Goats & Graphics

twirling thru my world...lost then found, then lost.... then found...then

2010-12-04T21:23:00.000-08:00

Reality TV, I don't understand the interest. I find I spend most of my days 'lost' in the world I created, then when I tumble into bed at night I am amazed I have 'found' myself - just in time to get a good night sleep then awake to being 'lost' all over again. I keep telling myself - it is the journey - even when the journey takes me around and around and around in my own world. So where have I been - it has been a number of days since I have written. Let me look into my time tracker which is my 'iCal', my MAC calendar program and see where I have been. Last blog was Oct 30.

The Photo and Poster was my job for this event.

November 5, 6, and 7, the Central Coast Weavers of which I belong, had our Holiday Show and Sale. It was very good with over 40 of us selling our products. There was woven, knitted, felted, hand spun and more. There was hand made soaps, toys, buttons, saddle blankets, jackets, shawls, jewelry, sweaters, art pieces and more. I had about 25 items for sale and then I did some spindle spinning in the demonstration area on my spindle. I also did some spinning on a Great Wheel or Walking Wheel. This Wheel was made sometime in the 1700-1800's. I am a very beginner on it but it is truly fascinating to think of the life a wheel like this has traveled to get in one piece to the year 2010. Fires, floods, heat, neglect - and it still spins wonderfully. I need to challenge myself to work with it more. This wheel belongs to Kay and Rosemary Thorne of which are the owners of the Strawbale Barn, which was the location the Weaving show was. This is a super event so mark your calendars for next year - the first full weekend in November, I will meet you there!

This is one of my "Simple Elegance" Shawls, for sale.

I have to share some fall photos with you. At our Ranch we don't get a lot of RED or ORANGE in the fall. Yet I do go looking for them so let me show you some.

Leaves of our 'Autumn Maple'.

One of 3 pumpkins that made it.The wild, ya right, turkeys got the rest of this
years pumpkins. I did make two different pumpkin soups and a batch of
pumpkin cookies from these 3 however. They are good eating.

These are some of last years, which was 'before' the turkeys moved in.

We have had rain to green up the hills already, and had 28 degrees
a few mornings yet the Valley Oaks are holding on to their leaves. A
great crop of acorns this year! Those are my horses, Spice and Shane.

So then there was the Olives. A few years back I wanted to plant olive trees. A neighbor and friend, Ann, said just pick mine. She has 10 trees that are over 40 years old on her property. Ann told me and Celeste, another friend and neighbor what to do and which to pick. So after going out and picking two different times - what fun! I had olives in lye, olives in water, olives in salt brim and olives hanging in a bag with salt from my barn rafters. The house was covered in olives. Now I have gallons of olives in the refrigerator in finishing brim, and olives still hanging in the barn in salt and olives in my tummy - yummy! I have olive curing directions everywhere. And Celeste is sure I will kill us with these olives. Well - if I have to go - the olives were and are great!

Just some of the pounds & pounds of olives I picked and cured.

The goats are growing fleeces. I didn't get them all sheared so the first warm week this winter - oh sure, I will 'think' about shearing, otherwise they are happy and warm in their fleeces. And it has been cold already this winter. Remember I am a Californian living 30 miles from the coast, so 28 is cold for me. I grew up in the San Joaquin Valley were cold was 31 and there was a grand total of 7 inches of rain a year. So far we have had 4 inches of rain with more to come this weekend. We should have about 24 inches total for a good rain year.

And now for the Graphics. I have a job helping a Wine grape grower in Cambria with labels, business cards and a website - and much thanks to my friend Lise' - who handed that job on to me. It has been a fun job. One day I did a photo shoot of the Syrah grapes being picked. Here are just a few of those grapes. What a pretty day and a fruitful vineyard.

The pickers haven't gotten to these vines yet,
but they will before the day is over.

And they taste good off the vine!

This load is ready to become Wine.

After the picking, (and for me, the photos were taken - got over 300 I like!) we got to take home a bottle and boy was it good! A 2007 bottle of "Syrah" from Boulder Ridge Wines in Cambria CA. Look for it! I will post where and when it can be bought in a later blog. Very good wine. Was a fun day, like taking a trip without leaving the county.

