Friday, March 22, 2013

My hand dyed pygora scarf is coming along, slowly but nicely.  The pink in the picture is where it was space dyed and it turns out like planned stripes.   The yarn doesn't feel quite as soft as I'd like, even though I used the black rayon accent yarn.  I'm really hoping it will soften up a lot after its washed.  But I always say that.  And it does.

I'm only able to weave about an hour a day, maybe three days per week.  So many other things to do now that spring is right around the corner.  Also a trip into town takes us nearly all day with errands.  Then we have to eat, of course.  We've discovered some really great places to eat this year.  Not all are restaurants, but more like the Costco food court.  They have got to have the very best pizza!  And hot dogs!  And berry parfaits.  Guess I'm hungry.

A received a gift of a mangle iron from a friend today.  No pix yet, I don't have it in my studio but it is an older model and works good.  This will save a lot of time when making scarves so I don't have to keep running back to the house to iron, then back to the studio.  We will be able to use it on woven scarves after washing them and also for silk scarves that we've hand painted.  I usually iron the silk ones twice, once to set the paint and the last time to iron out the wrinkles.

My daughter and I got our new chicken coop assembled.  I took this picture before I got the roof on but its very cute and the same color as our house and studio.  :-)

It said it was large enough for four chickens, but I'm thinking two, possibly three.  Two nesting boxes in the rear, the small section with the little door is for roosting,  the rest of it is open all underneath so they don't feel so much like they are locked up.  We put it in the fenced garden and I hope to let them out to run around but we'll need to put some chicken wire along the bottom so they can't get through those large squares in the field fence.  Right now we don't have any chickens yet and we covered it up with a tarp, since we are still having snow / rain / wind / sun / gropple (those little tiny snow balls that fall like rain).  No roosters this year so no baby chicks either.  We've got too many hawks that swoop down to eat our chicks.  A couple years ago we lost every one of our hens.  I guess those silly roosters (seven!) were too fast for the hawks because they never caught any of them unfortunately.  And the roosters wake us up at 3:30am every morning.  Waaay too early for me.  But we will have lots and lots of eggs.

Hopefully our egg storage will work out.  Don't wash off the bloom from the eggs, just the poopy if there is any.  Then rub them with mineral oil and they should keep a long time without refrigeration.  We shall see, I'll let you know.

3 comments:

Sue W. said...

Your blog entry sounds like Spring. We are still getting snow here tonight, but I have hopes that it is the last of the season. I hope. I'm SO ready for some spring weather. Unfortunately for me - the snow is hard on me (walking) and heat is really really bad for me. So, here in the Midwest, I get a couple weeks in the spring and a couple weeks in the fall that I can really get out of the house. I feel personally affronted that winter is claiming some of my precious time.
I hope it works out for you two with the chickens and that you can foil the hawks this time. Wouldn't you know the roosters would survive?
Isn't it strange that when you should have more time because you are not working, still, somehow, there is not enough time? I have the same problem. All I do is sit here, day after day, yet somehow I don't get to complete all the tasks I set for myself. Of course, always falling asleep in my chair (MS fatigue is very common) doesn't help. Hopefully, nice weather is right around the corner.

Sheryl at WovenDreamsFarm said...

Sue, here's hoping all this snow etc will mean a cooler and longer summer. I also get frustrated with old-age syndrome not being able to do a full day's work without having to rest in between. Not like the old days. Our nights are still cold (19 deg) but our days are creeping up into the 60's by this weekend. Lovin' it!

Take care of yourself. Hope all is well there.

Sue W. said...

"cooler and longer summer"...from your lips to God's ear!