Quick Catch Up

I'm sure it's a cliché to say that I'm not sure where the last six weeks has gone.  I can look at my calendar and see events, one after the other.

There was the rest of Le Tour de Fleece, during which I spun everyday except for the two rest days and the last two days during which I had the flu and was trying to keep the entire world from spinning while I moaned on the couch.   I did spin for several days after to make up for the missing days, and have a lot to show for my efforts.

There was a mountain retreat to Forest City, filled with girlfriends, laughter, excellent food and, of course, more fiber and spinning. 

Riley was exhausted by it all.

At roughly 5000' and far away from light pollution, I felt compelled to use the stargazing app on my iTouch to identify many of the constellations.  I really like this application and have continued to use it at home to learn more about the night sky.

Then there was the always inspiring Nevada County Fair.  The local fiber guild hosts the woolen and woven entries at the fair each year, breaking up the duties amongst ourselves.  I didn't enter anything this year, having suffered an overdose of procrastination when it was time to register exhibits, but I did help receive all of the beautiful entries and then volunteered three nights of the fair to demonstrate spinning.  In other words, it's another excuse to hang out with girlfriends, gab and spin.  There may also have been some Lazy Dog ice cream involved, but I'm not telling.

Jocelyn also taught Mardi, Barbara Sue and I how to use the inkle looms, and now I'm thinking about what wonderful projects I might make. 

On the home front we've been doing winter prep.  It seems far away now, but we only have half a cord of wood, which means we need to keep harvesting.  We'll go through at least two cords, more if it's a nasty/early/cold winter.  We're also doing a few weatherizing improvements and getting fall vegetables transplanted into the garden.  I snugged starts of broccoli, red cabbage, brussel sprouts and parsley into the garden this morning, where the larger summer plants will help shade the new plants while they get their root systems established.

More babies!

 In total we hatched out seven baby chicks between the two mommas. I wasn’t sure what the babies were going to look like, given that we had four varieties of chickens involved, but it looks as though we have two Ameraucanas, one gold-laced, three silver-laced and possibly one blue-laced Wyandotte types.  It’s great to see that they take after the individual varieties so strongly even though they are mixed parentage.

This week also yielded more goat babies!  This was Pi’s first pregnancy, and her birth was over almost before it even began.  I got a quick call that she was in labor, and six minutes later a second call that we already had one baby.  By the time I made it home from work twenty minutes later, everything was over and we had two cute little bucklings.  

We do not need these boys for breeding stock, so they will be wethered (neutered) and sold as pets/brushers.  They’re super cute with elfin ears.  Being second (?) generation mini-manchas, they’ll stay a manageable size, about 70 lbs when full grown. I prefer the minis because I can handle them, even with my torn sacrum ligament, and they don’t overwhelm my nieces and nephews.  We'll try again next year for some doelings out of Pi.

Last week kicked off the Tour de Fleece/Tour de France.  I’m part of Team Spinning Spinderellas.  Organized by Steph, our goal is simply to spin everyday the riders are riding.  Most days I’m spinning in the evening while the family watches tv.  I started with this delicious batt from Rowen.

Yesterday was the monthly spinning Saturday hosted by our fiber guild, and several of the team members joined in the air conditioned meeting room to share what they’ve done so far and get in a solid three hours of spinning.  Alas, I forgot my camera, but Birdsong posted a pic of the pile of finished yarns on the floor.  I started spinning a roving by Steph, "Gonna Nail That Catfish to a Tree."

More spinning today at Tin Thimble’s spinning Sunday!

Of course, between the heat and the spinning, some things like gardening have fallen to the wayside, at least for the moment.

Chickies!!

This post is two weeks old, will get a newer post up soon!  So much more to share.

We have some new additions to our laying flock. Two of our hens became broody, and so we set them up in a couple of dog crates for some quiet solitude, and three weeks later, voila!  We have baby chicks.  So far we have three from the first hen, Smoke, and one from the second hen, Ash, though I'm not certain that Ash is done hatching babies just yet as she started 3-4 days later than her sister Smoke.

