What Housework?

All is well

Vermont finally made national news, but not in a good way. Tropical storm Irene came through Sunday afternoon. The flood damage in the state is unprecedented and kind of hard to wrap your head around. Brandon, a town not far from here, lost several downtown buildings when the river overflowed. 

I am touched by all the people from far away, most of whom I've never met in person, who have emailed to see if we're OK up here. Actually, our town saw relatively little damage, and our property saw no damage at all. Roads outside of town are apparently washed out and causing major headaches for lots of people, like dairy farmers, whose milk has to be dumped because the milk trucks can't get through, not to mention the people in outlying towns who've been stranded. So, all is well at the Lazy J. But thanks for your concern.

The blog would have been updated two weeks ago, because I had the cutest pictures I've taken all year, including a series of my husband sitting out on the porch Sunday morning sharing a bowl of cereal with a hen who had made herself comfy on his lap.

But I deleted the whole set of pictures by accident. I'm just getting over the loss now.

There's not much farm news. It's late summer, I need to process the corn and tomatoes, pick the basil and green beans, and shell the dry beans. And brew another batch of beer. Same old, same old.

A few weeks ago, I picked the last of the shell peas.

The results, though always meager, are delicious.

I pulled the pea vines and they made some goats and a sheep quite happy.

Other veggies from a few weeks back:

We had a hailstorm, but as with Irene, it didn't do any damage.

Sunday, when Irene came and it rained and rained, was the day our meat birds were scheduled for slaughter. My husband and the two guys who came to do the work did despite the rain, in the barn. The day before, we had spent the morning trying to get 76 giant, not-too-bright chickens from their portable coop into a holding pen in the barn. Not exactly the running of the bulls at Pamplona, but eventually they got in there. Now they're all in freezers around the county.

Except one.

What we have in this photo are five young Araucana ("Easter-egger") laying hens. And one Cornish/White Rock cross meat bird. "The one that got away," I guess you'd say.

He was gimpy from the get-go, but never immobile. Still, while his coopmates ate and grew strong and healthy, he never left the coop. Each day we brought food and water to him and my husband kept saying, "I should get rid of that bird." But he never did. Slaughter day came and went and we were stuck with this undersized, limping bird not fit for eating. My husband, once an avid hunter, doesn't care to "get rid" of animals on the farm if he can help it. So this one got a stay of execution.

For the time being he's living with the other birds. The big chickens peck him hard whenever they get near him, but the young girls don't seem to mind him. Maybe he'll be rehabilitated, probably not. Maybe he was faking a limp so we wouldn't eat him. Whatever. He's staying for now.

My last batch of photos, the ones I deleted, dammit, had some pictures of the meat birds on pasture. I have not yet tasted one of these so I can't say if keeping them outdoors on grass made a huge difference in the finished product. However, contrary to what many people told us, they DID move around a lot outside compared to the ones we've kept in the barn in years past. They DID chase earwigs and other bugs, they DID peck in the dirt, they DID eat grass, and in general they acted a lot more like real chickens, not like lifeless eating machines. Just getting sun and fresh air had to make a difference in their health. I'll report back with a taste test soon.

The tomatoes are coming in fast and furious, and thanks to my friend Jenn, who came out and saved me with her gardening skills a couple of weeks ago, the weeds have been beaten into submission and the garden is once again thriving. Which may not be a good thing; it means more work for me.

So tonight I have a date with the Squeezo and a batch of tomatoes. But there's this other thing I've been wasting my time on lately:

Yeah, knitting. Remember that thing I used to always do? This is Vivian, a cabled, shaped cardigan by Isolde Teague. Winter is coming, after all, and fast.

So, wrapping up, life at the Lazy J is crazy, as always, but smooth and untroubled compared to the rest of the state. Thank you to all who have expressed concern as to my safety. We got lucky with this one. Just ask Roy and Trooper.

 

 

 

Let's get this party started

Unlike most years, we're hitting the holidays hard and fast this year.

I actually think I like it.

Most of our shopping is done (out of economic necessity, not good planning). I started my Christmas knitting last month, only to find that no one in the family will leave my side long enough for me to sneak in any work on their gifts. So I've started making these:

Korknisser! Are these not the most adorable things you ever saw? (I say this as a Christmas cynic who thinks Bad Santa was hysterically funny and who considers National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation high art.) But when you have to keep hiding your real knitting from gift recipients, these little guys can keep you busy for 20 minutes or so. The pattern is here in Ravelry, here on the web in Norwegian, and translated to English here. I changed up the hat decreases for a little variety. I think stripes might be next, but I'll have to drink more wine first. For the corks, I mean.

Since I can hardly find a quiet moment for gift knitting, I have been working on my own project. Remember this stuff?

It was something like 26 batts of fiber I carded and then dyed. I carded it again to blend it into this:

...which I then spun into a 2-ply bulky yarn:

I immediately knit the sleeves and then waited for inspiration for the design. I wanted a really basic sweater for the express purpose of keeping me warm at work, and since the blend contains a bunch of local alpaca and a bit of silk, in addition to a lot of Blue-Faced Leicester, warmth is practically guaranteed.

