Merino Sheep and Fine Wool products
Animal Companions Working With Us To Steward The Land and Co-Create Our High-Vibrational Knitwear Line
“We believe in the hidden energies of the sun and the earth that power life in its constant ascension and evolution. Our sheep gather all of this celestial light through living grass and alchemize the earthly energy the elementals provide to imbue the wool with high-vibrational frequencies.”
Explore below:
· How and why we chose to raise Sheep
· Knitwear Design
· High Vibrational Stewardship Practices
How and why we chose to raise Sheep
When we first moved to the farm Anne was adamant about one thing. We would not get animals. Now, this probably stemmed from some sort of innate wisdom that once you have animals on the land, you are bound to it and it becomes very hard to leave.
Over time we both watched the land, listened to what it was trying to do, observed animals such as deer, bear, turtles, snakes and many other creatures moving across it, all while spending an extraordinary amount of time mowing it. Even mowing just once per year was a huge effort, costly in gas, destructive to habitat and the noise and vibrations produced are those we ultimately don’t resonate with.
At the same time we would talk about potential and Anne’s innate gift for creativity. Everything she touches turns out beautiful, from websites, paintings, graphic designs and other editing it has been a tremendous boon for our branding and business to have such a talent dedicated to the vision and mission. She had learned and cultivated new skills to deploy her creativity but David had seen what she created while studying knitwear in Milan, Florence and New York City and knew that was a missing piece to the blossoming story at The Farm at Catawissa Creek.
During these conversations David was learning too. He picked her brain about wool types, would ask questions about processing the raw product and how difficult each type of fibre was to handle. He asked what her dream fibres were to work with so that when the opportunity came, he knew what to look for and the realities of dealing with them.
We had moved to the farm officially in August of 2020, and got our starter flock of American Merino Sheep in November of 2023. It took 3 years of learning the land, constant dialogue and developing a common vision to finally drop out of the fear, uncertainty and doubt distortions that were holding us back from this amazing relationship. This leap of faith to bring on animal companions to help steward the land and co create our soil based products has been more rewarding than we could ever have imagined.
Knitwear Design
“Beyond the inner war one faces, there is a state of peace, a higher state of mind epitomized by the sacred feminine, she is an archetype from the ancient world, the supreme protector, fearless, filled with compassion for all beings and there is a part of her in all of us” -Anne, 2012
This project was started over a decade ago, inspired by the reverence of the divine feminine by the ancient Greek and Roman sculptors. Anne wanted to create knitwear designs that mimicked the texture and draping in the sculptures through different patterns of ribs but also retained the reverence for the divine.
Anne’s creations inspired David to find and raise a fine wool breed, so that all future creations are of the highest possible vibration. Imbued with love and light at every step—from stewardship of the soil and animals, to hand shearing and processing fleeces into yarn, to knitting and dyeing—these garments will be truly unique and one of a kind, resonating with the cosmic throws of divine harmony.
High Vibrational Stewardship Practices
“We believe in the hidden energies of the sun and the earth that power life in its constant ascension and evolution. Our sheep gather all of this celestial light through living grass and alchemize the earthly energy the elementals provide to imbue the wool with high-vibrational frequencies.”
The most unique thing about our sheep is that they have never been indoors since they arrived on our property. This includes lambing season as we aim not to intervene in any birthing event unless absolutely necessary. We have had successful lambing seasons since we began and have never had to intervene and we strongly believe this is because the sheep are not stressed by unnatural conditions.
Our methods are in complete contrast to basically every piece of modern advice for raising sheep. Now, there are many reasons why we do this and basically a singular reason why you would elect to keep sheep in a barn for the majority of their life.
The only reason why you keep your wool sheep in a barn is that you get a clean, easy to shear fleece as an end product. This is the modern world of farming where you turn inputs into outputs in the most efficient way you can contrive.
Now, why would we elect to go against the grain when raising a fine wool breed if we care about transforming the wool into something beautiful and usable? Well it starts with the belief that animals manage the land better than we do, and in order to manage effectively they need to move across the land rapidly just like their wild counterparts do such as deer. This is the primary reason why we move them every few days. The sheep select diverse forage, eat the best and trample the rest which puts additional carbon into the soil alongside their own poop which fertilizes the ground and cycles nutrients in a natural way.
There are very practical health and safety reasons as to why we move them so rapidly as well. Sheep eat a lot and process it very quickly. They poop a lot and like to lay down right after they go to the bathroom. If you keep them in a barn you can imagine how quickly this would get unsanitary. If you feed them in the same spot in your barn yard everyday you end up with a giant mud pit full of pee and poop.
This is especially problematic because sheep are very susceptible to hoof problems that can quickly leave them lame or dead. These issues almost entirely come from the situations above where they are eating and drinking in the same spot every day and mud packed with urine and poop is getting lodged into their hooves. This leads to constant deworming practices, chemical drenching, and other modern pharmacological solutions to keep production running.
Of equal importance is our belief in the hidden energies of the sun and the earth that power life in its constant ascension and evolution. Our sheep gather all of this celestial light through living grass and alchemize the earthly energy the elementals provide to imbue the wool with high-vibrational frequencies.
This is just something you cannot achieve by keeping them in the barn, eating dry or dead forage in a mud pit of excrement even if it means it is harder to shear because the wool gets matted near the legs and belly of the animals.
We love our sheep, not only do they gather the celestial and earthly energy but are imbued with energy from our loving hands as well. We spend time everyday with them, building relationships, cuddling and just hanging out. We also handle them and shear them ourselves as a team- the old fashion way with shearing scissors.
This is a long term project and we will continually update our progress on this venture as we gather more equipment, grow our flock and turn wool into yarn. This year has been a fruitful step in the process: We have learned to shear the sheep ourselves using hand shears. Coming up we will learn washing, carding/combing, and spinning the wool into yarn.
For more sheep and fashion updates, join our email and follow us on Instagram. If you are interested in purchasing lambs, email us at catawissafarm@gmail.com
Discover more about the Farm
-
Spiritual Stewards
We consider ourselves spiritual stewards diffusing celestial light into soil based products and high-vibrational services/events
-
The Herbs
Where soil and light are made one: Our process deriving whole herb extracts
-
Frequency Healing and Bodywork
Thai bodywork with Tibetan singing bowl sound bath immersions. Private sessions, couples and group workshops
