I am always working on the blog, always pondering what to do with my photos. The latest:

We met with Brad Eastman yesterday at A&M printers in Cambridge, Maria is interesting in selling some of my photos and using some to revive the notecard idea. My notecards have been selling steadily, but we have not made any new ones for awhile. I don’t want to be in the photo or stationary business, I’m not interested in selling photos for a living or making calendars or selling my work at shows, on Etsy or the other photo-sharing sites, I make my living writing and through subscriptions to the blog., and that’s enough for me to focus on most of the time.

My photos have always been free for people to use as bookmarks or screensavers or whatever and they will stay that way, I don’t need to bookmark them or protect my copyright. If people wish to compensate me for them, they can subscribe to the blog. People sometimes ask me about buying my photos, and I have sold quite a few, so I think it is a good idea to sell a small number of them from time to time, providing we can do it cheaply. That means selling them without frames, on good but not fancy archival paper and for $75 or less, mostly as smaller prints.

The problem has been the cost of printing and matting and shipping. We won’t offer junk so the prints have to be first-rate and the price low, Brad is printing some of my images to show me the kind of work he does, and offering some estimates.  Maria wants to sell a cat notecard series as the next one – Flo and Minnie, maybe some chickens. That would be fun, then later Red and the donkeys, maybe the sheep as well. I suspect the Spring lambs will make a great notecard package.

Maria has a good heart for art and business, and she has a good bead on how to offer these things and what will sell, i am happy to leave that to her.

We are trying to figure out if A&M can help us do this inexpensively and well, we will be in touch about it. Maria plans to put the images for sale on a gallery page on her website, people can see them and order them easily enough, we can print to demand.

In addition, I met recently with Chris Archibee at Mannix Marketing about helping newcomers to the blog figure out what is happening here at Bedlam Farm. New people come all the time and wonder where the original Bedlam Farm went, and what happened to Rose, Izzy and Elvis, among others. So we are  going to have a video shot here which updates things on the farm – when we moved, what animals are here, which ones are no longer with us, and show the barns, donkeys, dogs and Maria’s studio. I think this is a good way to help people get oriented, things change around here, and often.

Many people ask about the farm on Facebook, but I don’t wish to be on Facebook all day updating my life to good people who are curious, so the video will hopefully be entertaining for those who are already here and those who are coming. Sort of a “Welcome To Bedlam Farm” thing, we will get Simon braying and Frieda barking and Red strutting around the pasture. I’ll do some talking, maybe we will include some video of this great down – Connie’s store, the Round House Cafe, the food Co-Op.

So those are two things in the works – selling a limited number of photos inexpensively, and some notecards as well, creating a video to bring people up to speed on the ever-evolving wonder that is Bedlam Farm. Just wanting to keep you posted.