Podcast Episode #119: Wing & A Prayer Farm with Tamara White
Today, Sharri has Tamara White on the podcast. Sharri describes her as a fiber farmer extraordinaire. Tamara has a farm located in the Green Mountains of Vermont called Wing and a Prayer. Listen as Tamara shares how she has guided her business throughout the years with her passions, her passion for animals, sustainability, the environment, creativity, as well as education. There are so many tips for all of us in this conversation, so listen in as Tamara shares how one small decision can make an impact on the larger world.
Tamara White’s website, https://www.wingandaprayerfarm.com/
Tamara White’s Instagram, https://www.instagram.com/wingandaprayerfarm/
Tamara White’s Patreon, https://www.patreon.com/join/wingandaprayerfarm
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Podcast Episode #119: Wing & A Prayer Farm with Tamara White
Sharri Harmel: Welcome everyone to the Extraordinary Women Podcast. I’m Sharri Harmel, host of this particular podcast, as well as editor-in-chief of the Extraordinary Women Magazine. Well, today I am chatting with Tammy White, who I describe as fiber farmer extraordinaire. Her farm is called Wing and a Prayer, and it is located in the Green Mountains of Vermont. Now if you don’t know what a fiber farmer is, and I didn’t, we are talking about, Tammy has sheep, 70 of them. In fact, Tammy was truly ahead of the environmental movement having started over 20 years ago, gradually adding different varieties of sheep, numbers of them, as well as always naturally dying her woo with plants from what she calls her die garden. I’m no farmer, no surprise there, but this was one of the most fascinating conversations I’ve had. And I want you to listen to how Tammy has guided her business throughout the years with her passions, her passion for animals, sustainability, the environment, creativity, as well as education. There are so many tips for all of us in this conversation, so I’ll stop talking now and let Tammy share how one small decision can make an impact on the larger world. So let’s get started. Tammy, I am so excited to talk to you today. I saw you in what Women Create. I know Jo Packham and I read about you in her magazine, and I thought I have to talk to this woman. This is incredible what you are doing. So start with kind of an overview of your business cuz it’s multiple businesses.
Tamara White: Thank you for having me. I would say that the biggest part of the picture is that I am a farmer. I’m primarily a sheep farmer. I have approximately 70 sheep. Oh, and I have alpacas and goats. I used to have more goats, but I’ve been farming for 22 years in Vermont. My goats have mostly passed away by now, and I haven’t renewed the flock of goats. They’re a little bit trickier. They’re so smart and they think fences were designed for them to figure out how to get out of. So as I get older, I don’t feel like being so clever all the time. So I am a yarn farmer and so I like to celebrate and relegate rare breeds, and also to preach about small farms and how we can make a difference in the world. That would be the overall picture. And then breaking it down I have these animals that graze my property. I have about 20 acres. The product that they yield is wool or fiber, and I turned that into yarn. Felt like wool comfort. Blankets. Woo batting, woo stuffing. So that’s my main product on the farm is yarn. I call myself a yarn farmer. And then beyond that, I’m a dyer, so I naturally dye all of our farm’s wool that is not already naturally colored. Some of the sheep are dark brown or gray or whatever, so there’s no need to mess with nature, but everything that is uncolored, I might dye, and I raise a dye garden for that.
Sharri Harmel: What does that mean? Explain to people who don’t know.
