Poppet gets more gifts

Poppet was always excited when she received gifts. She tried her best to be a good friend and neighbour sending gifts back in return. She did wish that Mr Developer would find a way of attaching a return label to the gift so that she didn’t have to remember who had sent what. Often when she was busy she just opened everything without thinking, five minutes later, she couldn’t remember who they were from.

Gifts, was the title of another one of Poppet’s lists. Every day she would make a long list of everyone who had sent her a present. Later, when she had finished the day’s harvesting, she worked through the list and send gifts in return. Recently this daily task had begun to take a long time, the more neighbours that she had the longer and more challenging the task became.

Despite the fact that the Mayor encourages his farmers to take a break from farming and send gifts to friends a number of times each day, farmers actually have a ‘gift limit’ imposed upon them, around twenty each day. When Poppet only had a handful of friends this ‘gift limit’ was fine but now she has oodles of friends and neighbours.

She began to have discussions with herself about who she could send gifts to and who she should leave out, how they would feel, would they think she was a bad neighbour? These rhetorical ponderings caused our little farmer to lose sleep, until one particular morning in the shower; Poppet always had her best ideas in the shower! She came up with a plan.

Poppet changed the way that she created her gift list. She entered all the names of her Farm Town neighbours into a data base, she liked using Excel for these particular tasks, next she listed them alphabetically and finally grouped them into daily gifting sets. This didn’t solve the problem of many neighbours not receiving daily gifts; however Poppet felt that now her system was fair to everyone. She began to sleep better at night.

When the new Farm Town Charter was introduced permitting, indeed encouraging, farmers to own factories the atmosphere around the town changed. The air in the market was buzzing with conversations between neighbours discussing which, and how many, factories they were each planning to buy.

Poppet was no different. She also buzzed with a new level of excitement and indeed rushed out to buy as many factories as she could get. I said earlier that she installed a chicken coop, dairy shed, sugar refinery, dairy processing plant and pizza restaurant on Poppet’s Patch. She already owned a lovely old red windmill; there were many of them dotted across the town. Mr Developer had decided that it was high time that these windmills were upgraded and brought once again into working order.

The day came when Poppet’s factories were ready and open for business. She stood outside, jumped up and down, even clapped her hands excitedly; she couldn’t wait for the first products to roll of the production line. She thought about how much more money she would make and how she would buy even more factories as soon as others became available.

The first thing that Poppet noticed about factories was how much harvest was needed to manufacture the produce. Right from the start she ran out of everything really quickly. She had loads of chickens but the eggs that she collected every morning were gone in a flash, used in the pizza restaurant. It was the same thing with the cow’s milk. The cow meadow was crammed to bursting but even though the cows were milked twice each day there was never enough. She couldn’t produce enough cheese or mill enough flour either no matter how many fields of wheat she planted. She had to plant and harvest other things too, strawberries, blueberries, onions, mushrooms more, more and more.

As the list was growing her farms appeared to be shrinking!

She would be busy working out in the fields overseeing harvesting when one of the factory foremen would come trudging across the fields, a red clipboard tucked under his arm. As soon as she noticed the flash of red she would sigh audibly. We need more they would say, MUCH MORE!

Every day, sometimes all day Poppet asked her neighbours for more gifts. She didn’t feel too badly asking because when she saw a message on the market notice board that a friend needed something she sent the item off immediately. She even sent things to farmers that she didn’t know in the hope that they would return the favour.

WHEN

Mr Developer increased the number of factories for sale and also encouraged farmers to earn more by helping each other out with production. Poppet didn’t really think things through; she just wanted more factories and she wanted her friends and neighbours to come and work in them too. She got everything that was on offer. She spent hours deciding on their location, landscaping the surrounding farmland and planning what to grow. As I said she invited friends to come and work at the end of each day.

When I first met Poppet I quickly realised just how much she needed my help. I informed her that there were stages to achieving more and that she wouldn’t be able to solve all her problems over night. She must be patient but that by the end of my visits she would have as much as it was possible for a Farm Town farmer to get.

