Names for ewe lambs #4 and #5 have been chosen: The very dark brown lamb #4 is "Cinder" a name suggested by Kris. Lamb #5 is aptly named "Biscuit" by Valerie. Thanks Kris, Valerie and everybody – my brain's on overload this week with so much happening here, and it's nice to have so many thoughtful names to choose from (without having to think of them myself). Holly and I were heading to a Fiber Twist meeting in Greenfield today and I totally zoned out and got on the interstate heading south instead. Had to drive all the way to Deerfield before we could turn around and head back. Jiminy Cricket. 

Exciting news – Chris Spitzer has sent a new batch of photos of the CVM/Romeldale lambs. Good heavens, I was astonished to see how much they have filled out. I feel bad for Chris's daughter, Randi, who did some heavy lifting so we can admire these lambs. What fun (for us, that is)!

Note: You can click on the photos to make larger, except for the first one – I spaced out and forgot to super-size it, sorry).

Tumbleweed (formerly ram lamb #1):

Java (ewe lamb #2):

And Java again, in profile, so you can see her lovely fleece and round tummy:

Dune (ewe lamb #3). I love her color; her name is so appropriate:

And here are the little girls we are naming this week.

Ewe lamb #4:

And ewe lamb #5, who is the youngest in the group (I think) and seems a little smaller than the others:

Thank you Chris for finding time to take these photos. I realize you must be up to your eyeballs in work at this time of year. Rounding up seven lambs for portraits is no small task and I appreciate your sharing so we can see how the lambs are coming along. Your daughter, Randi, is a good sport! 

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copyright 2009. Barbara Parry. All rights reserved.

photos by Chris Spitzer

I can't believe another week has flown by. Just a quick progress note on the naming of the CVM/Romeldale lambs.

Here's a glimpse of my shearer, Andy Rice, in action as he unfleeces one of my Cormo ewes. I am rough skirting the fleece as it comes off the sheep, which saves a ton of time on the skirting table. On shearing day last week we repeated this process 33 times. 

I gave Mike a camcorder for Christmas and we've playing with it, making some exciting movies of our golden retrievers, the sheep, our shoes (well, we didn't know the camera was on). My sheep are no strangers to cameras. I take shots every day and the lamb cam is permanently mounted to the barn wall like "big brother" watching their every move. 

Ordinarily a bunch of big-time hams, they were completely freaked out by the camcorder. So it's a good thing I'm getting them use to it now, before I film the arrivals and antics of the little ones.

Here's a clip of their first camcorder encounter (starring Issey the brave):

For me, the only thing more exciting than waiting for lambs to arrive is waiting for the arrival of freshly spun skeins and carded roving from the fiber mill. I picked up the first of my spring yarns at the spinnery this week. This yarn run has been in the queue at Green Mountain Spinnery since the end of last year. In February the newly shorn fleeces from my Cormo-cross yearlings joined my late autumn wool clip at the mill to produce boxes of glowing skeins (now stacked floor to ceiling in the studio).

For me, the timing is a bonus. Although I still have mountains of Cormo to skirt (I call the stack of wool bags in the studio Mount Cormo!) I can get started on readying product for my spring shows. For members of Sheep Shares, my new farm yarn & fiber club, this means your spring share may actually be on its way before my first lambs drop here at the farm.

Here's a peek at the yarn along the way. Once I've skirted and boxed the fleeces from shearing day, I stuff as much wool as I can possibly fit into the back of my Toyota Highlander and truck it up to the spinnery in Putney, Vermont. At the mill, Dave Ritchie and I weigh the incoming fiber and discuss the plan of action for the yarn run.

As promised, here are some better shots of last Monday's cormo shearing day, courtesy of Adrian B. (thank you, Adrian!).

Which is what we thought of "Tumbleweed", suggested last week by Lori. Of all the great ideas, this one best fits this little ram. When  look at his fleece, I can picture the color of a tumbleweed blown across a dusty field. We'll probably call him "Tumble" for short. Thanks and congratulations, Lori for a great suggestion! 

Monday was the big push to shear all adult cormos, including the bred ewes – and also the day of what I hope will be the last winter storm. A ripping nor'easter rolled in early Monday and pretty much socked it to us all day, dumping a good 8" of powder here in western Mass. Although we worked indoors and the sheep were all inside, it was not the ideal conditions for shearing day.

 

Mark and Mike talked sheep (I think).

A break in the action, while this ewe receives a pedicure.

One of my favorite things about shearing in late winter is checking tummies for lambs (though the udder is also a good indicator of whose carrying). My shearer Andy Rice stops so we can give this girl a pat down. Its easy to feel a lamb head or a lamb butt or hoof. If you push gently, the lamb floats away and then bumps right back. Sometimes you feel a little kick. I get so excited. For much of the year, lambing feels remote and far off, something that happens "later". The first kick from an unborn lamb tells me it's imminent and real. Love it.

And as harsh as late winter shearing may seem, it actually serves the very good purpose of giving a ewe a keen awareness of the real temperature – which will let her know she needs to keep her newborns warm.

In between helping me bag fleeces, Adrian took some great shots of the shearing. I'll try posting some of them tomorrow.

Tomorrow I announce the name for CVM ram lamb #1 and we start a new contest for naming TWO lambs for next week. 

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copyright 2009. Barbara Parry. All rights reserved.