Northeast Kingdom Balsam

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S ince 1977 our family, with a lot of help from friends and neighbors, has been running a Christmas wreath business from our farm in West Glover. We are Peggy and Dennis Gibson, along with our three daughters Leanne, Meg and Liz. We live in the northeast corner of Vermont in an area known as the Northeast Kingdom, a highland of rolling green pastures and mixed hard and softwood forests. It is a good place, with strong independent people and tight communities. We especially love our neighborhood in our back valley. E very October when wreath season rolls around, we begin to assemble a crew on the farm to work in our shop making wreaths and garlands. We also hire lots of people to make wreaths at home, in this traditional Vermont cottage industry. In November, after the cold weather sets in, seasonal brush cutters look for stands of wreath-quality balsam fir. Pickup trucks loaded with balsam brush pull into our dooryard, and we buy the boughs that will move through our shop to be arranged into wreaths and garlands for our customers all over the country. A round Thanksgiving, the action becomes non-stop. The wreaths that we have so carefully collected all season move out at a lightning pace. We struggle to keep up, do whatever it takes to stay on schedule, and then it's over. Wreath season is like an orchestra adding instruments and building to a crescendo. Then all is quiet, and it's Christmas. After that we look forward to the silent white snow, and reading and skiing the winter away.