River Oaks Farm & Studio

Help! I'm Dyeing (and picking and carding and sorting) my Wool

2009-11-04T16:00:00.000-06:00

These are the Bluefaced Leicester/Tencel blend batts I decided to dye yesterday. I love the tencel addition, it gives the BFL fiber even more luster.

For the past few days I've been going through my washed natural colored Bluefaced Leicester fleeces picking out the curliest, most lustrous locks for an order. They looked so good I decided to make up several 1 ounce bags for future sales.

As long as I was at it, I dyed some grey Bluefaced leicester in the microwave too...

I like that! I want to do more. So now I need more dye and time to pick and sort through my white BFL fleeces too. I'll package the locks and send the rest off to be processed into roving or batts.

These dyed BFL/Tencel batts will be used for cobweb scarves. I've found the blend spins up into a very lustrous, springy yarn.

In sheep-related news, the mules have left the premises! The photo above includes a BFL who wouldn't leave the catch pen, of course we didn't let her leave. :-) The mules will have a wonderful home with a new shepherdess who lives only a few miles from me. They will be used for market lamb production, just as they should be. It feels SO good for me to find them a good home instead of sending them off the the auction and not knowing what their fate would be. They are such beautiful ewes - Peppy will join them next weekend for breeding.

And Shachah continues to be a wonderful addition to our place. The ewes are accepting him pretty well now. My husband is really liking him, too. As you can see in the photo above, he likes to lounge in the ewes' hoop house now. The other day I got to see him in action. The wind was blowing hard and the ewes were grazing the falling leaves to the north of the hoop house where Shachah was snoozing away. I was a little disappointed to see him sleeping and them off grazing, but as I watched, the wind blew down a small tree near the ewes. The noise and the falling tree sent the whole flock running back toward the barn. Before I knew it, Shachah was right there, sauntering about, sniffing the air, looking around. He was perfectly calm and seeing that no danger was present he simply laid down where the ewes had been grazing. Slowly they ventured back to the vicinity and started grazing again. :-)

He barks at night, sometimes a lot, sometimes just a little. The other night a fox was bugging him. And last night it was the coyotes way off by the river. Stan went out and called his name and he quieted right down.

I was told today that it's best for us to acknowledge his barking since he is an only dog. That will give him a feeling of having some back up so he won't have to bark as long. Those LGDs really are smart!

He never barks at the neighbors' little dog, he's great with our cats and our chickens. Who could ask for more?

River Oaks Greyson

2009-10-30T21:14:00.001-05:00

I finally got a photo of the button scurred ram lamb I plan to use on a few Shetlands this fall. I'm only going to breed a 3-4 Shetland ewes this year. I've still got quite a few sheep here and I'm hesitant to bring more lives into being than we have the resources to care for on our little bit of pasture.

His name WAS going to be Sebastian, but for some reason I kept calling his half brother that name and it was starting to stick. Then one day I heard about Florida Senator Alan Grayson on the news and I thought, Greyson would be a great name for a grey ram out of Kimberwood Harrison and Bramble Cordelia. So I registered him as River Oaks Greyson and then I found out that Juliann has a ram named Greyson too. Oops!

Anyway, there he is above at age 6 months...

And this is his back view from August... You can see that he's Ag, but so far his fleece is holding that beautiful grey color. I hope it keeps on holding!

Below is a fleece photo taken the other day with a flash...

And below is his fleece in natural lighting, you can see the blue-grey color in this one, but it's too blurry to see the crimp... Both photos are rump area fleece.

I love that his fleece is soft and crimpy, but has some length to it also. His twin sister is an Ag Gulmoget. Her fleece is much lighter and much longer.

My plan is to put him in with River Oaks Lana, a black gulmoget who may carry moorit. I also plan to put in River Oaks Hannah and Leonie, both brown factored ewes. I'm still debating on whether to put River Oaks Hattie in there too. She's got a turned ankle and I always feel bad for her when she's very pregnant, but she always produces such nice lambs!

Well, it's off to bed for me, I'm heading out in the morning for a mini-fiber-retreat-weekend with other Shetland ladies. We plan to make felted slippers, spin, knit, eat, and drink wine. It should be lots of fun!

Flock Changes & 2009 Breeding Plans

2009-10-19T19:51:00.003-05:00

Well things have changed a lot in the past 10 days or so!

As I went through my paperwork prior to my annual SFCP inspection last week, I came across photos and information on LOTS of sheep that have come and gone over the years. There were so many special sheep that I had to let go. That got me started thinking I should concentrate more on fiber and a less on lamb production. So I decided to get out of the third tier market lamb portion of my flock and just stick with the purebred Shetlands and BFLs. Fortunately I found a new home for my Shetland Mules and Ile de France/Dorset ram. They will be close by and I will be able to keep tabs on their production and answer any questions from their new owner.

The mules will be leaving soon and the Ile de France/Dorset left yesterday to breed a few Mules at another farm. You can see he was all ready for that assignment! When he returns in mid-November, he'll go straight to his new owner where the girls will be all settled in and ready for him.

