Bare Naked Ladies

After two false starts, we finally sheared the girls.  Last week, and after a week of rain, Dave called to say Peter, our shearer was arriving on the first ferry on Friday morning.  The prospect of twenty two wet fleece did not cheer me up.  However, the forecast for the coming week was great so we spread tarps out on the grass with plans to dry the wool over the next few days.

Peter arrived with the sunshine, set up and started to work.   He sheared four sheep before badly slicing his thumb in a scuffle with one of the girls who somehow managed to jam his thumb into the gate in the sheepfold.  He spent the next four hours in Lady Minto Hospital waiting for medical attention and came out sporting a heavily bandaged and sutured thumb.

 Maybe it was the shirt that made her do it!

 Shearing was rescheduled for this week and the weather was great – until the night before when once more it clouded over and rained all night.  The sheep were waiting patiently out in the open in the small paddock.  Peter called at 6 a.m. to say he would see if the weather changed and sure enough, the sun came out shortly after eight and dried those woolly coats in time for his arrival at noon.  By one thirty we had 22 naked girls and some very confused lambs who recognized the call but not the new vision their mother presented.   The noise as they sorted themselves out went on for several hours.

 

Shearing is not an elegant process - at least for the sheep.

Note Peter's gloved hand!

It just takes two or three minutes to remove a fleece.  It also takes a lot of skill to handle the sheep and to get them into a position where they 'give up' and let it all happen.  Although they seem to be pleased with the results, they have a great deal of trouble recognizing one another without their coats and even the lambs will go and sniff the fleeces to see if their mother's are somehow still inside those big piles of wool.

There are some lovely grey fleece this year.  The fleece in the forefront is brown/black, soft and lustrous - a definate 'keeper' for hand processing.

All the fleece looks good.  I estimate we sheared about forty five pounds of grey and another fifty pounds of the white; enough when combined with the fleece from Windsor Farms to make up a load for the mill in Carstairs.  There is one lovely brown/black fleece which I may hold back and hand process.  

 I estimate we have over 100 lbs of fleece (unskirted and unsorted).

Next week will be spent skirting, sorting and weighing in preparation for the mill.  We will see if my estimates hold and how much we have left after the sorting process is done.  The fleece is pretty dirty this year due to all the wet winter weather.  The girls take shelter from the rains under the cedar trees and in the hedgerows among the thistles and brambles.

I managed to sort and skirt all of the grey fleece before heading home to pack my bags for a trip to see the Vancouver grandchildren where I even got some knitting done with Naomi and her friend Abby. 

This is what it is all about.

 

 Bare Naked Ladies.

2013 Vancouver Island Fleece and Fibre Festival

This was the fourth year for this highly successful festival held in Coombs on Vancouver Island.  The theme for fibre nuts is to take the 100 mile challenge and to use only local fibres in their craft.   Craftspeople from all over Vancouver and the Gulf Islands and the lower mainland of B.C. attend to shop for yarns, fleece and other related products. 

This year, Mary traveled up to Coombs with me which meant an early morning start to catch the 7 a.m. ferry across to Vancouver Island and then a one hour drive north through Nanaimo and Parksville to the little community of Coombs, best known for the emporium with goats grazing on the roof.  We were set up and ready to go by 9 a.m.  Sales were steady and I parted with about one third of the hand dyed yarns I had prepared as well as many of the natural coloured wool cones.  In fact I sold out of the grey cones which are great for weaving.  Mary keeps reminding me not to fret - the sheep are growing more every day!

Mary behind the counter with her drop spindle

I had taken along Emily's vest with the humming bird pattern and was also knitting an adult vest with a sheep motif (just visible in front of Mary on the table).  If I had taken kits of these items with the patterns they would have sold well as there was lots of interest.  I have promised potential customers that I will be posting the patterns in the next two weeks so watch this spot and my web site.  The 3 ply yarn in grey and white that I had milled at Carstairs Custom Woolen Mill in Alberta is a good weight for these vests and the colour definition is great for this type of knitting pattern.

I was also pleased with the interest in the hand dyed yarns.  I had dyed both white and grey skeins in the same dye baths for complementary colour shades primarily for weaving.  The muted shades dyed over the grey wool were the ones that sold well.

 

 

The turquoise colour on the left was in the same dye bath as the more muted shade on the right.