Well I think I will stop here - and hope to report back much sooner with the next blog. Stay warm, keep the fire going - eek - I better get to that job... bye!

rip, rip, rip... (should be done in private ...)

2010-10-30T17:05:00.000-07:00

before ripping it out

Rip, rip, rip goes the yarn. Rip, rip, goes the brown and orange and rust yarn. My new shawl project was not working out, the color scheme that I thought would work wasn't and I had a few knitting stitch goofs - even though I was 2 inches from the finish I wasn't happy. So after sleeping on the decision, then doing a few other projects, I decided to rip the whole thing out. The good part was, that from taking that time before ripping, I was able to look at the project with a clear mind. Before ripping, I took a photo of the project to help me remember were the goof with the color was and to not do that again, and the second thing was to rework my written pattern using the 'now large sampler' to write in the fixes. Then I rip rip ripped. The interesting thing was, that my fiber friends were having a tougher time then I was, they tried to get me to stop, and "oh, no one will ever see it, and why do you do this ripping, and how can you do this it is so pretty!" Boy was that hard to go though. I think next time I will rip in private somewhere. I have since started back on the project, and I find I am just as excited to work on it this time, as the first - so I think I will be finished quickly. I am doing the leaf lace pattern from the Lavish Lace book, and I am using three different colors of my dyed Pygora yarn. It is going to be pretty - rip - just kidding...

This past weekend was our Weavers retreat in Cambria Ca, which is about a hour + drive from my house. This is a camp type of retreat. We stay in cabins made of straw-bale construction. The beds are bunk beds which can sleep 10 to a cabin. There is indoor bathrooms/showers and heaters if needed. Each cabin is painted with a theme. I stayed in Marie Curie, I have some photos of the great murals painted on the walls. My roomies were wonderful, Karen and Roberta from my New Mexico trip, Kay, and Patti along with the other two from our local Weaver's guild and Silvia from the Ventura Guild. Our guild invites two other southern California guilds to this as well - which really gets the creative ideas flowing with the more the merrier at this retreat.

My nest (bed)

Roomie Kay

The cabins do stay a comfortable temperature and I don't think heaters have ever been needed in the 4 years I have gone to this retreat. This weekend started out with rain, then a sunny beautiful Saturday followed by rain on Sunday. After arriving Friday afternoon and then adding my stuff (creative tools) to my fiber sisters stuff, we opened some wine and toasted the success of the weekend. I was working on that shawl project that I talked about in the first part of this blog, others where spinning , some were knitting, others were weaving with beads and one was weaving with medal. The dinner bell rang which was great from the on site kitchen and Chef, then back to a lovely fireplace fire and projects, gabbing and sharing the night away.

Meal time

Saturday brought out the sun and some of us took a class from Hebe in leaf printing on tee shirts, using bleach. I did two shirts a green and a brown that I think turned out good. Then I got out my support spindles and spin the rest of the day away - oh - I did spot a huge pod of porpoises traveling south. That was cool, the camp has a great in ground large telescope that is set up for ocean viewing. We all took turns watching the porpoises leaping out of the water as they swam by.

Hebe our instructor

Hebe has us captivated

a bleached leaf

my two shirts, the bleach is drying, then I will rinse, dry, then use a sharpie pen to highlight the leaves.

One of Hebe's finished bags

Below are some sun seekers - 4 spinners and 1 knitter.

Lunch

Roberta & Karen

The dinner bell rang three times on this day with three more great meals from the kitchen - how wonderful to create all day, and have someone else feed and water us and clean the dishes up!

Karen's big project

Comfort workers

Sunday projects

Sunday was a short day, with breakfast, packing up and goodbyes.... This weekend was way to fast and way to fun. Here is a link to photos I took in 2006 - my first year at the Central Coast Weavers retreat. Weavers retreat 2006

Back to Oregon:

I would like to finish my Oregon trip which had one day left of the fiber Festival. I was the Judge for the Pygoras that day. It rained most of the day, so I had the experience of judging wet goats. They are normally puffy and fleecy and this time they were soggy and wet. We were in a covered arena, but the goats had to walk outdoors to get to this arena. But the show must go on, and it did. Elaine took some photos with my camera while I was judging, so I will share those with you here.

got to check out the fiber and what is under it - a goat!

cute little wether!

directing traffic...