I almost traded away my 2 year old natural colored BFL ram, Beechtree Granite, but at the last minute decided to hang on to him and trade our natural colored ram lamb, Devlyn instead.

I didn't want to let Granite go, his fleece is looking so good this time of year (I think you can click to biggify his fleece photo), and he's so easy to handle-- at least he WAS until today - he got loose twice today in his quest for the ewes.

Devlyn will get two ewes at his new home, I'm sure he can handle that. And he may even get to serve as clean up ram too. Lucky Devlyn!
Our new LGD, Shachah, is now in with the ewes. He has full run of the paddocks and is doing great. I'm loving having a BIG dog here so far.

Shachah started barking last night about 3:30 a.m. So do I have to get up and check out what's going on when ever he barks at night? Of course I did get up, but as soon as I turned on the outside light, he quit barking. Not sure if that was a good thing or not.

So my 2009 breeding plans for the BFLs have changed a bit. Granite will get Lanora and Rhyn again this year. He was used on them in 2007 and gave us two nice ewe lambs, we'll hope for that again. :-)

Ward Harwell will get Granite's two yearling daughters. Leora at left and Rhaya below.
I'll post more about my Shetland breeding group when I have some better photos of Greyson, the button scurred ram lamb I'll be using.

Getting to know you

2009-10-14T20:29:00.000-05:00

We've been getting to know Shachah, inlcuding how to spell his name correctly. :-)
He seems to like me, he wags his tail and wants me to pet him. I figured out yesterday that he needs to be let out of the chain link kennel to relieve himself, doesn't want to soil his kennel. So now he gets the run of the backyard a few times a day. This way he's getting to know the smell of our kitties and Ozzie.
He's getting more used to Ozzie too. No more barking or growling there. I haven't let them meet without a fence in between them yet, but I think it might be time to try pretty soon.
Last night I suddenly thought about our neighbor's super cute little King Cavilier cross, Kia. She comes over fairly often. She doesn't bother anything so we don't mind her visiting. Well she came over this afternoon just after I let Shachah out of his kennel. I got to her first and petted her to show Shachah that she was okay. He didn't even bark, he just sniffed her. Now that he knows her, I'm pretty sure he won't hurt her. But she does have a tendency to be bossy. She'd better watch her step with the big guy.

He hasn't shown any interest in the chickens so far. But I've kept all our pets on the outside of the fence he's in until I get more comfortable with him.

I am anxious to let him in with the sheep. Maybe I'll walk him through their paddock and see how they react to him. He walks very well on a leash.

We got ourselves a Guard Dog!

2009-10-12T18:14:00.000-05:00

We picked up Shacaw this afternoon. He's a 5 year old Great Pyr/Akbash guard dog who needed a new home because his owners are moving out of state at the end of month. He's so big and seems so calm, just having him laying near the sheep pen gives me a sense of security.

As soon as we let him out of the dog crate, he focused right in on the sheep and they focused in on him...

Of course they're in separate pens for now. After Shacaw accepts us and Ozzie, we'll see how he does with the sheep. So far he's very laid back. Mostly just laying around sniffing the breeze.

And since it's been snowing all day, it's nice that he's decided to use the small calf hut we put in there for him.

Getting ready for the S-Word

2009-10-11T08:01:00.001-05:00

I got so much done Friday! The forecast of SNOW for Saturday morning was enough to get me off my butt and outside getting things done for fall.

First thing was to move the Shetland geese out of the backyard. I just love how they still consider me their leader and they follow me closely wherever I go. I love the sound of their feet paddling along behind me. After they explored the hostas for a while, I took them out of the gate and down the steep hill to introduce them to the pond...

We haven't gone down to the pond much this year and the path was a bit treacherous, but they seemed very eager to get down there. Once there, they looked and looked, and nibbled some grasses, but they didn't dare leave my side to go in the water. So back up we went.

I got them inside the chain link fence with the adult rams. One of ganders immediately grabbed a hold of Peppy our Ile de France ram, but it didn't phase Peppy a bit. He just wanted a sniff, as did Granite and Socks. The poor geese were pretty scared . But they have to learn to live with other animals, so I left them to work things out on their own.

Next I cleaned out my garden which was hopelessly lost in the freeze the night before. The ewes were happy to get the last of the cucumbers and zucchini. I picked the low hanging apples, they are nice and red and bigger than usual this year. I will be canning applesauce this week.

As I was feeding the ewes later, I heard the low nickering sound of a romantic ram. Oh my gosh, my ram lambs were still sharing a fenceline with the ewes! I just hope there hasn't been any "activity" going on between them already. That would me some early lambs next winter. So my next big job was to move their fence about 50 yards away.

This is Ward Harwell on the left and our sweet little Doulan on the right. Harwell will all four of our BFL ewes. Notice our high class fencing. LOL. Twine connections make rearranging fencelines an easy thing for me to do. I took the hog panels from around the now defunct garden and tied them up to finish off the ram lamb's new fence. After all these years of raising sheep, we've figured out lots of ways to create pens and shelters. It's been a creative endeavor.

Finally after supper I got to knit some more on my Brioche stitch watch cap. I love knitting up that hat from the directions in Elizabeth Zimmermann's "Knitting Without Tears". It doesn't take long at all.