 

 

 The bright colours drew the eye but the muted shades were the ones that sold.

It was a great festival, both for vendors and for shoppers who learned from one another and came away with many new project ideas and uses for their fibre.  I certainly learned a lot about what people want to buy and about presentation.  It was also very gratifying to have customers return to purchase yarns that worked well for them over the past year.  Mary and I made some new friends; found some familiar faces and got caught up on the latest fibre news and came home tired but very satisfied with the day.  For me, it was also great to have the company and the help.

The next task is shearing the flock then skirting and sorting fleece; deciding where to get this years fleece processed; packing it; and sending it off to the mill.  Mary is right!  I should not be worried about having parted with any of it - it just keeps coming.............

Weaving, Spinning, Knitting and Gardening

We have been blessed with glorious weather and I can hear the weeds growing as I work in my studio.  I have a spring sale coming up at the end of May so have spent as much time as possible out on my deck, dying yarns.  I have created complimentary shades of white and grey wool dyed in the same dye pots.  The results will make wonderful shades for weaving so if they do not sell at the 100 mile Fleece and Fibre Festival in Coombs on May 26, I will be making blankets all summer.

I visited the Qualicum Bay Fibre Mill in early April and finished carding the white wool from last year.  The Romney/Cheviot mix is proving to be a wonderful fibre, lofty and strong and with little tendencies toward shrinkage or felting. It was so lofty I was catching it in the air as it flew out of the carder. 

I have also been knitting.  Influenced by the Cowichan knitters I have knit two jackets, one for each of my granddaughters.  The first which I knit for Naomi's 8th. birthday has a traditional whale motif borrowed from a Coast Salish pattern.  It turned out well but I do feel uncomfortable knitting traditional patterns as a none-native knitter, even though those patterns are now in the public domain. 

So I designed my own patterns of a hummingbird and of butterflies for Emily. 

As an expert knitter will see, I had some trouble with the butterflies and would add the extra stitches to the upper wings rather than the lower wings (see the top section).  The hummingbird worked out rather well.  I am currently drafting out the patterns for sale on my web-site and will make it available along with the yarns required.  This yarn knits up well and provides good definition for the motifs.  Unlike the single ply yarns used by Cowichan knitters, this is a three ply yarn spun in Carstairs, Alberta at the custom spinning mill and is not as heavy although the result is a great outer garment which could be lined with fleece for additional warmth.  

I used small bird motifs for the front of the jacket although I have designed a smaller hummingbird motif as a substitute.  I also prefer the collar design on this second jacket.

I used this same yarn in my weaving and produced a lovely weight of fabric suitable for blankets, cushion covers and upholstery fabric.  The picture below shows plain tabby weave on the loom but I was also able to produce some lovely chevron designs in various colours - something to discuss another day.

Plain weave on the loom.

For now I am off into the garden.  I had my windows cleaned today so now I can see those weeds and there are no excuses left not to get out there and do battle.

Moving On

Walter moved on to his new home last week.  He is just a few kilometers away and has a new harem of girls as well as a variety of other livestock to keep him company.  He is on Rock Farm along with the two male lambs we sent to be hand raised and bottle fed so he already has family there.  We shall miss him.  He was a good ram; not too aggressive and difficult to handle and always available for a good head scratch as you passed him by.

Meanwhile the lambs continue to grow and to thrive.  The weather has been fairly mild and so they have enjoyed the sunshine while learning the farm routines.  Dave goes out each day and gives them grain which is a real treat so they gather around him, affording an opportunity for him to inspect them and check for any injuries or problems.  They play hard and can often be seen limping along from some minor injury sustained while engaging in a game of king of the castle.

inspection time

Meanwhile, I have finished my first weaving samples and have been knitting.  I also went to Duncan to visit my women friends who Knit the Cowichan Sweaters.  I took a second indian head spinner with me that we mounted on an old treadle sewing machine base for Terry, one of the knitters to use.  The wool for the sweaters is all hand spun into a single ply, thick lopi weight yarn.  Terry makes spinning look so easy but I am having trouble getting the knack of it and can't keep the yarn even enough.  

Spinning looks easy

I am learning so much from these women and have knit a jacket for my granddaughter in the Cowichan style.  It is opening a whole new direction for my knitting and while I feel uncomfortable using the traditional Coat Salish patterns, I think it would be fun to design my own patterns reflective of our island life.  