Tamara White: For example, right now, actually this whole week, I have been harvesting the indigo. You see my hands are a little bit blue too. So I’ve been creating indigo VAs and using indigo, both fresh and fermented. So with the fresh I get these greens and marine blues sort of turquoise. And then with the fermented baths, I get that traditional indigo blue that you think of when you think of blue jeans. And so my dye garden produces the indigo plants, the persicaria tin tuia that I harvest. Also, I have a big old pot of marigolds that I’m dying to get yellows, and I picked some more this morning in this late autumn, it’s kind of unusual that I’m still picking from my dye garden, but I was picking weld plants. And weld plants also produce like a bright, bright yellow. I combine it with the marigold so I could get a really strong and vibrant sort of gold yellow, not like a lime yellow that the weld on its own wood yield. So I do all kinds of sort of alchemy in my backyard studio. The fiber from my animals. I also will dye, you know, textiles that are non-protein fibers. Protein fibers being wool and cellulose fibers being like linen and cotton and plaques. So right now I’m also dying cotton duck. That’s like really heavy and I’m dying it with indigo too. Solstice calendar, so you know about advent calendars. So I’m creating solstice calendars. I’ll have 21 pockets because in my mind the solstice is a very special event because the winter solstice, because after that, the day start getting longer. And I really do love me a sunny day, you know, in the winter when it’s very dark and we have lots of winter here in. Though I love the piece and the beauty of the snow and the leafless trees and the silhouettes. It’s so pretty. It’s like stained glass at sunset, looking through. I love all that, but I really have more energy for working outside and all that during the warmer month. So anyway, solstice is a big deal to me. So I’m dying all of this canvas that I’m going to be turning into that product. So besides the yarn farming, besides the farming, besides the dye garden, and besides like all of the products related to the farm, I also have a pie business, which is sort of a pie gig. Mostly weddings that I sell pies. People get very excited around the holidays too. They like to order pies, but mostly I do like pie weddings now that’s using, and that kind of started from being at the farmer’s market every week with my yarn way back when and then not really selling yarn in the summer, but like, well, what can I sell? I’m sitting here every week, and so my grandmother had taught me to make pies when I was little. I used to help her, and I could make them quite easily, and they were always very delicious. So I thought, let me bring some pies. And that’s how I started getting known for pies. I’ve tried to taper that back because I’m so consumed by the farm work and, um, dying and I can’t really be in the kitchen as much. It requires really late nights and early mornings, and I have a lot of work to do around my yarn business, so I’m tired, but pies are easy for me, like I just was settling up with a bride. She ordered 22 pies for, oh gosh, you know, a week and a half ago. And I have four ovens, so that really helps.
and I have another wedding this week. It’s in Pennsylvania and that’s fun because I get invited to go to the wedding and I love a wedding, but you’re just always like, hope the pies taste good cuz I’m right here.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. I have never heard of this trend in, of having pies at weddings versus cake and it’s actually, it sounds wonderful.
Tamara White: Here in the Northeast there’s also, people are doing a lot like they’ll have donuts. I don’t know if it’s because it’s Vermont, but people are wanting to have simpler faire and maybe they have a cake also.
I’ve been doing the pie wedding thing for I think 10 years. But it’s so festive and I wanna say it’s so fun to work with the wedding parties that are having these pie weddings. They’re pretty laid back and they just love something delicious and yeah. There’s not a lot of stress because I used to be a florist way back when I first graduated from college. I pursued floristry and I had my own business, and I did weddings. And I much prefer pies being involved with pie than flowers. I love flowers, obviously I love gardening and I love being outdoors, but it was more stressful when I was a florist than being a pie acre.
Sharri Harmel: What are their top choices?
Tamara White: Strawberry rhubarb. They love interesting strawberry rhubarb. Yeah. Which, When I was younger, I wasn’t so crazy about strawberry rhubarb, but it’s fun. I mean, for us, right in the countryside. Rhubarb is very common Like every old farmhouse has a rhubarb patch in front of it. And I actually use rhubarb leaves for dying. and then the stocks for pies. So it’s really a practical and useful vegetable. I don’t, I appreciate it very much, but I don’t think I appreciate it as much as people that are ordering these pies because I think it’s unique and you don’t usually find it available in a store to purchase, like it’s really seasonal. And then, and I have funny names for my pie, so it’s like much, much ado about Strawberry Rue, happily ever after and pair way to heaven.
Sharri Harmel: Oh, I love those
Tamara White: wild blueberry yonder I know. And peach into the choir, much new about strawberry and Happily Ever After.
Sharri Harmel: That’s funny. And Pies will travel. It sounds like if you’re going to Pennsylvania, you stay probably on the East Coast, so your pies stay fresh. Is that true?
Tamara White: I have mastered shipping them and people would like to have ordered pies. The thing is, it’s very expensive to ship them, as you could imagine. So you end up paying as much for shipping as the pie and there again, I feel like I’m so practical, that’s a hard thing for me to appreciate but because I feel like you could maybe find pies closer to you.
Sharri Harmel: But go back if you can. Cuz, you talked about doing flowers for weddings when you first got outta school, and how did you get into the sheep and the fiber? So it’s one thing to have a couple of sheep in your backyard., but it’s another to be 70 sheep and the business of fiber, and I just can’t imagine. How did this evolve?