With help from Ann Budd and Elizabeth Zimmerman, I came up with a round-yoke neck with knit-purl patterning. With this yarn, however, the purls were invisible; it looked like someone had made a lot of mistakes rather than a cunning Norwegian design. So I ripped it out.

Next, I went with a seamless raglan and cowl/turtleneck. Finished!

Cute, right?

Not so fast.

As it turns out, I can't stand alpaca near my chin and neck. I got so itchy just trying it on I knew I'd have to make some adjustments. (And you can't see it too well, but these garter stitch raglan decreases did not work at all -- too stretchy.)

So the finished sweater soon looked like this:

Sigh.

I went back to it and turned it into an Elizabeth Zimmerman seamless saddle-shoulder (with a little fudging around the armpits, as I was too lazy to rip out those last few rows). I need to get a good picture, but the out-of-focus one gives you the basic idea:

Plain. Effective. Comfortable. The sleeves are extra long to cover my wrists, key when typing all day in sub-zero temps. The length, while pretty long in comparison to my other sweaters, looks a bit short. I think the longer lengths and tunics currently in style make this look practically cropped in comparison.

Warm? Yes. Itchy? No, as long as it's not touching my chin area (an area that is getting lower every year...).

In fact, I wore it today on our expedition to ... get a Christmas tree. You heard me.

Tree cutting is an annual event that causes great stress at our house, usually some time after Dec. 12. Today we had an opportunity, sunny weather, and the inclination to at least tag a tree. But we decided to save another trip and just bring the damn thing home.

Two hours later, it's up and lit and, yes, decorated. Crazy. I make fun of people who put their trees up in November.

And yet, it feels pretty good. One less stressor in the limited number of weekends remaining before Christmas.

So that's where I am. Four Christmas projects and two baby projects under way, and ready to knit. Now that the tree is up, I've just opened up a whole Saturday afternoon and evening to knitting, as long as I can get away from Those People. My family. It's all good.

All I have left to share is the shop update at A Piece of Vermont Yarn & Fiber. I currently have these colorways available in merino/bamboo/nylon fingering:

I only have two colorways available in Long Trail (wool/nylon sock yarn):

Crisp:

and Blush:

And for spinners, two pairs of superwash sock yarn batts. Blue-Faced Leicester and nylon carded together for Hansel and Gretel:

and Autumn Leaves:

Here's to a smooth holiday season for all of us, from a newly converted early bird.

Sheesh.

Who wants a cat?

Just kidding, we're keeping him. But Milo, he is truly a possessed semi-feral animal.

The pictures above show him in the morning. He comes in for breakfast after a night spent terrorizing the local small animals. He expects affection done just right; pet him the wrong way and he eats your arm.

Each day, I go upstairs to shower and make the bed, and within seconds, he races up there, alternately running around under the sheets and then hiding under the bed, the better to attack my ankles. After a few minutes of making the bed with one hand, and using my other as a defensive shield on my legs, I get cranky. I wait for Milo to attack my forearm and then I walk out into the hallway, shake my arm vigorously until he lets go and drops off, and then race back into the bedroom and lock the door.

My hands look like I get a daily manicure from Edward Scissorhands.

Anyway. Life is busy. There are some things to report, such as that my older stepson proposed to his girlfriend last Sunday. (He bought the ring in July, but has been waiting to ask her father for her hand. Let's just say they do things a bit more formally in Oklahoma than in Vermont!) Both of them are still in college, but again, in OK this does not seem wildly impulsive. In Vermont, I knew exactly one person who got engaged while still a student. He also just started a full-time firefighting/EMT position at the Will Rogers Airport in Oklahoma City, even though he has half a semester to finish out at OSU. Should be interesting. He's a hard worker, and at worst he'll have to take one more class next semester, on his dime. The wedding will be in Oklahoma next summer (!) but he wants to have a huge second reception back in Vermont. At our house.

Okie-doke...

Back in the relatively uneventful life of Jessie, there has been some knitting.

I made some Fleece Stuffed Mittens for my daughter from the Robin Hansen book, using unspun wool/angora rabbit for the thrums and two strands of my Long Trail sock yarn for the mitten. Delicious.

You see two mittens but I actually knit four in total because I had to rip each one out once. I'm so tired of thrums. And, it turns out, my 10yo LOVES them, except not to actually wear in public, let alone school, because they are very bulky. Nice. See if I ever knit her four mittens again.

I also knit something more enjoyable: Ishbel. (Note the yucky incandescent-light photos; short days have come to Vermont.)

Ah, you say, "But Jessie, you are not a knitter of lace. You have a pathological fear of yarn-overs."

No, I'm not. And yes, I do. But this was far too easy and fun to be lace. I don't know what it was but I loved it. Knit with my bamboo blend sock yarn in the "Martha's Gown" colorway.

