Highland Games 2009

Our local spinners' guild, Spindrifters, participates each year in the Highland Games in Mount Vernon, Washington. We do a fleece-to-shawl demonstration. Using a fleece that previously was sheared off a sheep, skirted (nasty bits around the edges removed), and washed, we pick and card the fiber and then spin it into yarn, which is then used as weft in weaving a shawl.

This year, our Fearless Leader chose a white Romney fleece. We decided to do a plain weave shawl on a Baby Wolf loom, which is very portable. We got donations of handspun yarn from several of our members to use for warp, and generally mentioned “blue” as a suggested color & “worsted weight” for thickness of yarn. Of course, those were general guidelines and we ended up with a great assortment of yarns which made for a very interesting warp.

The pickers & carders set to work, and then the spinners took the prepared fiber and spun yarn for the weft. The shawl was woven mostly by one weaver so that the beat was consistent and the shawl turned out gorgeous! It will be raffled off at our next spin-in, and I hope I win it. :-)

Of course there are lots of other things to see at the games. There are sports which actually make sense to me – hurling a small bale of hay over a high bar, and carrying a 265 pound keg as far as possible (many of the competitors got over 200 feet)! Then there were the sheep-herding dogs who competed, and lots of bagpipe bands & guys in kilts. A fun day was had by all, despite the rather chilly weather and rain.




On another note. . .

IT JUST DOES NOT WORK

I have been knitting the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn Clark, which can be found here: http://www.evelynclarkdesigns.com/pdf/Swallowtail.pdf
and I have to say it's a lovely knit, a wonderful pattern, and I'm enjoying working with the 2 ply yarn which I spun from a friend's llama combings.

The problem was that I misunderestimated the yardage required & came up just a bit short. I don't know why it is that any time I think I may be running out of yarn for a project, I knit faster. It seems that maybe I'll have enough if I finish sooner. It's kind of like driving faster to a gas station when I think I'm going to run out of gas. Somehow, I've always been able to finish or get there just in the nick of time. Not this time. I came to the end of the ball while ¼ of the way through the cast-off edge. So, yes, I could technically have gone back to the beginning of the row & just done a regular cast-off with the existing loops, but that wouldn't have given me the elastic edge that I suspect will be important when I need to block the shawl.

So it's back to the bag of fiber (fortunately there was some left) & the spinning wheel. I think I have spun enough, now, to finish. It's drying & I'll let you know soon.

Oh - and my other blog is at: http://www.spinnerseden.blogspot.com

New Blog - Spinner's Eden!

Just thought I'd let you know that we have changed the name of our farm from "Aquarian Hamster Farm" to "Spinner's Eden". Please go to the new blog to see why!

In the meantime, I will probably keep posting here, too. So just thought I'd let you know that

I FINISHED THE SWEATER!

This is Nora Gaughan's Asymmetrical Cardigan, but I changed the scarf portion from a cabled motif to leaves that I found in one of Barbara Walker's books. I'm very happy with it (although the sleeves are longer than I'd hoped), and I've gotten lots of compliments on it!

Now, go check the new blog! Thanks!

There Are Three Kinds of People - Those Who Can Do Math, and Those Who Can't

I have been trying to knit socks that fit my size 10 feet, using Cat Bordhi’s sock book, NEW PATHWAYS FOR SOCK KNITTERS. She is a dear lady and extraordinarily clever. I’ve been fortunate enough to take a class from her, in which we knitted the “Little Sky Sock”. I learned her new methods of increasing, her flexibility in the type of needles we could choose for the project (I’m a 5 dp kind of gal), and I grasped her method for wrapped & turned stitches, no problem. The little sock I made is cute - doesn’t have a mate yet, but it is cute and will fit *some* little body at some time. The problem came when I attempted to make a sock that would fit *me*.

The way the book is written is that there are master patterns in which one gets the general idea of the sock’s structure. Specifics relating to gauge and the individual recipient’s foot measurements are all on tables at the back of the book. It’s simple enough to refer to the back of the book for numbers of stitches & numbers of increases to use. I thought, again, what a clever idea, and I took the book into Office Max & had it spiral bound so that I could easily flip back and forth. (BTW, I came to the conclusion that if Cat were ever to need a nom de plume, I’d suggest “Paige Turner”.)

I chose to knit the Riverbed sock, which originates at the toe, increases & widens on the sole of the foot toward the heel, turns the heel, and in a very clever way, knits the heel flap in combination with eating up wing stitches. It’s a wonderful design. Really. Should one want to do any fancy lace or cables, well, the top of the foot has no complicating minutiae whatsoever. All the increases are on the bottom of the foot. Brilliant!