Tamara White: Well, that’s a good question. It was a really gradual and organic growth because my children, I have three adult children and in 2000 they were little, and I was homeschooling them. And in about a year’s time, we have Acreage here in Vermont, and it seemed like we mowed a little too much. It’s like 20 of the flattest acres there could be in this massive, in the state called the Green Mountain state. But so we would mow, and we were like, we need to, you know, this is not really so sustainable. And so we started to learn about raising sheep. I had a little bit of farm experience. I lived on my grandparents retired dairy farm, so I had had four H and knew about chickens and ponies, and I didn’t really know about sheep, though I didn’t raise livestock like I do now. So we learned about different breeds of sheep. We decided upon Shetland sheep, we went to different farms in our state to visit the farmers, learn about their farm, and then settled upon buying our first three Shetland sheep and receive them here. In 2001 and in like a day I was like, oh my gosh, we have to have more. And contacted that farmer and she set aside a UAM for us that when she was weaned from her mama would come here. So when Maggie, our first uam, that was going to be the matriarch of our flock, moved here. We didn’t realize that 22 years later, I would be a full-time yarn farmer raising wool as my main product, and it’s how I pay for my taxes and my insurance and my, it’s like my whole livelihood this farm. I never dreamed that would happen. But anyway, as the kids grew older, and I had this infrastructure by like 2010 and. Knowledge from doing it for 10 years and had grown the flock. You know, if you sheep at a time, Maggie had twins and then the twins were old enough and then they had twins. You know how it goes. And so then, oh wow. I also became a place where people wanted to drop off their, not drop off, but rehome their animals because they were like, oh, you have a nice farm. And as I went along, I learned more. My kids grew on to go to school or careers outside of the farm. Instead of downsizing, I upsized. So I just, you know, took what I knew how to do which, I had gotten pretty good at farming and I loved it and it’s hard work. Everyone always says, oh, you know, how do you do it? Cuz it’s such hard work. It’s very hard work and maybe one of the hardest things about it, not physically, but is like emotionally, it’s not necessarily a secure feeling, right? It’s all up to the decisions I make, and you know that we will be okay or not. And the. Physical ailments and the weather challenge you constantly, that kind of thing is what’s difficult. And then like of course there’s like backbreaking work of, you know, cleaning stalls and all that sort of thing and putting up hay. But it also keeps me young, you know, I feel really every day I go out that door and take care of all of these animals that are dependent on me. So I have the good fortune in the last few years since Covid that my eldest and my youngest sort of returned to the Nest. Oh, they’re nearby and can help me now. So that’s really great. They have jobs and. such, but they’re, whenever they can, they definitely pitch in. And so I’m not entirely alone. There are times when I’m entirely alone because they travel or whatnot. Yeah, I have a good support system.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah, it sounds like it. It’s wonderful. Now are different cuz I looked online and for all of you who don’t know what Tammy’s talking about and don’t know how different sheep can look, actually go to Tammy’s Instagram. I have all the information down in the show notes, but you had just recently posted that picture of the one sheep that’s in a coat and he’s like in the coat all the time and there was another next to him that looks smaller or next to her that looks smaller. So what do you do all day long? I, and I don’t mean that in a negative way, cuz I know you have to share ’em to get the yarn, you’re obviously doing the dying process now, but what in Tammy’s world?
Tamara White: Well, that’s crazy that that would stick with you and I’m really glad it would because that’s just like kind of shows really how much there is to know about taking care of them. It’s really hard to encapsulate it in a dis, you know, a simple description. In that instance, in that image that was Mary and Bluma who are like half-sisters and Mary is not Sean. She had not had her wool. Bluma had been sheered, so their silhouettes were quite different because Mary was like still very wooly. Yeah. And then she has her coat on and Bluma is, you know, in her bi there, little, but they both wear, they wear coats. And the coats are to keep the fiber clean and maintain the integrity of it because. That’s the product they’re growing. The product that we use to make yarn their wool is a kind enough wool called a fine wool. The micron count is such that there are different categories of wolves, and so theirs is considered fine. Everybody knows about Marino wool, so I usually compare it to that so that the fine wool and that kind of wool when it’s exposed to the. The weather, the dirt, the whatever breaks down more. So I would lose a lot of Bluma or Mary’s crop, you know? If we’re calling their wooer crop, if I didn’t coat them, not every sheep wears a coat, but with the coat comes all of the maintenance because. I’m a wild animal. Not wild, but I’m a sheep and I’m out in the field and I’m wearing my coat and I have an itch, so I’m gonna rub on something, maybe my coat’s gonna get stuck on that. Something, you know, uh oh, maybe I’m stranded, or, uh, oh, my wool has grown so much. My coat is very tight. Now I wonder, the farmer will notice because it’s rubbing under my arm, and it hurts. It’s up to me. Pay attention to, to dress these guys. So I, I often mention like when you’re putting a toddler into a snowsuit or think of me wrestling my sheep into their coats. Exactly, it’s, it’s a trick. But so that’s like wrestling that you have to do is change their coats, make sure their hooves are trimmed, because I don’t want them to grow too long and be misshapen and have them experience hoof raw. Make sure that that sheep over there, who’s separating himself from everybody else is okay. Go check his eyelids. Make sure that he is not anemic. Make sure he is not having a hard time with parasites or. Any other ailment that maybe you need to call the vet on or right now it is heavy on my mind to separate my sheep. I need to spend one day, not today, because it might rain later, but I need to separate them. The use that are going to be bred this year from the lambs, the lambs. From the older generation, then the used will go into a special place where they’ll get ready for a breeding season, because I have my Rams ready for that, and getting my Rams ready means making sure their nutrition is right and mm-hmm.