I didn't get a good picture of it, and you'll notice that my points on the edges ended up fading away and even curling a little. I'm not sure if it was the fiber content or my blocking procedure. (Note: If the only rug in your home is on the floor next to your husband's side of the bed, make sure you don't leave any stray pins around. Men can be so whiny.)

I still haven't done anything but the sleeves on my handspun sweater. The yarn, in case it's been too long for anyone to remember, is this:

I think I want a pullover, but I can't decide on the yoke. Round yoke? Raglan? Turtleneck? Hoodie? I just don't know. But it's so cold in my office, I need to make up my mind soon. There's a Downy commercial on TV these days where a woman steps off the elevator at work wrapped in a down comforter. That's what it looks like at my office; two people actually bundle up in blankets at their desks.

However, I'm already planning Christmas knitting (not for the 10yo, oddly enough). The bright side of our personal economic crisis (which is, I'm happy to say, easing up a bit, 10 months or so after it started) is that we've done quite a bit of Christmas shopping, as odd as it sounds. Rather than have the big all-out shop-a-thon in December, we're picking up one or two things a week as the grocery money allows. It's not going to be a normal over-the-top Christmas (which I hate anyway; my husband's the crazy one), but I'm thinking we may be able to avoid the mall altogether this year. One can only hope.

Okay, as I am going on and on, let me say there's been a lot of this:

Pumpkin pie made with the only little pumpkins I managed to get out of our garden. I had to buy more this week and today I'll make a pie and put the rest of the filling in the freezer for this winter. So delicious. We're still rocking the freezer full of our own meat and frozen veggies and fruits. Nothing beats the flavor.

Also, I had a shop update last night, which many of you already know from A Piece of Vermont Yarn & Fiber's mailing list. If you want to receive extremely infrequent updates, sign up here.

Bamboo Blend sock yarn, two skeins of each:

Late October:

Gingerbread:

Mountain Laurel:

Olive a Sudden:

Merino/Tussah silk 80/20 blend top. Remaining colorways are

Truth or Dare, 4 ounces:

 

Wildest Dreams, 8 ounces:

Okay, I think I've gone on long enough this morning. The house is a mess and the chickens want out of the coop.

Have a good weekend.

Foliage break

We're heading into a classic Vermont autumn weekend, and I'm taking a small getaway. Unfortunately, I'm not actually going anywhere. I'm just taking a weekend off from the February Lady Sweater (on Ravelry here):

I'm making steady progress and all that, but the weather is about to turn sharply colder, and a lacy sweater is not really at the top of my list right now. I promised my daughter some fingerless gloves (not fingerless mittens; she wants the individual finger holes) and I decided I would devote this weekend, starting tonight, to making her a pair. We'll see how I do...

The February Lady sweater is interesting. Assuming you have been under a rock, knittingwise, the deal is that the pattern was originally a lovely baby sweater designed by Elizabeth Zimmerman. In June, Flint Knits reworked it "to fit a grown ass woman" and posted it on Ravelry, where it took off. When I cast on for it a couple of weeks ago, 2,013 people had it listed as a project. Three days ago, that number was 2,254. Today it's 2,282. I'm a sheep, but a very trendy one.

Anyway, I was at the local farmer's market last weekend, and damned if I didn't see a woman wearing one. I practically tackled her. Yes, lots of people are knitting them, but in Middlebury, Vermont? Her husband rolled his eyes as soon as we started gabbing about lace repeats in the arms and such and said, "Here we go." He and my daughter chatted while we gushed.

It was a lovely week, weatherwise. Yesterday, I accompanied my daughter's class west across Lake Champlain (via ferry) to Mt. Defiance, a Revolutionary War site that looks down on Fort Ticonderoga and also Mt. Independence, which her class hiked last fall.

The view doesn't suck.

This is the view looking east at Lake Champlain and Vermont and the Green Mountains in the background.

Although you may not be able to tell from the picture, Fort Ti is that gray thing just to the left of the cannon tip. (Try clicking on the picture.) Mt. Independence is on the point of land off to the right.

Fort Ti was built by the French and was a pivotal place in the 1700s, because at the time the lake was surrounded by virgin forest and the lake was about the only way to travel. It's sited at the point where the LaChute River (which starts at Lake George) flows into the Champlain; the mouth of the LaChute is there in the left foreground. The fort changed hands a lot during the Revolution, but it may be best known for one early morning in 1775, when Benedict Arnold, Ethan Allen, and the Green Mountain Boys surprised the French garrison there, and scored the first American victory of the Revolutionary War.

Here is a view of Lake Champlain looking south from Mt. Defiance.

.

The very steep (now paved) road that we hiked up yesterday was originally cleared in 1777 by 700 of British General Burgoyne's men, in 36 hours. They wanted a place from which to rain cannon fire down on Fort Ti, and the oxen that hauled the cannon couldn't get through the dense forest. The move was a good one, apparently, as it allowed the British to retake the fort until the end of the war.

Thirty-six hours is pretty quick to clear a road using hand tools, considering how long it takes today's road crews to get paving done. But then, the British army probably didn't have to follow union rules...