For those of you not in the know, hens do not need a rooster present to lay eggs, but those eggs are not fertilized.  Because we do have a rooster, the eggs we collect each evening have the potential for hatching a baby chick, given the right conditions.  Those can be man-made, but a broody chicken is the easiest way to go.  Once a hen has accumulated a nest of eggs, if she is broody she will sit on the nest, incubating the eggs and rolling them over.  Upon hatching, she will begin to teach the chicks how to hunt and peck at food, even mashing up larger food to feed to the babies.  Unlike other baby birds, they are up and following mama within a day of hatching.

We have four varieties of chickens in our flock.  Our rooster is a gold-laced Wyandotte.  Among the hens I have silver-laced and blue-laced Wyandottes and Ameraucanas.  This means that all of the chicks are mixed varieties, though they are exhibiting  certain plumage patterns already.  One looks Ameraucana, one looks blue-laced, and two look silver-laced.  It'll be interesting to see what they look like as they grow up.

We finally named the doelings Mary, Bridget and Bess, three great queens from the British Isles.  Bess is the large, pale doeling.  Bridget is the mostly black doeling and Mary is the calico, which somehow in our minds most closely resembles plaid.  They are friendly and playful, loving to run the length of the pasture in the cool mornings.

Of course, all of the animals, plants too for that matter, are telling me quite clearly that the world is heating up outside.  The plants are wilty, and all of the animals are taking it easy in the shade.  Everyone has access to lots of water, and when it really heats up we'll set up misters to help keep everyone comfortable.

Speaking of plants, I'm trying out a new system for tying up tomatoes this year.  Using a simple A-frame made of 1x3 lumber and a piece of electrical conduit, each tomato is tied with a piece of twine around it's base and up to the conduit.  Every couple of days I simply twist leader (main stem) around the twine.  That's it.  No finding scissors to cut bits of string, or oops, the stake fell over.  Just another twist around the twine.  All the tomatoes are tied up in just a few minutes, and they look fabulous.

I'd heard about this method, and need to give kudos to this humorous youtube video for the clear explanation about the twisting.

The beans are finally sprouted and climbing up their poles.  You can even see the painted lady heirloom beginning to show it's beautiful red flowers.

Triplets!

Our first dairy goat, Maharani, delivered triplets girls Thursday evening.  Just hours after putting the final touches on the new birthing pen, her mucous plug broke, and we were officially on baby watch.  This being Maharani's second birth, it didn't take things long to progress.  I thought I had plenty of time to run to the feed store on the corner, but when I came back, it was to immediately set stuff down, wash my hands, roll up my sleeves and jump into delivery mode.

Her water broke just as I entered the pen, and then we went straight into hard contractions.  My husband said something was coming out, but it didn't look to be a hoof or head.  We changed positions, and I determined it was a front elbow poking out.  I looked at my husband, said something like, "Here goes nothing," and gently pushed the elbow back inside.  This is the first time I've tried to turn a baby, and let me just say, it was amazing, cool and freaky all at the same time.  Things were progressing too quickly to do more than rotate the leg back against the body of the baby and let it come out in a modified birth position.  Goat baby 1!!  Goat baby 2 popped out in the standard diving position twenty seconds later.  Goat baby 3 quickly followed, toosh-end first and still encased in her amniotic sac.  We ripped open the sac and cleared the mucous away from her mouth, and she mewled too.  

Aha!!  Three goat babies!  You never really know for sure how many babies you'll get from a goat.  Twins are typical, but it's just as common to get singles or triplets.  After last year's single boy from Dharma, I was hoping for at least one girl, and twin girls would even better.  I'm not sure I can share just how elated we were at delivering three (count 'em, three!) girls. 

Everbody was up and nursing withing twenty minutes.

Riley really wanted to see.  He's not quite sure about the need for any more babies...

So, we've got the light brown with white undersides, the black and white, and the calico.  Everyone needs names.  Suggestions?  I'd love to have some kind of theme...

The light at the end of the tunnel...

For awhile I was sure the light at the end of the tunnel was the proverbial oncoming train, or even worse, that the light was cut due to budget constraints, but I'm finally there.  The end of the tunnel.  The 2010 Nevada County Grown Farm Guide is off to the printer, the 20th anniversary land trust event was a success, and everything wrapped up last Saturday with the spring native plant sale. Whew, regular programming can now resume. 

