Common Ground Fair '08 & New Furniture

We had a great weekend! We took Karis to her first Common Ground Fair and first trip to an apple orchard.

On Saturday we drove to Unity for the Common Ground Fair. The Common Ground is sponsored by the Maine Organic Farmers and Growers Assoc. It is so much fun. The vendors are tons better than those at a regular fair. There are tons of arts and crafts, yarns, aromatherapy booths, baby items, country living, sustainable living, and vegetable stands. There are bands playing, people dancing, children sliding down a hill on pieces of cardboard, sheepdog demos, and parades. One of the special aspects for BJ and me are all the tree huggers. Unity College is also heavily involved with the fair, and it is similar to Northland. The fair takes us back to Northland with all the barefoot people, dreadlocks, hippy dancing, and environmental causes.


We were there for hours. I think I had more fun this time than any other time. Karis took her first ride in a wagon pulled by a tractor. She slept through it. BJ and I took turns carrying Karis around in a sling. I surprised an elderly woman sitting on a bench. She had been ready to compliment me on my purse when she saw Karis' hand poke of my sling. I fit right in with all the other moms there. There were moms nursing comfortably in public with no one looking at the funny. There were tons of organic, handmade, and sustainable baby and children products for sale. I bought Karis a relaxing aromatherapy sachet for under her cosleeper. I could have gone crazy buying stuff for her, but that was the only thing I got for her.

We started our Christmas shopping at the fair. I bought some stuff to create some gift baskets. I also got some Sweet Annie that BJ is going to make a swag out of. It'll make the kitchen smell really good.

The food there, although just like regular fair food, for the most part has to be organic. BJ and I had indian food- Somosas and Palak Aloo. I love Indian food, and hate that there isn't an Indian restaruant nearby. We also got a local Apple cider which was awesome.

By the time we were done we were all exhausted.

On Sunday we went back to the furniture store we had been to in Thursday. It turns out both the table and the lazyboy were both still there AND had been marked down further. We splurged and bought both. We are going to move our current chair upstairs in to one of the guest rooms, and I think I'm going to move the old kitchen table upstairs into my craft room and get rid of my craft table. I'm not sure what we will do with the chairs.

After the furniture store we went for a ride up to Bailey Orchard. Karis is, of course, too little to pick apples so we just went to the stand. We got cider, McIntoshes, and plums. BJ plans on making a pie. We hope to take her apple picking next fall.