One Step Closer To Being Ready For The Zombie Apocalypse

Just kidding, I’m not getting ready for the Zombie Apocalypse. But I do enjoy making myself as self-sufficient as I can, and yesterday I took another step in that direction.

It somehow seemed appropriate that I take the occasion of the 4th anniversary of Sweetie’s passing to play in the kitchen with the goat milk that I have been collecting from Myrtle. And while he would not have appreciated the mess I made, he would have found a great deal of joy in how much I was enjoying myself as I experimented with making not 1, but 2 kinds of cheese.

I have been following Leigh’s adventures with her goats and homestead for quite some time, so earlier I had checked out her archives for the info I needed, as well as doing a little additional research online. Can’t have too much education when starting a new project! I had been scooping the cream off the milk in the fridge and putting it in a jar in the freezer, and Saturday morning, the jar was finally full enough to try my hand at making butter.

 It was a warm day, and once it solidified it was too warm to stay cohesive until I could take a picture of it. A little time in the fridge though, and I had butter! I find the taste difference between cow’s milk and my goat milk more noticeable in the butter than in the liquid milk. Not objectionable, just different. I was already aware that it wouldn’t be the standard “butter yellow” that we are used to in store-bought butter, but that doesn’t bother me in the least. Used on something (like the fresh corn on the cob I shared at Mom’s for dinner that evening) it is very tasty.  

Yesterday morning, I got up ready to dive into cheese making. I had read several things that indicated that mozzarella might not be the easiest cheese to start with, but I laughed in the face of danger. I’m not ready to do hard cheeses yet, and I’m not a huge fan of chevre, so mozzarella it was.

 I added my gallon of milk to the citric acid in a pot set in a sink full of hot water.

 It started to coagulate almost immediately, which was fun to see. Once it was up to 90 degrees, I added in the rennet. From what I had read, I thought it would take a while before I would see clear whey, but after just 5 minutes I was ready to proceed

 I cut the curds and let them sit for a while before scooping them into a colander to drain. I added 1/4 teaspoon of salt to the curd, but I think next time I will add more (it seems a bit bland to me)

Then comes the really fun part – stretching! I had put a pot of water on the stove earlier to heat up, and found out that on low, the front left burner kept the water at the perfect temperature (140-150 degrees). I had bought a brand new pair of insulated rubber gloves for this step, because that’s a little warmer than I’m comfortable with. I dropped about half of the curds into the hot water, breaking them up with my fingers so the heat could get into everything. You work the cheese, lifting it up out of the water and back down as it cools. The transformation is very cool, at least to my cooking geek. When you start, the curd is kind of grainy looking, but after a short while it gets glossy and workable, kind of like taffy. Couldn’t really get pictures of that part, since I was home alone, but this is what I ended up with:  Isn’t it beautiful?!

And while I was working on stretching the mozzarella, I had put the whey on to try my hand at making ricotta too. I had read mixed reviews about how well that process worked but figured I had nothing to lose. I didn’t measure the whey, but judging on where it was hitting on the pot I figure there was about 3/4 of a gallon. I heated it slowly, working it slowly up to 200 degrees. Not seeing any changes by the time it had reached 180, I chickened out and added 2 tablespoons of vinegar (next time, I will trust the process and try it without). At about 190 degrees, I finally started seeing something happen

This got drained and salted also  Plus, I now have whey in the fridge to play with.

Finally results: 14.9 ounces of mozzarella, 5.4 ounces of ricotta, and a half-gallon of whey. I used some whey in a brine that the mozzarella sat in for a couple of hours. The ricotta is wonderful, very tangy and smooth. The mozzarella is very firm (I hesitate to use the word tough, though that was my first thought). It shreds very nicely and melts beautifully (yes, I tested it on a piece of french bread set under the broiler. Yum!) I am now researching how best to use the whey.

I’m not getting a ton of milk out of Myrtle, but next year I will hopefully be milking all 3 of the does. My goal is to make hard cheeses like the daughter of one of my friends used to (before she got married), and to try my hand at Camembert. For now, I will be satisfied playing with a gallon at a time. I started a Dairy Journal, so that I can keep notes on what I did and how it worked.

I am also slowly working on getting the garden back up and running. I’ve weeded 2 beds completely, and rescued the rhubarb at the end of a third bed (I thought it had died off, but it was just buried under grass. Freed from that and with a top-dressing of alpaca poo, it has made a very happy recovery). My back only allows so much digging, but I’ve got peas, beets, spinach and chard in the ground. Hopefully, they will produce something before summer gets here. The sheep and goats are very happy to deal with the weeds I’m pulling from the beds, which haven’t been really worked in 5 years. I get my garden back, and they get snacks; it’s a win-win situation!