It's not quite peak foliage here yet, but the views were still beautiful, both at long range and close up.

This also marked the second day in two weeks that I have spent with my daughter's class. Last week, we hiked through the woods behind the school--to our house! Farm field trip, don't you know.

Anyway, despite all the chaperone time I've been putting in, I did update the shop a couple of days ago. If you are on the mailing list, you've seen all this. For the rest of you, here goes. I posted my favorite decadent-luxury spinning fiber: bombyx silk and merino top. Delicous.

Sea Glass:

Crime of Passion:

Monet's Bridge:

Monet's Bridge is actually 7.5 ounces (or a little more), whereas the others are just over 4 ounces. I may end up keeping 3.5 ounces of it for myself, but first I'll offer it up to the spinner who wants a somewhat larger project. It's the same stuff I photographed in process in my last post.

I also have yet another non-yarn, non-fiber offering: silver-wire jewelry. You remember way back when I bragged about the bracelet my friend Amy surprised me with? I asked her to make more jewelry for me to sell, and she did. Like this:

And this necklace:

And this necklace:

Amy bends almost all the wire herself, so even the beads that go through the wires are her own, not factory-made. Each piece is unique, all are lovely, and you can get more details by clicking on the links.

Life continues on the farm. Here's a shot of the trout having breakfast. I should have brought my camera out last night. They must have been hungry because the water looked like there was a piranha attack going on; sometimes the fish flip right up, almost completely out of the water. When a dozen of them are doing it at once, it's pretty fun to watch.

Milo injured a baby rabbit that my husband and brother-in-law tried to nurse back to health.

It didn't work, or I'd have pictures.

Rotten cat.

That's all for now. I've got merino/silk yarn and BFL top to dye today. And bamboo-blend sock yarn. Have a wonderful weekend.

Catching up, part I

Help! I've fallen so far behind in blogging that I can't find a big enough chunk of time to update everything. Fall, it turns out, is a busy time. So I'll break things down into two parts and see if that helps.

KNITTING

A handspun hat for my husband, done:

 

It's the same Norwegian Star Earflap Hat I just made, only this time it's out of handspun BFL and, obviously, I skipped the colorwork. Who needs Fair Isle when you've got handspun?

  

He refused to try it on for the camera, which may have something to do with the Holly Hobbie thing, but that's fine.

I also got all crazy and pumped up with a desperate need for an Aran vest of my own design. Never mind that I don't know how to design knitwear. After days of taking notes, planning, swatching, and waking up in the middle of the night with a concern about armholes (what, this hasn't happened to you?), I decided to plunge in. I started, top-down, with this:

  

This is my kettle-dyed "Bristol" Real Vermonter yarn, held double for an Aran weight. I absolutely love it.

Then I woke up, again in the middle of the night, and realized I had intended some shoulder shaping so I don't look like a linebacker. I'm going to start again, this time from the bottom up. Don't know when I'll get a chance to work on this.

SPINNING

Good news: I finished my sweater spinning project! Two pounds of wool/alpaca, all local, and processed from raw fleece to finished yarn. I am so awesome!

Bad news: I spun it so densely (or the alpaca was dense, or I put in too much lead, or gravity is acting up) that two full pounds only yielded 750 YARDS!!! I suck!

Check it out:

  

That little ball, which fits nicely in the palm of my hand, weighs 4.7 ounces. Hmmm. It's bulky, but it's hardly super chunky. I'm afraid I'm not going to have enough for even the plainest sweater, which is breaking my heart. I have to swatch and see if I do it on big enough needles if it will look cool and artsy or just stupid. It's so heavy, I'm afraid it's going to knit up into chain mail.

VERMONT SHEEP & WOOL FESTIVAL

It seems like ages ago already, but I did attend VT S & W, without a camera. If you were expecting me to reveal the contents of a fiber-stuffed trunk, here's the deal: I don't need any more yarn or spinning fiber. I am not a mad stasher, and since my current projects are at overload, I couldn't see buying more raw materials at the festival. I bought a mug.

But I did get to meet lots of people. In no particular order (and certainly not a complete list; I didn't have a notebook): I met vtknitboy, the Ravelry-pin-sharing Mountain Fiber Folk, Norma, Sandy, Laurie and Laurie, Manise, Monica, Paula, Lee Ann (and her patient family), Gayle, a more-local Gayle, Lee, Marjorie, and a lot of other people who are slipping my mind but only for the moment. It really was cool to meet people in person and to see people I already knew.

I hear the festival is (a) going to be held in October next year and (b) going to be held at the Tunbridge fairgrounds. Thumbs up on both counts. My husband and I just spent a day at the Tunbridge World's Fair last Friday and it was wonderful. We spent most of our time on the "antiques hill" looking at antique farm and home stuff and watching demonstrations of 19th century activities such as hewing logs, making shingles, running a drag saw, etc. The place definitely has the feel for a wool festival. I ran into the same spinner who was running the great wheel at VT S & W (check out pictures in Gayle's post here) and this time I saw her spin flax also.