This is the part that you really need to read if you don’t yet know how to increase your daily gifts!

The first thing that I advised her to do was to visit some stores that friends of mine owned. These stores were different from any other that she would ever find because they had a truly magical quality about them. Here she could get all of the gifts that were available in Farm Town, not once, not twice, not even three times but over and over again every day. That wasn’t all the good news. At these stores there wasn’t any limit to the amount of the gifts that she could receive, she could take what she wanted and always know that she could return the very next day for more. There was just one thing that the storekeepers asked in return.

NO don’t fret it wasn’t money or anything like that.

What they needed were copies of new gifts, which were then magically duplicated ready for passing on to other farmers. All Poppet had to do, before using a gift, was to take a copy and post this to the store. Simple!

The second thing that I advised her to do was to put another advertisement into the Farm Town News asking for a Manager. She told me that she had already realised that she would never be able to run all the farms, the new factories, restaurants and shops without more help. She decided to put the advertisement in the next day.

Poppet liked to make quick decisions, relying upon her instinct, and just three days later she was shaking hands with a lovely man, Mr Billmore. She liked him instantly he had an air of confidence coupled with a good sense of humour which she believe could be a winning combination when dealing with the public and her for that matter.

The next morning Poppet found Mr Billmore, along with the other factory managers, in the store organising the recent harvest. He informed Poppet which crops she needed to sow and harvest and those that she should acquire from the stores that she had told him about. He went on to say that it was pointless, no matter of the monetary value; to grow what she now knew was freely available.

Poppet liked to make quick decisions, relying upon her instinct, and just three days later she was shaking hands with a lovely man, Mr Billmore. She liked him instantly he had an air of confidence coupled with a good sense of humour which she believe could be a winning combination when dealing with the public and her for that matter.

The next morning, found our little farmer happy. The sun was shining, birds singing her gift box was full to bursting, what a lovely day. Poppet skipped from her house smiling, singing to herself as usual. She stopped suddenly.

Mr Billmore and many of the other managers were waiting for her outside in a little group. She could overhear mumblings and realised very quickly that the faces of those around her were not smiling or happy.

We need more harvest. MORE of everything they shouted in unison.

Poppet Realises That She Needs More

Like most communities Farm Town has a hierarchy. Farmers are ranked by their level of experience (XP), when they first arrive they are considered as ‘Getting Started/ Just Moved In’ (level 1) right the way to the most experienced farmers who earn the title of ‘Industry Leader’ (level 115).

It was Poppet’s good friend Lacey who first told her about Farm Town. Lacey herself had been living there for a little while and owned a farm he used to tell Poppet, all the time, about which crops she was planting, the animals that she owned and the house that she was living in. Farming Life sounded so exciting.

One day, not long after, a neighbour invitation arrived from Lacey. Poppet had grown a little tired of her life in the city. Feeling that she needed a change she packed her bag and made the journey to the country.

When poppet first arrived in Farm Town she moved into a little wooden house on the edge of Poppet’s Patch. She called her farm this because it really was just a patch. A 12 X 12 patch of land which, was provided free of charge, by the Mayor of Farm Town, Mr Developer. Upon arrival farmers are also given some basic tools and a little ‘start up’ cash. When Mr Developer first established Farm Town he only permitted his farmers to own one farm, reach the level of Green Wizard (34) and buy a mansion house.

No contracts are ever signed. The Mayor doesn’t consider them necessary. Farmers are issued with a simple three-tiered challenge: the first to amass coins, required for purchasing everything needed to live and prosper; the second to gain experience points (XPs). As farmers gain experience they are able to increase the size of their farm to the maximum, 24 X 24. More experience also means that they can purchase more, more seeds, more buildings and more animals from the store; the third, to increase the size of the community by inviting their friends to become neighbours. Neighbours can send each other animals, flowers and trees as daily gifts. More neighbours mean more gifts.