Dealing With Death

Not the cheeriest of titles, I know. But this time of year, that is where my mind goes. Tomorrow is the 5th anniversary of my beautiful Daughter’s passing, and in less than a month it will be the 4th anniversary of Sweetie’s passing also. For most folks, spring marks the beginning of things. For me, it marks ends. The passage of time has not made it easier, and I am a mess a lot of the time though I do a decent job of hiding it from most folks.

It is also an unfortunate fact that, as a farmer, I have to deal with death more often than most people do. It is simply a part of the life that I have chosen. I know that some people don’t want to think about the more unpleasant parts of my life style, and it won’t hurt my feelings if you choose not to read this post. I promise to get back to happier subjects next time.

Some years are worse than others. A few years ago, I grew to dread going out to feed, as it seemed that more often than not there would be a dead animal to deal with. Lambs dropped like flies, it seemed, and ewes too.

   The first picture is Inesh just after I sheared him before breeding season a couple of  years ago. He is the father of all of last year’s lambs. Next is Malcolm as a lamb, then Merlin.

Since November, I have lost him and my other big ram, Kirk. They had been fussing with each other for a while, and I can only surmise that they caused each other some internal damage since they died within a week of each other. This month, I lost both Merlin (last year’s bottle lamb) and his twin Malcolm. Fine in the morning, dead when I went to feed in the afternoon. In reviewing my books, I have had problems with all of their mother’s lambs.

So, what does one do with a dead animal? I have always chosen to treat them with respect. Used to be, they would go into the ground here, with a pile of rocks on top to keep them from being too attractive to the neighborhood dogs. We have quite the graveyard in the back, including Kid the Younger’s horse (thanks to a good-hearted acquaintance with a backhoe).  My back, however, no longer makes it easy for me to dig that big a hole. So now I take a drive out to federal land and lay them to rest there. It is a solemn undertaking. No radio, my thoughts centered on the animal in the back of the van, words said in thanks to all they have given me. Their body goes back to nature, and I am always amazed at how quickly that happens. Within a month or less, there is little left but bones and fiber.

Most areas do not have an easy, inexpensive way to deal with animals that have passed. There used to be a rendering plant locally, but it closed due to new neighbors complaining about the smells (which were there before they built their fancy houses). The landfill does not knowingly take livestock. Some friends compost or burn dead animals, some donate them to zoos or places that keep large cats or wolves. It is a fact that all of us have to face, that none living survive forever. I am glad that I am able to honor my animals contributions to my life respectfully. I just hope that I don’t have to do it again soon.

On to happier subjects. Fiber Market Day went well and several of the bar code towels went to new homes. Last week, I did a new-to-me show, sharing a booth with Laura at the Small Farm Journal Fair. It is interesting how different things sell at different shows. I sold several of the silk scarves I’d dyed a few years ago, as well as some batts and finished items. We did a lot of demo-ing, and I took Myrtle and Naveed as pr animals. It was a fun show, but being on for 4 days straight was almost more than my poor introvert brain could handle. In addition, on the last day of the show I spent the morning at another venue teaching beginning drop spinning. Sunday I spent recuperating, so exhausted I could barely follow the tv show I was trying to watch.

I took advantage of the fact that I would be gone for most of the day during the show to wean the lambs (that way I miss most of the drama and noise). Naveed was the last to get weaned since he was at the show with me. When we got home, Myrtle joined the other 2 goats in with the wethers, while Naveed went back in the main pen with Ashe and the other lambs. Starting Sunday morning, I have been transitioning Myrtle to a milk goat. It is so nice to have fresh milk for my morning coffee! It has been slow going making the switch, but she gave me 8 ounces yesterday morning and 6 in the evening (as compared to 4 ounces each time the day before). I’ve got a jar of milk in the fridge that I am letting sit for a while to see if I can separate the cream off and make a little butter. Wish me luck! Making cheese will probably have to wait for next year, when I will hopefully be milking all 3 of the goats. All in all, I am very happy with my progress so far. Myrtle has a nice little udder for a first timer, and I am keeping my fingers crossed for Clara and Cloe.

Ashe is doing well, working really hard at getting up. I opened up the barn now that it’s just her and the lambs, and she gets herself outside to enjoy the sun. She still can’t straighten her front legs all the way, so she looks strange, but she can get herself a drink of water on her own and her spirit is unbelievable. She is putting on weight and eating like a horse. Even if she never recovers completely she is an inspiration, and she will be auntie to the lambs as long as she chooses to stick around.

