Not completely devoid of knitting content

Though I will admit that I've lost my sense of urgency for warm woolies once the temperatures hit the 70s every day...

I'm still plugging along on my Bramblewood vest, though not without problems.

Right now it's sitting in timeout.  (Actually, I'm the one who should be in timeout, but it's not big enough to send me, so there.)  Things were going smoothly round and round until the last time I got to the cable section on the center back.  Something didn't look right.  I checked the cable section at center front and discovered that this round should have been a cable round, but I'd knitted a plain one.  Drat!  I started tinking back to the center front to have another go at it.
Unfortunately, I got interrupted.  No idea what it was, but the upshot is that I dropped my knitting into the basket and wandered off.  The next time I reached for the knitting, I forgot that I was supposed to be going in reverse and just blithely started knitting away.  Until I got to the cable section at the center back again.  Double drat!  Drat drat drat in mighty drattiness!  So I started tinking back again, and (you guessed it) got interrupted again.
But hey!  I'm getting smarter - I only knit a couple of inches the third time before I realized I should STILL be going in reverse...

So, let's talk about alpacas instead!
Saturday was the big shearing day for Wicked Good Stepmother's alpacas.  The shearers, consisting of a mom, a dad, and the three kids, arrived with mats and muscles and got down to business.

The muscles came in handy.

Not that alpacas are stubborn or anything.  Or dumb.  Unh unh. 

Lovely cooperative intelligent creatures, each and every one.

(We won't talk about the fact that this gray one peed on the girl's leg while she was trying to hold it steady...)

  Soon all four had their new spring haircuts and were looking pretty spiffy.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any pics of them at the spiffy stage, since they all had a good roll in the dirt as soon as they were released back in their pasture.  At that point they just looked like four big dustballs, so I went back to helping gather up fleece.
I really need to get that spinning wheel going, don't I?





 

What would be the point of a weekend off if you don't end up with critter pics?

After all the auto angst, it was a smooth trip there and back, with nothing whatsoever exploding. Yay! (If only it wasn't an 8 hour trip. Each way.)

And I promised pictures...

First up, piggies!
I've mentioned a few times that my dad raises pigs. A lot of pigs. (He told me his New Year's resolution this year is not to build another barn. Those of us who know him think this is totally hysterical.)
I tried to make friends with these little cuties, but they weren't having it. I couldn't even tempt them over with corn. Every time I moved, they'd scatter, then inch closer as long as I was perfectly still. Even so, they kept a strict distance between me and them. I was disappointed, since I really wanted to scritch them behind the ears.


Hard to believe that something so small grows up to be something so big...



Anyone who is currently breastfeeding might want to skip the next couple of pictures - they'll give you nightmares. Or maybe you'll want to look, and think about how happy you are that you're human and not swinish...

Yep, that's two layers of piglet goodness.

While I was trying to get closer for a better shot, one of the little piggies panicked and made a noise. Mama heaved herself up to see what was going on. The little ones vanished -

and hid behind her.

But they were way too curious to stay hidden for long.

All these little ones are about a week old. They're just at the point where they've started to run and jump and spin around dancing. I could have watched them all afternoon, but there were other critters to see...

My Wicked Good Stepmother has an alpaca collection. (She started with 2, then suddenly found herself with 6. She's not entirely sure how that happened. She's back down to 5 now, as one of her original ones passed away last fall, but who knows how many she'll have tomorrow.)



And you know me and the chicken pictures...
Here's part of Dad's motley crew -


As you can see, there's plenty of variety in that pen (and I only got about half of them in the picture.)


There's also some molting going on. Poor raggedy looking things...

There was also a lot of fun

Lest you think the whole trip to my dad's was a disaster, I should share some of the good stuff...

I got to meet the two new alpacas. Dad and Wicked Good Stepmother now have 6 (six!) alpacas. The little guy is Max - he's a runt. Two years old, and looks like he's half-grown. But what he lacks in size, he makes up for in personality.

Here's my grandson (aged 2.5) 'reading' a story to his great-grandpa and the dog. (The dog was a little bewildered at being read to... She finally took refuge in Dad's lap, and little Mr. C followed along with his book, enjoying the larger audience.)


There were piggies to admire:

The boy was a good little helper, come chore-time. Though it takes a long time to fill a trough, a dozen kernels of corn at a time...