Here’s my problem. Each time I have made this sock (four so far, in various weights of yarn) I have had issues with the length. Always too long. Which totally sucks, because I don’t realize how long the sock will turn out to be until after the heel turn is done, at which point I have to rip back past all the increases to the toe. I decided to use up some of my leftover yarns & make a sample sock, again, following the tables in the back of the book, to determine exactly where my problem is. All the yarns I used are “sock weight yarn” & are very similar in thickness.


So here is the fruit of my labor. This sample sock is over 12” long. My foot is 10 3/8”. And the only thing that I can figure is that perhaps the numbers do not include the length of the heel turn & flap. Of my two friends that have tried this pattern, one seems to be able to execute it without any difficulty whatsoever. The other has exactly the same issues that I have. So who knows. The last time I became this frustrated with my knitting was when I began knitting lace. I do have to say that I have not *yet* thrown the sock into the driveway & run over it with the car, though. Yet.

Opposite Day/Week/Month

It’s now the 30th day of March, and April is just around the corner. We’ve passed the Vernal Equinox and spring is officially here. We’ve had just enough days of sunshine and warmish (50s - hey, it’s the Pacific Northwest - that’s warm for here) weather that I’ve said in the last few weeks that it’s time to get out the short-sleeved T-shirts & put away the long-sleeved ones. (Yes, I am a slave to fashion.)

I have been thinking of summertime knits. . . maybe a 3/4-sleeved cardigan in cotton, with some bright color like Provence’s Be-Bop Rhubarb variegated red. Or perhaps even getting out the crochet hook again to do a Luna Lovegood short-sleeved number that would be a great topper over. . . what? Well, I’ll resolve that later. And it seems to me that *every time* I entertain such thoughts, we have snowflakes and/or I awaken to temperatures in the 20s again. So I’m taking a different tack.

From now until May 1 (I’ve chosen that as an arbitrary day - surely it won’t snow in May) I’m going to knit as if it were November, and blizzards are just around the corner. I am going to knit socks - warm boot socks out of heavy yarn that will keep my toesies toasty on the way to the barn as I tromp through icy puddles. And if I can find the thrummed mittens that I started on St. Distaff’s Day, I’ll work on those, too. And the sweater under construction will be wool (although a springy green color that will wear well if the weather were ever to change).



I will cook soups. Hot, hearty beef barley, split pea with ham and carrots & parsnips, and maybe even a beef stew. No chilled green salads for dinner, and maybe not even for lunch. It’s going to be spicy chili & cornbread. Or maybe posole.

As for the sheep, most are in full fleece right now, and will need shearing whenever the weather turns warm. We sheared four of the ten grown-ups, while under the delusion that spring had arrived. We just ordered new coats for them. The little ones are still in polar fleece & it’s a challenge to keep up as they grow into larger sizes, but their fleece is growing out and they are pretty comfortable even without. So there are a couple of naked sheep out there right now. Fortunately they are able to take shelter.

Busy Days

I suppose I deserve flogging for letting the blog go so long without a post. I have truly had my hands full with a barn full of lambies & their moms. At this point, I'm really behind with pedicures, which need to be done at regular intervals to keep the sheeple comfortable. But that's on tomorrow's agenda.

Weather here has been abysmal. We got away for a week long vacation in Arizona, where it was in the 70s. We enjoyed our visit with Doug's folks, and our trip to the San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park where we visited with giraffes, rhinos & birds. We were very happy that our daughter got to come with us on this trip.


The morning after we returned, we awoke to two inches of snow on the ground, and temps in the 20s. Snow here, and especially with temps below freezing for a long time, means that it's time to drag the hose (full of ice) into the house & place in the bathtub to thaw. Then I drag it back out to the barn & loop it over the pillars, so that after I'm done watering the animals, I can easily drain the water out & keep the hose from freezing solid again. The spigot in the barn doesn't freeze - just the hoses. This sure beats dragging buckets of water to the trough.


I got some serious knitting done on our vacation. Finished the Tina Shawl, a Fiddlesticks pattern. I've drug this project around for about two years now and I'm very glad to have it finished. Woohoooo! I am planning to enter it in the Lynden Fair this year. Other than the shawl, I've been test knitting a sock pattern for a friend. This pattern uses Cat Bordhi's method of toe-up socks, and it's given my brain a bit of a cramp, but I think I'm on the right track. Pictures will follow when I finish.

Meet the Flockers

I thought it was about time for an update on our little ewe, Blossom. She’s doing great! She’s over 12 lbs now and spends some time each day with her Mom, Aunties, siblings & cousins in the barn. I’m hoping eventually she’ll come to feel more at home out there. She takes her bottles of lamb milk replacer with enthusiasm & loves nibbling hay & grain.

