Early on during COVID lockdown, when people were making homemade masks and other PPE for medical…read moreworkers, masks were hard to come by. As we started wearing masks every time we left our houses, we needed more masks. I had a sleeve of six flimsy disposable masks, and I really needed--or at least I thought I needed--comfortable reusable masks at the time.
So I looked online and found Farmhouse Frocks, which offered all these different masks sewn by Amish seamstresses. I ordered some snazzy sheep masks at first--what better way to make fun of people making fun of me for going along?--and when I really enjoyed them, I had a bunch delivered to my parents.
These masks were heavy duty, well made, comfortable, and stretchy. They also had many different colors and designs. Most importantly, they fit me well, which was important at the time, because I spent a lot of time wearing masks.
Eventually, we learned that these cloth masks were largely useless against the tiny COVID particles, and we were really only wearing masks indoors and in crowded spaces, so I retired all my Farmhouse Frocks masks for multicolored N95s that my mom got in bulk from somewhere.
Obviously, we were wasting our time and fogging up our glasses for no reason all along, but we didn't know that at the time, and I'm still proud that I thought of the the larger community rather than my own convenience, and I still believe that it's better to be safe than sorry, especially with a new, unknown virus that would go on to kill at least three people I knew personally, including two relatives.
I ordered masks from Farmhouse Frocks at least four times. One time, there was a problem with an order I made for my parents, and Farmhouse Frocks corrected it promptly and threw in some free masks for my trouble. They were always friendly and responsive.
I don't plan to start wearing women's close sewn by Amish people anytime soon, but if another pandemic hits with larger virus particles, I know where I'm getting my cloth masks.