With these simple challenges the Mayor perpetuated a culture of wanting more. Exploiting this desire for more cleverly ensured that his farmers remained, like the guests at ‘The Hotel California’, forever ploughing, seeding and harvesting their land, (actually his land).

I may have mentioned before that the Farm Town Market was the hub of the town. Farmers regularly came together, not just to sell produce and hire workers, but also to ask each other for help and advice. Due to the fact that Tom was in charge of running the market farmers went to him with any issues that they had. By way of ensuing the smooth running of the town Tom then passed this information on to Mr Developer.

Recently Tom had sent a message to say that there was a ‘buzz’ of disquiet amongst the residents of the town. Farmers felt constrained by the experience level that could be achieved, the size of their farms and the amount of money that they could earn. They were bored by growing the same crops over and over again and were expressing a desire for different goods to be made available at the store. They were also asking for other ways in which they could earn extra money. Some had even expressed a desire to leave.

In order for Farm Town to continue to grow and prosper Mr Developer realised that he himself needed more. He believed that it was necessary to find new and interesting ways with which to entice his farmers to stay. So he did just that. A new Farm Town Charter was produced. This new charter increased the experience level to that of Industry Leader (level 115). Farmers were offered the option of owning more farms, first two then three, four and five depending upon the experience level and the amount of neighbours that each particular farmer had. They were also permitted to own factories, to hire friends and neighbours to work in them and to sell the produce at the market. Within a week of implementing the new charter Tom was able to report back to Mr Developer that Farm Town was once again a hive of industry. The market was packed every day with farmers and their produce, there was so much stored in the warehouses now that Tom felt he needed to expand, he needed more space.

I do hope that you didn’t mind hearing something of the history of Farm town but felt that it is important to understand that Poppet was no different from any other farmer she received her little patch of land which was the same as everyone else. I could have started telling you our little farmer’s story at this beginning, but suffice to say that she ploughed, and seeded and harvested for all she was worth in those early days. I will tell you though that Poppet actually left Farm Town for a while.

Blue and Poppet met in those early days of farm Town. They quickly became firm friends and neighbours. Every day they used to meet, harvest and plough for each other. The friends chatted as they worked about what crops they would plant next and what animals they would buy. I remember Poppet telling me about a time when Blue particularly wanted a bull for her farm. A friend had one and she really wanted one too but she wasn’t experienced enough to buy the bull from the store herself. Poppet who by this time was an experienced ‘Green Wizard’ was able to purchase anything that Farm Town had to offer. The very next day she woke early rushed excitedly to the store, purchased the bull intending to send it as a gift for her friend. She thought about how thrilled Blue would be when she woke to the sound of the bull charging around her yard. Can you imagine then how upset our little farmer was when she realised that she couldn’t gift the bull to her friend, this option wasn’t yet available. To make matters worse still she had to explain to an upset Blue why it was that she too now owned a bull. Fortunately her friend could see the funny side of the tale.

I have to tell you that Blue and Poppet were amongst the disgruntled farmers who used to talk with Tom at the market. One day, after receiving a letter from an old friend asking for help Blue left to visit her friend in the nearby farming community of Farm Ville. Poppet, disgruntled as she was continued farming. She had other friends who she regularly visited but never felt quite the same after her Blue had left. So it was that some time later when she received an invitation from her friend to visit her for a holiday she accepted. In truth Poppet stayed away for some time.

The news of the recent changes taking place in Farm Town and the new charter spread throughout the farming community. It was this news, the promise of extra farms and the fact that she realised she missed the social aspect of the town that brought our farmer home once again to Poppet’s Patch.

We are very nearly up to date with our story of Poppet but I can feel you wondering how it was that she managed to go from being a green Wizard and owning just one farm, Poppet’s Patch, to becoming the proud owner of five farms and the experience level of Industry Leader.