Next up on my to-do list is getting all the stuff I didn’t sell listed on Etsy, so keep checking back there if you are interested in any of the bar code towels, batts or hand-dyed top & yarn.

Woven Words

Years ago, I had the idea to use a bar code generator to create stripes in woven goods. I finally did it, and I’m pretty thrilled with the results!

There are a lot of free bar code generators available online, so I found one I liked and typed in what I wanted to say. I then traced the code straight off the computer screen and figured out how wide each stripe was. This is a judgement call, so I can’t be positive that they say exactly what I intended when woven up (the bar code reader on my phone has a hard time reading the stripes when they are woven. I’ll try to get it to read the warp only next time I set a bunch up). But I know what was intended, so I will market them as that word or phrase.

Remember all the yarns I got from Laura? They are becoming dish towels. I also had some cotton ric rac cones that are compatible with some of the colors, so I used it for weft on some of the towels.

I set up the first 3 warps (“Believe”, “Laugh” and “Love”), and then discovered that the little Dundas loom that I bought several months ago needs a LOT of work before I can weave on it. Luckily, when I was venting to Laura, she offered me the use of her little Dorset loom, and even delivered it on one of her trips in my direction. So I was up and running.

It has been a long time since I warped a loom, and it has been a bit of a challenge. Each warp I set up was supposed to give me 6 dish towels and room to play a little. The first one gave me 5 and a short towel that I played with different treadlings on (so it will be mine). Finally, after building a raddle and figuring out what I’ve been doing wrong, I did get 6 towels out of the third warp.

 This is “Believe”, the first set that I did. I took these in with me to my mom’s church knitting group, and the whole set even got blessed by her priest.

Then came “Laugh”. ,

and “Love” 

Every towel in each set has a different color of weft, so even though they are all related, they look completely different. Here’s the whole group, ready to be hemmed.

They’ve all been through the washer and dryer, and I’m doing the hemming by hand. The plan is to have them all finished by the last Saturday of March, when I will have a booth at the High Desert Wool Growers Fiber Market Day. I still need to design and make labels to sew in while I’m hemming, and some hang tags to attach so folks that are gifted one will know the story, so the work isn’t done yet. But I can’t wait to get back to the loom and make up some more towels, and some scarfs, and I’m even thinking of weaving some fabric to make myself a vest to wear to the fiber festivals I vend at. So many ideas, so little time!

 

More Miracles

Navid is doing well. Conformation wise, he is a hot mess (leg issues), but I am hopeful that many of them are caused by his mother’s lack of movement during her pregnancy. I have seen some improvements during the last week, but even if I wasn’t going to wether him, he would never be a show stopper.

Last Sunday was scheduled for a spin-in at Correy’s house. She had texted me on Saturday, saying that the yearling Nubian/Nigerian doe had kidded, but the kid wasn’t viable. When walking the doe across one of her pens, her bottle lamb had nursed on the doe and the doe had seemed to accept it. Correy wanted the goat gone and offered her to me. I figured I had nothing to lose. Even if she wouldn’t accept Navid (or visa-versa, since he had never nursed on anything but the bottle), I could at least milk her and add that to his bottles. So Sunday, she came home with me. Meet Myrtle (she didn’t really have a name before coming here, and she strikes me as a “Myrtle”):

She got put in the barn with Ashe, and Maeve got released from barn duty. You would have thought that Maeve had been locked up for months instead of just a few days; she totally ignored the hay and proceeded to spend an hour or more bouncing around the pen. Even the lambs stopped their races to watch her. I started a routine of milking Myrtle twice a day. She hadn’t been hand milked before, so I wasn’t getting a ton out of her. The few times I tried putting Navid on her, he didn’t get the idea that there was anything good under there, and spent so much time fighting me that it was frustrating for all of us.

Then, late Thursday night, I quit thinking like a person, and started thinking like a lamb. I started feeding him his bottle under the goat. I placed the bottle between her back legs, so he was nursing on it right next to her udder. The 3rd time we did this, he slipped off the bottle briefly and found a teat. He didn’t suck long (nursing off a bottle is much easier than the real thing), but it was something. This morning, I helped him find the udder before I offered him the bottle. He chugged away on one side, then wanted the bottle (but only took about 3 ounces, instead of the 6-8 that he has been taking).

This afternoon, when I went out for his noon bottle, both Myrtle and Navid were out of the barn. I caught her, intending to put her back in. Instead, I tied her to the barn and showed him where to go again. This time he nursed on both sides, and when I let her loose he followed her. I sat on the edge of the tub and she came over to see me. I pushed him back towards her and he latched on and nursed a couple of more times. Success! Two hours later when I went out to check, they were laying next to each other in the sun, and he followed her over when she came to see if I had anything good. I provided a little direction again, and made sure he nursed.