And he got to meet a pig up-close. (That's a very alert Great-Grandma hovering over him, ready to whisk him up and out of the way if the pig got grumpy.) Check out the bottom left corner of the picture - you'll see 2 very tiny piglets. My favorite was the pink one with freckles!

Alpacas are big fans of corn, as well.

The Divine Miss L, my granddaughter, stayed in the house - she'd spent a couple of weeks on the farm last summer, so doing chores wasn't near the attraction for her. She had happy Christmas loot to play with, which beat the pants off freezing outdoors.
Meanwhile, little Mr C was being followed by the paparazzi - his grandmother, mother, and aunt were all trooping along behind him with cameras...

Ply me to the moon... (sorry, sometimes I just can't help it.)

Okay, this video just changed my life...
Sarah Anderson's Navajo Plying. I don't even remember where I first got the link. I watched it, bookmarked it, and thought "Gotta give that a try next time I'm stuck with Navajo plying."
I've whinged many a time about chain-plying. I always feel like I'm about a hand-and-a-half short of being able to do it.
Tonight was the night. I had singles left over from the 3-ply alpaca I'm spinning. (As I always say, why, oh why, do the bobbins never come out even...) Loaded up the video, watched closely one more time, then gave it a shot.
I mirror-imaged her, since my right hand is my orifice hand. And holy crap! First time ever that I chain-plyed without extensive and vehement cursing! The twist was consistent. The little knobby loops disappeared.
One less thing to whinge about.
Life is good.

I Just Wanna Ply

(Put your arms around me, baby. Put your arms around me, baby...)


Ready or not, here I come... As soon as I hit that "Publish" button, the wheel will start turning!


In the good news department: I got to meet the Extreme Gardener and her husband tonight.
Turns out they're literally our neighbors - only a couple of miles up the road. Madman and I gave them the grand tour of our little crazy acre. They scritched our sheep and smiled at the chickens, and we talked garden, garden, garden. We compared notes on plant varieties, swapped stories of gardens past, and shared plans of gardens yet to be. Incredibly nice people! Looking forward to seeing them again.

Gah! Summer's nearly over!

I can't believe it's nearly the end of August already. And as awful a summer as it has been (on so many levels...), at least there's some good coming from it.

Here's what Madman picked in the garden tonight:

The big honkin' yellow cucumbers will end up as seed for next year. The paste tomatoes (Amish Paste and a few Debarao) are simmering on the stove right now, filling the air with sweet summer's scent. The green and red peppers are Ace - we chop the green and freeze them, the reds will be roasted and frozen. The long yellow-green peppers are Cubanelle, which is a variety we've never grown before. (Both peppers are plants we bought as replacements for our poor frozen seedlings last spring. We normally grow Ace, but Cubanelle is an experiment. I'm still mourning all the Ancho and Anaheim peppers we lost...)

The beet greens are looking good.
And the yellow onions are starting to bulb up!


The red onions, not so much...

Jean's Beans are coming along nicely,

as are the Vt Cranberry beans.

And we've got an Amazon forest of winter squash growing. They're now so overgrown and intermingled that we can't even get to the center of the patch. We peek and poke around the periphery, trying to get a count of the squash on the way. We'll have plenty of delicata, from the looks of things, and lots of buttercup and acorn. Butternut is represented, but we can't get a good look.
But here's the surprise we found tonight, along the upper edge of the patch, growing in or near last year's compost pile.
Normally, our delicata will fit in the palms of our hands. The variety we grow is a single or barely a double serving. This one is at least three times that big.
But the biggest surprise of all was hidden in the leaves a few feet away...

(Madman's hand and a beer bottle included for scale.) That thing is the size of a soccer ball. The markings are delicata, but it doesn't have the ribbing we know and love. Mystery squash...
Madman threw out some old squash seed on the compost pile last spring, and we had a bunch of squash come up (as well as tomatoes and tomatillos) that we just let go and grow. We won't know till frost kills the vines so we can trace them back, if this is something that sprang from those old seeds, or if it's from our acorn hills (which are closest to this area) and means our acorn seed from last year has taken a wonky turn.
Wonder what it's going to taste like?

And it's not all gardening (though it's close!)
I've managed to squeeze a little bit of spinning in. Here's some of that gray alpaca:
Notice the halo. I can't seem to get alpaca roving under control as well as the commercial processors. It might groom itself a little better when I commence to plying - I'm planning a 3-ply. Or maybe it'll just end up three times as fuzzy...

I think I could live with that...
,

Being good is cutting into my spinning time...

