Tuesday, May 15, 2012

We have a new baby!  Wednesday we traveled to Baker OR to look at a little border collie X.  He is so sweet and so cute.  Since our older border died a few weeks ago we have missed her so much and feel we need another dog.  We like to have an indoor dog as well as an outdoor dog, both to guard the property.  His name was Bernie but I think we have renamed him Dexter.  He responds very well to Dex and always comes when called.  After our Great Pyr, who is very aloof, he seems so smart and quick.  At only 3-5 months old, he is going to be a great asset here.

I took some alpaca fiber over to a farm to get it 'blown' out in her big tumbler.  It really did a nice job getting the VM out along with a lot of the shorter fibers.  Now I can either send it to the mill or wash and card it myself.  I don't have a de-hairing machine and its too tedious by hand, so it probably will end up at the mill.

I'm spinning some of the fiber my good friend Judi from Serano Alpacas sent me a couple weeks ago.  It is just incredibly soft.  I'm just about finished with four oz of Jasper/Alex, which is a dark burnished auburn.  I may just make something for myself with this!

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Rain rain rain rain ... and cold.  We've seen snow in the low hills around here, none at our farm but its cold enough.   73° by Tuesday however.  Sounds really good to me!

We had our garden tilled this week.  Then more rain, so I haven't been able to get over there and finish the weeding part.  I have seeds to go in asap ... corn, onions, cherry tomatoes, eggplant, sweet basil, cukes and zucchini.  And I'm still babying my indigo in the starter tray in the house.   Hopefully it will warm up a bit and stay warm.

We've got wildflowers to plant, sweet pea and an old fashioned mixture ... just finding a spot for these beauties is a problem.  They are weeds for the most part and sometimes hard to get rid of in the following years if they are in the wrong spot.

We went down to the river last week to see how high it was with all the rain and snow melt.  We've not seen it this high before.  Usually you can just see it below the road.  It looks level with it from where we were.  What a beautiful sky!

A good friend sent me some of her alpaca for spinning.  It is from two of her animals that are both the most beautiful color ... dark brown / auburn.  I've wanted to spin this color for so long.  It spins like butter.  I'm thinking it will be a nice scarf, maybe a 5/2 rayon warp in black, using the alpaca for the weft.  Let me know if any of you want to buy some and I can give you her number.

Also the autumn-colored scarf on the loom is about 1/3 complete.  I finished enough for one of the three scarves yesterday.  With such a long warp, it may be a while.  But I'm anxious to keep at it, they will be soft and colorful and I may enter one of them in the fair in August this year.

Just realized I forgot to post a picture of the indigo plants.  This was taken outside last week when the weather was so nice.  Those little guys sure liked the sun.  They look like they grew several inches in the two days I set them out there.  They love warm soil, so it will be a couple more weeks before I transplant them.  We have had snow the first part of July a couple of times in years gone past.  Maybe Memorial Day will be a good planting time.