you know, it’s just like, I don’t know. You’re the principal at the school and you care about every student, you know? Yes. And all that goes with it. You have meetings with the big wigs, and you have you know, and you have to talk to a little Johnny who might be having a bad day. It’s a very varied day, but when I wake up in the morning, I start with two cups of espresso,
Sharri Harmel: So do I accept I don’t do anything comparable to what you are accomplishing in a day.
Tamara White: Trust me. Well, while I’m drinking my espresso, I’m generally twisting yarn. So the yarn that I’ve died, yes. I was drying it overnight. And so now I’m gonna twist it, it needs to be tagged, so I’m kind of in charge of all that product as well things like that. My indoor chores, I need to clean my house more, but I never do that enough. But at the end of the day, I am good and tired. I, I like to. Spend, like if I can spend the whole day outside, I feel a hundred times better than when I have to pour over the computer and such.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. Do you sell most of your yarn or do you sell online? Because I saw you can purchase your yarn online, but do you sell it also to other as a supplier?
Tamara White: So two of yarn shops have, I have, there’s like one shop in Vermont that, it’s called Ma Love Yarn, and they sell our yarn in their shop and they’re a special yarn shop in that they have like a whole section devoted to farms and farm yarns. And that’s really nice. And then I have sold my yarn in small shops around the country, but generally because every batch, every colorway, every dialogue is quite unique cuz it’s all small batch. It’s easiest for me to sell from my own platform to sell online. Or, I have an Airbnb here. And when folks come to visit, they wanna see yarn sometimes, or some people will just look me up and say, can I come by? I don’t have a shop per se. And I would love to be able to have one going forward and maybe next. I’m trying to do that just so that I don’t have to drag people into my kitchen and my house. You know, there’s sink full of dishes or laundry or whatnot, and I don’t necessarily want everyone to have to see all that. People don’t seem to care. They seem charmed by my messy house. So especially in the fall, going through winter. That is when I would be most active vending, because that’s when most people who are buying wool are thinking of buying wool. It’s, you know, in the colder months. So I’m like, just finished an event in New York. Called the New York State Sheep and Wolf Festival, and there were 55,000 people in attendance. And so that’s a lot of knitters. And so I was out straight that weekend. It was great. Um, wow. And then the weekend before that was the Vermont Sheep and Wolf Festival and like all of these sheep and wolf festivals or like there’s one in Springfield, Massachusetts. in two weeks that I’m getting ready for right now. And so I will spend the weekend standing in my booth and meeting people in person. And it’s really lovely. It takes a lot of energy to be on that circuit and I have to find coverage on the farm while I’m away. Right. But it’s so important because then I can meet people and they can touch the yarn in person, they can see the colors and appreciate them in person. And we can talk about things like a lot of people. I love the customers that we have. They’re all like very special to me. They have some really beautiful stories to share and that for me is an important part of what I do. I’m with sheep all of the time. I’m with animals and I really appreciate that. But I love listening to people’s stories.
Sharri Harmel: That’s really special though, Tammy, cuz you’re really both doing an event. and selling takes a certain amount of extroversion, so to speak. You know, cuz you’re connecting with people where being with animals is much quieter in many ways. You know, they talk to you but in a different way, So it’s really amazing. Have you seen a resurgence or maybe a surge in the hand arts or knitting and yarn? And do people care where the yarn comes from more than they did five years? What’s going on?
Tamara White: I think that’s a great question. I, obviously, during the pandemic, there was a great resurgence in homesteading and in the making world, and a lot of folks that thought they might want to knit took it up or started knitting again, or crocheting or weaving, immersing themselves in fiber arts and other arts watercolors and reading more books and things like that. So that was definitely helpful for what I do. And then I took it virtually as well because we all got very comfortable with Zoom. And then they started taking all of these in-person events that I had been a part of and having virtual formats. And I would make a mockup shop, or I would host lots of event virtually. So there was a good way to reach people who couldn’t necessarily travel, and they could discover what you were doing. And then since the pandemic, it seems like people are still staying passionate about making, wishing they had more time for it. So they’re not ready to slow down yet. And definitely in the past 10 years, a strong increase in my farms outreach. But part of that is that I have been constant. Promoting and educating from my farm. So I think when you’re a small business and you know, your livelihood depends on what you do. There’s no rest for the wicked, so to speak. So I’m constantly investing in sharing, but I like to, I, you know, I was a home educator with my children for 10 years and I believe in what I’m doing. So it’s sort of easy to share when you love what you’re doing, and I’m a talker.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. Which is great. You talk about that a little bit on your website about sustainability and it’s good for the climate and that we have animals that are creating the yarn or the wool that is needed for someone to make sweaters versus going and buying something that, who knows where it was created, or if it’s even natural fibers.