You can see a grey watch cap in the back right of this photo. It was knitted from Sheepy Hollow Rachel's wool. The musket cable hat was done with Sheepy Hollow Beau's wool. I love the natural Shetland colors!

The white one I was working on in the photo is some thick springy yarn, I must remember to ALWAYS label my yarns! I'm not sure if this is Babydoll Southdown, Ile de France, or a BFL/cormo cross whose fleece I traded for some Shetland. I only had 3 ounce spun up, you can see the little ball on the left, but it was so lightweight and super springy that it was plenty to finish the hat with a 2" brim. If you haven't tried the Brioche stitch (AKA the Prime Rib stitch), it's very easy and a super stretchy rib. For this hat you want to use a thick yarn and big needles, it's only 36 stitches and one of the few EZ patterns knit flat and then sewn.

In the center of the photo is some luscious white yarn I spun from my Shetland Mule combed top. I think that will make a great scarf.

Saturday morning we woke to a covering of snow and there is another 6 inches forecast for tonight and tomorrow.

Shetland Mules for Sale or TRADE

2009-10-09T13:49:00.001-05:00

I still need to cut back on my sheep numbers here. I'd like to breed for solid-sided polled gulmoget Shetlands, so I will retain all twelve of my Shetlands. And I can't keep up with the demand for white BFL fleece, so the BFLs will be staying too.
Unfortunately, I just don't have pasture here to keep 30 sheep year round.
That means the Shetland mules will be the ones to go. As much as I hate to let them go, I certainly don't want to send them the sales barn as culls.

They are priced at $100 each, after breeding season exposure to an Ile de France/Dorest cross ram, they will be priced at $125 each. There are three two-year-olds and three one-year-olds.

All are white and all are friendly with fabulously crimpy fleece.

Beautiful girls with good lambing histories. Two of the yearlings have not lambed.

I am willing to be creative and would consider giving them to a good home in return for 50% of their 2010 lamb crop (ram lambs only) and 50% of their 2010 fleeces.

Our flock is healthy, and these girls are up to date on hoof trimming, and vaccinations (CDT). They can be wormed prior to leaving the farm. Let me know if you're interested.

Also, we have a natural colored BFL ram lamb for sale ($200) and three crossbred BFL/Shetland beautiful friendly ewe lambs ($100).

Guard Dog Possibility - photos added

2009-10-06T09:14:00.001-05:00

Okay, am I crazy or too much of a worry wart? There is a 1/2 Great Pyrenees, 1/2 Akbash guard dog available near me.

He's 5 years old, has been raised with sheep. He's good with sheep, children, cats, other farm animals. He's excellent with newborn lambs, and never was aggressive to sheep.

I went to meet him the other day and he's very mellow...

and very BIG.

The only things holding me back from snapping him up are:
1.) his history of arthritis in a back leg (he can't jump fences anymore)
2.) my lack of previous experience with any kind of guard dog.
and
3.) my husband doesn't think we need a guard dog since we've never had any losses in the 8 years we've had sheep here.

#1 makes me nervous about possible vet bills in the future. The previous owners have given him glucosamine pills in the past, but now just an aspirin when he's stiff and sore. They say it's been a long time since he's needed any aspirin. They say having a shelter for him in the coldest months of the year keeps in better shape. They say he can run, but when I saw him he was very laid back. I saw him walk and he wasn't limping at all.

#2 is most compelling, I'm not really a dog person. I'm not as stern as I need to be to keep a dog submissive. I've read that these breeds are very smart and need someone who can keep them in line as they can have a mind of their own.

I say #3 is pure luck in combination with the Australian Shepherd marking the area. We had a coyote within 50 feet of our barn right before lambing in 2008 and a cougar was spotted just north of us (about 3/4 mile) right before lambing this past spring. There are bears in the woods adjacent to our paddocks. And our neighbors have a penchant for taking in and caring for other people's dogs for months on end.

What you guys think? I need to make up my mind or let someone else take him.

Yes, I know....

2009-09-30T20:32:00.001-05:00

I've been neglecting the blog lately. It's just that my card reader hasn't worked for weeks and I can't upload photos to my hard drive. I ordered a replacement 9-in-1 card reader card almost TWO weeks ago. It was supposed to be here in 3-4 days - but now I found out it won't even get shipped out until Oct. 3rd. Grrrrrr!
I've already replaced that card reader once before, I'm not happy about doing it again.

Things have been really busy here with the census work, the Sticks & Stones Art event this past weekend, and trying to keep up with the garden - there are TOMATOES everywhere. We had frost warnings last night, so I picked all the green peppers and tomatoes and brought in the flowering plants that I will winter over.

I love the Brandywine tomatoes because they are so big, my mom says they're like boxing gloves, and they keep producing right up to the frost. It will take weeks for all the little green tomoatoes to ripen indoors, so we'll have plenty for BLT's and salads well into November.

I canned tomato juice and spaghetti sauce this year. My food processor broke, so I couldn't make my annual batch of zucchini relish. I'm still picking raspberries every day -- gotta love those ever-bearing plants! I just freeze them so I can make my jam closer to Christmas time.