When I went out to feed this evening, he somehow ended up next door in the boys pen, much to Puff (the alpaca)’s consternation. He started crying, since he couldn’t figure out how to get back, and she ran over, calling to him. While I sat in with Ashe letting her eat her grain and hay pellets, I saw him figure things out on his own. A bottle baby no more! This is huge; no more round the clock feedings. Of course, I just bought a new bag of milk replacer, but that will store until the next time I need it. Of course, with at least one cooperative goat, I hopefully will not need it (but it’s good to have on hand, in case).

And in more good news, Ashe is working on getting her feet back under herself. She got her rear end up briefly yesterday (trying to avoid her antibiotic shot). Keeping my fingers crossed for her too. Her new companion in the barn is Millie (one of last year’s lambs), who is not impressed with this whole idea. She is the least friendly of the ewe lambs last year, so the confinement will give me a chance to give her some special treats and see if the way to her heart is through her stomach.

All in all, a good couple of days! Pictures of weaving next time, I promise.

Miracle Child

Ashe is the last of Kid the Younger’s flock, and as such is special. She is also a nice ewe, has a lovely white fleece and an even better disposition. Unfortunately, she has been down (as in unable to stand) since mid-November. This is a big deal for an animal that is firmly of the opinion that it is on everyone’s dinner menu. Fortunately, she has maintained a very good attitude in the almost 3 months that she has been sequestered in the barn. She has not been alone, since most sheep regard being alone as a signal that they should die. I have rotated several other ewes through “Ashe duty”; currently it is one of the yearlings, Maeve.

Imagine my surprise to discover when moving her early last month that she was starting to bag up (develop an udder)! This poor girl is pregnant! I was not sure that she could survive long-term, let alone deliver a healthy lamb (something she has not managed when healthy, by the way). Not only could she, she did! Last night I skipped my late evening tour of the pen and barn, since everyone else was doing good when I fed and she was not showing any signs of being that far along. Since the ram was in with the ewes for 2 months, there was a big window of possible delivery dates. She ate like a horse yesterday afternoon, drank well, and was settling down to chew cud when I left her.

When I checked on her at 11:30, there was afterbirth behind her. Searching the barn, I found a lump of lamb, chilled to the bone and not moving at all. It had been cleaned off a bit, but was still wet, which wasn’t helping things at all. I grabbed a towel that was in the barn and started rubbing vigorously. My reward, after several minutes, was a very weak little cry. Into the house we rushed. A quick feel led me to believe I was carrying a little girl. Warmed up enough to tube feed an hour later, I discovered that I was wrong. That’s how cold he had been!

 Luckily, I had some colostrum frozen from a few years ago. It is very important that the lamb receive this within 12 hours of birth, to help boost their immune system. You can get generic colostrum from the feed store, but it’s better if you can use the real thing. I wish I’d saved some from the ewes as they lambed this year, but most of what I got was going into little Nellie to keep her going until she figured out nursing.

He got to spend the night in the house (a rare occurrence here), but by this afternoon he had mostly figured out how to suck on the bottle  

and had a good nap. 

So, about 1 pm, we went out to the barn and had a bottle there. He isn’t drinking much yet, which means I will be checking on him every couple of hours and offering him the bottle again. He ate well after I fed everyone else, and when I checked on him about a half hour ago, he was just waking up from another nap and ate again. Like most newborns, this will be his main focus for the next couple of days: eat, sleep and poop. So far, he’s a champ at all three. Kid the Younger has named him Navid, which he says is Persian for “Good News”. I think Ashe did a great job delivering her Good News.

I will be raising him as a bottle baby, since Ashe is in no condition to nurse a lamb. Hopefully, her condition will improve and she will get up soon, and Navid will do well enough to get to stay out in the barn. I know that some folks will disagree with my decision to put him outside. It is cold out there, but in my experience well fed lambs do better learning as soon as possible that they are sheep. If he gets chilled, I can always bring him back in to warm up. But at some point, he needs to learn how to get along in the flock, just as the other lambs do. Once he is more mobile, I hope that he will learn to steal a little milk from the ewes (as Norma Jean is currently doing, not that she needs it at all). They will show him how to eat hay and grain, and playing with the other lambs will make him stronger. While it is a special feeling to have a bottle baby come running to you, I prefer it when they would rather hang with their buddies once their belly is full. Most of this year’s lambs are very cuddly already (more so than last year’s lambs), and I enjoy spending time out there, sitting on the ground scratching ears and necks. That, to me, is more special than just being able to bond with one that needs a bottle.

