We wish they all could be California Girls -

Well, not really - we really like our Washington Girls - but adding some new blood once in a while -

This is "Joshua's Farms Garnet" - she has come to be company / BFF for Lilah, our one ewe lamb from the babies we had this spring. 

She is very well behaved and leads like a dream.  She came from the same breeder where we got Elliott a couple of years ago.

In fact her bloodline goes back to my old friend Nancy Krohn's boys Skittles & Apocalypse.  (her Great Grandfather and Grandfather respectively)  Even though Nancy is no longer in the sheep business, I know she would love to know that her sheep continue to make a difference. 

The Shepherd and his new sheeplet.
















Isn't her wool just the prettiest color? 

It will be November of 2016 before he breeds her with Django - (we don't breed ewe lambs)

It will be a long wait to see what happens, but that's the sheep business. 

Gracie want's to know what the heck all the ruckus is about........

Garnet and her new friends were less than thrilled to be put into a pasture by themselves...

Black Sheep Gathering - "Part One"

The 2012 BSG T-Shirt - Pretty cute, huh?  

We left last Thursday a.m. (right after taking The Shepherd's work truck into the repair shop) for Eugene Oregon and the 2012 Black Sheep Gathering.  I was somewhat anxious about our trip - we couldn't find an in-house farm sitter this year however some friends graciously stepped in to take care of the kitties and the sheep so we could take our vacation!  To top it all off, George had come up limping on Tuesday and hid out so my efforts to take him to the V.E.T. were thwarted -  he didn't seem to have any punctures or bleeding, but we weren't sure what we would come back to.  Luckily, he seemed to have just sprained it and it seems to have gotten better on its own (I guess that's why you don't see little bitty kitty crutches....) 

We made it through the Seattle Metro area in record time and stopped in Chehalis to have lunch with my sister, niece and grandnephew.  Flew down the highway - not even too much traffic in the Portland area - amazing!  

 

 Since I wasn't taking my spinning wheel, I decided to see what I could make with this pretty yarn I spun a couple of years ago - The Shepherd gave me the fiber for Christmas - all I can remember was that it was alpaca and cashmere - I think with some superwashed merino blended in or something - it is incredibly soft.

The pattern I'm crocheting for this scarf is called Mosaic Scarf's little sister.  I was afraid that I wouldn't have enough yarn, but I finished with just a few yards left - whew...
















Here is The Shepherd with NW Shetland breeders Jackie Craw Forest Mountain Sheep, Chelan, WA, Donna Schoonover, Schoonover Farms, Sedro Woolley, WA and Michelle McMillen, Boulderneigh Farm, Amity Oregon. 

They were in a serious discussion about some wool samples that The Shepherd had brought with him. 

But lets talk about what is really important here - and that is shopping - hundreds of booths filled with delicious flavors of fiber - Blue Faced Leicester seemed to be a favorite this year.  Plus, I bought another 4 oz. hank of silver baby alpaca so I could work some more on the yarn for my camelid shawl, and some more baby camel to go with the baby camel fiber that I bought last year that I still haven't done anything with...

Fiber Arts Judging

So, I actually had a method to my madness this year.  I walked from the sheep barn through one side of the vendors, through the middle hall, and then sat down and watched the fiber arts judging while I rested my knees.  This skein of yarn, as you can see, unfortunately was disqualified because the maker had tied it all together and it could not be opened up to look at it.  Oops...

She seemed to be pretty good at her judging - listening to her talk definitely gave me things to remember the next time I prepare yarn for competition.

Knees rested, I pressed on through the last vendor barn - No, I didn't buy any of this yarn, but isn't it pretty?

And look who I found?  Marcia Adams, who used to shear our sheep.  She sells her Coopworth wool roving at festivals now and had landed this prime indoor spot at the last minute when someone else had to cancel. 

Yarn and fiber in all kinds of rainbow colors. 

A delight for the senses

Late June in Eugene, more often than not, is in the 80's - 90's - this year not so much.  In fact, I don't think it got much into the 70's - I felt bad for the outdoor vendors- all the tents on the far right on this picture - but, they take their chances and if it is hot out, they definitely have a better deal than in the stifling hot of the barns -

So Friday,  the rains came -

In a day or two I'll tell you about Saturday's events - the Fleece Judging and the Spinner's Lead.

                                            Enjoy the sights and sounds of the judging ring -

Meet the Mrreows!

PTU's (*Prisoner Transport Units)

Check -









Dinner table ready and waiting

Check -







Litter boys & girls room ready

Check -

Oops, no pooper scooper (I think it got thrown away when Sinda went to the bridge) - have to correct that soon...





Thursday night we went out to Nooksack to meet George and Gracie - two tiger striped tabby cats - about 9 months old - Our BSG house sitter had connected us up with Linda, a friend of hers, who was actually an acquaintance of ours from the local fiber world. She needed to find a new home for these kitties.

