow for their loss of Loretta, who seems to have been a very special woman.

Thank you, Karen and Chris!

I’ve spent the last couple of weeks trying to catch my breath and get organized. See, there are a whole handful of amazing things about to happen to me and to Juniper Moon Farm that are really going to raise our profile and bring us all kinds of new opportunities. Things that are so far beyond any goals or dreams I ever had for myself that I keep wondering when I’m going to wake up.

Of course, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t face change- even fantastic change- without some trepidation. I’ve worked really hard over the last few years to build a life for myself. It’s not a big, important life- I’m not curing diseases or anything- but it’s my life and I love it. I wake up every morning with a smile on my face and with my heart near bursting. I have a lovely home and my flock is healthy. I have the most incredible friends. I mean, really, my closest friends are some of the most intelligent, successful, compassionate and hilarious women in the world. I have a family that would do anything for me. And today, I went to Target and couldn’t think of a single thing I needed.

So, it’s probably not surprising that I’m feeling a little protective of my little universe right now. Change, even good change, means that this farm, this business, this blog, will be growing. Growth is necessary and exciting, but it’s also a little scary. There is some tiny part of me that wants to build a wall around everything I have right now, to keep it from changing, to keep the unknown out.

Luckily, the 99% of me that is rational is making all the decisions around here. Nevertheless, I’ve been honoring the 1%’s fears and indulging in a little nostalgia for right now, lately. Whatever happens, I will never be in this place- this wonderful, often exciting, occasionally infuriating place- ever again, and I don’t ever want to forget how lucky I was to be here.

In the next few weeks, you’re going to see a lot of changes around here. There will be new faces on the farm and all kinds of news. Crazy news. Seriously crazy news. You’ll start seeing some changes on the website very soon as well and we may experience a some growing pains and technical issues along the way, but I hope you’ll be patient and we’ll try to keep the disruption to a minimum. (I’m determined to get all the bugs worked out quickly, before all hell breaks loose.)

One more thing. The most important thing, actually. Thank you. Thank you for reading the words I write here . Thank you for supporting this little farm with your yarn purchases. Thank you for commenting on the blog, for being here for me in the down times and for celebrating the good times. Thank you for choosing to spend your hard-earned vacation time with us and for the emails and cards and handmade sussys that fill up my mailbox.

Some of you have been with me since the very beginning, back when I was the only farm employee and was holding down two full-time jobs at the same time. We have been through a lot together, and all the good things that are happening right now? They wouldn’t be happening if it weren’t for you.

I don’t have words for the kind of gratitude in my heart right now, so I’ll just say “thank you” and hope that you know I mean it to the very depths of my soul.

The last few mornings, I’ve woken up in the morning with the strangest feeling. It takes me a few seconds to figure out what it is I’m feeling in my groggy, half-asleep state. Once I realize that what I’m feeling is hapiness I spend another couple of moments trying to figure our why. Is it Christmas? Do I have the day off? Oh I know! I’m happy because of…well…everything.

I’m happy because I’m building a life for myself that I love and I get to do it without compromises. I’m happy because I get to live on the most magical 11 acres in the world, with a home and a farm that couldn’t meet my needs better if they had been custom built just for me. I am happy to have  Kenny and Diane, the couple that own my house, who are so kind and caring and invested in what we’re doing here that I refuse to call them landlords. They are the friends who own my house.

I’m happy that my flock is thriving in our new home and that my dogs are so happy and healthy. The peace I get when I know that all the animals in my care are well and fed and content is immeasurable.

I’m happy because I have great friends who know all the bad stuff about me and still love me anyway. I’m happy because I have a family that loves me enough to make sacrifices that any competent financial planner would have strongly advised against. I’m happy because I have someone in my life who makes my heart leap up and gives me butterflies in my stomach every single day.

I’m happy because I have learned over the past year what  I am capable of, that I have reserves of strength that I didn’t know I possessed, and because even if the worst happens, I know I’ll be okay.

Now, by nature, I am a skeptic. And I am more than a little suspicious of all this happiness. I won’t lie to you- I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop at any moment. But whatever happens tomorrow or next month or next year, I will always look back on this adventure as the greatest time in my life and I will know that I had an amazing group of friends, family, shareholders and readers who made it all possible. I quite literally couldn’t do this without you.

I am so grateful to all of you for giving me a chance to live this life. I don’t say it often enough. Thank you. For the very bottom of my heart.

When I was in my twenties and early thirties I was crazy about clothes. I was making a good living as a network news producer and, most weeks, I just signed my paychecks over to Anthropologie. I window shopped at Barney’s and learned what it means to covet something.

These days I could care less about clothes. Most days I’m lucky to find a top and pants that aren’t manure stained when I need to go to the grocery store. 

Now the objects of  my desire are barns. Big, beautiful, wooden barns. Barns with haylofts and room for a dozen kidding pens. Barns with weather vanes and those cool sliding doors for driving in a tractor. Swoon. 

So when Sand Creek Post & Beam contacted me about becoming a sponsor of this blog it was like hearing from Yves St. Laurent himself.  I squealed, actually squealed, as I read the email. Then I spent hours pouring over the photographs on the Sand Creek site. Then I fainted. Then, in my most dignified tone, I wrote back said that, indeed, we would be most pleased to have Sand Creek Post & Beam as a sponsor. Then I fainted again.

I have used this space in the past to chronicle the grief I feel when I drive by an old barn that has been allowed to fall into disrepair and ruin. Well, looking at Sand Creek’s barns is the exact opposite of that. To me they look like hope. Hope that “family farm” won’t become an anachronism. Hope that people will continue to care about where there food comes from. Hope that one day “Farmer” will rate right up there with “Doctor” and “Policeman” when children dream of what they will become.

A new barn is a powerful thing, my friends.

Welcome Sand Creek Post and Beam. I’m awfully glad you are here.

Thank you all for the kind emails and comments about Biscotti. I was surprised by how comforting it was to me that so many of you were thinking of us and sending us prayers. Surprised because I thought nothing could make me feel better.

Thanks so much to everyone who voted and left so many kind comments. I just can’t believe we won!