Look at the pretty does, working toward Senior Champion here.

One of the winners! Sara showing a Hawk's Mountain Doe

The Diamond Buck winner is a Colored Angora

Darn I didn't get the Diamond Doe winner's photo, which was a PYGORA !

the next day I flew home - and back to the ranch. What a fun time I had in Oregon. Thanks all!

All for now - have a great week!

Day 3 in Oregon and other stuff...

2010-10-15T17:10:00.000-07:00

Already the second week in October and the weather is hot then cool then hot. But I am seeing some color start to show on a Maple tree that I planted and that makes me happy. I told you that I would show you the logo I finished last month. I do like it. It was a redo from another logo they had that needed a face lift. The owner of this logo will place it on their building, their website, and even on their door mats - they are really excited and I am happy they are happy with my job!

So lets go back to Oregon for my third Day. A recap - Thursday I flew in, Friday we figured stuff out and where stuff was, and now it is Saturday and the Festival truly begins. But first... there is... the Elevator.

September 25, Friday, another day of fun! Elaine was interested in seeing the elevator. I said, an elevator, what are you talking about - you want to see an elevator? She said she heard that Oregon City had one of the 4 outside big elevators in the world. So Fran, Elaine and I drove to the older part of Oregon City and went for a 130 foot elevator ride. What is going on here is that the town is split by a bluff so to get to that part of the city quickly, one takes an elevator ride. And this has been in service since the 20's. Of course the elevator itself has changed many time since then. It really was cool and so fast to ride up. From the top we could see the river and the city below. For more information on this, take this link. Oregon_City_Municipal_Elevator

water for the paper mill - I think

After our ride up and down the elevator, we took Hwy 99 which travels along the Willamette River to Canby were the fiber festival is held. We stopped to look at a paper mill and where the river is diverted to create power. Water going every direction. Then on to the show.

Some colored sheep showing, Martin is in the ball cap

After arriving at the festival I watched some of the sheep and my friend Martin Dally show his sheep. Leaving the sheep ring, I headed to the lawn were a sheep dog was moving some ducks around the working pen. Look at that dog, is he intense! I then checked out some bobbin lace knitters, wow, too many bobbins for my brain to keep track of. But I sure learned something from these really nice people that were demostration this art.

too many bobbins for me.

I am a Knitmore Girls groupie!

At noonish I played groupie by going to see the Knitmore girls. My favorite podcasters. That was fun and they had wonderful goody bags to give out. And while I was there I bought some super pretty cashmere and silk roving, like I don't have any... ha ha. knitmore girls Blog .

Then I headed to the sheep show ring and watched some of the angora show, and finally I checked out the vendor booths and then spindle spun with my friends Susan and Terry at their rainbow yarns booth. Terry was spinning some of the most beautiful rust red Pygora and silk roving, I had to have some of that also, dyed by her and Susan... ok so I didn't need more roving.

A color angora - pretty - wouldn't you love to spin that fleece!

A morning shot of the river across the street from our room.

Ok my friends, have a good week and talk with you next.

I had a great day even though I felt like I had a disease that the goat barn would get. But what it was is, when one is a goat judge at the show, one can not go in to the goat barn before the show - so I didn't get to hang out were I usually like to hang out - yep, in the barn. Anyway, today was a wonderfully warm sunny day, tomorrow I will be judging most of the day starting about 9 am so I am very glad to get to do all this sight seeing today. One more photo I like I took from the window on our 4th floor room at the hotel.

friends, dahlias, spinning, judging

2010-10-10T20:28:00.000-07:00

Sheep to Shawl 2010

This ended up by being the Winner!

Another busy week, I am looking forward to a slow week coming up, I hope. However this week had two fun things that I want to tell you about. Our Weaving guild had its second 'Sheep to Shawl' contest which took place in Shell Beach, on a bluff above the Ocean. The location is a park that hosts an Arts and Crafts event once a month, so we were there during one of their events. The day started out with overcast coastal skies. There was 6 people on each of the three teams; a carder person to card the wool to ready it for spinning, three spinners, spinning the carded wool and one weaver. The sixth person was a gofer, which was to talk to the public and tell them what was happening and to make sure all the team members got what they needed. They had 4 hours to finished the shawl and I think the winning team finished their shawl in about 2.5 hours. The finished shawls were all beautiful! The sun came out for a few hours, yet wasn't to hot. It was a super day, and I heard one person walk by, then stop to look at all that was happening and said. "Wow, this is the real deal". Great job Weavers!