There’s a whole, how do I wanna say, almost advocacy, climate advocacy behind. Some of your conversations. Is that true? Am I reading it correctly?
Tamara White: Yeah, I can spin on that for a long time because I believe in everybody being accountable for the climate like, I think that most people cannot be farming in their backyard and raising their own fibers or dying their own things naturally or whatnot, but you can support a small farm that does that, or a small business that does and instead of waiting for the government or for big corporations to make those decisions to care about the environment, we can do it. So I feel like it’s up to us and it’s easy to make sustainable choices. So change your spending habits or reuse things or reduce what you’re doing. You know, the fashion industry is fun because it’s so connected to art and a lot of us love fashion. But if we think about how the fashion industry is all about money and they don’t really care about the environment, then It’s not to say don’t indulge in your whims but do think more carefully each and every day about reducing your carbon footprint. And maybe you’re not going to spend money on, you know, a throwaway wardrobe. Maybe you’re going to swap with your friends and, and thrift and things like that, or you know, I feel like I care so much about the animals and I care so much, especially when my children were little and I was teaching. I just really want them to have a full life, and I want the next generation to have a full life. I don’t want us to ruin that. And so, it’s always on my mind about how to make the earth a little bit greener. And then the animals are just so amazing at how they work at this without expecting a thing. I like to talk about it because it breaks it down how simple it is that. Small animals with small hooves go around, and so they’re not breaking up the sod in a harmful way. And so they have very tender footsteps, which is like akin to like aerating the soil. If you were paying a landscaper to poke holes, you know, the little sheep and goats’ whatnot, they have already that built into their bodies. And then they’re consuming as they consume. They’re like nibbling with their teeth to get like the tips of the grass. They don’t nibble it down to nubbins. And that s. Each grass to grow, you know, a better root system. And that’s what helps draw down carbon from the atmosphere is greener. So in the way that the sheep are grazing just so simply for themselves, for their energy, they’re helping to green up the earth, and then there, they are fertilizing as they go, so no need for chemicals. And it’s like little, tiny pellet forms, so it’s not squashing and killing the grass. It’s like, the perfect size. So sheep are kind of the perfect landscapers. I jokingly call, and then on top of it, cleaning up the earth. And then they grow this fiber annually. Like you can shear some of them twice a year, but like the wool that they grow can be used for so many products. And it’s all 100% natural. We didn’t harm anything in the making. And so there are problems with inhumane handling of animals. Obviously wherever, you know, you talk about an animal product, there are, there are those associations, but that would not be the case on my farm, especially because every single animal here has a name. I know them all. and most of the small farms that I know, I mean, I can’t even say most all of the small farms I know we are 100% humanely invested in our flock. As with anything, there are bad apples. Yeah, I could talk about that for a lengthy amount of time because I think it’s sort of magical and beautiful that we have this amongst us and it’s as old as time, but it. Climate change for us to think about it and appreciate it, whereas generations before us, they just knew that it was.
Sharri Harmel: It’s a gift. It’s a gift that we often don’t even acknowledge, and especially if you live in a city and you don’t live. Vermont’s one of the most beautiful states, I think in the United States.
I’ve spent time both on your side as well as the other side of the mountains. I like in Warren, Vermont, different mountains.
Tamara White: Yeah, I’m in the southwestern part in Warrens up near like ski areas, mad River, Glen and Stow
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. Beautiful state. But if you live in a city, you know, you live in Boston, you live in New York, you live in LA or whatever, you don’t get to see those gifts on a daily basis. And so sometimes we can lose track of what nature naturally gives us and naturally makes happen without asking for really a whole lot of in. Not much. Maybe some love a name and food but go to the fashion because I thought it was absolutely so interesting. As you can see, I printed it off the dress that woman had on at the Met Gala. Was it a crochet dress?
