5 Weeks

Somebody turned 5 weeks old yesterday! AND somebody has already learned to use the litter box - hooray!!! I can't believe how big she is getting. She is so happy and playful. It's hard to get anything done around here because all we want to do is play with her!

Sunday

Yesterday at Only Ewe and Cotton Too was so much fun! We really enjoyed ourselves and THANK YOU so much to all of the people who came there to support us and Only Ewe. We really appreciate it!!

We are spending the day unloading the car. We have a lot of interesting pictures to share with you from last week so we'll get those downloaded today so we can put them up over the week!

In the mean time - please enjoy the pictures of the baby turkeys that are currently growing up on the farm!

Kitteh!!

Well, I think our new little friend finally has a name! Took us long enough, eh? We think we have settled on Nessie. It was down to Zilla or Nessie. Obviously, we think she is a little monster! :)

Now, I know what you all are thinking. You are thinking that we named her Nessie because of the Twilight series - not so! Actually what happened is that we sold some lace weight yarn one day in the colorway "Nessie" and we both thought - hey, that's a great name for a cat! So be it. Her name is Nessie unless something else sticks. Sort of like Willow - her "name" is Willow but Missy has just stuck so that is all we call her. We just need to get her name changed on her veterinary record!

We are starting to trust Petey a little more with her. He is VERY concerned about her but all he would have to do is accidentally step or sit on her and she would be flat! But we got some cute pictures of him checking her out yesterday.



She is so super cute! She is starting to act like a little cat now. She almost has playing figured out. Mostly, she just entertains us though!



Before you go into the weekend I must share a picture of my husband in the shower yesterday. No - it's not what you think! He worked in the garden yesterday morning and came home a little....ahem......dirty shall we say. The water was just a bit dirty. I keep telling him that he is a dirty old man! Now I have photographic evidence for proof!



Have a great weekend! I hope to see some of you at Only Ewe and Cotton Too on Sunday!!

Sunday June 27th!!!

We have a fun date coming up soon! I have some new stuff that we are taking to Only Ewe and Cotton Too on Sunday June 27th. We'll be there from 12-4 so come by if you can! We will have some 50/50 silk/merino, some 70/20/10 alpaca/silk/cashmere and some aran weight. None of those things are available on our website. I dyed them all special just for Sunday! We'll also have some of our regular yarns, roving, yarn bowls and spindle bowls.

Here are a few more random shots from around our place. Honestly, I'm just trying to take up blog space since I have no knitting to show you.

More wildflowers



Yellow squash



Butternut squash



If you don't like spiders....................don't scroll down!!!!










Check out this crazy spider nest that we found in one of our trees!!!! Pretty cool, eh? They were kind of hard to get a good picture of. We think these are wolf spiders, which are harmless but they can get HUGE and scary looking! I imagine they eat lots of the annoying bugs though so they are fine by me!

Our House

Look at this cool picture our neighbor took of our house from her house. Isn't that a great picture?? I'm not sure what those pink flowers are but they sure are pretty!

Here's a picture that she took of me and a Nubian goat last week. It's a long story as to why we were there and what we were doing but suffice it to say that we enjoyed our visit with Izzy (pictured) and his sister Trixie!!

Random Shots

Here are some random shots from around our yard. I tell ya, that mushroom compost is like gold when it comes to gardening! Our plants are doing MUCH better this year than last year.

Here are some tomatoes (and Wayne!)



Here are some hanging tomatoes (and Petey!)



Wildflower



Our grapes that we planted last year

Hydrangea

Ya just never know

You just never know what you are going to see around here. The other morning we were going about our business and Wayne happened to look out the window. Just on the back side of our pond were these little happy things!



These two hang out around here pretty often. I believe that this is a brother and sister pair and I think their mom got killed several months ago, unfortunately, because there used to be 3. We saw the dead deer (not sure what happened to it) but we weren't sure which one it was.

Luckily, they haven't discovered our gardens yet but it is probably just a matter of time. Petey must be getting used to them because he was just sitting out on the porch watching them!

In progress

That's pretty much the term we have used for our house since we moved here! But, my wonderfully talented husband just keeps plugging along. Honestly, it's amazing how much he gets done considering how busy we stay!!!

Here's a picture of the back of our house before we moved in. We tore down the deck and all of that walkway and railings.