Well the truth of the matter is that Poppet realised that she was an extremely competitive little farmer. She made it her mission to move through the experience levels as quickly as possible, doing whatever needed to be done in order to achieve this. As I began by saying the best way to become an accomplished farmer in Farm Town is to plough, plant and harvest as much as possible. She went to the market every day, worked for as many other farmers as she could for as long as she could. Poppet never ever turned a job down, except for fishing. Very quickly she earned enough to buy the second and third, farms. Next she purchased factories. At first just a few, the dairy processing plant, the sugar refinery and the windmill.

Poppet had animals on her farm from the very beginning but now they could earn their keep too. As soon as she installed the chicken coop her hens and geese began to lay eggs. The dairy shed encouraged her cows and goats to produce milk. She sent the wheat that she harvested to the mill for flour. The Pizza restaurant was next on her list of purchases because she could send the produce from her other factories to make pizzas. A short time later Poppet was able to buy her fourth and fifth farms and many other factories, she was building a little farming empire.

Poppet’s day now consisted of inviting friends to harvest her crops, trees and flowers. She then ploughed her fields and planted new crops. Took her harvest to the factories and put this into production. The last thing that she did most evenings was to invite friends to come and work in the factories. It wasn’t long before Poppet noticed that her factory production was completed with lightning speed, it was impossible to keep up. She needed to produce more harvests faster than ever before. This in turn meant more animals, more crops, more trees, more flowers and even more factories.

She suddenly realised that she was caught up in a spiral of ‘needing more’.

She put an announcement in the Farm Town News asking for help.

Did anyone know how she could get MORE?

Mr Developer was sitting at his breakfast table early that Sunday morning, eating his toast and reading the paper. He glanced down and noticed the announcement that Poppet had placed in the paper. A broad smile brightened his burley face.

And now, at last, I am going to tell you why it is that I am writing this tale of Poppet. I too was eating my toast that same Sunday morning, drinking coffee and reading the paper. I noticed the advertisement asking for help, just as Mr Developer had done. That very afternoon Poppet and I were standing outside her mansion house at Poppet’s Farm. I explained to her some of the ways in which she could have more. I remember saying that Poppet was an extremely helpful young woman; well she thanked me kindly for my help and advice and before I left asked me to share this information with you.

Poppet Harvests Her Crops

As Poppet walked along she talked to herself, working through the list of jobs that she had to do that day. She often found it easier to talk out loud, things became clearer and by the time that she returned to Poppet’s Patch she had a clear picture in her head of how she would tackle the day’s work load. She was nearing the river when the scent of pine tipped with cinnamon tickled her nostrils. Dear me! Forgotten about those. . . She thought but continued chatting away to herself happily about how, using the new Farm Town axe, she would chop the pine and cinnamon trees herself whilst her friend Sweet 1 (trees only) harvested all the others.

Friends often chatted whilst they worked on each others’ farms and this was one of Poppet’s daily pleasures. She looked forward to finding out how they were and what news they had to tell.

Farm Town reached far and wide, I did say before that it was a magical place didn’t I. Well Farm Town days weren’t like any other that you could imagine, they were twenty hours long, BUT 7am for Poppet could just as easily be 7pm for another friend and for another still it could be the middle of the afternoon. In this magical place mere moments were captured haphazardly from here, there and everywhere. Fragments of time were miraculously woven together to form the social tapestry that enveloped the town. I could stop now to discuss the many tools at Poppet’s disposal, explain how she uses them, go on and on about how valuable they are. Explaining all this would take a long time and her crops need harvesting. SO come with me and find out how she got on.

The first thing that Poppet did every morning, after she checked her farms and completed her charts of course, was to message her friend Sweet 1 (trees only) to let her know which farms she needed her help with.

Poppet was chopping her way through the hundred or so pine trees, which grew daily around the edge of farm five when she realised that the air should be heavy with more than just the scent of pine and cinnamon trees. As she looked out across the fields she realised that the flowers desperately needed watering too. Watering flowers was a chore for Poppet and she wished that the Mayor of Farm Town, Mr Developer, would find a way to water all the flowers on the farm with one single click of her little fingers. At the moment she had to use the watering can tool, this took forever; well at least it felt like it anyway!