This morning I subbed for pre-school, then ran over to the local auction and got a tray-type sheep feeder. This one doesn't have a hay rack. I didn't go high enough to get the one with a hay rack. Darn!

I've created a sales blog, www.riveroakssales.blogspot.com If you get a chance and need some sheep with friendly personalities and wonderful fleece, be sure to check it out. I'm especially hoping to find homes for Opal and Lavender, both are beautiful BFL cross ewe lambs.

Woo-hoo!

2009-09-11T07:14:00.002-05:00

I got called back to work on the U.S. Census again! It will be so nice to make some decent money this fall. Last spring was pretty hectic trying to work full time on the census while lambing and dealing with physical problems, but this fall should be a piece of cake. This assignment is only supposed to last about 8 weeks, so the weather shouldn't be an issue.

The first thing I'm going to do is send in my 2009 fleeces for processing. That will clear out a big section of my wool room. And now I'm thinking I can afford to book a flight out to the Black Sheep Gathering for June 2010. I'm hoping to make it a family trip after seeing the beautiful photos of the Oregon coastline on Tammy's blog. A trip out to Oregon and then down to San Francisco would be a great way to celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary.

Other good news is that I got another one of those wooden sheep feeders from the auction. Actually a friend bought it for me for only $10 this time! I'll bet that person doesn't bring any more to sell at that price. Anyway, now Stan only has to make me two more. :-)

1954 Sheep Movie

2009-09-08T23:02:00.002-05:00

Someone posted this link on the Sheep Producer's Forum today. It's to a classic 1954 sheep video on you-tube. I thought those of you raising sheep might be interested in checking out the way Suffolks, Southdowns, and Hamps looked 55 years ago. Now I don't feel so bad about the plump ones in my flock. :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRxRoLs8hdg

Auction Sheep Feeder/Fleece shots

2009-09-06T11:50:00.008-05:00

The card reader went out on my computer so I can't download my photos easily until I replace it.I had my photos put on a CD the other day so now I can share them. I'll start off with a foggy morning shot of the Shetland geese welcoming the day. I swear one of these days, with a good wind, they will be able to take off! Notice the 2' fence that contains them for now. :-)
And here's the new sheep feeder I got at the local auction almost 2 weeks ago. It was brand new and only cost me $24.50 (with the sales tax). I want Stan to make me three more!It can easily feed 8 sheep at once and it really saves on wasted hay. Also, it lessens the amount of hay on the sheep's backs. But the downside is their neck wool gets dirtier than when feeding in the buckets on the ground.

And here's a better photo of Devlyn our natural colored BFL ram lamb who is for sale.
I was checking fleeces on my two Shetland ram lambs the other morning and was delighted to find that the one I thought was black, out of River Oaks Leonie and Kimberwood Harrison, is actually shaela. Sorry these photos are so blurry, but at least you can see the color change.
And my button scurred Ag grey ram lamb, Sebastian (out of Bramble Cordelia and Kimberwood Harrison) is a very beautiful blue grey color under his dark tips. I hope he stays that color as an adult. Some Ag greys do stay grey (rather than lighten to almost white) and that's what I've been striving for in my flock. I plan to use Sebastian on 2-3 ewes this fall. Sheepy Hollow Rachel, now owned by Sabrina, is an Ag grey with lovely grey fleece in adulthood.
Side fleece above, and rump shot below.And this is his twin sister, Camille's fleece. She's an Ag grey gulmoget.
I love it! And I love her - everyone who comes over wants to take her home.She's very petite and so soft and so friendly. I can never get a good shot of her because she's always right next to me. This photo doesn't do her justice.I have to work tonight, it will be a long one, but I hope everyone has a wonderful Labor Day tomorrow!

Sheep for Sale- more photos added

2009-08-27T08:59:00.009-05:00

Okay, I'm going to bite the bullet and make some downsizing decisions here!
The following sheep are for sale:
River Oaks Hannah, dark Moorit, F2 Holly, 3 years old. Nice little tail, good back end as shown with her daughter below. Single coated, crimpy fleece, carries spots and modified genes. $250
Twin ewe lambs, out of River Oaks Hattie (Hannah's twin sister) and Kimberwood Harrison (polled black gulmoget). These girls are petite, they should carry polled genetics, heavy Holly and Roban Dillon lines, not registered yet, buyer can choose names, I've been calling them Freya and Freida.One twin (Freya) is a solid sided black gulmoget (sale pending) and Freida, pictured above as a lamb in May, is black ($200). They may carry modified genes. Single coated, fine, crimpy fleece on both.River Oaks Bo, F3 Minder, moorit yearling ram out of Windswept Boggart and River Oaks Cora. Nice wide horns, great tail and nice fleece. Carries modified and spotting genetics. The photo above is from March, and the one below was taken in May, his horns have grown quite a bit since then. Priced at $200 or BO.
Twin yearling Shetland Mule ewes, white $125 each.
Two year old Shetland Mule, white, $125.
Registered Bluefaced Leicester ram lamb, natural colored, very fine fleece, excellent conformation. $200 pictured below as a lamb in May.To good home, River Oaks Hattie. Hattie has a bad ankle, not hereditary. She's the black twin sister of Hannah, F2 Holly, three years old.