Busy Ewes

At least my loss of sleep is being rewarded!

 Kay was waiting for me in the barn when I went out to feed Sunday afternoon, presenting me with 2 little hooves and a nose. Soon a tiny little lamb (less than 5 pounds) was on the ground, and Kay settled down to her dinner. The lamb was a long time standing, so I tube fed her to make sure she got some colostrum.  This became a recurring theme with Nellie. She was unsteady on her feet, and to add to the confusion, Kay has more than 2 teats. In fact, she has 4, only 2 of which actually work. Plus, poor Nell’s suck reflex was not the greatest. It took her 46 hours to figure out that all that good stuff I was putting in her tummy actually could be had on demand direct from mom. 46 hours of me going out every 3-4 hours round the clock to tube her. Worth the patience and perseverance, since she is nursing like a champ now.

In the meantime, Fraija went into labor late Sunday night (actually early Monday morning). She was escorted into the barn and with a little help soon was nursing a healthy boy. I hit the hay about 5 am and set the alarm for 9 am. When I went out to feed Nell again, Fraija had delivered another lamb. I had seen her pass the afterbirth after the first lamb, so this was a bit of a surprise. Meet Nelson and Nora:

 Nelson has lots of small dark grey spots all over his body. Nora is also spotted, especially on her back legs. On one hip, the spots are black. On the other they are much larger, and brown. Talk about multi-colored!

Yesterday morning, Ida Lynn had a strapping white ram lamb by her side when I went out about 9 am. He is a bruiser, already broader than the older lambs. And it looks like he will be horned as well. I’ve named him Ned:

Finally, this afternoon when I went out to feed, I could see that Marge had a lamb by her side. To everyone’s disgust, I held off on feeding until they were both in the barn out of harm’s way. She is a lovely tall CVM ewe lamb. Mom Marge is ok with colored lambs as long as she doesn’t also have a white lamb (yes, sheep have prejudices too!). I haven’t named her yet.

All this action makes for some shuffling. My barn isn’t very big to begin with (only 8′ by 16′), and it’s made even smaller by the fact that I’ve partitioned half of it off for Ashe (the ewe who is down) and whoever her companion is (Kay and Nell at the moment). The other half can hold 2 lambing jugs (3 if I am very creative). I like to keep a ewe and her lamb(s) in the barn for at least 24 hours, until I can make sure that the lambs have figured out how to nurse well and the ewe is not likely to lose them in the pen. I also take advantage of the close quarters to try to handle the lambs a bit, so they can figure out that I am ok no matter what mama may say. This handling works better with some lambs than others. Norma Jean is perfectly comfortable being picked up and carried around, and will fall asleep in my lap at the drop of a hat, but I’m pretty sure that Ned wants little else to do with me now that he is out of the barn. That’s ok, since I’m hoping that he will be worth keeping a ram.

 Ashe is proving to be quite the baby sitter. Norma Jean climbs through the fence to get back in the barn to snooze in comfort, and Nell is willing to share the snuggle rights next to the warm auntie. You can really see the size difference here. Yes, Norma Jean is 6 days older, but she weighs about 4 times what Nellie does. Hopefully, now that she has figured out nursing Nell will catch up somewhat.

So far the count is 7 lambs (6 surviving), of which 4 are girls. Still to lamb are Faith, Ashe and Irene for sure. Amber is still a maybe, as are the goats. Unfortunately, it looks like Eartha may have lost her pregnancy. She was developing an udder back in December, but last time I felt it was gone. I hope she will prove me wrong, but I am not hopeful at this point.

Hopefully next time I will have some weaving to report. I’ve been planning some warps. Time to dig out the warping board and get to work!

The Ups and Downs of Baby Watch

First the bad news: my first lamb of 2013 didn’t make it. It is always sad when something like this happens. I pretty sure I know what happened, and hopefully he will be the only one. As we say, sometimes a new life looks around and figures out what they came back as (“I’m a sheep? What the heck!”) and hits the re-do button.