Do you know what multi tasking is? Well Poppet does and she is an expert at it, juggling chopping, watering, messaging her friends and harvesting were things that she felt she was born to do. She was happy so sang along with Seth Lakeman whilst she waited for Sweet 1 (trees only) to arrive. The two friends often chatted for a while about what they were going to do later after the harvesting was done. When Sweet finished harvesting the trees on farm five Poppet sent her off to another farm then went again to check her buddy list. She thought she would find out if Anysortof flowes.co, who (I bet you can guess) loved to harvest flowers, and ember were around. Oh dear, no sign of them. Poppet knew that she had no choice she would have to go to the market!

The Farm Town Market was often very busy. Farmers came to sell their produce, hire workers to harvest crops, trees and flowers, plough fields, and fish for them. I haven’t talked to you about fishing yet, enough to say this is another job that Poppet feels should be done differently. I will tell you about why she added the (no fishing) to her name another time.

Farm Town farmers earn 346 FT coins when they hire workers to harvest their Aloe Vera and 288 FT coins when they harvest this crop themselves. Quite a difference so as you can clearly see it makes more sense to employ workers, also this leaves you free to do other things, usually working for other farmers! Poppet used to love working out how much more money she had made when she hired a friend to harvest for her than if she had done the job herself. Often at the end of the day instead of putting her feet up or watching television, like many of the other farmers, she would use this data to produce graphs and charts on her computer.

When you arrived at the Farm Town market Tom, who was very helpful, was always there to welcome you, find out what you needed and direct you to the correct place in the market. Poppet was rather like Tom in that she was an extremely polite and helpful young woman who always tried her very best with any job that she did. She was asked once if she could say two things about herself that she felt she needed to improve, she thought about this question for a while then simply replied that her back stroke was pants and that she had an inability to say NO. . . So that had to be improved too!

Poppet didn’t actually need to earn extra money, she had oodles of Farm Town coins she thought that she would probably need a truck if she ever had to take them all to the bank, but a farmer could always use more. Everyone around the market talked about when Mr Producer would offer the farmers yet another farm. Buying and upgrading farms was extremely expensive so Poppet harvested willingly for others when they asked her for help. There was another reason that Poppet helped everyone who asked and that was because they generally helped her in return.

Poppet knew how important it was to harvest her crops before they could spoil. The one thing that won’t ever wait in Farm Town are the crops. Another thing that she knew for sure was that harvesting, ploughing and re-seeding five farms takes time, plenty of time! Today she didn’t have time to harvest for other people, not until all her own crops were safely harvested and stored away.

She arrived at the market with her resolve firmly in place to find harvesters and under no circumstances to harvest for anyone else. Sometimes a girl could be bombarded with requests asking to harvest, plough and Oh YES FISH!

Poppet had literally just put her foot on the market green, said hi to everyone, when she received a message from farmer Louise asking her if she would harvest some crops. Without thinking she accepted. Aloe Vera, excellent, the percentage that she got for harvesting this crop would come in handy. Whilst she was working she asked Louise if she would like to harvest for her in return for her help. Poppet was a little surprised when she said that she didn’t want to but asked Poppet if she would like to harvest and plough another farm. Because she was a helpful young girl she said that she had time to do that even though in reality she didn’t! Poppet harvested and ploughed the second farm then returned home.

This time, when she checked her buddy list she noticed, thankfully, that ember was online. She sent her a message asking for help, sure that ember would come and help harvest, possibly do some flowers too. Whilst she was waiting she went to the market for the second time with the same level of resolve as before sure that she could find a harvester. Without even thinking what she was doing, she accepted an offer of work from Stacy Loo. Just as she ploughed the last plot of land she was transported to the middle of yet another farm dragging the plough square, which she hated, along with her. When a farmer hired the worker twice, once straight after the other, the plough square vanished making it possible to plough fields in half the time. Stacy Loo ignored Poppet’s plea to be hired twice even though she had agreed to do just that. Poppet also asked if she would like to harvest for her in return. There was no answer, nothing just an empty farm full of, thanks to Poppet, newly ploughed fields.