Here's an "in progress" picture.



Here's how it looks now! He still has a little work to do on it but it is much improved!

Chicken Update

It's been a while since you all have had a chicken update! The chickens are doing awesome!! I can't believe how big they have gotten. They are just now 12 weeks old but they are just about full sized it seems. They have a bit more growing and filling out to do yet but they are well on their way to being adult chickens! I got a picture of them all squeezed together in their laying boxes. You can't see them too well but they are in there!



The red one is our rooster.

3 Weeks!

First of all - just to be clear about the post from yesterday - the opossums are NOT going to be pets! Wildlife babies should be rehabilitated and then released back into the wild.

Many people are very misinformed about opossums and just don't like them because they think they are scary looking and mean. In reality, opossums are a very important part of the local eco-system. Opossums are scavengers and eat many things that other animals don't want to eat so they help to keep the eco-system clean. They are the nighttime cleaning crew while vultures are the daytime cleaning crew! Both of these animals are important for a balanced eco-system. ANY mammal can get rabies. However, the chances of an opossum having rabies is extremely rare due to their low body temperature. Skunks, bats and raccoons are much more likely vectors for rabies. So, there really is no reason to fear an opossum having rabies. They are very defensive but they aren't necessarily mean. They aren't going to attack you unless you try to harm them or get too close to their nest. They have sharp teeth so that they can eat the foods that they need to eat. They also eat poisonous snakes!!

Anyway - I just wanted to clear up some misunderstandings about that. Now back to your regularly scheduled blog......................

Well, Little Miss Nameless is 3 weeks old today! She is doing so great!! We have thought about lots of names but just nothing has stuck yet. I guess she will tell us her name when she is ready.

Little Miss Messy had her first bath the other day.

Something new

There is always something new and unexpected around here. No day is ever routine it seems. I guess that is good - it keeps us from being bored! I took Little Miss Kitten to the vet the other day just to get her checked out (she is great!) and this guy walks in with a bucket that appeared to be full of hay. He says "Uhhhh........I got me a bucket o baby possums here what do I do with 'em?". The receptionist, the tech and the vet all immediately look at me. I was like "Umm, OK - I'll take them."

Thank goodness our wildlife rehabber Liz was coming in later that day so I could pawn them off on her! We took care of them for the day before she got there and I was actually amazed at how easy they were!! Much easier than the kittens but, of course, they had a little more age on them. They are probably around 4 weeks old or so I imagine. I have taken care of plenty of squirrels but I had never really taken care of baby opossums before - OMG they are so friggin' CUTE!!!!!!

When I got back to the house I took them all out to get them on the heating pad - there were 7!


They have been happily moved to our neighbor's care and they are all doing great!

Happy Friday!

Just a little note to wish everyone a Happy Friday! Little kitty went to the vet today and after a good look (and someone helping us hold her still!) we think she is a girl! We'll check back in about a week to be sure but I'm pretty convinced. It's hard to see all the appropriate stuff when they are so little! So, we were going to name him Oscar (because he was a grouch) but I guess that name won't work anymore. We are still in the market for a good name!

We have a few more wildlife additions after today. I'll tell you about those next week!

Updates and such

Since most of the bowls we put up last week are gone, we put some new yarn bowls up on the site today.

We did our speaking thing at the City Council Meeting on Tuesday and it went pretty darn well! We got a very positive response from people about the prospect of adding curbside recycling so that was great! If you want to see the write up that we got in the paper the other day, you can see it HERE. We will probably be in the paper again today and tomorrow so we'll see what those look like! Gotta love life in a small town - it's so easy to make the paper! Then wherever you go in town people say "Hey! I saw you in the paper!".

Seriously, I am still knitting a shawl and I don't really have that much more left. It's just a matter of getting to it! I am knitting it with a 50/50 merino/silk blend which is really nice. I'll have to get some pictures of it for you although it looks like crap all bunched up on the needles!

Today we have a meeting with one of the county commissioners and Advanced Disposal Systems to discuss a donation that ADS would like to make for Feed Fannin. Should be interesting. The mayor sent us an email yesterday asking us to be on the appeals board because she thought we would be a perfect fit. As soon as we figure out what in the heck that means we will consider it!! Any input there???

