This week Brian made his second trip for wreath greens to Whitefield NH.  Many may not know that evergreens need a good hard frost to set the needles on their boughs which is why we don’t harvest greens earlier than November for our wreaths.  The greens are kept cool and watered every so often so they don’t dry out.  Because of this our wreaths tend to hold their needles very well and can last for months indoors and out.  The only thing that hinders this is a south facing exposure in full sun.

Wreath assembly involves cutting boughs down into smaller pieces that can be grouped into small bunches.  Once that is done, our double sided wreaths are assembled one bunch at a time by wrapping them with wire around a wreath ring.  All in all it is a time consuming process but one that produces beautiful fresh, full wreaths.  On average we will make 80 to 100 wreaths for the holiday season.

Balsam Bough

Prepped greens and wreath in process

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks.  Oct. 21st we set off to Michigan for the annual North American Maple Producers Conference in Frankenmuth, Michigan.  The trip out found us meeting a maple producer in Emlenton PA named Joe of Old State Farms.  He is a great guy working for The Hardwood Mall in that town which is quite a place to see.  Look them up online if you get a chance.  But he showed us his new evaporator and a quick tour of the sugarhouse. But he also mentioned his pal Pat would be at the conference.  So sure enough we met Pat and his wife of Frost Ridge Maple.  Super folks to know and looking forward to seeing them again.

We also got to tour a sugarhouse, a wind farm,  the Octagon Barn, visit the Henry Ford Museum and a sugar beet processing location.  Sugar beets are in season for harvesting now and there are miles and miles of acres of sugar beets out there.  Did you know 40% of our table sugar comes from sugar beets not just sugar cane?  One thing I can tell you is that making maple sugar is much, much easier!!!

On another note I am proud to say the Brian took first place in one of the photo contests.  The category was “Maple People on the Job” and the photo that won is the one on our home page; Brian’s self portrait of tapping.  How cool is that!  We are pretty tickled to say the least when you have entries from many of the 14 states and provinces to be judged against.

The week ahead is going to be all about wreaths.  Looks like Wednesday Brian will head north for the first cut of balsam to start making wreaths.  The next few weekend my Mom and I will plan the decorations and we’ll start assembly the weekend after Thanksgiving.  We’ll be busy, busy, busy for sure.

Holiday Open House

Saturday December  3rd  9am to 4pm and Sunday December 4th  10am to 3pm

The summer markets are just about over so we  are switching gears.  There is a lot of work to get prepared for our annual Open House Weekend just 8 weeks away.  In a couple weeks Brian will be heading north to cut the first batch of balsam greens he uses to make our wreaths. Early November is a good time for this because the trees have had a few good frosts to set the needles.  He makes 2 to 3 trips in November to get all we need and assure the freshest greens possible.

My mom and I will be getting into our shopping mode to round up all the decorations needed to put on the wreaths.  After which we need to spend a few weekends planning the designs before we can start assembling them.

And as always there are gift baskets to be made along with offering all our usual maple products.  We will be open the following two weekends in December as well but the hours have not been decided just yet.