Monthly Archives May 2009

Lamb Safari

I'm posting from my hotel room in downtown Providence, having spent yesterday evening in the company of a great group of people – the Slater Mill Knitters Guild. This fortunate group has one of the most amazing meeting venues I've ever encountered: the refurbished Slater Mill complex, a historic mill located on the Blackstone River in Pawtucket, R.I. that has been resurrected as a museum and community guild meeting space. You can check it all out right here. Lovely setting, lovely group of people. I was fortunate to have been asked to share my story with them. Thank you Bernadette
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Fair Weather

I spent Memorial Day weekend at the Massachusetts Sheep & Woolcraft Festival which is one of my favorite gigs. Located in Cummington, just 45 minutes from the farm, it's like playing for the home crowd. Many of my neighbors are exhibitors, visitors or volunteers. The weekend has the feel of a visit with good friends. Fantastic weather, despite the thunderstorms that blew through the region on both Friday and Saturday night. Got lucky there.   I got lucky in the fleece show too. Stella McCartney's (a black ewe lamb from 08) pretty fleece scored a blue ribbon in the Colored Fine
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Lambs & Barnswallows

The Massachusetts Sheep & Woolcraft Fair is this weekend in Cummington. Small, laid-back and authentic, it's one of my favorite festivals.  The volunteers work very hard to pull this event off. The weather looks promising. I've selected some of my cormo, leicester and cormo cross fleeces to enter in the fleece competition – we'll see how it goes. Wish me luck. Another show means another busy week, so I'll apologize up front for my blogging brevity, and for taking the easy way out with this little movie of Holly trying to feed a handful of bottle lambs at once. You
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Bottle Babies

I spent Saturday at Webs Fleece Market in Northampton, an annual event that coincides with Webs' annual tent sale extravaganza. You should have seen the crowds. Since I was vending and signing copies of my hand dye book, I never made it to the big tent to check out the wares. It's really nice of Kathy and Steve share this busy venue with local wool growers. Having rushed out the door at an early hour yesterday, it felt good to relax a bit this morning with Mike and the lambkins. I think I've told you that the bottle feeding is
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Lambs & Rams

It's interesting to watch the progression of lamb behavior as they grow. With the 5 week age span in the lamb flock, there's quite a range. Zuni's lambs stick to her like velcro and panic whenever she's out of sight. Verbena's triplets orbit like little satellites, keeping tabs on the mothership at all times. The oldest lambs, Cobalt, Crimson and Saffron have become bold and free-ranging. I watch them migrate to the pasture's edge in the morning, to explore the tangle of multi-flora rose. Some of the middlings stay back in the morning to investigate the barn.  Some of the
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Lambs’ Frolic

This morning I discovered I had several mornings' worth of lambs frolic stored on the memory card of my camcorder. The following clip is actually a compilation from  both today and a few different days last week.  But before you press play, a word about the color contest celebrating my book, Teach Yourself Visually Hand-dyeing. First of all, I was truly touched and impressed by the stories that were shared. It's amazing how colors trigger feelings and memories – and many of your stories triggered my own color memories. I enjoyed reading every entry and thank everyone who took the
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All work, and some play

The end of last week was all about getting ready for my first spring show, New Hampshire Sheep & Wool Festival. Despite my best intentions to pack the van and depart on Friday, by the end of Friday afternoon, I was too exhausted to consider driving 2 hours and setting up. Which means on Saturday morning, I was up at 4  and out the door by 5  to make it to the fairground for set up by 9 a.m. I was running on fumes throughout the day, but there was something completely energizing about seeing so many friends and having
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Zuni’s Lambs

Sorry to keep you all in suspense, but things went much slower than expected yesterday. In the end, it was worth the wait. Zuni delivered a healthy ram and ewe lamb last night. Meet our newest flock members, Coral and Slate.   The little family is in a bonding pen, to give them space away from the robust, nosey crowd of lambs. I had to drape Zuni's pen with rugs and blankets for privacy as many little curious onlookers came by to check out the newest arrivals. Zuni is not wanting visitors. She's a "stomper" – assertively stamping her hoof
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This could be it!

Guess who's finally in labor? No, not Crackerjack. At last Zuni looks like she's in the early stages of labor.  We'll stay close to the barn to be with her throughout the afternoon. Zuni's sticking to Crackerjack like glue. Funny how the ewes instinctively seek the llama's protective presence at birthing.  I'm not sighing with relief just yet – will fill you in on a few things that have made the last few days particularly challenging, once I've caught my breath – but I'm so glad she's delivering before I head out to NH Sheep and Wool Festival this coming
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My book is here!

At last, my very own stack of copies of my very first book, Teach Yourself Visually Hand-Dyeing (Wiley Publishing) has arrived.  When I last saw my book last winter it was in its final editorial stage, a fat sheath of black and white copies held together by a giant clip, scribbled all over with the red ink of my last round of revisions. It was really exciting when the UPS man arrived (like the stork), delivering my very first copies to me. And on Monday I'll have a stash of copies hot off the press to share at upcoming events
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