Tamara White: It was knitted and there were actually four or five farms of wool that were produced. Our farm was one of them that went into that dress. The knitter, Catia Mian. A graduate from Parson School of Design and Kaia was a Woolmark scholar while she was enrolled as a student. She’s been out for like three years now, I think. So she’s young. She knit the dress for the c e o of the Met Gala’s wife three years in a row. So Sandra Jarvis Weiss chooses to wear a wool knitted dress to the Met Gala each here. Her husband is the CEO and Kaia always designs and knits. And that is in all of our, as soon as I saw that picture, I like knew my wool. I said, oh my God, that I said, that looks like our yarn. And I sent a note to Kaia, and she said, yeah, that’s it. And so I, I kind of know my babies, you know, but yeah, yeah, she used all of our naturally dyed yarns to embellish. So everywhere you see like a special FL Flowers Embellishment. That’s all from our farm and it’s pretty amazing to see something that I made in my backyard here. Yeah. At the MET Gala. Like that’s just wild. And I, I think most of the outfits at the Met Gala are. Incredible. And not in a way that I would wear them incredible. Like I wouldn’t have thought of that. But you know, it’s cool that they’re celebrating fashion. I think that’s fun, and I could see how they got there. I, I don’t quite know, like, I mean, it’s not something that I. My life is so completely different. So it’s just a, it’s a phase, right?
Sharri Harmel: If we had an event, we would wear that dress. I think that dress would look beautiful on a woman 30 years old and a woman 80 years old, it’s absolutely gorgeous. So everyone, you have to look at it. It’s under wing and a prayer farm Instagram, it’s just beautiful. But wasn’t there something else recently that I remember seeing them. coming down the sides of the building. What was that?
Tamara White: So all of these amazing opportunities have come my way, which. I am still sort of flabbergasted about, but, and he just wouldn’t put them together with a, a shape farmer or a natural dire in Vermont. But this spring I was commissioned to create dye the wool for the Guggenheim for an artist from Chile who likes to use wool as media in her performance art. And so I had to die in a particular color way. These 54-foot-long pieces of wool that were like anywhere from 20 to 42 inches wide that we’re going to be cascaded down into the rotunda from the fifth story. And that was what you saw in that image was it was all part of her performance. Her name Cecilia Vaya, and she’s now, right now she’s at the Tate in London and she has a, an exhibit in Venice and she has one at MoMA and she’s just 75-year-old artist who’s been very, very active politically and environmentally, you know, with her. She wanted something that would be able to be used in this special performance where it was going to end up in the sea, and so that’s how they connected her with me because all of the wool is organic, so it’s biodegradable. Everything here. as well as I die naturally. So she knew that it wasn’t going to harm. So when it was released as an offering, then it would be safe. And so again, I am a producer, but I was invited to participate and to be a part of the event. And so for the first time in my life I went to the Guggenheim, and I was there as a participant in this performance art in front of, you know, thousands. And then at a certain point we then, all of this wool that I had died a mile down the streets of New York City. You know, it was a giant parade of all of this wool from my farm that I had died. And then we got onto a ferry, and we went out way past the financial district, like way past the Statue of Liberty, out to where the start and then it was released as part of this offering. So this was all the artist construct and ideas, and it was very magical. It wasn’t like initially when I learned about what was gonna happen with the wool you know, being a practical person can really wrap my head around it. But I definitely appreciate the artist’s vision and the work she does. Also, her energy that she’s a very special. So I also appreciated that she thought about the materials she uses. So it was a great fit, and just who knew, right? Yeah. Just never know what kind of opportunity is going to come your way. You just do what you do.
Sharri Harmel: I love that. But there’s a part of you that seems to really stay true to what you’re passionate You have an internal compass or meter or whatever you wanna say that helps you to stay on track with what it is that’s important to you. Would you say that’s true?
Tamara White: Yes. It’s easy to do everything when you have that focus, and I am so grateful for it all of the time because I’m a creative person too. And I could see me going this way in that way, and., but I’m very centered around, I guess, my mission, which is to do my best to care for those who depend on me and that means my flock, my family my friends and that guides my actions generally.
Sharri Harmel: Do you sometimes have to say no?
Tamara White: I do, and I don’t say no as often as I probably should, and I blame that on feeling younger than I am. I often, like of course, you know, I never think, no, I can’t do that. I always think of, yes, I can. So most of the time I’m really happy that I said yes. Sometimes I reflect and say I should have said no to that. But you know, you live and learn.
Sharri Harmel: But that internal compass also I’m imagining keeps you on track in terms of not just time, but does this fit with what it is that I want to be doing and, and what I’m all about? I would imagine.