During lambing season I try to check on the ewes at least every 6 hours. The first few days I do this, they are very loud about my visit, sure that I am bringing some sort of snack with me. After a day or two, they settle down and mostly ignore me.  Since I tend to feed in the late afternoon, I take a walk out there at about 11 pm, 4 am (so I can still get a few hours of sleep before I get up for real) and 10 am. Last night when I made my 11 pm tour through the sheep pen, Bridget was pawing the loose hay in the barn and laying down, sure signs of early labor. I sat and watched for a while, but she was making slow progress. I figured she’d get down to business about 3 am. I went back out 3 times between 11 and 3, just to make sure that she wasn’t progressing faster than that. She is my oldest ewe (13 in April), and I didn’t want to miss any problems. Sure enough, at 3:12, there are toes pointing at me, and with a quick assist there was this:

 The lamb tried to stand before the umbilical cord was even broken! Mom cleaned her off (yes, a girl) and I made sure she latched on and had a good drink of milk before I went back inside. I tried to nap, but I’m not very good at that, so I went back out to make sure she could find things on her own at about 5:30 am, then off to bed for a couple of hours. My 10 am check was good. This is a much better picture of the newest addition

 Isn’t she a cutie? Worth the lost sleep.

Lambing season is hard. I don’t get to sleep through the night, and I’m not very good at napping, so I wander around in a daze a fair amount of the time. Because the ram was in with the ewes for an extended amount of time (mid-August to mid-October), lambing will be strung out over several weeks. There will be times when I’m pretty sure that no one else is imminent and I will take advantage. If I am wrong, there may be problems. It’s not that my sheep can’t deliver unassisted; they can. But when there is a problem, you are needed right then. I have lost lambs and ewes over the years by not being there, and it breaks my heart every time. Even with vigilance, there are losses. Shepherding is not for the weak of heart.

But there is a special kind of beauty in heading out in the cold, dark night to check on my sheep. The moon was so bright last night that I carried my flashlight without turning it on, watching my shadow walk along side me on the frozen ground. It was cold and breezy, but warmer than some times. There are times when the air is so cold and crisp that it makes your nose hairs feel crisp when you breathe. I am reminded in those moments of being a child in Norway, where we spent a year. We were told not to run for the bus if we were late in the winter time, so that we wouldn’t breath through our mouths and risk freezing out lungs. It being the olden days, the girls had to wear dresses, and I would wear 5 pairs of tights to try to keep my legs warm. When it got to -30, we could wear pants. So silly, that fashion and society would dictate that girls couldn’t dress warmly unless it got to a certain temperature. Every winter now, I think of that as I bundle up and step outside my back door. When there is snow on the ground, the moonlight makes it sparkle like diamonds sometimes, and I wish there was a way to capture that on film. I do have old pictures of hoar-frost that I took several years ago (on actual film, imagine that), and they are beautiful too but the weather that brings it is not my favorite – cold and humid is not a good combo to my mind.  But even the weather I don’t relish has an appeal to it, a beauty if I will only open my eyes and accept it for what it brings. I feel blessed that I am still able to do that.

Enough philosophy! I finished another prayer shawl for my mom’s church group. Hopefully I will get all the ends woven in tomorrow and get it blocked. I used up lots of leftover acrylic yarn that I’d gotten at the thrift store, alternating shades of orange with other colors. Mom thinks I should call it Joseph’s Coat, but I am leaning more towards Circus Whore. It is garish, but someone will love it. I also started playing with my felting needles again. I am working on a small bust of a slave man. The armature is leftovers from a commission spinning fleece, and I am applying moorit Romeldale for the skin.  Lots of stabbing (very therapeutic), adding layer upon layer to build up the features of his face. He is a long way  from done, but here he is so far:

Surprise!

I spend a fair amount of time most days planning blog posts. And then life happens, and days and weeks go by with those ideas just floating around in my head.

Any way, yesterday when I went out to feed, the ewes were not happy with me. Instead of going and buying more corn, I spent the afternoon playing with Laura (more on that in a minute). So they are milling around, complaining loudly that they are starving, that hay just isn’t good enough, that they will keel over and die if I don’t have a bucket of corn for them. Silly girls. It had finally warmed up enough for the hose faucet to work, so I’ve stretched the hose out and am filling waterers while I can, which includes using a bucket to fill the tub in the barn. I am walking back and forth between the barn and the big tub when I spot …. (you ready for this?)… a lamb!

Now, the day before when everyone was sucking down corn as fast as they could, I had walked around behind the ewes, feeling everyone’s udder, to get an idea of who might lamb when. Some are closer than others, but no one feels imminent. As compared to Faith, who is in the barn with Ashe, whose udder is full and has changed to a rich pink color which normally indicates impending babies. The lamb cozies up to Midge, who is still big as a house and whose udder was soft when I checked. She talks back to him and lets him nurse. He is dry and has obviously eaten already, so I pick him up and walk over to the barn. She follows. I open the barn gate, Faith comes out, and Midge and her son go in.

 To add to the surprise, when I was snuggling him at midnite I’m pretty sure I felt horns. Both his parents are polled (no horns). Hmmm.