In case I hadn't said, I've been volunteering with the local chapter of the native plant society as a way to hone up on my plant id skills.  So Saturday found me cashiering at the biennial plant sale. Riley helped too.  You can see him here checking out a selection of native plants.

Here's what I can home with: monkey flower 'terra cotta', a hot pink penstemon, coral bells 'red bells',a couple of bleeding hearts and blue-eyed grass. And then we picked up some 6-pack plants at Eisley's, including parsley, celery, chard, some cosmos and strawberries.  Here's a wheelbarrow full of the day's haul.

Last Sunday started out with planning the expansion of the goat pens in preparation for the new arrivals expected at the end of the month, testing out the drip irrigation system and getting supplies. Sadly, when one has been working continuously for 5 weeks, the weeds have an opportunity to take over the unmulched portions of the perennial garden, so before I could really plant anything I commenced with the weeding. 

Riley liked weeding. We removed quantities of annual grasses, chickweed and a non-native mallow, as well as the ever present blackberry sprouts. The vegetable portion of the yard is ready for planting, having been thoroughly sheet mulched in the fall  with straw, hay, and goat poop from the goat pen. 

And then I sprained my ankle.  Kind of put a stop to my gardening plans for the rest of the week.  Troy did a great job of stepping up (since I literally couldn't) and continued weeding out the blackberries and installing a fence to keep the chickens out of the garden.  Still gimping around, we managed to get most everything planted this afternoon

Meet Riley

Riley is our new Corgi puppy, and here are just a few of the questions I field daily:

Yes, he's a purebreed, they're the smallest of the herding dogs, being used historically in Wales to herd cattle and be a generally awesome farm and companion dog.  Yes, his ears are really big, no, his legs are just the right length, and yes, you can take a picture of him.

We've had our pup for two weeks, having driven to Oroville to get him from a breeder.  He's now fifteen weeks old.  We knew getting a Corgi pup would be a big adjustment in our lives, having introduced the equivalent of a toddler to our household.  Before bringing him home, we had to puppy-proof an area of our little abode.  Luckily, he's a very smart pup (part of that herding dog thing) and we've already started puppy training.  We're working on sit, down, stay, leave it and come.  

Introduced him to the rest of the animals - chickens, who he finds fascinating, goats, which he finds a bit on the large and alarming size when they jump suddenly, and the cats, who are glad he can't get onto the bed.  And we introduce him to lots of people and new places, like the office, spinning Saturday and knit night.  Luckily he tires quickly, so if I time it right, he'll pass out for awhile.

Everything was going swimmingly.  Then I got the phone call Friday at work, while Riley was home with my husband.  "He vomited about an hour ago, seems a bit disoriented and his back legs are a little uncoordinated when he tries to walk."   A quick internet search shows that this could be the beginning symptoms of many things, including Parvo and vinca poisoning.  PANIC!

My SIL is a vet tech at Grass Valley Vet, where I normally take my cats for their routine care, but they close at 5:30 and there's no way we'd get the puppy there in time.  She recommended LOP vet, just around the corner from where we live.  

Two hours, a basic exam, blood panel, chem panel, 2 x-rays and a fecal exam later we'd ruled out Parvo, toxins, and blockages to confirm what you already knew, that dogs like to eat other animals' poop!  He has coccidia, a protozoa.  I have the treatment for that because of the goats, so they gave him a subcutaneous injection of electrolytes to combat dehydration, suggested a bland diet, and sent us home with the treatment instructions.  Half an hour later, you certainly wouldn't have thought from watching him play that we'd been concerned for his well-being that same afternoon.

So other than being sleep deprived from getting up a couple of times a night to take out Riley, we're all doing just fine and we love our puppy!

Happy Equinox!

Equal day length.  After today the daylight minutes will outnumber the dark and continue to gain in dominance until the summer solstice.  Spring is officially here.

To celebrate I joined the California Native Plant Society's wildflower walk along the Independence Trail.  The trail exists in the remains of the Excelsior Ditch, which moved water 25 miles from it's source on the South Yuba to the diggins at Smartsville.  Since the ditches were designed with subtle elevation differences, the old canal beds area smooth and easily accessible, and it was a good first "hike"since recovering from pneumonia.

