A few scenes from Christmas day at the farm. Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday.
We're getting hammered tonight with the first blizzard of the year. Tomorrow will be busy, plowing, shoveling, snow blowing. But for tonight, I'm just enjoying the storm as the holiday weekend winds down, crossing my fingers that we don't lose power.
Community
The simple gifts each day brings can easily be overlooked or taken for granted. For just a moment each day this week I'm making a point to pause, reflect and appreciate.
Please join me.
Animal rescue requires a leap of faith.The caregivers at the Animal Rescue League shelter an animal that's been abandoned or neglected, in hope that someone will give it a home. Adopters take on responsibility for the well-being of an animal whose complete history is often obscure. You sign a contract and hope for the best.
We 've adopted our new llama following a gut instinct. His behavior is cautious and understandably so given the hand he's been dealt. There isn't the slightest sign of aggression. We know that he was brought to the shelter in September after escaping from his previous home somewhere in Massachusetts and running loose for 2 months.
His prior owners had acquired him at auction. He appears to be about 7 years old and is in good health. At the shelter he was tested for various diseases (all negative), innoculated, castrated (no wonder people make him nervous) and placed in a paddock with three sheep, adjacent to a paddock of horses and one pig.
While he is perfectly calm with sheep and other animals, he is very wary of people. They told us he is a spitter, but so far he hasn't spit once in the handling we did yesterday (haltering, leading, trailering, leading into a strange barn). Not at us, nor at the sheep. He didn't spit at Caitlyn either when she came up to inspect him.
He's a gentle, thoughtful animal. We've placed him with Mistral's group – last year's lambs. It frees up Crackerjack to be with our expectant ewes. For the lambs, it was love at first sight. They gathered round his legs with welcoming sniffs, tilting their wooly heads way back for a good look at the new tall, dark and handsome guy. I am in awe of how mellow this llama is given everything he has been through.
We're taking a leap of faith that he will learn in time to trust us. Mistral and her friends are modeling good barn behavior. We're giving him space, letting him get use to our voices and routines.
And making sure all doors and gates are secure.
(Now you know why I am so grateful to Crackerjack for telling me we have faulty gate latches earlier this week!)
You've asked about his name. The Shelter told us his name was Louis, aka Louie the Llama. We wanted to think about that.
I found a Llama Name Generator online (Mike said I was crazy when I went looking and was then shocked that such a thing even existed. hah!). The first name it spit out was "Marni Cuca Chicken". Pretty lame as a llama name (so much for Llama Name Generators).
Given this guy's history we thought of names that had to do with roaming: Cruiser, Drifter, Roamin', Roving. But after reading comments from readers yesterday we've decided to name him "Sol" for his arrival on the winter solstice. The white blaze on his face is like a flash of sunlight. Thanks for the great suggestion.
He is our Sol Llama.
The two lucky winners of Sheep Shares 2011 Farm Yarn samplers are:
Marie (comment posted 12/21 at 7:17 pm)
and
Kris (comment posted 12/17 at 10:44 pm)
Welcome to the flock!
Mistral's first morning, from April 2010
If you are interested in joining Sheep Shares CSA 2011, we still have yarn shares available. We now have a wait list for fiber shares. Thanks to everyone who helped spread the word!
Last week Mike and I took a little detour on the way to visit my cardiologist in Boston. I had just received an email from Lisa Lagos, the director of the Animal Rescue League of Boston's large animal facility in Dedham. A 7-year-old llama who has also had a rough year was seeking a home. We stopped by to meet him.
Honestly, we had no plans to adopt anything right now. But that trip to the Rescue barn in Dedham on Thursday has brought the newest member to our flock today, in time to celebrate the Solstice.
I promise to tell you all about him tomorrow. But right now, I'm exhausted – between getting up at 3 a.m. to view the lunar eclipse, then leaving at 5:45 a.m. to fetch a llama. Andy drove and made sure the loading and unloading went as calmly as possible. We got back to the farm early this afternoon.
Speaking of joining our flock, tomorrow two lucky blog commenters will win Sheep Shares CSA Farm Yarn Samplers when I pull names. If you'd like to enter, today's your last day. Please scroll back to post entitled Sheep Sharing Give-away and leave a comment.
Wishing you a peaceful Solstice.
Hope
Mike and I decided that providing a home for a special someone in need is the best gift we could give each other this year.
The simple gifts each day brings can easily be overlooked or taken for granted. For just a moment each day this week I'm making a point to pause, reflect and appreciate.
Please join me.
Home
The simple gifts each day brings can easily be overlooked or taken for granted. For just a moment each day this week I'm making a point to pause, reflect and appreciate.
Please join me.
(BTW – In the early hours of tomorrow morning a full lunar eclipse coincides with the Solstice, something that hasn't happened since Dec. 21, 1638, according to NASA. Set your clock, witness the full eclipse on the longest night of the year with me – 3:17 a.m. ET.)
At this time of year, the season of giving, it's so easy to get swept up in the holiday shuffle and bustle. The simple gifts each day brings can easily be overlooked or taken for granted. For just a moment each day this week I'm really making it a point to pause, reflect and appreciate. It feels especially important to me, in a year that has been spectacularly difficult although I'm working on seeing that too as it's own gift.