This was also the week of AGventures of which I take some Pygora goats and present a hands on talk to 5, 4th grade classes. 20 minutes each with a 5 min break between. It is fast. And it was the first year of the about 6 years I have done this, that it rained the all day. My goats don't do wet well, so we were moved from our favorite grassy area to the barn. It worked out great. I talked about goat care, goat poop, what they 'do' eat, not cans, and shearing, spinning and knitting - wow. Sounds like a lot, but the kids did great and so did Margarit, Leah and Yt, the three does that I took. It was their first time at this event and they really did well - I was happy.

So, now I would like to get back to the Oregon trip to tell you about Day 2 which was a Friday, so here goes:

Day 1, ended with meeting up with my friend Fran Bishop from New York and my new friend Elaine Deegan from Rhode Island as their flights came in almost the same time as mine to Portland thanks to Fran's careful timing. We got our rental car, then drove down to Oregon City and our hotel room. We had a great dinner at our hotel's restaurant of which Chris Utterback from Canby Oregon joined us. After an early night, we were off to bed, the two from the east coast had been traveling since about 4am, they were tired and had a right to be!

Day 2 started with the fact, I didn't have to be anywhere until about 5:30 in the evening, which was when I was to judge the Pygora Sanction Fleece show. So I said, whatever, where ever, ok with me. The first thing was that my roomies need to do some goat stuff at the show, so I went to check on the timing of my judging for the Pygora fiber show and while there was invited to take a class on Alpaca fiber. I got to spin the two different types of Alpaca. There is Suri and Huacaya. Turns out I like spinning on my support spindle the huacaya alpaca, which to me was very similar to Pygora fiber. I met some nice ladies in this class and the instructor Barbara, who also has a mill to process Alpaca, was very knowledgeable about her topic.

After my class Chris met up with us and took us to a wonderful local dahlia farm with so many colors of dahlais. (Swan Island Dahlias) Big ones and little ones, giant ones and tiny one. And in the distance we were treated to a view of Mount Hood. WOW! To think that this dahlia farm was only a few miles from the fairgrounds and I never knew it, I could have been stopping here every year I have come to this show. This was a treat to see.

yummy lamb in pita with peppers

Then Chris, Elaine, Fran and I went to a restaurant were we had some great grub. Was really nice to set and visit and not have to rush back to goats that need cleaning up for a show.

Back at the festival, I started doing my wish. I sat down with some other ladies and started knitting and sharing fiber stories. One lady was a sheep raiser that was a spinner and a weaver. Another lived in a town house and had more fiber then she thought she should have.

Then finally it was time to go judge some fabulous Pygora fleeces. There was great entries of the three fiber types that make up the different Pygora types of fiber. And since all the boxes of fleece have no owners, ranch or goat's name on them, it is truly an anonymous judging. And I was very surprised when I found out that I had chosen one of Fran's goats fleeces for Reserve Grand Champion and she was very thrilled to learn about her win as well. Then off to dinner and back to our hotel room. We ate at the hotel again, really good food and the prices are good. Day 2 ended - very well. I will continue with this trip on the next blog.

Hey got those bucks allllllll sheared, finally, so now I need to finish tractor cleaning their pen and fix the hot-wire to keep them in. All the goats are acting frisky - it is that time of the year, bucks in rut, and does looking for bucks, and wethers just confused. My graphic Web work is going good - so life is good.

Canby Oregon - Day 1

2010-10-02T09:32:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am a week behind on my blog. So, lets pretend it is Thursday, Sept 23. Here goes:

2008- calling the tow truck north of Redding, CA

I am here, in Canby Oregon for the Flock and Fiber Festival. Exciting! I have shown at this event for many years and I love coming back each time. Two years have past since I was here last, yet I still remember a few things I said the last time I was here . These things I said were to myself and they were in the form of wishes. First I remember I wished to someday get to this show without my truck breaking down either coming or going. My truck seems to like to take a "tow truck" ride part of the way to or from Oregon - I will leave those adventures for another time. But, this year I as ask to judge the Pygora fleece show and Pygora goat show and so money was donated (thank you ALL!) and I was flown up. My first wish was granted. Pretty cool! And the second thing I wished is that sometime, I would get to sit in the spinning circle and spin with the other spinners at this event. And I will get to do that since I have a free day at the festival on Saturday - exciting! And that was wish two.