So two things have moved on this week; first Walter and then the spinner.  Both have gone home.

Meanwhile, John just reminded me I have a  freezer full of strawberries and blackberries from last summer waiting to be made into jam.  So much to do; so little time.

Final count

Of 19 bred sheep, two were barren.  17 sheep dropped lambs for a total of 31 live births.  5 lambs died, smothered by their ewes - all of them triplets.  Two white male lambs were sent to Windsor Farm to be bottle fed.  One lamb was still born.  28 healthy lambs survived.  7 are black, 4 female and 3 male.  Of the white lambs, 10 are male (including the bottle fed lambs) and 11 are female.

 Dinner time.

This past two weeks was school spring break so the house has been full of grandchildren.  The weather has been amazingly warm and sunny and all the daffodils are out in the field; trees are in bud and I have been out planting the garden.  Today I put in red currant and gooseberry bushes.  Weaving and knitting has taken a back seat to the outdoor projects which also included refinishing another old singer sewing machine table and mounting a second Indian head spinner which I will deliver to the Cowichan Knitters on Wednesday.  I did finish the grey jacket I started in February and have been designing vests for both granddaughters using some lovely old, hand drafted patterns found in the recycling bin at one of our seniors homes.  The designs look like a cross between the traditional Cowichan Sweater patterns and the old Mary Maxim sweaters that were so popular in the 60's.  More on these patterns later.

Granddaughter Emily and friend.

That's All Folks!

There have not been any new lambs.  The two remaining sheep are likely not pregnant although one of them is very large and may yet surprise us if she was missed in her cycle for breeding but then bred later.  The other has never looked pregnant.  So now it is time to do the math and discover the final results from the event.  That can wait for a few days.

Meanwhile we have had some nice sunny days and can start cleaning up the garden.  It was St. Patrick's Day yesterday; the day to plant potatoes in Ireland according to my old friend who lives there.  Dave spent it digging up the rhubarb patch.  We moved some of it up here from the farm to my house and I now have a patch of my own next to the kitchen door.  Of course, it is shrouded in wire netting to keep the deer out of it.  Although the leaves are poisonous for them, they eat it anyway; and anything else of value that sticks a shoot more than a half inch above ground.

I have spent the day threading my loom under the remote tutelage of Mary P., Master Weaver who helped me to wind my warp and 'beam it up' last week.  We had several exchanges today by e-mail of pictures of my progress and by phone for her advice.  She talked me through to the 'tying on' stage - not to be confused with tying up which will happen tomorrow and is a whole different part of the process.  I am using grey wool from our flock that was grown two years ago.  My first project involves weaving a sample to determine how it works into blanket cloth and to try some of the weaving patterns.

 Ready to tie on

Meanwhile, another friend in Vancouver is knitting her first pair of socks.  She ran into difficulty and e-mailed for help turning the heel.  Now there is a challenge, talking (or writing) someone through that process.  She may end up with some funny looking socks.

It is raining again tonight.  I will have a good excuse to stay inside tomorrow and to finish dressing this loom ready for some weaving.

It is Raining Lambs

Dave was greeted by a second set of triplets yesterday morning, again two female and one male.  He decided to send the two male of each set to be bottle fed so the mums had a good chance of rearing the ewes.  The girls at Windsor Farm (affectionately known as Rock Farm) have had great success with bottle fed lambs and these two will soon be joined by Walter, their Dad as we move him on to join that flock.

Another set of triplets.

Twins arrived this morning, both healthy and strong. Dave ringed all their tails and sent them on out to pasture in the spring sunshine.

Healthy twins

But it was not all good news.  Dave found Blossom in the field beside one of her lambs which had died in the night.  It appears that, with forty acres of field  space, Blossom had lain on her.  Both sheep who have done this have very heavy coats.  Perhaps they cannot feel the lambs under them, particularly when they are small.  

Lambs often sleep on top of their mums for warmth but tend to lie away from them as they get older.  It is amazing to see how much cold and wet these little creatures can survive with such a relatively thin coat.

  Dave ringing tails

There are only two ewes left that have not lambed.  We suspect one of them was never bred.  She might surprise us but she is very small for a pregnant sheep.  It will be good to have the process finished and not have to worry about the difficulties of birthing and be able to just enjoy watching the lambs play in the field.