I have spent most of the last 2 days trying to write this post. For every sentence I have written down, I have hit endless interruptions.

I suppose it is the consequence of a life that is deeply entwined in work. The goats get out when I am on a zoom call and I have to dash out. A lamb is born while Kevin is chairing a meeting on teams from the barn. On Wednesday, I taught sourdough while our work experience student cuddled cats outside and Kerstin, our operations co-ordinator/head baker/long time friend/god mother to my children packed soap and did dishes and bottled our honey harvest. Theo who was "sick" ran in and out of the house and studio. The pigs escaped. A neighbour popped by to grab honey for his beautiful handmade honey dippers. Another stopped by to check the cow for us.

Once upon a time, I would have felt embarrassed by working in this way. It's not how it is supposed to be done, is it? And I like a plan. While not specifically an organised person, I like to know what shape my day is going to take when I get up in the morning. Years of working in the civil service and for NGOs instilled a certain expectation of what work "should" look like and I tried to replicate that for so long. I would work from 9-5. I had a desk that would have looked at home in an office block with the thick door that shut out the menagerie on the other side.

These days though, we work in the thick of it. A work meeting turns into "why don't you stay for dinner" pretty quick around here. Someone comes for a goat visit and ends up becoming a close friend or work colleague. A staff member comes to pack orders and ends up chasing a cow back into her field in pink flip flops. Our delivery drivers are our friends and our friends are frequent collaborators. There is no work life balance, not really. It is all of it and more. While sometimes it can be overwhelming, on the whole though I wouldn't have it any other way.

Using our work to support our friends is one of the best consequences of building the business this way and we have a great collaboration for you this week! We are delighted to announce our amazing collaboration with our beautiful friends Jim Riach and Eilidh Weir on our Honey Gift Boxes.  A jar of local honey, a bar of honey soap and a hand poured beeswax candle in a beautiful Buchlyvie Pottery ceramic holder. 

We only have a few available, so grab them while they are here!

While not necessarily farm related, I can't send this newsletter out without a massive shoutout to the Stirling City of Culture bid team, led in part by Kevin in his day job as the director of Artlink Central and Scene Stirling. Stirling was the only Scottish bid to make it through the expression of interest stage and we are SO PROUD of him (and long time friends and colleagues Lesley and Fiona).  It is a lot to juggle the farm with his work and wins like this make that juggle feel all the more worth it.

Proud wife rant over! I am off to wrangle children as half term is here!!

Kat

PS the title from this post was stolen from the brilliant book of the same name by Merlin Sheldrake all about the wonderful world of fungi!