We also have crossbred lambs for sale, some 3/4 BFL's and one 3/4 Shetland ewe lamb. Priced at $75 - 100 each. Ewe lambs and intact ram lambs available.

Some Cool things to share

2009-08-25T08:06:00.006-05:00

This post is a compilation of links you might be interested in, but I had to include these beautiful poppies that my friend Sue grew in composted sheep manure that she and her husband got from us this spring. At three years old, the compost is really nice, like a lightweight potting soil. They put one of those boxed flower seed carpets on it and viola! I'm going to try that myself next year.
The first ever worldwide Felt United Day is October 3rd, 2009. You can check out the new website and think about you might want to do in your area: http://www.feltunited.com/
I'm thinking about doing something with the local school kids. It should be fun.

There is a nice pair of Lives tock Guardian dogs available near me. I can't buy them myself, but maybe some one out there is in need of a good pair of guard dogs?

Third, a friend of mine has this beautiful Schacht Matchless spinning wheel for sale. It's a single treadle wheel with scotch tension, double drive, or bobbin lead options. I had set it up for double drive in these photos. It's in great condition, spins like a dream, very quiet and smooth. It comes with three extra bobbins (for a total of four bobbins) and a lazy kate, $450. Email Deb (woolyewe @ youbetnet dot com) if you're interested.
Fourth, Lisa has been dyeing up some beautiful skeins of her BFL yarn recently and it reminded me of these cool socks by Tein Chui. I made some a few years ago and they were lots of fun.

Hummingbird Rescue

2009-08-12T07:39:00.005-05:00

A picture's worth a thousand words! In the background you can see the Shetland geese and my little garden. In my hand is the hummingbird I found exhausted on the floor of my barn the other day.
It's so cool to hold a hummingbird in your hand! They are so tiny. My son took photos of this one next to a ruler, but they were too blurry to share.

This isn't the first time I've rescued a hummingbird. I've found them in our garage in the same condition. The poor things fly into buildings through the open doors and then can't find their way out. It doesn't take long for them to use up all their energy trying to exit through a closed window.
When I find them I mix up some corn syrup and water to administer with an eye dropper. No eye dropper on hand these days, so I used an old plastic straw. This one didn't really drink much, but in about an hour, she was able to fly away.

Here she is almost ready to take off. I knew she was starting to feel better when her feet starting gripping my hand again and her eyes stayed open longer. But she spent another 10-15 minutes recuperating after this photo was taken. Then I put her onto the plant and turned to grab the camera for one last photo. When I looked back she was gone. I hope she's doing okay.

Home Again and all is well!

2009-08-04T07:48:00.007-05:00

It's good to be home again. The sheep are all doing well, the goslings are starting to honk like grown up geese, and the garden is growing well with all the rain that has come through lately. I'm so glad to have my husband take care of the animals so I can get away sometimes. The one thing he doesn't do is water plants - oh well, my peace lily has come back to life with a good drink.

I had a great time at the Midwest Felting Symposium, it was absolutely perfect. Thanks to grant funding, I was able to take five full days of classes this year. *

I was happy with the projects I made, but I still have lots of work to get some of them finished. Every night when I got back to the hotel, I would put them on the couch and photograph them. here is a shot from my last night at the hotel..Day one was a dyed, felted, stitched, and over-dyed shibori scarf...Day two was several felted paper transfer resist dyed samplers...Day three was a wool painting...wet and needle felted.Day four was a needle felted German Shepherd...it was a small class, so we had a whole day of SINCO's undivided attention.
This was the only day we didn't have to do the strenuous process of felting and fulling the wool. But it was still a lot of work getting our dogs looking somewhat like real German Shepherds. I still need to finish the paws on mine.
Day five was a felted embroidered bracelet which didn't get embroidered before it was time to go. There will be time for that later.
I had a very nice hotel room, complete with a sink, fridge and microwave. I was even able to connect my old laptop to the internet.
Thankfully, I met Tricia and Skeeter at the hotel during breakfast the first morning. Since I had gone all alone, I was glad to see them and other felters at the same hotel. Tricia and Skeeter were so nice to let me tag along to dinner with them too. Here we are in the felted jewelry class with instructor, Annemie Koenen, on the right. Annemie was such a patient and fun teacher. Everyone was so friendly and willing to share their knowledge of felting. I wish I could have cloned myself and taken more classes! Susan McFarland did a great job of organizing. The food was really good and the whole event was so much fun. I'll have to save my pennies to go again next year!

*This activity was funded by a grant from The McKnight Foundation through the East Central Arts Council/East Central Regional Development Commission.

Midwest Felting Symposium- here I come!*

2009-07-27T08:29:00.009-05:00

This has been such a busy summer -- I can't believe it's time for me to head over to Madison, WI for the Midwest Felting Symposium already!