I must have a great wheel of my own.

Seriously.

APPLES

Apples. We got 'em. Not a huge amount, since our trees got pruned hard this winter. But enough. So far we've made a few batches of applesauce for the freezer, made one pie and put away enough for a few more, made apple dumplings, made applesauce bundt cake, and eaten a few.

Just another reason why fall is the best time of year.

I have also been baking lots of bread and processing an endless supply of tomatoes.

SHOP UPDATE

I almost forgot to mention that I updated the shop with more bamboo blend sock yarn in lots of yummy colors, such as this:

And this:

And, for a change of pace, some giant skeins of Long Trail sock yarn. Superwash wool/nylon in skeins running close to 700 yards and weighing almost 6 and a half ounces. Massive. If you want stockings or have a large-footed husband who wants socks for Christmas, check these out. Here's a teaser:

 

PIGS

I better quit with the update now as I'm already out of time and getting too wordy. I leave you with a happier-than-last-time series of pig photos. (At the moment we have 10 pigs, in case you were wondering. two of whom are presumed pregnant.)

The above pig is one of three we keep in one pen. Sassy and her six piglets are in a different pen. But the piglets made a hole between the pens.

Three of them can still squeeze through.

The other three are very upset that they can no longer get treats over here, and there is much squealing and gnashing of teeth.

Silly pigs.

NEXT TIME...

• My list of favorite blogs, since I got the "I love your blog" award and must pass it on
• Photos of Saturday's Great Pig Escape
• Sophie
• Neckwarmer in progress
• and much, much more...

R.I.P. Fudd

We'll miss him.

Even once you get used to the idea of raising animals for food, sometimes it's hard to let one go. In this case, Fudd was a boar we originally borrowed to breed Sassy.

We liked Fudd's personality and huge ears, and he went on to father Sassy's first litter of piglets this spring. We decided to adopt him.

At first he was an eager and patient father.

But late in the winter he hurt his back leg and never fully recovered. And then, as the piglets got bigger, he got more aggressive and (sometimes inadvertently, sometimes not) slashed them with his tusks.

A few weeks ago, when Sassy came back into heat, it became clear that with a gimpy back leg, he would not be able to get the job done. That ticked both of them off, and there was much grunting, squealing, and cursing coming from their pen.

We tried moving him into his own pen where he wouldn't hurt the other pigs, but then he got lonely and depressed. And last weekend, at a moment when he really wanted to get to Sassy, he broke down a door, causing my brother-in-law to become a rodeo clown in short order and jump to safety.

So what do you do with an 800-pound boar who is too big and old to provide good pork, can't father any more piglets, eats a lot, takes up a pen needed for other pigs,  is injured, and is getting aggressive?

Sigh. The deed was done last night while I was sitting at the spinning wheel, but unfortunately the window was open and I heard the shot.

Fudd, you were Some Pig.

Moving on to brighter topics...

I made a hat.

It's not easy to find people to model a wool ear-flap hat when it's 82 degrees and muggy out. I did force my husband to do a Holly Hobbie shot for me. Do you see any resemblance? (Well, she might have a mustache, who can tell?)

It is the Norwegian Star Earflap Hat by Tiennie at Tiennie Knits. And I did it in O-Wool on size 6 needles (though 7s are called for). I eliminated the garter stitch band above the ear flaps because I thought it made the flaps look like afterthoughts. (As usual, you can see my knit/purl tension discrepancy in the ear flaps, knit flat.)

I liked this pattern and have already started a second version of it, this time with my handspun BFL. I tried a variety of artsy shots, in an attempt to capture the yarn and the beautiful late summer weather (I take back everything rotten I said about Mother nature in June and July). Not sure any of the pictures really succeed, but the yarn is awesome.

Obviously, the next hat will lack the snowflake pattern. (One thing about the first hat: I should have held the white yarn in my dominant hand; the way I did it, the white stitches sit "behind" the maroon and the individual stitches are hard to see. I noticed it a few rows into the pattern, but I knew my nephew wouldn't care so I didn't bother ripping it out.)

I have done a few rows on my latest socks but I have to tell you, it's pretty satisfying to get away from size 0 needles and finish a hat in a matter of a few days.

I've also been spinning my sweater yarn.

I can't remember if this will become my third or fourth skein. I know one thing: With the alpaca content, each skein feels like I have a strand of lead in there. This is going to be one warm sweater.

Although my mood has not been stellar lately (lack of exercise for 5 weeks = perpetual PMS, but I've gotten back into workout mode and I no longer want to kill anyone, not even my husband), the weather has been outstanding. We have enough sweet corn to feed an army. Every couple of days I pick a dozen or two ears, husk them, blanch them, slice the kernels off the cobs, freeze meal-size baggies, and give the cobs and husks to the pigs.

So far I have 17 bags in the freezer, which is not nearly enough to see us through until next summer. I'll keep picking.