We have another busy weekend coming up. Karen is coming with our 3 month old grandbaby that we haven't seen yet so it should be a fun (and busy!) weekend with all of the other stuff going on. I need to get some pictures of the little kitten soon too - he is growing so much and changing every darn day!!!!

Yay Spring!!

I love this time of year because of all the babies! The geese came and visited us again a few days ago (I really don't know where they are hanging out this year because we aren't seeing much of them). They started off with 6 babies but now they are down to 5 unfortunately. The five that are left are doing great though! They grow so darn fast! We heard a pack of coyotes howling last night REALLY close to the house - closer than I have ever heard them before. So, they may have something to do with a missing chick. We were on high alert for our chickens. Luckily - we have some safeguards in place for them.


During the Arts in the Park Festival that I told you about yesterday, Wayne took one of his kilts to our good friend Pat who (along with his wife, Polina) own the Blue Ridge Brewery. Wayne thought that the kilt would be a perfect fit - and he was right! Check out these two Blue Ridgers in kilts!

Arts in the Park

On Memorial Day Weekend Wayne and I helped out with the Feed Fannin booth at the Arts in the Park Festival. Luckily, the weather held out for us and it was a great weekend!!! We raised lots of money and got the word out to a bunch of folks.







These past few days we have been working really hard on BRAEA and trying to work on getting mandatory recycling for our city. We have been meeting with all kinds of city officials and waste management companies to try and understand how we can get this going. Tonight we are speaking at the City Council meeting in favor of adopting some recycling and environmental standards so - wish us luck!!!

The little peanut is doing awesome! He is officially 2 weeks old today! He is turning into quite the butterball. He has an orange dot on the back of each of his ears - they look like eyes - so cute! What should we name him??

And then there was one

Unfortunately, we are down to one kitten. These poor little things were just way too tiny to be away from their mommy. As heartbreaking as it is, we are now down to one. However, the good news is that he is doing great and has always been far stronger than the others. Of course, he isn't out of the woods yet, he is still tiny, but he has a good chance. He is about a week old now. He is very cute and is actually starting to act like a little kitten. He is purring and trying to kneed with his little feet and is taking milk from his bottle like a champ!



We have done so much stuff over the past week I don't even know where to begin! Our schedule has been nuts but we have done some good things in our community I think and we are working towards doing more! We went to a meeting at City Hall on Tuesday night and the mayor asked us if we would get on the agenda for the next meeting to talk about our environmental group. Of course, I eagerly agreed (any chance to run my mouth, right?) and I asked her when the next meeting was. She was like "Oh, next Tuesday.". Uh - as in a week from today? Yep. So we have been scrambling trying to get information and plan what we are going to talk about. Yikes!

Anyway, just a bunch of stuff going on this week so forgive my blog absence. I'll try to do better next week. Have a great weekend everyone! We are hoping for a relaxing one this time - though I'll probably be dyeing yarn since I haven't managed to get to any of THAT this week at all!!

I will get club shipments out next week on schedule though - I promise!

Apparently...........

I'm taking a few days off from blogging! Please forgive my absence of amazingly witty tales that I know you all just sit on the edge of your seats and wait for!! :)

We have had an incredibly busy weekend and we are still trying to catch up. I have lots of pictures that haven't even made it through the download cord yet so hopefully I'll be able to get my act together for a few decent blog posts this week.

We worked the Arts Festival all weekend for Feed Fannin, I had 2 papers due, I had 2 big wholesale orders to get finished, we had plans with friends, my dad drove up and brought us a new-to-us kitchen table and stove so that we can replace the stove in our dye kitchen (woo hoo!) and our neighbor and I had 6 3-day old kittens bestowed upon us to try and keep alive. So far that has worked for the 3 remaining kittens. They are so tiny but the ones that are left are doing great so keep your fingers crossed. I'll have some pictures of them for you too. Three days is REALLY young for these poor kitties to have lost their mommy.

One piece of amazingly good news is that I got my statistics paper back yesterday and I made 100% on it - woo hooo!!!!! Who would have thought I could make 100% on a statistics paper! So, that pretty much made my week (I know, I need more to look forward to, right?).

Anyway, we'll be back up and blogging soon. We have sent out a BUNCH of bowls lately so if you have ordered one, rest assured that it is on it's way!!