2005 Shasta KOA, Beth and I traveling with Pygoras

Flying on Alaska Air was pretty smooth getting here and I was totally enjoying the flight until I started thinking about all the wonderful things I have seen and smelled and tasted on the way up and back, and now I was missing them. One of the things I always look forward to was getting north of Sacramento. California is really different once one is above Sacramento. It is greener, there is river and waterways, and the mountains start getting closer to the highway. And the people just seem nicer and less in a hurry. The town of Shasta and our first night stop at Mount Shasta's KOA. They have always been goat freindly. I remember the first time I stayed there I was with Beth Tompkins and we had about 8 goats with us. We took the goats out for a little walk and the owner of the KOA came out and took pictures of us walking the goats. The goats loved it. The air was cool, almost cold, and the leaves were starting to change to fall colors. Driving into the park there was ripe black berries on the vines. I always felt our trip was finally happening when I get there.

2008 lunch time stop, with Beth and Alicia and Goats

The next day, we would see wonderful views of Mount Shasta as we drove. The town of Weed would be next and the high mountains and cattle in tall grasses were all part of the scenery. Then we would come into Oregon and start the big up and down passes. Driving up a grade then down a steep mountain and the trees of madrones, big leaf maples, and oak would change to green pines. My next stop I look forward to is Sunny Valley, and the Graves Creek covered bridge for our lunch stop. Not far off the hwy is this covered bridge that is a perfect place to stop for eating lunch out of the camper. I usually sit behind the stock trailer and leave the back door open and the goats get air with out the trailer moving and bumping from the highway. Then it is time to walk over to the bridge, cross it and the see if there is any black berries still ready to eat on the otherside. I always forget to bring a bowl - one time I will have to remember to do that. There is a grave marker were a little girl is burried. She died durring the time of a wagon train coming to this area durring the great westward Oregon trail journey.

Graves Creek bridge, would love this crossing my river!

This area of Sunny Valley is quite the historical place. There is even a musum here which has wonderful information about the Applegate trail. I always take whoever is trailing with me to see this musum. Then onward we go - heading to Albany Oregon and our next night. The Albany camp ground was a sheep field at one time. The owner said his dad tryed to get his sheep and goats to eat all the berry bushes up and never was able to do it. So he said to let my goats out for a walk, and don't worry if they want to eat anything, have at it. Nice guy. He also would tell us that this was the time that the vultures would start migrating. Migrating - I didn't know they did that! I have a pine tree of them year round, I have never see them leave. Yet Albany has vultures flying though and this means it is fall to those that live here. The next morning we finish our last hour of the drive to Canby. These are just some of the things I missed by flying.

I will continue with my Canby story in the next blog.

Alicia found me in the berries - yum!

I finshed the logo job before I left, yea! I and the client are happy - which is very good. So now on to getting that website for a local yarn shop further along, and I have a wine label to work on as well. I did get two of the 6 bucks sheared with the angora buck being one of them. He is the hardest one, because of all the fleece he has, and he is done. 38 more to shear.

until next time - enjoy - Fall is here...

racing out the door with cell phone, lap top, and grabbing the phone book as well,

2010-09-18T11:00:00.000-07:00

wish we had sunflowers this year like we did in 2008

Now why would I need a phonebook if I have all that other "new technology" stuff in hand? Well, I just need to thumb through the pages to look up information. It is like, how will I know what I am looking for if I can't start with one of the pages and work my way to the answer? Or, if I am not were there is internet the computer can't help me. And I don't want to pay extra for the cell phone to call information and have them get me the number. I would rather - grab the phonebook then later, not remember that I stashed it under my seat in the car - right? Oh well, I take so much stuff with me when I run out the door, it would be nice to quietly walk out the door and leave with out thinking I am the eye of the hurricane.