The big tomatoes have all split and rotted, but the little ones are delicious. Fudd's original owner gave us eggplant seedlings, and Monday night we had homemade eggplant parmigiana with them and our tomatoes. Yum, yum. What I love about our veggies is I bring them in, using my t-shirt as a basket, and throw them on the counter and they make a lovely little still life:

How can you not want to eat these?

We also spent a chunk of change on having our apple trees pruned and treated (sorry, but they needed it). The Macs are coming already.

Yield is going to be low this year because the trees got pruned within an inch of their life this winter, but the apples look good (and taste good, although the Macs are a bit tart at the moment).

Even though the weather is warm during the day, the nights are cold. Sophie got a severe haircut (because we let her get all matted), so she requires near-constant cuddling to keep from shivering.

It's certainly put me in the mood to knit and spin and my latest dream is to design and make an Aran vest (hoodie?) using a double strand of the Bristol Real Vermonter yarn I dyed for myself but haven't used yet. Remember this?

My increased knitting time is reflected in my reduced blog-reading time. Well, I may not have read your blog lately, but if you are going to the VT Sheep and Wool festival Saturday, I'll be wandering around fondling wool. I plan to see at least a few of you there!

(Hey, don't be too sad for Fudd. He had a good life compared to the average pig and enjoyed plenty of sunshine, mud, good food, comfortable sleeping quarters, back scratches, and--until late winter--rambunctious sex. And his death was quick. We won't forget him.)

So close and yet so far away

A lovely neckwarmer...

...that I didn't swatch for. This is some of my own silk/merino and while I like the yarn and the simple pattern (the Stacked Eyelet Cowl by Ami Madison), it would have been much better with a 20" circumference instead of the 24" I ended up with:

It really isn't going to keep my neck very warm with that kind of roominess. I could fit another head in there with me.

Since there is no way I'm going to bother ripping this out, I can either add a pin or something to cinch it together in front, or maybe slice up the back, cut out 4 inches, and sew it back up. At least the yarn is nice and soft...

The weather has turned distinctly autumnal here in Vermont (read: Hard to Dress For). The days go up to 80 and it's been very sunny. But the nights are cold. I believe last night got down into the mid-40s. It does inspire the knitter in one to get to work, though. Besides whipping up the barrel cozy neckwarmer, I have started another pair of socks for me and an earflap hat for my nephew. He is in 9th grade and has been begging me for a patterned earflap hat in maroon and cream.

I am positively itching to spin but time is tight right now. I may have to take up Carole's challenge to spin 10 minutes a day, because I know once I get back into it, I'll keep going.

The socks are, once again, from Favorite Socks (scroll down for the associated A Piece of Vermont sales pitch). This time it's Priscilla's Dream Socks, which I'm doing in stripes using two shades of the Long Trail superwash seconds.

The hat is the Norwegian Star Earflap hat by Tiennie, and for that I'm using O'Wool.

Right now it looks like a teeny wool bikini top.

***

SHOP UPDATE. To avoid offending any readers who hate to read a blog that seems more like an ad for the blogger's yarn business, I'm saving the shop news for the end here. I fully understand if you want to bail right here. But if you want to see some cool new stuff, read on...

There has been plenty going on at A Piece of Vermont Yarn & Fiber, including a decent update of bamboo blend sock yarn, much of which sold after the recent update to the mailing list. There's still some left, however.

If you haven't done so already, please check out the Kits & Combos section. There you'll find two copies of Interweave's Favorite Socks, each bundled with a skein of bamboo sock yarn:

and, even more exciting,

three Dye & Spin kits!

I love these! Each kit contains a copy of the Twisted Sisters Sock Workbook, 8 ounces of undyed Blue-Faced Leicester top, acid dye powders in three primaries plus black, squeeze bottles for mixing, and a dust mask. (You provide gloves, white vinegar, plastic wrap, and a stainless steel stock pot or electric steamer.)

If you are not familiar with the Twisted Sisters book, it is not a learn-to-spin book. Rather, it is a book devoted to handspun yarn (esp. with a drop spindle) made from fiber you've dyed yourself. It's part color theory, part dyeing lesson, part spinning, part knitting. The book assumes you have basic spinning skills. Various basic sock patterns are included, but I really consider this book more of a dyeing and spinning book than a sock book. I go back to it over and over.

If you have ever been curious about how to make cool handspun yarn, this is the kit for you. You'll have enough dye to do plenty more yarn or fiber down the road. (The book includes instructions on dyeing yarn as well as fiber, but the focus is definitely on the fiber.)

***

School started today so I will have more time in the shop now. Today I'm working on dyeing more bamboo blend sock yarn (which will be seeing a price increase on Sept. 1) and Blue-Faced Leicester top. I will have more Learn to Spin kits going up at the end of the week, as well as some other book/yarn combos. A skein of bamboo blend superwash with Nancy Bush's Knitting Vintage Socks, anyone? Or, for the newbie, how about Ann Budd's Getting Started Knitting Socks? And keep an eye out for some beautiful new drop spindles in the coming month...

Fall is here, people. Knit faster.

Attrition

Well, didn't the overconfident little farmer wannabes take a fall this week! We had a turkey tragedy.