Most of Blossom’s sheepy antics, though, take place in the house. In the evenings, she gets a burst of energy & acts like a little Road Runner (from Buggs Bunny cartoons), except that she says “Ma-a-a-a-a” instead of “Meep Meep”. She tears around the house and at times the front end is going at a different pace than the back end. There are jumps straight up into the air, & general cavorting. She has figured out how to climb stairs, but not how to get down again. She’s a very busy & inquisitive little girl. It’s much like having a toddler around.

All the other births this year were rams. All the boys are doing well with their Mommies in the barn. One has been a bottle baby - that’s Demetri, whose Mom, Pebbles got mastitis. She regained some function on that side, so Demetri now gets most of his milk from her, but he still likes a bottle once a day. He is a little squirt by comparison to his burly brother, Cosmo, so I figure he needs it.

So here are some photos - Blossom’s brothers, Elmer (brown) & Finnegan (black), and Gabriel with his Mom, Anemarie. They’re all Romeldales, and Gabriel has the CVM (California Variegated Mutant) color markings. Otherwise, they’re all the same breed.

Blossom is Awesome!

Meet Blossom, our little ewe, who is one of triplets born to Helena, a first-time mom, on January 23rd. The morning she and her two brothers were born, it was 23 degrees. They were inside the barn, but it’s not all that much warmer in there.

When I got out to the barn in the morning, Helena had *just* delivered her triplets and was busily cleaning them up. It appeared that Blossom had been born first, and Helena, being very busy giving birth to lambs #2 & #3 hadn’t gotten around to cleaning her up & getting her moving as would normally have been the case. Certainly, three lambs is a lot to look after, especially for a first-timer.


Little Blossom was cold and covered in amniotic fluid, and although she was breathing, she was less active than the two little rams, who were just beginning to get up. I called Doug from the barn & he brought out a large bucket of warm water & a plastic bag. Blossom went into the bag, and I floated her in the warm water, as we attempted to get her body temperature up. Doug needed to go to work so I phoned BFF Janice, who came to assist. FYI, the plastic bag allows the scent of the amniotic fluid to remain on the little lamb, so that when mom smells her, she realizes it’s her lamb.


Three buckets of water later, we still weren’t having much success getting her warmed up in the barn, so we took her into the house. The laundry room has a deep sink, so I filled that with warm water & dispensed with the plastic bag. We had gotten a few “Maaaa’s” from her, and she was breathing better so things started looking hopeful. We got her temp up to 102 (normal for sheep), and began feeding her. I was able to get some colostrum from Helena, and the little tyke did okay with the bottle.

When things began to calm down, Blossom settled down on the floor with my dog, Shaela, a very experienced mom from the looks of things. (We adoped Shaela last spring & don’t know much about her background.) Shaela took Blossom as her puppy, and licked her from nose to tail, got her standing up & moving around. I could see the concern in Shaela’s face (Boxers are incredibly expressive) as she worked diligently to get that baby going. Blosson, for her part, showed us a determination & strength that gave us hope for her survival.


It was later that afternoon that Blossom began breathing very fast & panting like an overheated dog. She felt very warm as Janice held her in her lap. We decided that a trip to the vet to evaluate the respiratory distress would be a good idea. At the vet’s office, Blossom’s temp was 108.6. Blossom received alcohol baths to cool her down, and we went ahead with antibiotics & IV Banamine, an anti-inflammatory. I decided to begin gavage feedings at home to see if we could allow her some time to clear up what we figured was aspiration pneumonia. We came home with a gavage tube. Once home, her temp registered 109.5 & we again put her in the sink, but this time to cool her down rather than warm her up. I began gavaging Pedialyte, because I knew that she would have lost fluids with the high fever. Eventually she was back on colostrum, which I milked from Helena (who, by the way, was less than enthusiastic about that activity).


It’s been over a week now, and I have to say that at every turn, Blossom has showed us her determination to survive. She has had her setbacks & more trips to the vet, but at this writing, she is able to take bottles of milk replacer, and spends her time toddling around the house in a diaper, following me and/or Shaela, and generally exploring. We’ve taken her out to the barn for visits with her sheep family, but it’s a bit cold out there for her right now & she is under “doctor’s orders” to not subject her to temperature stress. She starts wheezing like a little asthmatic with stress, and then has difficulty eating. She’s almost up to eight pounds now.

There will be a time that she can join her flock, but it’s not going to be this week. Maybe not next week. But we’ll allow her to grow & gain weight as a house lamb for now. In the meantime, the two little rams are thriving in the barn under their Mom’s care, along with the other moms & their little cousins. We hold onto the hope that Blossom will be able to go out there & enjoy the pasture with her family eventually.