This week has been crazy. I am trying to finish up some deadlines so I can leave next week without so much "guilt" sitting on my shoulders. I am almost finished with the logo job and I will post it here when I am done, I really am liking it. And the new yarn show in Atascadero, Ranch Dog Knitting, I just sent out their on-line newsletter tonight - but I need to get more of their website done soon soon soon... I had a photo shoot with the Central Coast Weavers guild on Tuesday. I shoot the photos of some of the products that will be sold at our November Sale. Then I create postcard and the posters, which need to be sent to the print before I can leave on Wednesday. And I have a meeting for another job just before I leave this coming Tuesday. Could things be picking up in the graphic world? Dare I hope?

My big 2007 winner, Moose, at OFFF, Oregon.

So, were am I going this coming Wednesday. I am going to Canby Oregon to the Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival, which I have shown my Pygora goats at, I think, a total of 6 years. It is 900 miles one way from here. This year, those putting on the show collected money to fly me up since I will bet the Pygora Goat Judge. I will be judging the Pygora shows, two of them and a "All other" fiber goat show as well. I am so looking forward to this trip. I plan on taking my Support Spindle and joining the spinning circle on Saturday and spinning. Sunday I will be judging alllllll day, but I have all day Saturday to check out the festival, visit with my fiber sisters, and maybe learn something. Friday night I will judge the Pygora fiber show. All these boxes will have Pygora fleeces in them, and I will work my way though them looking for the best and then the best of the best. I know at least one person will be very happy with my work. The Winner! I hope I do good.

My spindles and Pygora roving

What I haven't done on my to do list. I haven't sheared those bucks yet. I plan on doing it this Sunday - I can I can I can. I haven't worked on cleaning up the garden, and I haven't worked with my horses. I will try to do better.

What I am liking: the weather has been perfect, I have been walking in the early evenings and it is soo very nice, and I finished knitting a burnt orange beaded shawl. And a friend bought a natural colored shawl and sent it to England to a family member. YA! I hope she likes it.
Until next time - enjoy the last days of summer, Fall starts Sept 23 and it is a full moon as well! Wonder what that means, maybe plant the fall garden that day?

How come, what you think you will do, it isn't what gets done?

2010-09-06T13:54:00.001-07:00

Today is Labor Day 2010. How can it be that we have flown thru so much of this year already? Today, I had plans to work on those graphic jobs for my Imprint Design business, shear the billy goats and fix some goat houses - and maybe get to the coast to see my Mom. But what I am doing is sitting outside with my laptop under a nice group of valley oak trees in my yard, guarding the baby chicks and their mom while Jim races to the lumber store to get a smaller gage chicken wire to lace their pen with to keep them inside until they get bigger. The last two weeks all has been fine with these chicks having the run of the farm. But the last three days, we have lost one chick a day for three days in a row, down to 13 chicks. And no one is telling who did it. I am thinking it is ravens, yet could it be a tree squirrel? Well - I am watching and will continue watching as I write this blog.

Tex, my Angora buck before shearing fall of 2007

I did get the 6 Pygora bucks moved from their field into the smaller working pens and have used a pour-on to de-lice them. I really didn't look to see if they had any lice, thought I would just hit them up and then give them a good 48 hours for the lice to leave before shearing. However, I think I used the stuff I didn't like last year. I have noticed that there is two different types of pour on. One that will make the lice leave and one that kills the lice and leaves die bodies that then get into the fleece and stay all the way thought the mill process of washing, carding and spinning. So, I will have to deal with that if that is the case. I plan on getting a move on shearing this week.

2007 at Santa Margarita Lake

Riding my horses, hasn't worked so far, but yesterday I helped with the lunches at a dressage horse show. I don't think I have ever been to a dressage horse show other then seeing it on tv and my friend Ann needed help so off I went. The advanced freeform with music class was good, but the collection of that big beautiful bay horse was not to my idea of a happy horse. But later I saw a darling Half-linger that did a great job with its pattern and wasn't over collected to my taste, and I thought - hey - maybe Spice and I could do that some day! It all starts with getting my foot into the saddle and making the time - Right?

I did list a couple roving products on my Etsy store. And one mohair roving sold, Yea! Still need to list a lot more, but got a start on it. Link to my Etsy Store, click here. And I did sell a natural colored Pygora knitting shawl this week to a friend - thank you my Cheri! - all goes to feeding those goats.