Back on Feb. 1st, I applied for a grant from the East Central Arts Council to help defray the costs of my trip. It seemed like such a long way off. In March the application was approved and now here I go!*

I will be studying with Chad Alice Hagen, Andrea Graham, SINCO, and Annemie Koenen of the Netherlands. I'll be making dyed felt scarves, a wool painting, a needle felted German Shepherd and some embellished felt jewelry. What fun!

I'm bringing my old laptop. I hope to be able to keep up with my email and the blog. But that hasn't always worked out in the past. So if you don't hear from me for a week or so, you'll know why.
I'm bringing two wool paintings for the exhibit, "Portrait of Lena" (above) and "Tranquility"(below).
The portrait of Lena (sorry for the poor quality photos, but at least you get an idea of the piece) was done in wet felting only. Tranquility was a combination of wet felting and needle felting.
When I get on the road tomorrow, my first stop will be to see my oldest son's new house! He bought it on June 26th, but I've been so busy I haven't gotten a chance to stop in and see the inside yet. We drove by a few days before he closed on it and I took this quick photo. Too bad it's so far away from our place. But both our boys wanted to move to the twin cities rather than stay in Mora.

If anyone gets a chance to swing by the Symposium this week, look for me. The symposium is open to the public for shopping, the felting exhibit, and mini make-and-take sessions.

*This activity is funded by a grant from The McKnight Foundation through the East Central Arts Council/East Central Regional Development Commission.

Growing lamb photos

2009-07-24T08:16:00.008-05:00

I had a whole day at home yesterday. I spent some time with my flock in the afternoon. It was a beautiful July afternoon, I should have chopped thistles in the pasture or cleaned out the chicken pen, but I chose to take some photos of the lambs and ewes instead. :-)
Above is a photo of River Oaks Sebastian, Ag grey ram lamb at age 12 weeks. He's 50% UK (F2 Minder, F3 and F4 Dillon, and F5 Holly).
Definitely a half poll. I'm hoping his horns stay small like this. I'd like to use him on my Holly ewe line, RO Hannah, RO Leonie, and maybe his older half sister RO Lana.Above is a shot of his great little tail,I hope you can see it, the photo is rather dark. I've included another shot of it below with RO Freida's tail shot.

Here's my favorite ewe lamb, and Sebastian's twin sister, Camille. What a sweetie. Bramble Cordelia really gave me some nice lamb this year. I'm planning to retire her now.

I'm also planning to retire River Oaks Hattie, she gave me these two ewe lambs, Freida in front and Freya in back. Notice the funny coloring on Freida's back leg. At first I thought is was just dust or dirt, but it hasn't gone away. You can see it in the photo below too. I wonder if Freida may be modified.Here's shot of Freya showing how solid sided she is...
This is RO Leonie's black ram lamb - as yet unnamed. His horns are starting to grow at age 10.5 weeks. But I'm pretty sure he's a half poll too.
He's got a bit longer tail that I hope he will grow into...if he does, he will be for sale.
Last but not least, here's a shot of our two BFL ram lambs, Devlyn on the left and Doulan on the right. Devlyn is for sale too.

Shetland Goslings at 7 Weeks - video

2009-07-23T21:00:00.003-05:00

I can't believe how the Shetland goslings have grown. They are only seven weeks old. Here they are enjoying the fresh water in their pool this afternoon.

Catching Up again

2009-07-19T07:44:00.007-05:00

Whew! It's been a busy few weeks! I got the arts grant submitted on the 15th and did the Majestic Pines Art Festival in Nisswa, MN the 17 & 18th. I was so busy last week trying to get everything in order for both projects. Now I'll just have to wait and see how the grant proposal goes.

And as far as the arts festival, I should have stayed closer to home and done the Pine City Arts Fest instead. The weather was cold with some misty rain (thankfully I had an indoor booth), and sales weren't the best. Oh well, live and learn. Stan and I had a great time meeting the other artists in the festival. There were some really interesting artists up there! I made a few trades which helped too. The sponsoring group had a great reception on Friday evening for the artists with appetizers and wine. I was glad that Stan came with me for this one, those wine glasses were bigger than I realized! It didn't help matters that I was so tired after getting only four hours of sleep the night before.

The lambs have been weaned here - all except the youngest two. This was the first year I took ewe lambs away too. The noise was awful for a couple days and nights, but things eventually died down. The lambs look fat and sassy on the good hay they're getting (I took all the sheep off pasture because of our lack of rain). The ewes seem to be doing fine without the lambs. If I had time, this would be my opportunity to collect milk for sheep milk soap.

We wormed the lambs and weighed a few when we separated them from the ewes. The oldest 3/4 BFL lambs (twins) weighed 62-65 lbs at 93 days. Devlyn, the natural colored BFL ram lamb weighed about the same (89 days). We didn't get a chance to weigh them all, just a few -- using the bathroom scale method. Opal, a Shetland mule twin ewe weighed 40 lbs at 80 days.

The Shetland goslings are out of the garage and into a chain link pen in the back yard. They have a section of the back yard for grazing and their own pool. We had to keep them off the sidewalk.. so far they are pretty quiet compared to other breeds of geese we've had.

