"Tinsel" yarn

I was perusing one of the local craft stores last week, and noticed that they had some eyelash on clearance.  So I bought some to put in my angora-merino yarn blend as I was plying, just to see how it would turn out.  My husband says it looks like tinsel. I have to agree with him. Not sure what's going to happen with it yet. Maybe my sister (who actually crochets, unlike me), will have some good ideas. It would certainly make an interesting hat!

Our cat, Turtle, thinks that she is a dog

We have a cat that we rescued. Her mother abandoned her and 2 of her siblings when they were kittens, and we kept her. She is a tortoise-shell, so she got named "Turtle."  At the time, we only had 1 other animal - a very accommodating corgi, who apparently considers Turtle his baby.  The cat is the only other non-human animal allowed near his food dish when there is food in it - and she's allowed to eat from it too!

Now, with a corgi for a surrogate parent, our cat has some weird issues. For instance, she plays fetch. She also enjoys eating vegetables.  Now that the green beans are coming in, she apparently feels the need  sample the fresh ones.

The other evening, I caught her doing her sneaky-stealth-walk in the kitchen, onto a kitchen chair, and then to the table where there was a bag of recently picked green beans.  She grabbed one, looked around to see if anyone was watching, and dragged it to the floor to enjoy her spoils! 

 She ate about half of it, and then decided that it would make a better toy.

Farm Sewing Projects

I wanted to have this post up before the first fair, but since I only just finished the projects in time to get them to the fair, that obviously didn't happen.  However, since I am rather proud of them, and they worked out well, I thought I would post them anyway.

My first project was to make a sign for our farm.  Since I do a lot of sewing, and have lots and lots of fabrics lying around, this is what I came up with:

The fabric paint that I used was rather old, so it's a little hard to see in the picture, but it does say "Button Brook Farm" in the corners of the sign.  I just couldn't squeeze out enough to put "Fawn Grove, PA" in the last corner. Still, I think it looks pretty cute.  The buttons on the tree are all old buttons that I got from a jar of buttons that came from somewhere.  Recycling!

And now, more recycling....

At a show, you need to be able to feed your goats hay.  However, goats are very good at wasting hay. At home, we have homemade wooden hay feeders that work somewhat well, until the baby and adolescent goats decide to get into them.  However, they are not portable.  And we do not have any metal hay racks that most people take to shows.  We do have a hay net leftover from when the previous owners had horses, but I was worried that our goats would get their heads caught and hurt themselves.  So, I made some of my own hay bags.

The first one is from a laundry bag that I found at a Goodwill (by way of Ikea).  I added 2 holes with windows (again, to keep the goats from getting their heads stuck).  This one has a nice strap on the back which allows you to sling it over your shoulder for easy transport with or without hay in it.  We tied them up with bailer twine, which was free.  Total cost: $4.00.

The second one was completely free, since I made it out of old pairs of jeans (for durability) and scrap fabric.  Again, I put little windows in it, added some loops and straps, and along with the bailer twine, we were in business. The goats seemed to figure it out pretty quickly.

Of course, that didn't stop them from helping themselves to anything in another goat's pen that they could get to.  This was true of all the goats though, so I didn't feel particularly bad when our goats did it.  One of the young goats belonging to someone else actually got through the bars into the wrong pen, and then couldn't get back! One of the other competitors made the comment that "Whoever coined the phrase, 'The grass is always greener on the other side' must have had goats." So true!

Mason Dixon Fair 2013: Day 2

Yesterday was a very busy day for us at the Mason-Dixon Fair. After the am goat-feeding (for the fair goats), we took a few hours at home to take care of other animals and pick green beans, and then headed back in the afternoon for the fiber goat show.  Fiber goats are shown with halters rather than collars (so that their fleece is not harmed).  Luckily there was an old pro there who was willing to share her knowledge; we apparently were walking our goats around with the halters on incorrectly!  It was very nice of her to let us know before we got into the show ring and the judge had to tell us.

So, Colleen was up first, with Fiber Goat Showmanship (in showmanship they judge the handlers rather than the animals). She was first in her age class, and received Reserve Champion Showmanship overall for fiber goats:

 

After showmanship the fiber goats competed by age class.  Both of our does were in the same class, as they are the same age.  Sassafrass (the greyer one) came in second, and Midnight (the black/grey one) came in third.  Of course, Colleen had chosen to show Sassafrass and was quite happy that her goat placed above mine:

 

Since Sassafrass placed second, she got to compete for both Supreme Champion and best fleece.  She placed 4th:

And yes, that is Chad holding a goat that is not ours. The young man (he's 4!) had 2 goats entered, and they were both competing in Supreme Champion.  The black goat that Chad led around won that category.

And that's not all! Showmanship for the market goats was also this evening.  Apparently the adult class (which they so nicely call "Older and Bolder") only had one entry, so they decided that it would be fun to have me walk one of our crazy goats around.  I got a nice little blue "Participation" ribbon (which I will take over the mud brown 8th place one Colleen got with this goat on Monday).

Colleen also had to do showmanship for the market goats. She placed 2nd in her age category:

And here we are with all our ribbons and Colleen's trophy:

Mason Dixon Fair 2013: Day 1

Yesterday was our first day at the Mason Dixon Fair, located just above the Maryland line in Delta, PA.  The goats that we took with us were mostly cooperative getting into the trailer and luckily it's only about 15 minutes from our house.  Unfortunately, we picked the exact time of the afternoon that it decided to rain in which to drive over and unload.  Extra bath for the goats I guess! 

Last night Colleen showed 2 does in the breeding classes. Our younger doe, "Fluffball," placed 8 out of 8:

 



The 2-year old doe, "Snowflake," placed 3rd out of 6!  Both of these goats gave Colleen a hard time, as they did not settle in too well at first.

After they were done showing, and people were coming around to look at them, they would let everyone pet them but us. I guess they were afraid we were going to make them walk around that ring and get felt by the judge again!

The angora girls on the other hand, settled right in. Their pen is right next to the tack pen, and they have already tried to help themselves to some of the people snacks stored next door. We also have our hay in there, and Midnight has figured out that she can stick her head through the bars and eat as much as she wants!

First Spinning Lesson

Yesterday I had my first spinning lesson at Feederbrook Farm.  It was a very lovely place, and the lesson was quite low-key.  They are a Kromski dealer, so we used Kromski wheels. From what I had read about on-line and elsewhere, I really expected to like the Kromski Sonata (which I had a chance to try). It wasn't bad, but I found that I actually preferred the Symphony, which I did not expect.

So here is my first yarn:

This one was done on the Symphony. It was not as difficult as I had anticipated.  Most of the beginning-to-spin things I had read talk about how people have trouble adjusting to doing two things at once - moving both their feet and their hands - in separate ways. That was not what I had the most trouble with. I had more difficulty figuring out the rhythm of the wheel and when to let the yarn feed in and when to keep it out and build the tension.  This a little more evident in my second piece (below). The picture doesn't show it all, but there are many changes from very thin to very thick. I'd like to say that's because I was playing with the yarn thicknesses, but mostly that is not true.