Last week, Trixie hatched out 5 poults and we gave her the 6 we had hatched in the incubator. She was frantic to get them outside and we stupidly let her. One disappeared. And then there were 10.

She was doing fine with them, but kept sleeping out in the woods rather than near the house (probably to avoid Milo!). But my husband and brother-in-law dug a couple dozen post holes for the new, improved goat yard they are building. Sunday morning, we found that 3 of them had fallen into the holes and, unable to get out, had died. And then there were 7.

Meanwhile, the survivors were standing around in the cold, wet grass while their mother tried to rescue the victims in the holes. One died. And then there were 6.

The boys brought the survivors into the house and we put them under a heat lamp while we set up proper housing for Trixie and the poults. One of them just couldn't warm up. And then there were 5.

We made Trixie a nice setup right in the turkey barn, with a board across the door to keep the poults from getting outside but allowing the other birds to come and go. We brought the babies back to their distraught mother and she stepped on one's head.

And now there are 4.

Well camouflaged, aren't they?

Everyone left seems to be doing fine at this point. We are sadder but wiser now and, as with so much around here, have learned from the experience. I feel responsible for the loss of most of the other poults, but such is life on the homestead. You can't dwell on it.

Spring is full of contrasts, especially that of birth and death. Although this week is cold and windy, the weekend was a lot nicer than the forecast predicted. Here's Dave under the cherry tree:

Tulips and grape hyacinths:

My younger stepson home for the summer (do all guys just love tractors?):

The new, fortified goat fence in progress (the permanent part, which will now be electrified so we won't have quite so many daring escapes):

I have been busy in the shop. I shipped off my order to yarn4socks.com and have been concentrating on fiber. Some of you asked about my new Pat Green Triple Picker and what it does. Oh, I'll tell you. Here we have a couple of pounds of scoured Romney fleece from a local farm:

There's some VM, and while it looks quite fluffy, those locks are a bit too intact to put through the drum carder. You put on your leather gloves, feed the locks into the Triple Picker, and within a few minutes you have this:

A lot of the VM has fallen out, and the volume of the fleece has more than quadrupled. It's like a cloud of Romney! Now we can card.

Someone mentioned that they'd like some local fiber pulled into roving instead of sold as batts. I thought that would be fun because it opens up the option of space dyeing and keeping the colors separate. The good news is I tried it. From batts to roving:

It's lovely. The bad news is I discovered that pulling batts into roving takes approximately FOREVER. I will dye this stuff up but the price is going to reflect the labor involved in handling a raw fleece at every stage, from scouring to drying to picking to carding, to re-carding, to pulling into roving, to dyeing, to rinsing, to drying, to packaging, photographing, and uploading. On the bright side, there are not very many sources for non-mill-processed fiber from known sources.

Speaking of mill-processed fiber from an unknown source (weren't we?), I have updated A Piece of Vermont Yarn and Fiber with bamboo/merino top. Before I shop you the new stuff, look what I did with mine. I had meant to spin enough for a Clapotis, but after one skein I realized the colorway was a bit too My Little Pony for me. My daughter loved it. So, here's how it went:

Finished in two days, it's the Shrug This from One Skein Wonders. Like others on Ravelry, I question how this could ever have been intended for an adult. My gauge is smaller than what is called for, but even so... Anyway, it was a quick knit and my daughter (don't you love the summer bob, even uncombed?) modeled it and then wore it to school today. Now she wants a poncho from the same merino/bamboo.

And so we come to the shop update. I posted the following 60/40 merino/bamboo bumps to A Piece of Vermont Yarn and Fiber today:

Spring Fling, Mist, Three-Day Weekend, Mossy Stones, and Farmer's Market:

ETA: FARMER'S MARKET IS SOLD. YOWZA THAT WAS FAST.

Farmer's Market (the last one, above) comes with a special quantity discount. There are four bumps of that colorway totalling over 16 ounces, and if you buy all four at once, each one is $1.50 off, plus you get automatic free shipping for orders $60 or over. I know how tough it is to buy bigger amounts of fiber or yarn without breaking the bank, but this stuff would make a fantastic summer sweater or shawl. Of course, the discount will only work as long as all four bumps are still available.

And I just have to share the surprise that came in the mail for me yesterday:

That's real Oklahoma alpaca blended with silk. Gorgeous and buttery and I can't wait to do something with it. It was part of a thank-you gift from Susan, a.k.a. Red Dirt Knitter, to whom I recently introduced the magic that is real maple syrup. (I think she likes it.) Thank you, Susan!!!!

So, I have a little time before my daughter gets home to go for a run. I'm up to four (slow) miles a couple of times a week and I can still walk and take the stairs, which is nice. Standing up after long periods of sitting requires a bit more time than it otherwise would, but I can do it without yelling almost every time.

We're throwing a big Memorial Day barbecue/potluck on Sunday night. If I don't get another post in by the weekend, have a good one.