And here's a shot of Camille, our Ag gulmoget ewe lamb. She has stolen my heart. What a sweet petite little lamb she is.And I love her fleece...
I will try to get some decent photos of our ram lamb's scurs, they are still quite small. I'm starting to be hopeful about these boys as polled breeding stock.

This photo was taken on July 6th - you can click to biggify it. Their horns are still about the same. The Ag grey lamb (River Oaks Sebastion, out of Bramble Cordelia and Kimberwood Harrison) is on the left and the black one (still thinking on a name) is on the right. The black one's right horn is about 1/2" tall, so his could still take off and grow I suppose.

Fireworks and Hay

2009-07-05T21:53:00.006-05:00

We went to see the fireworks in Braham, MN on the 4th of July.
I tried to take some photos, but as usual, didn't read any directions beforehand, I just tried to wing it. I should have changed the settings to a higher resolution.The one below reminds me of a flower...
Toward the end of the display, they started coming two or three at a time...

And here's another familiar July scene:
Last week we unloaded the wagon and loaded our truck and trailer, then unloaded the truck and trailer stacked about 340 bales of hay. It left us both quite stiff and sore, but as usual we were hoping to get it all under cover before any rain came. We hired the neighbor boy to help us out since our own two grown boys were in the cities.
Stan pulled one of the big wagons home from the land (14 miles), but even with it only half full, the it was swaying all over the road. It was pretty scary, so we had to do things the hard way. We got two full wagon loads for our share of the crop. It's been so dry here I'm already feeding it.

The past two years we've had big squares made. They are so much easier, requiring very little of us. We still have 6 big squares left from last year, which I think will still be good. So now I just need to get about 100 bales of good quality hay for lambing next spring and get my flock down to around 20 sheep. Then we should be all set!

Hay is cut! Lamb updates

2009-06-30T09:34:00.007-05:00

Our hay is cut and drying. We've had hot humid weather, but now when our hay is supposed to be drying out, the weather has turned unseasonably cool and the clouds won't leave. Oh well, at least the sheep are more comfortable.

Don't these two look sweet? It's Dot and Derra, they are two-year-old Shetland Mules. I didn't get much interest in my Shetland mule sale package, so I've decided to keep the adult mules and Peppy the Ile de France ram. I'll go with the market lamb plan for 2010. I'll just have to cut back the flock somewhere else...
Speaking of Peppy, there he is in the photo above. He's such a cutie with that big fuzzie head, and he's very good natured. But he's raring to go for breeding season already.
The other day while I was at work, my wether and my new BFL ram lamb (Ward Harwell in the photo above), broke out of their pen and got in with the rams. The ram collection includes 2 year old BFL (Granite), yearling horned Shetland ram (Bo), and Peppy the yearling Ile de France. Fortunately, when I found them there wasn't much blood (the little there was came from Peppy's head) and they all seem to be getting along fine. That's a relief because it's one less pen to feed and water - at least until I wean the lambs.

Our two Shetland ram lambs are showing some growth of their "chocolate chip" horns. I'm see it more in Leonie and Bo's black lamb. He's only 3.5 weeks old and his chips are starting to fatten and get a little taller, he may be modified...I'll keep watching to see how he develops.

This is a photo of Cordelia and her Ag grey ram lamb. He's nine weeks old now and his chips are smaller than Leonie's ram lamb. I love his great little tail and nice straight back end. I know those horns could take off at any time, so I'm watching and keeping my fingers crossed on this guy. Here's another shot of his head - not sure when I took it though.I really wanted some grey in my flock again and this guy could be used on my F2 & F3 Holly ewes.

That said, I love Cordelia's Ag gulmoget girl too, She's definitely staying. Her name is Camille and she's so friendly. I love her intermediate fleece. Her tail is looking very nice now, it's smaller than in this photo taken a while back. It's developed that distinctive Shetland kink where the wool ends and the hair begins.
And Hanah's gulmoget ewe lamb Cleo is also staying...She's super friendly. Don't know why she's got her back feet so close together in this photo, but at least you can see her coloring. Below is a shot of her fleece under the light area on her side - she doesn't have the characteristic side dusting, hers is more like shaela underneath.
And probably both of Hattie's twins, Freya and Frieda will be staying. Above is a photo of Freya, taken with a flash the other night. I'm feeding Timothy hay from last year, so she's wearing some. She's a solid sided black gulmoget at this time. And Frieda is solid black.

Oh heck, I think all the the Shetland ewe lambs are staying this year! Above is a shot of Cleo and Freya's tails. It was taken a couple weeks ago, Freya (right) is smaller than Cleo (left).

And here is a shot of the Shetland goslings from the other evening. They are growing in their feathers now. Oh yes and they get the run of our fenced in backyard. I've fenced off my garden and we keep the garage door closed so they don't hang out too much in there.

Okay, now I have to buckle down and get a newsletter and grant proposal written for the art group and get my booth inventory made. I need to mulch the garden too and of course the hay crop will need to be brought home and stacked n the barn...Arghhh, there's just not enough time in the day!

Just What I DON'T Need!