Tamara White: Yes. And Sharri that makes me think of somebody who approached me, who wanted me to dye the yarn for them, for their knitwear line. And she’s a pretty, she is a pretty prestigious person, but her fashion and mind didn’t line up at all. And it would’ve been like a huge job for me. It would’ve been great, but I, you know, I realize now that I didn’t say yes to that. I would’ve been a poser if I took that work, right? I would’ve taken it so that I could have had that feather in my calf. But I knew like it’s just me. I can’t make promises to things that I don’t have the heart for because it requires too much work, even with the heart for it, you know? That does monitor how I decide on things as well.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. That’s quotable line. You don’t have the energy for the things that you don’t have the heart. Because those that you do, that you feel passionate about, that you have your heart engaged, they take a lot of energy, sometimes, so therefore, thank you. Yeah. Say no when your heart’s not in it.
Tamara White: Exactly. So yeah, I joke around that I have a lot of energy for the things that I love. But yeah, the second that you’re not invested in something, that’s a, that’s a big red flag. That doesn’t happen very much.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah, I love that. Well, that you keep it front and center. That’s a credit to you. Actually. Yes. That’s another gift. Right? So where is the farm going? Where’s the business going? As you see yourself, you know, the next five to 10 years, what? What do you want to do more of? What do you want to do less of?
Tamara White: those are such good questions. When I started, I had sort of a 20-year plan, and I would say that was in 2010 and I have shifted and moved that plan quite a few times because I’ve done things that I hadn’t anticipated I would do. There have been some changes of late, I’ve been thinking about that, and it seems like I need to be in my business for, you know, I, I don’t think I can retire, so to speak, for at least another 10 or 15 years. And also, I’m always going to love animals. I’m always going to love sheep, so as long as I’m keeping sheep, I will want to have them as producers. I think it’s the farmer in me that everything has a job, right? So I’m not ready to lead a simple life with no animal. So I’m thinking that in order to keep going, I need to simplify certain aspects of my business, which is like, the yarn shop right now is, it’s not very well organized. And so next year I’m hoping to invest in, like, rebuild some of the existing structures on my farm to accommodate a really lovely space that can be where I’m shipping and where it’s a store you could walk in. And where my die studio is, because right now I’m in the backyard and the weather is severe in the winter. It’s rough back here while I’m dying. taking an old garage and refitting it for that. And I think that that will really help me in many ways.
Sharri Harmel: Your customers will love that too.
Tamara White: I think so. And everybody likes the idea of like, I have a Patreon account in all me. Last night I had a zoom with them, and they were saying, oh, we should have, you know, we are meaning the wing and a prayer farm. Should have a, a fundraiser so you could buy a brick and a patio, and we could come and sit and have a piece of pie after shopping. They’ve already built my store up, so I love this. I love that. Yeah. But I also know that physically I have a lot of back pain from lifting, like the bales of hay are at least 50 pounds. Oh yeah. That kind of repetitive work is breaking me down. So trying to find a good farm helper or two. Going forward is going to be necessary. I’ve always wanted to write, and I really, really mean to get there. Each year passes and I didn’t do it, you know, so, I know that there’s a book or two going forward and it might even, I might have to give myself permission that they’re children’s books. I’ve kind of wanted to hold back on that because I am crazy about kids and whimsy and beauty and color and all those things, and I have so many stories, so I would love to., like I would love to go down that road. It would be easy for me, but I just haven’t taken the time because part of me says, oh no, you need to write a book about natural dying first. You need to write a book about, like a memoir about farming first, right before you can write children’s books. But maybe I’m going to just do what I want to, which is write children’s books. And that for me would be a fun thing. And then the last thing that I feel very passionate about and want to try to incorporate, and build is some sort of farm-based education. I would love to be able to be a place where you could come in groups to learn about agriculture, or there could be foraging walks, there could be dye workshops. There could be an artist in resident that school groups could come and learn about fiber art and learn about the environment. So one day I think it would be very beautiful to have my farm be a resource for farm-based education because I think that. in the world, we can, uh, really help children by helping them understand agriculture and how, what its places in the world. And so the more farms can contribute to that, the more real it will be. That’s also one of my, Going forward plan.
Sharri Harmel: Yeah. I absolutely love your plan and I think it’s so cool that you’ve looked at what matters to you, what you truly love, and how do I incorporate those, whether it’s the animals, the children’s education, the writing, a children’s book, and isn’t it interesting that we think we have to write something serious, non-fiction, even education heavy when some of the greatest books that we learn from our children which is interesting. But tell us, you said something that I did not know, but you said you have a Patreon account, and so tell us about this and what happens when you become a Patreon supporter.
