We’re Here

Sheeps & Peeps3 Comments

Saturday afternoon was spent breaking up the breeding groups and moving all the ewes back to the barn paddock.  Despite the snow and the bitterly cold wind, it went much better than we expected.  Usually we put up a moving lane to facilitate the moving process, but we didn’t this time because of the weather.  Instead we opened the paddocks one at a time and led each ram back to the barn.  All the ladies followed their guy… success!  We kept our old guy, Liam, and young Fury at the barn with the ewes.  Hopefully that will work out as well as it did last year with Strider.
And so, with a hearty round of the song “We’re all together again… We’re here… We’re here” everyone is settling in nicely.

Hosanna

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Hosanna, another of the lovely ‘twelves’, is coming around the end of the feeder to see if another bale of hay is on its way.  She isn’t disappointed, as it is feeding time.  After a couple of mild days, temperatures are back in the single digits this morning. and there’s a couple inches of new snow. We’re hoping to get the breeding groups all back to the barn today.  Hope it warms up a little 🙂

Joining Madge at The View From Right Here for Weekly Top Shot

In the Fiber Room

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Have you seen Brooklyn Tweed’s Winter 14 Look Book?  We really have our eye on the beautiful ‘Kelpie’ – a ‘modern triangular Hap Shawl’.  How pretty is this?

And while it is very lovely in Brooklyn Tweed’s fingering weight Loft, what really has us going is the thought of knitting it while replacing ‘Stormcloud’ with Poseidon’s millspun and the contrasting colors with some of our Border Leicester cross millspun that we’ve naturally-dyed.

What do you think of this combination?  It’s (left to right) Poseidon, Goldenrod, Hibiscus, Jewelweed, Hibiscus2 and Goldenrod2.  We just might have to take the leap and buy that pattern today.

Dog Tales

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The severe cold snap in the weather proved a challenge in making sure all were sheltered from the life threatening wind chills. All had good access to shelter but for the always – on – the – job guardian dogs….Sampson and Belladonna. Sam uses his doghouse frequently but Bella frankly refuses shelter, preferring to, at best, bed down in the downslope trees.
Thus, we decided to build a windbreak for Bella which was quickly claimed by Sam..and progressed into a two chamber shelter. ..then a tarped 2 chamber.
Finally as night fell and double digit temperatures kept falling with the wind gusts rising…and noone was using the architectural masterpiece..we decided to attempt bringing them in the barn for the night. Sam made himself right at home. Bella definitely did not appreciate being in, paced the floor, and escaped thru the gate to play ‘catch me if you can’ for a bit but both the barn and the dogs survived the adventurous night.

Pippen

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We’ve been contemplating keeping Pippen, one of Hera’s triplets, as a breeding ram.

We’ve kept an eye on his progress and he has an excellent health record.  We’ve admired his wool during the summer as the triplets took their supplemental bottles.
 

Still we weren’t quite prepared, when skirting this weekend to find that the extremely beautiful fleece we were working on turned out to be Pippen’s.  While we aren’t quite sure that we are happy with the conformation of his rear legs.  We sure are excited about the quality of his fleece.