Simple Gifts, day one:
Teamwork
Mike, Holly and I spent this morning rounding up the remaining sheep at the top of the hill, bringing them to their winter barn-yard. This job is so much simpler when tackled before the ground is snow-scaped and icy and when the wind isn't making your nose run like a spigot. So naturally, I've been putting it off for weeks. No surprise there, procrastination is my specialty (in college I double majored in English and the art of leaving everything 'til the last minute).
Sheep are always ambivalent about changes in routine. You've got to get them to move in unison and generally on the first try. Once a few of them get spooked, paranoia becomes airborne. Then even the calmest sheep act nutty. It took several efforts to get all of them into the catch pen. We then pondered the best way to get them all into the trailer.
It took bribes. And letting Mike take the lead, since they love following him (whereas this group for unknown reasons prefers chasing me).
The best part about working with Mike and Holly is that we each have a different approach to the business of getting sheep to cooperate. When you work with animals it's really important not to be rigid. If plan A is a disaster and plan B turns out to be not so great, you have to quietly move on to plan C. Sometimes even plan D. It's a process of give and take, being calm and patient with the animals. And with each other.
Holly and I were so excited to finally get them all in, we shut the trailer with Mike inside!
It feels good to have everyone back to the barn now.
Feel free to share a story of a simple gift for today.
What a wild way to end the week. I was in Boston Friday for an appointment with my cardiologist, back in time for dinner with good friends last night. This morning I was headed east again (attending a lovely memorial service for my friend's mom). Having spent two days in the car bouncing back and forth on the Mass. Turnpike, I was looking forward to a little quiet time today. A chance to catch my breath, catch up on correspondence, write holiday cards and maybe bake some cookies. But that all went out the window this afternoon just as I was heading to the barn for chores.
A neighbor gave me a heads up that Crackerjack, our number one guard llama/ lamb nanny, was on the loose, along with a handful of sheep and both goats. It looks like frost was the culprit, causing one of the paddock gate posts to heave. Either the wind blew the gate open, or a certain clever goat discovered the latch was no longer latch-y. Sneaky critters.
Fortunately, our neighbor persuaded the sheep and goats go home. But we still had a llama on the lam. When I arrived Caitlyn (llama number two) was highly concerned to see her camelid counterpart, Crackerjack sauntering through the hayfield to the north. She and the rest of the flock watched the llama round up with keen interest. My neighbors and I positioned our cars – flashers on – to alert motorists. Cracker continued to amble up the field, pretending not to hear me when I called him.
I'm lucky Cracker: 1. is such a sweet boy and 2. always thinks with his stomach. A grain pan was all it took to coax him back to the paddock. He did look a little sheep-ish about his foray. I spent the rest of the afternoon checking gates and adding safety chains until we can get the posts re-adjusted.
Pssst. We have a new addition arriving at the farm this week! Stay tuned, and you'll soon know why we now really need to be on our toes about gates . . .
And thank you everybody for spreading the word about our Sheep Shares CSA 2011 Give-away. You are tremendously kind. There's still time to enter for a chance to win (drawing on Wednesday) and 2011 Shares available.
This morning I wondered why the sheep prefer to camp under the stars along the fence, right up by our house, when they have a perfectly good house of their own at the edge of the paddock. Perhaps they like having a front row seat for the daily theater of humans. The show starts when I raise my bedroom shade just before sunup. Their eyes are instantly on me. They follow my movement through the house, downstairs to the kitchen window. We watch each other while I brew coffee. It's a daily ritual – one of many in the work of keeping sheep.
Some of you have been keeping us and our flock company, year in and year out. If you have then you know we're seriously dedicated to raising healthy, happy sheep who live as naturally as sheep possibly can, doing what sheep love to do most: roaming spacious pastures and grazing by summer; wintering in adequate barn quarters, lounging in clean dry bedding, sheltered from the elements. Or at least having that option, though they just choose otherwise.
Today we invite you to become a part of our farm. It's the official kick-off for Sheep Shares CSA 2011. Each year we sell a limited number of Farm Yarn or Fiber shares. It's your chance for a front- row seat for what we do best – raising the finest wool and hand crafting yarns of the highest quality. It's also your chance to support small-scale, sustainable farming. And to be on a first-name basis with your fiber.
To celebrate the start of a new season we are hosting a Sheep Shares give-away:
Two lucky people will receive a 2011 Sheep Shares Farm Yarn Sampler Membership (a value of $134) via random drawing. I will select and announce the winners right here next week (on Wednesday, December 23). Would you like a chance to enter?
Please do 2 things:
1. Spread the word: Share a link to this post with at least one other person who might be interested in joining Sheep Shares – Or who might be interested in gifting a Sheep Share for the holidays. Share a link to this post, tweet, blog or Facebook us.
2. Then post a comment here so I know you've visited. Be sure to leave a fowarding email address so I can contact you if I draw your name.
Click here to learn more about joining Sheep Shares.
Thank you for Sheep Sharing! Hope you'll consider joining us.