George and Gracie are siblings - they had been fixed, but have not had shots, etc., so that would be on the docket - but they seemed like nice enough cats and we wouldn't have to worry about tiny baby kitties being by themselves during the day and getting into who knows what kinds of trouble. We told her that unless we called to say no, that we would take them and made arrangements to come out Saturday morning to pick them up.

Turns out that today was the Everson Nooksack Festival Parade, and she said that I should make sure that I was out of town by 10:00 because they would be shutting down the main road (only in small towns, I gotta tell ya) at 11:00 for the parade - so I told her I would be there at about 9:00 - Yikes, that's early for me on a Saturday!

So I was up early this a.m., got the PTUs in the car, directions noted, called Linda to tell her I was on my way. Yes, when I got to Everson, the flags were out - a flagpole on the sidewalk about every 10 feet - it is a couple of miles from Everson to Nooksack and the school district serves both communities from buildings half way between - that is were everyone was gathering to be in the parade - I got to our friend's home and we got George in his PTU right away, but Gracie was no where to be found - but I hung around for about a half hour and she re-appeared - never having been in a PTU before, she was, lets say, none too happy...

But they both settled down right away once I got on the road - on the trip back through town, even though it was just 10:00, everyone already had their chairs out on the sidewalks - holding the prime real estate for the best parade viewing.

We're headed home kitties -

Once inside, the investigation begins - "Where the heck are we?" and "What is this place?" was written all over their little faces.



But they soon found the dinner table and were delighted to find the "stinky goodness" (that's canned cat food for you non cat-bloggers)

I had just put a little bit out - and they scarfed that down, so I put out some more - which they didn't touch until just a little while ago - - so I'll just have to get a sense of how much they are going to eat. I have quite a few tiny cans of gourmet cat food that I had bought to tempt Miss Sinda - she would only eat about a quarter of a one of those itty bitty cans and didn't like it when it got stale - I threw away a lot of expensive cat food over that six months. (Mind you - I'm not complaining - the extra time with her is something that I've treasured.)
So I set about trying to take some pictures for you - As you can see, George moves much quicker than the shutter on my camera...









Gracie was actually quite agreeable and posed quite nicely.












They were happy to join my "on the big bed" for a nap after lunch.

Gracie (on the left) is much lighter color than her brother, and her fur is also much softer.








Here, let me get that for you Gracie...









They are very affectionate towards each other.










They spent the entire afternoon in the bedroom - on the top of the bed, not underneath - that was a good thing.

Gracie seems to be a little more cautious than George - but I think that they both will like living here.



Don't you?

And you say, What is a Mrreow? They were the feline animals that lived on the southern continent in Anne McCaffrey's (one of my favorite authors) Pern books -

You can be sure there will be more to come.

Wonderful Woolies Fleece & Fiber Sale

Last weekend our friends Yvonne & Doug of Spinner's Eden Farm had a fleece & fiber sale at their farm here in the county.

We had about ten farms participating providing everything from CVM, mohair, Shetland (ours and our friend Nancy's), Alpaca, Llama, Corriedale, and a huge luscious colorful mountain of combed top and potluck roving from Kathy Green's Ferndale Fiber (that's Kathy on the left).





We had many discerning customers who were willing to brave the windy COLD (in the low 40's) day to come out, feed their fleece habit and get bargains right off the farm.


















A happy customer with two bumps of Ferndale Fiber and a beautiful big bump of Yvonne's CVM.







And YES, did I mention it was cold?

Here I am in my "little nest" - I had two shirts, a fleece vest, a winter coat (fleece lined and a wind breaker outer skin) - I was sitting on a fleece blanket that had been doubled up AND I had a down coverlet over my lap. Oh, and my new cowl/hood that I made from a blend of merino, alpaca and mohair.

I forgot to bring my fingerless mittens home from work, so I tried to wear my gloves, but I was cashiering and it was difficult to write with gloves on - I was also working on a crochet project in the down time (which there wasn't much of, it was really pretty busy!) and that really didn't work with gloves on.



OK, I know that I don't need any more fiber, but I just couldn't help getting these three bumps of Kathy's combed top. The colors will work really well for a crochet project I'm working on for a arts & crafts sale I've been invited to be in this fall.







Tables and tables of fiber - I'm sorry that I only took pictures of what I could see from the cashier table - It was a really fun day.









We got to know some very nice new "fiber farmers" and my ulterior motive for being cashier was that I got to meet and greet every single person who came to the sale. Many were folks on my spinner guild email newsletter list who don't come to meetings so I got to meet all those people too.


Yup, it was a really fun day!

Fleece in Our Hands

All too often, an “anticipated event” fails to live up to any internal or external hype that may have been built around it. Not so with “Fleece in Your Hands”, the three day workshop that I took two weeks ago from Judith Mckenzie McCuin. (for this essay, I’ll refer as JM)

We were greeted with piles of different fleeces – the first day we worked with some primitive fleeces, such as Icelandic and Shetland.