So what fun things was I doing with Laura, you ask? She had called me to see if I was available to go with her to pick up a Craigslist find (a small mangle for pressing her woven goods), and then she came back to the house to card some angora fluff she had gotten from a mutual friend. It was fun, and it will be great to see what she makes with the finished yarn.

I haven’t talked here about why Ashe is in the barn. She is Kid the Younger’s last remaining sheep from the flock that he had from being in 4-H, and I had held off on telling him she was having problems until he was here for his birthday. She has been down, unable to stand for over a month. There was one day where I was afraid she was checking out (she refused food and water), but other than that one day her attitude has been good. She is very skinny (she has always been thin), but eating and drinking well. I put her in the barn with a companion to provide her with as much comfort as I can. At first her companion was Eartha (who has always been my thinnest ewe). They got corn long before anyone else. After a few weeks of confinement, Eartha was getting a bit testy, so I let her out and brought in Faith, who seemed the closest to lambing (ha!). My other big surprise was finding out that, despite her illness, Ashe is still pregnant. She has never had a lamb that survived, so I am keeping my fingers crossed for her and the lamb.

Our weather has been miserable cold, not getting above freezing for days on end. This week is supposed to be back to normal. Living in an old (40 years old) mobile home, is a challenge in cold weather. If I am not careful (and sometimes even when I am), I have to deal with frozen pipes. It isn’t often that I have no water at all, though it has happened. Last week, I had water to my bathroom sink, but not that tub or toilet. The 2nd bathroom had water to the tub. The kitchen had cold water, but not hot. The hose bib was frozen shut. It makes doing things much more challenging. The toilet can be flushed, for example, but I have to manually refill the tank. Buckets of water have to be carried out to the animals so that they have something to drink (not enough snow on the ground for them to eat). It’s not quite pioneer living, but it’s as close as I want to get. I have no illusions about how hard life was in the “Good Old Days”. I laugh when someone tells me they’d like to go back and live at some time in the past. No thanks! I love my modern conveniences.

When I wasn’t dealing with wood and water, I’ve been knitting and spinning. I got the Christmas stocking fulled, finished one prayer shawl for my mom’s church group and started another, and finished the first pair of socks of the year:

  (this is about 70% of the ends I had from the Christmas stockings. The dime in the lower right corner is for scale)   Bias knit prayer shawl. The dark green is a bulky yarn, the cream is 3 strands of worsted weight. First socks of 2013, from a mohair blend yarn that I had in stash. There is enough yarn left for another pair.

In spinning, I have been working on some yarn spun from one of Faith’s old fleeces. I washed up some of the skirtings from her fleece using the directions in Margaret Stove’s “Spinning for Lace” dvd, and have been spinning them worsted from the locks. It is turning out very pretty, and with 2 spinning dates last weekend I’ve made a lot of progress on the bobbin. I am selecting locks to emphasize the color variations in the fleece.

I also took a couple of minutes to play with my new toy from Santa, a mandoline. Made quick work of some onions and potatoes for a tasty soup.

 This will get used a lot. Makes slicing so much faster (and uniform).

Hope you are staying warm (or cool, depending on where you are) and keeping busy. Talk at you soon.

It’s Official – My Kids Are The Best

Having survived the holidays, I did want to share that the kids outdid themselves with Christmas presents this year. Kid the Elder and his wife replaced my dying stove (one burner had a broken knob, and one had an intermittent short). Plus, it was at least 20 years old. The new one is used, but for the first time in over 20 years, I have a stove capable of self-cleaning (though I am not likely to use it, since it gets SO hot and I am in an old mobile home). It is wonderful to be able to cook on all burners again. It got installed the day after Christmas, being that I foiled the plan to install it while I slept Christmas Eve. I was sleeping in one of the comfy chairs in the living room, since I have been fighting a lung infection that prevented me from sleeping laying down for almost a week. The old one went to the dump as soon as this one was installed. No sense in putting it off while we had help.

Kid the Younger wasn’t able to come home for Christmas, but made it over a few days later for his birthday. Having a birthday so close to Christmas sucks, but I was well-trained by my dad, whose birthday was the 27th. The rules were simple – a joint present was not acceptable, and the birthday present could not be wrapped in Christmas paper. When Kid was younger we would forgo a birthday party in December for one later. Sometimes in January, but usually at the end of the school year, when we could invite the whole class over to run amok outside once filled with cake and ice cream. He way out did himself in the present department too – a ginormous gift card to Home Depot. He does know the way to his mama’s heart. I’m having as much fun figuring out what to do as I will actually spending it.