So, it's my day off. I'm trying soooo hard to be good and take care of the garden stuff, the Everest of laundry, the despicable state of the kitchen floor.
But the lure of this stuff is almost impossible to resist...


It whispers to me every time I pass by.

And my spinning wheel has started to whimper.

Carding up a storm

So I started carding the gray alpaca. (Is anyone surprised?) I'm using the hand cards, since I don't feel like fighting with the drum carder. Maybe tomorrow...
I've only got a few little bumps carded so far, but they look like light fluffy clouds. Well, rain clouds, anyway. My fingers are itching to start spinning, but I want to get a bit more carded first. Patience... *sigh*

And here's a good one:
When I went for an eye exam to get new glasses recently, the optometrist didn't like the look of my optic nerves. There was an oddness. He scheduled me for some tests, since that oddness could mean either of two things: a) it's normal for me or b) it's an early sign of glaucoma.
I had the tests this morning. There's no glaucoma in my family, and turns out that I don't have it either. I just have weird-looking optic nerves.
The final results - weird is my normal.
I could have told him that...

Alpaca fleece!

Finally got some of the alpaca fleece washed up.
Here's the black:Lots of VM, unfortunately... These are farm critters, so there's everything from hay and cockleburrs to squirrels in there. Well, maybe not squirrels.

Here's the gray. I washed a lot more than I had planned, just because it was so beautiful. I kept dipping into the bag for another handful. I finally ended up with such a mass that it took forever to rinse.
That picture looks good, but it's much better in real life. Lots of color in there... Madman pronounced it silver. He's got his hand up for something knit in the new fleeces. (I hate to tell him, but he's in line behind my Wicked Good Stepmother, since she's the Founder of the Feast.)
Long long ago, when I asked Madman what his favorite color is, he told me "Black and Silver." When I pointed out that that was a combination, rather than a color, he looked thoughtful for a moment, then replied, "Well, it's still my favorite color." (That's my man. Ask a simple question, get a complex answer.)

Now I just have to finish plying the merino I spun for Tour de Fleece (and beyond. I know, I know, TdF has been over for, like, forever, and I'm still not done. *sigh*)
Once the bobbins are cleared, it's on to alpaca!

Alpacas, and Pigs, and Chickens, Oh My!

So I'm finally almost not tired enough to put up some pics. (In my defense, I worked late on Monday (first day back), and the garden exploded while I was gone, so some freezing of produce was called for tonight. This is seriously cutting into my spinning time...)
First, the alpacas!This is Apache, aka Patch. He's the Head Alpaca. This means that he has to be first to investigate anyone with a camera. It also means that any and all scritching to be done will be done to him. It's a tough job.
He was soon joined by the black alpaca (who is either Chico or Berto. I'll be damned if I can remember which is which...) and Bob. Bob rooms with the alpacas. They don't seem to mind that he's a pig.
Ace, the white alpaca, and either-Chico-or-Berto the gray alpaca, preferred to watch me from afar. They might have been playing King-of-the-Hill, but only because Apache wasn't over there. (He's automatically the King. Of Everything.)
I've already got some of Ace's and Apache's fleeces left from last year, so I snagged some from Chico and Berto to bring home with me. WGS wants a scarf. I'll be happy to oblige.
There was a huge pack of little piggies to admire. (This picture only shows some of them. I just couldn't get all of them into one picture...)
(I was hoping for some newborns to ogle, but had to settle for looking at some extremely pregnant sows. They napped a lot. I remember how that was...)

I got to go along with my Dad to pick up a new little boar pig. This guy is a MuleFoot, a rare Heritage breed. Instead of the standard cloven hoof that normal pigs have, this breed has one hoof - it looks for all the world like the pig is wearing a ballet slipper. (I'm guessing they thought Mulefoot was a better name for a breed of pigs than Balletfoot. I could be wrong...)

Below is the best picture I was able to get of a foot. Unfortunately, his feet kept sinking into the soft straw bedding in the pen.

Dad is working with another guy to raise more of this rare breed. He's got another older boar, already hard at work. So to speak.

And, as if he doesn't have enough to do, here he's raking concrete, getting ready to build an addition onto the addition on the main barn. Busy busy busy. I'm hoping I'll be going as strong at 77 as he is.

Oh, I promised chickens, didn't I? If you look really close at that last picture, you might be able to spy a chicken or two on the left, behind those white rectangles...