shear them,” says Young. “They’re just fed enough grain to see it as a treat and come when you call.” Young and McRae further simulate nature with other
sustainable practices. Young describes they way they farm as a cyclical system. “One thing’s waste is another thing’s useful product.” She explains, “We don’t really have much waste product, because everything that someone might perceive as a waste, we find a way to reuse it.” They use newspapers and leaves to mulch the rows in the garden, and create their own compost, using several different methods. Manure from the animals, dead leaves, paper, and kitchen waste from the house are deposited in composting bins. In another container, worms digest organic material to create vermicompost. McRae and Young use no chemicals on the farm. Instead, they hand-remove bugs and hand-pull weeds. The farm’s plants and animals also naturally regulate pests. Ben- eficial insects that feed on pests are drawn to the diversity of the plants in the garden and pasture. The farm’s poultry, along with frogs that naturally populate the area, also eat pests.
Solar panels on the roof of the family home provide energy for hot water. Young says that she needs a lot of hot water to wash the wool that they shear from the animals. “So again working with nature, I don’t wash wool unless the sun is shining, and then I wash it early enough in the day that the sun will produce more hot water for us to use at night.” With the wool, Young spins her own yarn. She also cre-
ates numerous items by felting, knitting, and weaving in her fiber arts studio. The studio, like the rest of the buildings on the farm, was built of wood from the property. Young uses a non-electric, treadle sewing machine. Her loom and spin- ning wheel require no electricity as well. Young dyes wool with both homemade and commercial
dyes. She avoids toxic dyes, and she follows a process called “exhausting the dye-bath,” wherein the wool soaks up all of the dye, so the only waste is clean water. Young shares her skill in fiber arts by teaching on-farm fiber arts classes for adults and children. She also passes on her farming knowledge to others who desire to farm locally and naturally. “Because I started small,” she says, “and small was sometimes hard.” Most available resources for famers are more suited to the needs of large and industrial farms. “Like chickens, par- ticularly,” says Young, “If you want to get chickens, you order from a hatchery, and you have to get 25. You have to have a facility to keep them warm. So that kind of blocked me at first, because I didn’t have the facility and I didn’t want 25 chickens.” Luckily, someone sold her two chickens, so she was able to get started. “I had to start somewhere. Somebody else has to start somewhere. I can pass the flame.”
Dew Dance Farm is located at 3400 Deep River Road in Sanford, NC. Contact Laura Young at 919-775-5140 or at Dew Dance Farm on Facebook.
Equal Better Breast Health
8 out of 10 women are wearing the wrong bra.
Custom-Fitted Bras
Altogether Woman offers patented custom-fitted bras that will:
� Reduce neck, back and shoulder pain � Encompass all the breast tissue � Provide support from beneath the breast � Support the breast position comfortably � Eliminate pressure that restricts circulation � Help you look and feel your very best � Achieve a vital step in proper breast care
Call Parris Seaforth today. She will help you look and feel better tomorrow. Ask for A FREE
BEFORE
Nutritional Research Foundation pamphlet on breast health.
AFTER
Altogether Woman
703-798-4550
thebrababe@gmail.com
Serving women in the surrounding Triangle area
natural awakenings
Annual Guide 2010
51
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64