We did our traditional Christmas Eve dinner – tacos (been doing it since I was about 9) at my mom’s, but Christmas day was pretty laid back. Kid the Elder made coffee cake (another long-standing tradition, ever since he was old enough to run the stove with supervision).  He changes it up every year, playing with recipes.

I finally decided that it was time for new Christmas stockings. When I was pregnant with my eldest I started making stockings for my potential children. I was running on memory for how big mine was and had way over-estimated. So for many years, Santa has had to break the bank filling them. Now, Daughter is gone, as is Sweetie, and Kid the Younger has changed his name. I placed an order to KnitPicks in early November, dug out the knitting books, and started knitting in secret. I got them all finished (except for weaving in some ends on mine) on Christmas Eve, and they got hung just before I went to bed. They still need fulled, and I will post a better picture once that happens, but here they are in all their glory:

 As you can see, there are 5 of them. Kid the Elder is blue, DIL is purple, Kid the Younger is red, his fiancée is green, and I am yellow. The kids all have their mates color alternated with white on the toes, and the toe of mine has all 4 of the others. Since I’d ordered yarn without having a plan, I cut it very close on the yellow. I have only a tiny little ball left of it, approximately 2 yards. I am very happy with how they turned out, and it won’t be hard to do more if I am ever blessed with grand-babies.

I also knit socks for both Kid the Younger and his fiancée, but I don’t have pictures of them yet. They are supposed to send me a picture as soon as they find a second.

The ewes are starting to bag up (develop udders), so lambs are on their way! It’s always exciting to see what I get in the way of new babies. I borrowed a ram from my friend Correy, so I have high hopes for structural improvements. It will be interesting to see if I get some fun color patterns. I’m a total sucker for spotted lambs, though it is unlikely that he carries spotting. Some of the ewes do, so there is a possibility. I still can’t tell if the goat girls are pregnant, though I did dream that one of them was.

My other big adventure was helping Laura do in her two big white turkeys. She had been putting it off for a while, and finally conceded that she needed the prompting of my being there to get them done. We started with the hen, who was almost small enough to carry. Laura did most of the work on her, with me mostly supervising and bracing the carcass to facilitate certain maneuvers. Before we broke for lunch and to warm up a bit, we walked the tom up to the where we were working (no way we were lifting  him up) and hung him up to bleed out. A hot cup of tea, a slice of homemade frittata, and a little sit down time were a nice break, before we went back out to finish the dirty work. We both worked on skinning him out, and pretty soon he joined his mate in the cold water bath in her front yard. They spent the night there before being boned out today. She will be making a lot of turkey sausage, and I may be smoking some of it. I’m pushing for one that includes dried apricot.

Hope you all had a nice holiday season, and are off to a good start in the New Year.

Truly Thankful

Last day of the month, and I have managed to find something to be thankful for every day this month. These are the last ones posted on Facebook:

• Day 25 – I am thankful for the internet, which has connected me to so many new friends that I hope to meet for real. Thank you for sharing your lives and thoughts.
• Day 26 – I am thankful that I live somewhere with seasons. I may not always enjoy the weather, but I do like having 4 seasons. Maybe just not all in one day.
• Day 27 – I am thankful for my ancestors who passed on my love of working with fiber, even though I never met them.
• Day 28 – I am thankful that I have people in my life who really understand me
• Day 29 – I am thankful that I am comfortable in my own company. I know too many women who think they are whole only when they have a man in their life and settle for less than they deserve.
• Day 30 – I am thankful that I have so much to be thankful for!

The last 4 1/2 years have been hard, I won’t kid anyone about that. I have lost so many special people and my job. Money is really tight. At the same time, I have so much to be thankful for. If we would all focus on the blessings in our lives instead of the negatives, we would all be so much happier.

I am sharing the picture of the bride from Montana with her shawl. She shared the picture of her and me on Facebook, so her she is in all her glory. She was Daughter’s roommate all through college and after, and very, very shawl-worthy. I am just so glad that it matched her dress so well (almost looks like I had seen the dress before hand and planned things. Nope, just lucky).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, I do have to report that NaNo was a fail this year. I got to just over 17,000 words. I just couldn’t get anywhere with my story. I will keep plugging away at it, because I do think there is a story there, but it did not want to cooperate with the NaNo timeline.  Oh well, next year. I would encourage anyone thinking about it to take part. It is a very interesting self-challenge, and it continues to amaze me how much more creative I am in general during November when I am trying to put those 50,000 words done.

On the knitting front, I am still working on the uber:secret Christmas knitting, so no pictures of that. I just bought the latest issue of Interweave Knits, specifically for an article on knitting infinite cables. I would love to be able to knit a vest with my celtic knot ram. I may start with something easier, like this tree of life.