2009-06-23T08:14:00.003-05:00

Summer has finally arrived here in east central Minnesota. The temperature was 94 yesterday with high humidity. This weather is hard on the sheep, the Shetlands pant, but the BFL's really seem to suffer. I put up a fan in the pole building and later found Rhyn and Devlyn laying directly in front of it.

Anyway, it was hot and humid. The sheep were not happy. I opened the paddock nearest the pond for them to graze. A couple times in the afternoon I noticed the whole flock making a mad dash for the pole barn. It seemed odd that they would run like that in this hot weather. But I didn't think too much about it.

Around 7:30 I went out to make sure they had water and give them a little supplemental hay. As I brought hay out to the hoop house I saw not one, not two, but THREE fox (foxes?) IN and around my fence. No wonder the sheep were getting spooked all day! The mother fox was outside the fenceline heading into the woods when I saw her. The two kits were inside the fencing. One was only about 75 feet from me as I yelled and swung my arms at him to get him out of there. He was small enough to slip right through three fences to get back to the pond.

I had suspected there was a mother fox on the edge of the pond. She has been rather bold around the chicken pen, but I've only lost one hen so far. I'll need to keep my Shetland goslings under lock and key from now on.

Ozzie does a good job of chasing them off. But the mother will lead him one way while the kits go another way. We watched as she did that last night. We could hear the kits calling out in the woods but they didn't come out in the open again.

So I decided to put up electronet around the sacrifice paddock near the pole barn. I just can't have my sheep being chased by fox kits in this kind of weather and I worry about the Shetland lambs, they aren't that big, especially the three-week-old ewe lamb. It was so hot and sticky and the mosquitoes were out as I tried to set electronet up under all the trees, etc. - what a pain that was! I'm afraid it's going to be a long HOT summer if we don't get the fox family under control... I may need a llama.

Shetland Goslings and Lamb Update

2009-06-21T08:21:00.004-05:00

The Shetland goslings are excellent foragers already. I took a video of them, but I have to edit it down before I can upload it. So for now, here's the latest photo of them...When I let them out of their pen they follow me all around. Last night they hissed at our dog Ozzie when he came too close. They are growing up so fast. The little guy I had to hobble is on the right in the photo above. He's still pretty small compared to the others, but perfectly healthy. They are starting to get feathers in their tails.

And here's Mabeline with her mule lambs. They aren't our largest crossbred lambs, but they are a nice pair. Mabeline is going to have next year off from lambing.All our crossbred lambs are for sale. We have four ewes and four ram lambs. We have plenty of lamb customers for the ram lambs. I plan to wean them and get them on good quality hay so they will be plenty big by October or November. I'd say the two oldest, Derra's ram lambs, are around 50 pounds already.

Here's Lanora and her ram lamb, Doulan. He has a strange top line and will not be registered. He's such a sweet ram lamb though. And his fleece is so soft.

And we finally defrosted the freezer last week. This prompted us to make 25 pounds of bratwurst from our frozen lamb trimmings.
I know they look gross here, but I just twisted them into links and cut them apart. We've been grilling them. I forgot that the casings give me indigestion.

Happy Father's Day everyone. Oh, that's right, this is our 34th wedding anniversary too. Wow, that really makes me feel old. We had a little wedding in our own living room with a justice of the peace, (located from the phone book) on this day back in 1975...

Honest Scrap

2009-06-17T21:52:00.004-05:00

Well, Sabrina bestowed the Honest Scrap award to this blog, so I guess I can play along with 10 honest statements since some people actually enjoy reading that kind of stuff.

I will skip the part that requires naming seven other award recipient blogs.

Okay, here goes:

#1 - I was born the fifth of eight children. Being in the middle like that, I always have been able to fly under the radar and pretty much make my way quietly through life without being too noticeable.

#2 - I have never really cared for the warm colors like yellow, orange, and red. I'm more of a blue, green, purple fan.

#3 - I have been eating lots of spinach lately. And I found a volunteer spinach plant in the garden! :-)

#4 - I got the test results back from my recent surgery and they are NORMAL. Yeah!

#5 - I've made friends with two of my three gulmoget ewe lambs so far. Camille (the Ag gullie) has the nicest fleece! It's going to be the longer and wavy type like her mom's, and it's oh so soft! I am definitely keeping her. Her 10 year old mother, Bramble Cordelia, will be retired or culled this summer.

#6. River Oaks Hattie will be culled this summer too. She has given me some of the best lambs ever born here. But she has a bum foot that isn't going to get better. I plan to keep at least one of her daughters, Leonie (a modified moorit from 2008), Freya (black gulmoget from 2009) or Freida (black from 2009).

#7. The Shetland goslings are the greatest little troopers! They quickly caught on how to go up and down the two steps to the garage to get outside. They stay VERY close to me whenever I let them out of their pen. I hear the pitter-patter of their webbed feet and watch them tumble over each other to stay close to me. They have such tiny little wings! They are good foragers and have pretty strong beaks already. I'll try to post a video in a later entry.

#8. I remembered why I shouldn't hold the goslings on my lap and let them snuggle into the folds of my shirt. It was something warm and wet and very gross that reminded me.

#9. I have to limit my time on the computer so I can get more things done around here.

#10. I am having a great time at this stage of my life!