Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Fiber Fotos

Okay, first and foremost is the little black doeling who is putting on her beige cashmere coat and the grey buckling who is looking quite dapper.

Next is Valentino, the little wether lamb, who has a medium gray wool which transitions to white. He is very soft and quite the loverboy. His sire, Andes, is stretching so he can keep accurate tabs on who is in heat now, coming into heat, or might be thinking of coming into heat in the next few months!










Tuesday, November 4, 2008

October 30th -- A Date to Remember

After chasing Flicker the cashmere doe around for a week or two to no avail, Hidaway Andes Mint finally landed a date with Little Eagle Eve -- hey, at least she's a sheep! She is his favorite gal overall anyway. Perhaps rams prefer blondes with pink lipstick and black eyeliner??? So we're looking at a lambing date of 3/27/2009 +/-.

Southeastern Animal Fiber Festival (SAFF) was much more interesting this year after caring for the animals and getting to know the fleeces better. Took a drop spindling class from Lorien Alpacas and also a rug hooking class from Sara-Beth. Picked up a couple of books on felting (goes much faster than knitting/crocheting) and a needlefelting tool with 4-needles. Also went to Earthguild after and purchased hand carders and a couple of drop spindles. The clerks had a frightened look on their face as Jeff and I chased our vivacious (loud) acrobatic twins around the shop which included plenty of sharp pointy objects of desire. They get tired and unreasonably jazzed up in the late afternoon. Neither of us had much time to browse so we just compared notes after leaving.

Our twin boys are 21 months now and seem to be playing on their own a bit more now which allows me to get a few small things done. Like skirting and washing fleeces. As I was picking out manure tags, I began to realize that Jeff would be coming home for dinner soon and the image of me engrossed in such flora and fauna might not be all that appealing. Luckily I finished up about 10 minutes before he rolled in.

I've washed Eve's fleece which was already quite matted and somewhat felty feeling to begin with. It will need a lot of work -- I'm pulling out groups of locks or individual locks that I can get loose. Once it's carded, it's fairly nice. Hopefully she will be better next year.

I've washed 4 ounce samples of Andes and Kayla's fleeces. Kayla's was so fluffy that you could probably spin it very nicely right off her back. Andes had the least grease of them all and seems to be the softest. Eve by far was the dirtiest and greasiest but perhaps the longest staple.

As for the goats, the gray buckling is growing quite large and has so much cashmere he's beginning to look like a sheep! He is so very friendly, too. The white buckling was more robust at birth so we expected him to keep that edge. Husband and I are still at odds about which one to keep as the future sire. I favor gray and he favors white. The all white goats do look so elegant up on the mountain. The little black doeling is really starting to put on the fuzz now and is beginning to look like a brown teddy bear. I'll have to take some pictures soon.