Meandering is a good word to use to describe the speed one walks when looking at wildflowers.  We stop, gather around a wee flower, consult the book and come up with both scientific and common names.  I took pictures.  Turns out my new camera has a voice memo utility, so after I snap a pic I record the name.  No more notebook!  (This is really cool.  I love technology.  No, I'm not making squeeing sounds, really!)

Highlights?

Some shooting stars.  The fertilized flowers flip over and point up, the unfertilized are still pointing down in their come hither pose.

Hounds tongue, in the forget-me-not family.

A view of the South Yuba just downstream of the 49 crossing.

A California newt.  We put him back where we found him under the giant chain ferns.

Daylight Savings Rant

Last fall during the bi-annual time change, a friend of a friend on facebook posted something to the effect that daylight savings time was a relic of farmers and farming practices, and since farmers are a minority of the population, Day Light Savings should be removed.

As a homesteading/farmer type of person, I immediately and vehemently objected to his statement.  After all, he wasn't the one who was now milking goats in the dark because of the sudden time change at, nor any of the other chores that must be done before and after work.  My work hours certainly didn't change just because the time on the clock did, and instead all of our diurnal actions are shifted for this bit of tomfoolery.

So why do we have DST?  DST as a concept was suggested as early as 1794 by Benjamin Franklin, and was adopted in the United States in 1917 by an Act of Congress.  The basis for DST has always been energy savings, the idea being that people will consume less energy if they are maximizing their use of daylight hours. Unfortunately, studies don't bear out this assumption, but countries around the world continue to follow this principle.

Here's an excerpt from Wikipedia:

The practice is controversial. Adding daylight to afternoons benefits retailing, sports, and other activities that exploit sunlight after working hours,but causes problems for farming, evening entertainment and other occupations tied to the sun. Traffic fatalities are reduced when there is extra afternoon daylight; its effect on health and crime is less clear. Although an early goal of DST was to reduce evening usage of incandescent lighting, formerly a primary use of electricity, modern heating and cooling usage patterns differ greatly, and research about how DST currently affects energy use is limited and often contradictory.

Who really benefits from DST?  Well, the pool and BBQ industry fronted the biggest lobbying checks that got the US Government to add an additional 4 weeks per year of DST, with three weeks in the spring and one week in the fall beginning last year.  Those don't sound like farmers to me!!

So tomorrow morning the sun will not rise until 7:15am and I'm back to milking in the dark in order to get to work on time. 

DST or not, spring is just around the corner, and I have the evidence!

Goats in the sunshine

Flowering quince

The rosemary is beginning to bloom

As is the calendula

And the lilacs are preparing to spring forth!

It's Getting Better All the Time

In this case we're talking about the state of my lungs.  Many of you who saw me at Stitches know that I was suffering from a third round of this bronchitis/cold thing, and let's just say that things got worse before they got better.  So finally giving into common sense, I've been home for several days and broken out the honey-lemon-garlic syrup I should have brewed up weeks ago.

I've used this recipe to good effect many times before, often avoiding or reducing the suffering.

1 cup honey

juice and zest of one organic lemon

3-5 cloves garlic (if they're all big use 3, if small use 5)

1-2 sage leaves

Blend all ingredients together and let sit for 2-4 hours to homogenize.  Strain using a large mesh strainer and put into a small bottle.  Sip 1-2 tsps every 1-2 hours.  If blended right it should taste like a lemon drop.  Soothes throat stuff, coughing and kicks ass against most invaders as raw garlic is anti-bacterial, anti-viral and anti-fungal.  I think this recipe originated from one of Christopher Hobbs' herbals, though it could belong to someone else...

In one of my rare public appearances this week a coworker came by to carpool from my house for a conference in Sacramento.  "Wow, I know you said you lived on the Bear River, but you really do live right on the river!  It's right there!"  Yep, I really do live right on the Bear River, and the most recent rains have finally brought it up to a decent winter level of flow.  I think that both Rollins and Combie Dams have been holding back on the outflow to refill the reservoirs, which is not good for the health of the river, so I'm very glad to see the level up finally.  This is the view of the river from my "backyard".

She also met all of the chickens and goats.  She particularly loved the goats. "They're so friendly and attentive, just like dogs."  Well almost like dogs.  They don't play fetch very well, but they do like being petted and scratched, with a few key differences.  Goats like having their necks, chests and rumps scritched and rubbed, whereas a dog or cat will like their jaws, tops of heads and ears scritched and rubbed.  With goats, scratching of the head is usually a sign of trust as they  don't want their horn area messed with.

