Please enjoy these sheep and produce photos
Beets, tomatoes, cauliflower
Category Archive: sheep
Sheep migration; autumn socks
Sheep migration:
Today was migration day – time to move to fresh forage and grasses. It was really great that the neighbor brought over her border collie herding dog, because these sheep will stop for every blade of grass and without the dog, this job could have taken hours. Because they are going into an area where already many weeds have gone to seed, I wanted each to have a coat on first. Seeds are nasty to get out of wool. They will spend about a week to 10 days taking down the new area and then will need to be moved once again. Without rain, the pastures are not growing back.
Autumn socks
Lorna laces hand dyed sport yarn
I have been a couple of weeks without a knitting project and it is really warm outside, so I need something that doesn’t take too much thinking to do in the middle of the day. Using a Lorna Laces hand dyed sport yarn and number 4 needles, I cast on 56 stitches for a simple sock. My lofty goal is to get it done by the end of the month.
With the warmer weather, animals to water, a foot to pamper, and blueberries to pick among other things, I’ve slowed down a bit, so I’m just going with the flow and not pushing myself. Life will continue even if I don’t get everything done that I would like.
Surprise vacation
I was given a surprise vacation this week. Wordpress updated automatically and a number of us have not been able to get into our blogs and websites. I have spent hours upon hours this week. I am tiptoeing in here, because things aren’t quite right yet
At any rate, I hope you had a marvelous Independence day, whether Canadian or American. This usually indicated summer as officially here in the Pacific Northwest, although it was early this year.
As you can see from the above photo, I haven’t made much quilting progress. Maybe tomorrow, my machine will be ready to come home. If so, I can pick it up when we get the hearing aids fitted and ordered.
Most of the sheep have fresh coats on now and will move Sunday to a new field of weeds.
We have been picking and eating blueberries and other foods from the garden, and most of all, we have been watering and watering and watering.
So my plan is to be back to blogging again on Sunday to fill you in on life on a mini farm near the city.
Vet visit, horns removed
Today was the vet made his visit. The sheep have been given their sleepy injection and the vet (white shirt) is waiting for it to take effect. My neighbors came over to help separate the sheep. These sheep are not supposed to have horns, however, they are descendants of Merino sheep who have very large horns. Therefore, it is not unusual to have small horns called scurs. The problem here was they were fighting and had broken one. The other sheep had them growing in such a way that they would eventually have grown into his face. Not a good thing. 
The vet first sheared around the horn so he could see what he was doing, He then removed the scur and cauterized it.
Because we did not want this trait to be something bred back into these sheep, these boys are no longer able to breed. They will become lovely fiber pets. Horns on sheep are full of blood and tissue going down into the sinuses, so it’s a bit of a mess, but fortunately heals well.
Since I sprained my foot, I am trying to stay off of it as much as possible ( getting even less done now). So I spent the rest of the day working on my Website class. One of these days you will see the end results featuring these sheep
Sheep paradise after halter tying
Halter tying lambs
Today we had a different, but very good reason to halter tie the lambs. They needed their last baby shot. I do not have the skills yet, to hold a very squirmy, escaping, lamb and put the needle in the right place. When I halter tie them, I eliminate the escaping and if I hold them sideways to the feeder, they don’t have much squirm room either. So the whole process goes much smoother for both me and the lamb.
Pasture Paradise
I took so many photos of them enjoying this. Here they are coming down the hill from the barn on the right. They are so excited about the green, they must stop to taste on the way to the pasture.
Some of them have made it to the far side of the nearly dry pond.
After a rest and cud chewing time, they explored even more of the area that we had prepared for them. When it was time to come in, I had to have the neighbor come over with her border collie and encourage them to come back to the barn, safe from coyotes for the night. This will soon be routine for them and they will come back easily.
Where does one start ?
Where does one start with a room like this? These are mostly fleeces that I need to go through, pick out the vegetation and put up for sale. Only a matter of time to get all this done. And it needs to get done, because somehow the year goes quickly and there will be more fleeces that need this space.
So I picked a place to start and when it was filled, I quit and decided to tackle more of this later. Instead I sewed a few seams on the Hunters quilt and then decided to study more for my website formation class. Some messes are just too much to handle all at once.
Euro style scarf finished
This Euro style scarf is finished. It was a fast and easy knit, however, I did learn that if I’m not paying attention, I don’t count accurately. The pattern is a multiple of 5, which isn’t hard, just had to pay attention. This is very, very soft in the Cascade yarn. I will block it later.
This is another suggested way to wear it, which I won’t be wearing as I don’t go to formal events.
After finishing this, i spent 3 hours cleaning barn stall floors, so did not start anything else. And I will admit to wanting to eat something totally off program, but I won’t.
My day
Haltering babies: So much easier to tie them to the 2 x 4 and let them learn they aren’t in charge, than to let them pull you around.
My today
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Feed dogs at both barns
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Drive DH to gym and wait
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Ordered bird netting for berries
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Made day’s list
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Went to grocery store
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Went to office store
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Came home, made lunch
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Picked up co-op order
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Went to feed store to get more sheep collars
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Cheated and Napped
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Spent 2 hours working sheep with halters
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Put coats on some of them
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Fed, watered all sheep
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Watered in hoop house
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Picked and washed kale
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Picked and washed 2# cabbage and leaves
No one gets between these pushy, shovey, 150# girls at mealtime!
TIRED YET?
I still have a few things left on my list that didn’t happen – maybe tomorrow. But then some of these same things will appear on tomorrow’s list – like the sheep. This gives you an idea of why I don’t get much quilting or other hobbies done.
Early to bed tonight. I have 2 young men coming in the morning to help with the weed whacking (I think/hope they’re coming).
Weed whacking, phone
Did you know that you need to periodically clean out the little hole where you plug into your smart phone. I didn’t which caused me a trip to AT&T to find out why it wasn’t charging. It had too much dust and dirt to connect.
I am feeling hemmed in by the weeds which have grown as tall as the flowers, so today, the weed whacker and I spent some time together. But it is so overwhelming and really very difficult to find help.
And because today the computer is somewhat behaving, here is a photo of the green and cream colors that I cut for the quilt, plus the picture of 4 blocks put together.
Other than that, I cleaned a stall in the barn and worked on more lamb halter training. They do not like those lessons.
Yarn, more yarn, and patterns
Today was the day to gather the yarn from various places, sort and make a written inventory. I don’t have nearly as much as many of my friends, but it seemed to be hiding in various places. Then I gathered the sock instructions that I get free of the internet – which were also hither and yon and they are now in 2 notebooks.
This is one of the smallest lambs and one of the most difficult to catch. She makes up for size in her zippy movements. Today was her third day of halter training. The first day, she was a bucking bronco, yesterday, not too bad. Today, she managed to slip out of it and get away. Somedays, it is hard for me to win these battles.