Thankfully a message from ember saying that she would love to help cheered Poppet up. The two friends chatted for a little while before our intrepid farmer returned to the market for the third time in search of harvesters.

I don’t need to tell you what happened next do I?

You will be able to work out from the images who helped our little Poppet with her harvest and who didn’t. At one point she began to feel like the ‘Little red Hen’ a story that she remembered hearing as a child. I will share with you though, that this tale does end happily. The harvest from all five farms, those that were layered and those that weren’t piled high in Poppet’s storage.

Poppet Loves Farming

Poppet lived right in the heart of a magical land called Farm Town. Some people call the place where she lives a virtual reality, which is another way of saying that it isn’t actually real, but I can tell you that Farm Town is a real place and poppet is a real girl, as real as you or I. I can tell you this because I know her well.

Poppet’s Patch is the name of her main farm; this is where she lives. You can see her house, it’s the one with the big yellow seeder parked outside on the driveway. Poppet Loves farming, so much so that she now owns five farms. Every morning she wakes early and goes out to check her livestock and crops. The very first thing that she does is to find out if her animals are ready to be harvested, she has oodles of them, cows, goats, hens, sheep and lamas. Some of the animals are free to roam and graze in the paddocks, which are dotted around the edge of her farm. Others, because she has so many, stay inside their houses. All the animals are well looked after and happy. Every morning and evening the milk and eggs need collecting, you can see in the picture that on this particular morning the chickens were 100% ready, waiting to be harvest. Some flowers were also ready for picking, in Farm Town also called harvesting, but none of the trees on Poppet’s Patch were ready. Harvesting the livestock just takes a ‘click’ of her fingers, the flowers do take longer BUT the job that takes all of Poppet’s time is harvesting the many different crops that she grows on each of her farms.

As I said Poppet loved farming. She had other things that she also loved to do and one of these was making tables and charts. She loved to write things down; well she had to really, it would have been impossible to keep up with all of her harvesting work without them. So every day when she left her house she took her list, pen and clipboard, which was pink and glittery, with her.

As poppet visited each farm she made a note on her list of everything that was ready for harvesting: Poppet’s Too (she named her farm like this when she only had two farms, it was her little play on words, Poppet’s Patch and this farm too!) had trees and flowers that were ready; on farm three the harvest of pumpkins and broccoli were ready for harvest, so were masses and masses of trees; farm four had trees, flowers and crops; finally, she arrived at farm five where everything also needed to be harvested.

There are lots of special, magical tools in farm Town that you can use to help you improve your farm, make farming easier and earn extra cash. Poppet already had most of these, she was known by her friends as a Greenery Giant. There were also a few really truly special things that not many other farmers knew about; one of these was called ‘layering’. Besides farming Poppet also owned factories. The factories used the crops from the farms to produce many other things that could then be sold at the Farm Town Market. Keeping the factories busy was another full time job, as if one weren’t enough! Layering was like multi-storey farming and I will tell you more about that later.

Look at how Poppet completed her chart.

1	2	3	4	5
F	T/F	T/F	T	T/F
H		H	H	H
P		P	P

· What do you think that the letters mean?

· If you came to live in Farm Town like Poppet would you make charts like the ones that she uses?

One of the best things about living in Farm Town, as far as Poppet was concerned, was that it was a social community, a place where fellow farmers helped each other. Poppet had lived there for some time now and so she had quite a lot of friends. A special friend ‘Blue’ had moved away some time ago, Poppet missed her visited her farm from time to time to water the flowers and clear away leaves. She so wished that Blue would come home again, they used to farm together every day it was fun, but she had gone to a place called Frontierville. Now Poppet really did think this was one of those virtual reality places because she had tried to visit her Blue and another friend Clive there once but couldn’t find any sign of the place no matter how hard she searched. With a sigh Poppet glanced down at the chart she had just completed. . . Goodness me, she thought to herself I do have a hard day’s work ahead of me better go and see who’s around and off she went.