So I need to get about 5 more beads from the bead store in Pismo - Beads Beads Beads is its name, love that store, so I can finish another shawl. In the mean time, I should get working on those hobby horses, but I just don't want to. What I want is to find a knitting pattern that will be good for the mohair cranberry yarn that I have spun up and dyed from Tex- my angora buck. So far, I have swatched 4 different patterns and I don't like them - so I feel I am wasting time looking. But this is another - what I want to do, and not what I need to do. But this cranberry yarn is sooo pretty.

Gosh I am getting hungry - this chick guard job is getting tough, hope the husband gets here soon, so he can take his turn guarding, wonder if I can get the chicks into the house so I can fix lunch. Until next week... don't count your chick sales until they leave the farm and money is in your hand :-)

Updated - 4pm today - we have the chicks and the hen locked in their now very secure pen and are they mad! Chirp chirp chirping away. Now two ravens are high in the oak tree above them, I really think it was them that like chicks for dinner each day. So far we still have 13(now) mad chicks locked up - hope we can practice "tough love" and keep them in until they are bigger or have a chick sitter while they are out. Now, back to that list of stuff I wanted to do today.

Fall, 16 chicks, 4-H, Horse lesson - welcome!

2010-09-01T22:06:00.000-07:00

Poppy pods

I realize we have a few more weeks of summer before the start of fall, yet to me, the end of August and the start of September is the end of summer and the start of fall. To prolong my summer, I have been sleeping outside in my tent! I don't look forward to the short days which are already hitting us, so I thought if I could stay outside all night, then I would be enjoying the outside air of summer twice as long during a 24 hour time period. And if I could have a say in the matter of sunlight, I would make sure that the sun would not set until 8:30 pm up until September 15, then the day light could get shorter until October 31. This way our gardens would get those extra daylight hours to finish out their growing. This year we had so many cool days that the tomatoes are just sitting there waiting for warm days. And my goats are already trying to put on winter coats and yet I know we will have a heat spell before that happens and they will start to felt right on their bodies.

Notice the goat legs, as they watch the chicks

This morning, I pushed out of my tent and raced over to the dog crate where our Momma hen and her 16 babies - were chirping away - they wanted out know, the sun was up, time to get going with the day!! They are in the crate to keep them safe from the wild night critters. But during the day they are everywhere, just everywhere. Here is a link to their video I have posted which is about just one of their days. They are a bold fun group. 16 baby chicks video link here.

This morning I went to a friend's home to work with her and her horse on ground behavior. Our goal was to make sure that her horse is listening to her and she is paying attention to her horse's subtle signs on where her attention is focused. We had a good lesson and they both had improved from the week before. Not all lessons with your horse need to be on your horse's back. And this was a case with this lesson.

The day did get a bit warm, yet our oak trees keep us cooler then the neighbors that don't have these wonderful trees. Tonight is the first local 4-H meeting of the school year. Last year was my first year as a 4-H Leader, I am the Spinning Leader. We are using support spindles to make yarn. I had 2 students and 2 moms last year. This year I will be advertising for more students. So tonight I start that campaign. Last year we did have fun. We spun, we dyed roving and yarns and we made our own spindles from clay. And skeins of yarn where entered the fair. So now that I have 1 year under my belt, I am ready for more students. I hope - I hope.

Since this is the beginning of the month I need to make a list of things I need to do, so here they are:

Pygora and silk roving for spinning

1. Shear the goats, their fall shearing
2. Clean all pens and make sure the goat houses are ready for wet weather
3. Clear out the garden and flower beds from over grown plants
4. Get fiber products listed with Etsy
5. Send about 4 pounds of Pygora fiber to the mill for processing.
6. Get working on two hobby horses that will be for sale this November
7. Ride my Horses - fall is a wonderful time to ride!!

Now for the graphics, I have a new web job with a new local Yarn shop. This job has been exciting to work on. It helps to have a web job with products that I love as well. I am really looking forward to putting together this site. And I have a logo job as well. This is a auto repair company of which the owner is redoing his logo. And it is going well also. So, I will be busy with these two graphic jobs this week.
Have a great week,
Jill