Tamara White: Thank you. I don’t mean to forget it when I mention it. I don’t like to be like a walking advertisement for my business, but I always feel like I kind of am when I start talking about those enterprises because that’s a platform. which I’m really grateful to that exists, that I can write, and I can share. I have all these different tiers for subscribers. Okay. And so it’s an online subscription and every month you would renew it, or I guess they have a yearly and annual way to contribute as well. I will share and yeah, I write from my heart. So you get more than you would get from anything from social media. Mm-hmm. and I tell them all the backs, stories of what’s going on around here. Every animal has a story and people get very invested in them. But also the things that I’m working on like all of the Patreons knew about this Guggenheim project well in advance because they went along the steps with me. I showed them as I was dying and all of the things, the funny things that happened before I got to the Guggenheim, and they will get also like promotional codes sometimes or I’ll let them in. We just made these really gorgeous blankets with our valet black nose sheep’s wool, which is a very unique rare breed that’s now in the United States was the first farm in Vermont to have them in. So that’s been another project, which is a very cool sort of science and agriculture adventure. But we wove the wool from these beautiful sheets that I own into blankets with that are felted to be like a camp style blanket with a hand rolled finish. And they have like 22 warp threads in them that are dyed separately. I dyed them with walnuts and alette roots. Sort of be a dark kind of charcoal color against the cream background and their representative of my 22 years of farming and I put it out to the Patreon folks. I only had so many of these blankets and like they, they all bought them within an hour, you know, that I announced. And so I never had them for the general public to purchase. But there is a wait list, you know, so people that didn’t get one buy one for next year, cuz there will be more next year and there will be more of them next year because the sheep population has grown since this. So I like to sit with my Patreon subscribers also, like once a month at least. We sit with a Zoom, and we chat, and last night was just hilarious because I positioned my camera so that they could watch me bring in the flocks and they got a little taste of the mini donkeys, having the zoomies and taking off. And you know, it was really like your part of our family when you’re a Patreon subscriber, if you want to be. But then there are lovely folk who just like, sort of is in the background and they just wanna support them. and the work that we do.
Sharri Harmel: but that’s important. I think it just sounds wonderful actually. Very fun, interesting, and like you said, a way to feel connected and it might be your way, a person’s way who’s sitting like, here I am in Paris, France, my way to contribute even though I can’t have a sheep on my balcony, so to speak, so that wouldn’t work. Very well, very fun. So all that information is going to show up in the show notes, and I will certainly mention it again later on in the social media posts related to our podcast today. So anything else that you’d like to share? Just so everyone knows, Tammy’s sitting on a deck, I believe, and in the background is the farm. And if you hear little animal sounds, I’m assuming those are some of your families, so to speak out. It’s just gorgeous.,
Tamara White: thank you. Lots of poultry, lots of bird song in the background. Mm-hmm., a little bit of dog barking. We have a lot of dogs. I think that you hit upon everything. One thing that is a great way to keep up with the farm is to subscribe to our newsletters because sometimes we all miss out on social media posts and et cetera. And I usually use my newsletter as a once a month or more. Update that says where I’m gonna be. Cause maybe I’m gonna be in your area and you could come and say hi. I have a lot of events coming up over the next several months, so I post them in the newsletter as well as new products, and I just like to share education. So my newsletters might be a bit of a read because I don’t want it too just be. On sale now, or you know like it’s just not promotion. It, it’s different because it’s a farm. So I’m gonna share something about the farm and there’s a popup on my website where people can fill it out and then they’ll be on the newsletter list.
Sharri Harmel: That sounds fabulous. Well thank you Tammy, so much for talking with us today, cuz I know you’re busy. 70 sheep in the background. I think your kind of a busy lady, so I very much appreciate you being with us today. And everyone you have to go check out wing in a prayer. Thank you, Tammy. Appreciate your time. Thank you. Well, wasn’t that interesting? Tammy has so many wonderful gifts. I loved hearing how our creativity and collaborative nature just created magic. Those yarns from a little farm in Vermont ended up in a gorgeous dress worn at the Met Gala and became part of an artist, you know, whole collaboration at the Guggenheim Museum. Amazing. As Tammy says, small can be, might. Well, after the recording ended, Tammy and I talked about how the stories of women of a certain age need to be elevated because if we don’t already have a passion project, women of our age want to start one. And not very many people talk about that. But ladies, that is exactly the mission of the extraordinary women. Now a subscription is free, so don’t hesitate. Just go to extraordinary women magazine.com and subscribe now. All of Wing and a prayer farm’s information is below in the show notes. Her name is Tammy White, but the farm is called Wing and a prayer farm, and that’s where you will find her on Instagram as well as on her website. So sign up for her newsletter. Tammy’s newsletter sounds like an incredible piece of information that you’d get every single month and think about becoming a patriot. If you share in Tammy’s passion for animals and the environment. Well, I thank you again for joining us today and I look forward to our next Extraordinary Women podcast.
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