That little goat Finn, that was born last June to Dharma?  He's a big goat now, as tall as his mom but still has plenty of room to grow.  He's all leg right now and I expect him to end up about 20% larger than his mom by the time he finishes growing in another year.

Maharani was bred on New Year's Eve to my friend Joanne's buck Glimmercroft Stormfront, a third generation miniature La Mancha.  It's very easy to breed these medium-sized goats.  We watch for the girls to come in heat, snap them onto a lead and have them jump into the large dog crate in the back of the car.  A twenty minute car ride later and they are flirting with the buck of choice.  We stand around and shoot the breeze while the goats do their thing.  Three rounds is considered successful and back home we go.  

You really know you've had success when the doe doesn't come back into heat, as was the case with the little black doeling Pi.  This was Pi's first time, and she didn't have a very strong heat at New Years, so even though the deed was done, it didn't take.  She was very much in heat two weeks ago, so DH ran her over (I being sick) and there's no question about it this time.

Goats have a gestation period of 5 months (150 days), give or take 5 days either way, so we're expecting our first kids of the year at the end of May, and Pi in mid-July.  We haven't bred Dharma just yet, so we'll have some late babies this fall.  Then I'll be posting more pictures like this one of Dharma giving birth to Finn last June.

Stitches 2010

Ok, it's been awhile, but I've been busy, which means I have lots to catch up on sharing.  We'll start with Stitches 2010!

Vail and I undertook our yearly pilgrimage to the greatest concentration of yarn, fiber and knitters on the West Coast, possibly the entire northern continent.  All the hotels in the area were booked, and chances were that if you saw some knitted, crocheted, or felted item, it was probably handmade by the wearer.  After explaining what Stitches was to a puzzled male passenger on the hotel elevator, I suggested he should compliment the wearer of any such garment as we were armed with pointy sticks.  He wasn't sure if I was being comedic or serious...

My typical strategy is to scope out the market during the Thursday night preview, armed with my Ravelry queue, noting yarns and prices of interest.  Go back to the hotel room, crunch numbers, and start making purchases Friday morning.  Once the basics are taken care of, then it's time for free-form shopping with the remaining budget and a second-pass through the market.  This is of course, interspersed with squealing, fondling, complimenting others' sweaters and knitted items, and breaking for meals and snacks with other knitting friends.  No one thinks it odd that we are knitting everywhere, and I always find it distinctly amusing to see knitters congregating like so many other convention goers.

Here are Daniella, Barbara Sue, Vail, me, Sierra, Dee, Eva and Sue Flynn waiting in the auditorium for the fashion show.  Thanks to Mardi for taking the picture, and congrats go to her as well for winning one of the fashion show prizes.  Say cheese everyone!

Well, some of you may remember that last year at Stitches I was bit by the spinning bug, and so much of this year's budget was dedicated to all things fiber.  There were five fiber colorways purchased at as many vendors.  Of particular note were Abstract Fiber and Snicklefritz Yarns, both offering hand dyed rovings.  At Abstract we got to talking about drop spindles, and they want to come to the Foothill Fibers Drop Spindle Retreat in May, as they too are on that crazy drop spindle train. 

Snicklefritz has a traveling gnome that she uses to inspire her colorways, and she had this carbonized bamboo fiber, which she likened to crack.  I didn't get any of that, but I think that Stephanie and Rhodi might have.  

I bought Gnome in the Sierra in BFL roving.

There was some Miss Babs mixed BFL roving,

And some Lisa Souza superwash merino roving,

And Pigeon Roof Studio's superwash merino roving.

There was yarn too.  Here's Northampton Bulky wool for the Cabled Hoodie Cardigan,

and more of the silk/cotton/modal blend for the Penelope shirt.

And least you wonder who is this person who didn't buy any sock yarn, well, of course I bought some sock yarn!  Madeline Tosh Sock in "Jade" called my name while I was in line and that was that.

Home again now, and some more posts coming soon.  After all, we have drop spindles, goats, cheese, and chickens to discuss - those baby chicks and goats from last year didn't stop growing you know!