Sunday, March 17, 2019

It's that time of year!




We've gone from weeks of colder than normal to a forecast of warmer than normal. Vote for your favorite commentary on that:

  1. That's Spring for you!
  2. What's 'normal' anyway?
  3. There is no 'normal' anymore.
  4. 'Normal' is overrated anyhow.

This morning I saw my first violet-green swallow and it warmed my heart. Last week a male red-winged blackbird showed up on our deck several times, which is very unusual for up here on the hill. I suspect migrating hummingbirds have returned to join those that overwinter here, because we're seeing more and the sugar water is disappearing faster. The other morning at sunrise, I caught two sitting on our little feeder at once, a rare moment of tolerance:


Sheared sheep are showing up all over the blogosphere, and I need to be making plans for that myself. I did take fleece samples from the four two-year-olds and sent them off to Texas A&M for micron testing; all of them look lovely and will be performance-registered with the Fine Fleece Shetland Sheep Association:








I realized that I never got Bette and Bernadette registered with NASSA, so I took care of that as well. I snapped headshots to get their tag numbers; Bernadette's was too dirty to read but the photos are cute. She's a pretty little girl!



Vienna had a broken leg strap on her suit and needed a fresh one, so I took her photo, too. (Poor position and photo; she's not really rump-high.)

And here are ALL the fleecy ladies with a fleecy cloud backdrop!
Looking northwest from the arena

Looking northeast from the house

Now is the time to reserve fleeces if you're interested, because I generally go by "first reserved, first sheared." Bardot and Sarai are already reserved; the rest are available. No downpayment necessary; just tell me which one(s) you want and I'll get back to you with weight and cost once I shear and skirt your choice(s). Brian leaves Wednesday for a two-week mission trip to Guatemala, so that will be a good block of time to get at it. I'd better stock up on Aleve!

Oh, and Happy St. Patrick's Day! Appropriately, I'm getting back to a green section of my FatCatKnits fiber:

That's it for now from . . .


6 comments:

Michelle said...

First comment.

Mama Pea said...

Your sheep with their clothes off (!) look as if their wool has already been felted! Funny how it gets that way.

You're going to be two weeks without a teenage boy in the house? Wooo-eee! Maybe you should pick up a bottle of nice wine along with that Aleve. Relax and enjoy yourself and the solitude. But knowing you there's probably already a long list of things you want to accomplish since you won't have any interruptions! Do enjoy yourself!

Susan said...

Oooh, "you" time! I'm with Mama Pea - squeeze out every second you can get. Your sheep are so lovely, Michelle. If I wasn't dealing with a pile 'o fleeces from my liberally vm-d lot, I would reserve one of those beauties. I am voting for #3.... xo

Retired Knitter said...

Love the picture of the sheep in the pasture and your house in the background. What a wonderful view you must have!

Michelle said...

The coats DO compress the fleece, Mama Pea, but I haven't had trouble with actual felting. I won't have much time to relax while Brian is away; I'll have to post about all that's scheduled!

Oh, I'll be "squeezing," Aunt Sweezie – just to get as much done as possible!

Elaine, you can see our view in the second photo of the sheep, as that is taken from our deck – as are most of the sunrise photos I take. Yes, it IS wonderful!

Jeanne said...

Great pictures, Michelle!
So far, we haven't seen any rufous hummers this year. And we may have lost some of our Anna's during our extremely nasty snowstorm.

Don't overdo on all that work!