Over the weekend there were lots of little “ah-ha” moments, like finally understanding the difference between “woolen” and worsted (at least I think I understand)

There was a group of about 20 taking the class - from all over the area - our farthest student came over from Spokane and there were a couple of people from Port Townsend. It was a lively bunch with lots of good questions -




Most fun was that my friend Nancy G. in the class - (well, after all, we were at her house) - We did Potluck lunches (I brought my favorite Farmgirl Spicy Pumpkin Muffins the first morning and Cream scones the second morning - It was fun to have them to snack on before spinning.)













My doubts about the Icelandic fleece that we recently took down to Gretchen’s Wool mill were somewhat “quieted” as JM showed us the five different layers of these amazing fleeces – and how they can be separated out from the long, somewhat “wirery” outer coats down to the almost down-like layer that is against the skin. Look how easily she has separated these layers to spin into different types of yarn. I can also see how having all the different layers/lengths blended into carded roving or batts would contribute to the "itchy" feeling that some people get about wool - the different lengths would tend to poke out and cause the scratchys... hmmm










Lots more things to think about now when I buy fiber - like, "What am I going to use it for?" or how was it prepared - combed top? carded roving, batts, etc. I have always kind of let the fiber tell me how it wanted to be spun up - now maybe I can "talk back" and put in my own ideas of how I want to have the yarn look.













Even Nancy's horse was curious about what was going on -










There were many different wheels represented. One of the things that JM does is work with you to realize the potential that your wheel has - using the different drive bands or making use of a lace flyer to make ultra fine yarns.

Now I have new things I want, like a jumbo flyer unit for plying and maybe a McMorran Yarn Balance, and possibly a little Niddy Noddy for making sample skeins. I can see now that I'm going to have to clean off the shelves in the guest room to put my stash and my toys on.





I think one of the more surprising samples that I worked with was the CVM - I was amazed at how "springy" it was almost elastic. I have 8 sample skeins that I spun up - I finally got pictures taken tonight and will put them on here in a couple of days.








There was lots of show and tell - and lots of "tell" JM is a very good story teller and after the many years of experience that she has, she was able to answer most all of our questions.

Here she was showing us some plying techniques. On the last day she passed out little bobbins of mill spun singles so those who had never tried it could try triple ply (mine looked like "REAL" yarn!!) or even 4 or 5 ply.






Did I mention that we had a catered supper on Saturday night - Chicken Piccata, with salad, roasted fall vegies and rice. Very tasty and a fun time to get to know one another.










This is one of the biggest Shetland fleeces that I've ever seen. We didn't work with this one, but a lot of the spinning that we did was with fiber that we prepared ourselves with our hand cards or drum carder or combs.












She showed us a nifty way to get the batts off of a drum carder by wrapping them onto a paper sack.












I didn't have enough courage to try this comb set-up. But it looked like it could do a serious amount of damage if used incorrectly. Sounds like a plot for a good spinner mystery...













Click on this picture to biggify it - check out the crimp in the creamier colored fleece on the far right. I think she said it is from a domestic Corriedale bred with imported Australian semen. JM demonstrated how to wash the locks individually by wrapping single layers in cotton material (like an old sheet) and pouring boiling hot water into the pan. (Ok, so you kind of had to be there - but I think she showed how to do this in a Spin Off article sometime in the past two years)




Lots of time spent "fingering" the different fleeces that she brought - some to share and prepare, some just to look at. I'll definitely shop differently the next time I go to a fiber fair.














It is good to know how to prepare my own fiber, but you know what? It's even better if someone (like Gretchen) has washed it and picked and carded it for me... maybe I'm just a lazy spinner.


























One exercise we did with some corriedale roving was to spin as many different widths of yarn that we could. I should have put something along with these samples so you'd have a perspective. The skinniest is about pencil lead skinny.


I have 8 sample skeins that I finally go pictures of tonight, so they'll be on in a few days. I've been reminded that I'm "neglecting" some of the other aspects of my blog and some of my readers are getting a little bored with the spinning stuff... Well, there certainly isn't anything to take pictures of out in the garden right now unless I could figure out how to do wind and weather. Bud I have read some good books lately and as soon as it stops raining (it will stop sometime, won't it?) I'll get out to take some pictures of the sheepies.



There is much made about JM and her classes are, I'm sure, always filled, with a list waiting. It's not so much that she is a fabulous teacher - which she is, but it is that she makes one feel competent with their skills, which in turn, makes you feel really good about yourself - rather than being "The Goddess", I'd say that she brings out "The Goddess"(or God, as gender may be) in each one of us.

Will I take another class from her - You bet, at the drop of a hat! I would hazard a guess that I could even take this particular class over and still learn LOTS - Thanks to our LYS for sponsoring this event. It was fun.