I know why you're here

It's not for the knitting or the spinning. It's this:

I wish I had better pictures of these fast-growing little piggies but I haven't done very well with the camera. The above picture is a couple days old and these are even older (see how fat they're getting already?):

The thing is, these guys move like lightning and I have to use a slow shutter speed because there's not enough light in the barn. In lieu of adorable baby pig pictures, however, I did get some good ones of the older three. It was barn-cleaning day on Sunday and pigs absolutely love to burrow in fresh hay. Here, my brother in law is tossing forkfuls onto two of them. They run around and roll in it and snort and come for more when he stops.

There. Now that we've gotten that out of the way, there's more to report. Such as this on Sunday evening:

No, I don't mean the tractor, which saw a lot of use this weekend. And I don't mean the acre or so my husband tilled for my 30' x 40' garden (the man is a maniac on a John Deere). I mean that black dot way out beyond the pond. Here's a closer shot:

Yeah, that's a black bear. On our property. This was my first bear sighting, since last year I only heard the one that overturned furniture on our porch and bent our bird feeder pole. Maybe it's the same one.

I've got a bit of a shop update. There are four imperfect skeins of Crazy Love in Colonial Superwash:

That violet blotch appears once or twice in each skein. Still, at 20 percent off, maybe it's worth it to you. Four skeins could make a good-sized shawl...

I also put up some Blue-Faced Leicester in what I think are very cool colorways.

Suite: Judy Blue Eyes:

Peace Train (my favorite):

   

Scarborough Fair:

Long Ago and Far Away:

I spun up a tiny bit of this last one and got this. I Andean plied it and apparently the midpoint was in the middle of the black, so it knit up with a sort of gradient look, which was not actually what I was trying for. But it's neat. (And sooooo soft.)

Now, a couple of weeks ago, I spun up some merino/bamboo top. I finally figured out what to use it for: Katja from Knitty, for my nephew's new baby daughter. I'm not sure it's going to fit, as a lot of people on Ravelry said it was kind of wide and mine came out the same. But I'm hoping the colors are going to distract everyone:

I will be putting up more merino/bamboo top next week, and I am most certainly going to re-post these pictures, for advertising. This stuff is incredibly soft and silky.

I haven't blogged in a while because suddenly it's spring in Vermont and we've been doing a lot of outside work. It's been so refreshing (and exhausting) to be able to get outside and hang out with the animals.

The sheep and goats got a new electric fence and lots more pasture:

I have started brushing the goats with the horse slicker I use on the dog. They are becoming frighteningly addicted to getting a good grooming.

My friend Jenn, the newish knitter, just finished a Classy Slip-Up from the Knit Socks! book. I believe she used Plymouth Happy Feet yarn in a clever colorway such as 8. Or maybe 9. I forget.

I believe this is only her second pair of socks and she has quickly mastered the Kitchener stitch, although she has to have a paper bag to breathe into the whole time she's doing it. I was working in the shop (playing with my new toy, below) while she was grafting, and I think Sassy did less heavy breathing when she was giving birth to the piglets.

Look what I got:

It's not actually a Milo warning, although it could be:

It's actually my Pat Green Triple Picker, which makes short work of raw fleece to prep it for carding. That, or it's a medieval torture device.

I had some plans to offer some custom dyed Romney and other local fiber this week, but the Romney turned out to have too much VM for me to sell. On the bright side, I'm in the middle of blending up pure silk with Vermont alpaca, which is going to make batts so delicious I can't stand it. I'm carding the alpaca right now and it's so soft I feel like going to sleep while I'm carding. Just wait. More Panda Superwash is coming, too.

Well, I think I've gone on long enough here today. I've covered everything but the gratuitous cat photos. Here:

Piglets!!!

Last night around 8:00, Sassy went into labor. I haven't mentioned her pregnancy much because (a) we didn't keep track of when she actually was bred and didn't have a confirmed due date and (b) I wanted to be sure everything went well before sharing the news. Also, (c) Sassy has grown so unbelievably fat I didn't want to embarrass her:

Everything went well. Here's the first little piggy, unsuccessfully looking for a teat:

The midwives (my husband, daughter, and brother-in-law) looking on:

We weren't sure how much to interfere, but sometimes the gilt or sow can roll on or step on (or even rip apart!) the just-born piglets while she's delivering another one. So the boys moved the piglets out of her way each time she got up and moved around. They were surprisingly lively and wandered all over the pen shortly after being born.

My husband helping Sassy with her rhythmic breathing:

Fudd, the dad, paced nervously in the waiting room:

It took quite a long time between the first two piglets and the next two, but eventually there were four, in color-matched pairs:

Our older piggies seemed a bit curious about all the barn traffic that late at night:

And Fudd got up for a snack but went back to bed:

There was almost an hour where Sassy seemed to be having contractions but no piglets. I took more pictures of the first four but then had to bring my daughter (who was falling asleep seated on an upturned bucket in the pen) up to bed.

A few minutes after I got into the house, my husband called to say two more piglets had been born and it was over. The last one, he said, couldn't get the mucous out of its mouth and throat and would have died if they hadn't been there to help.

I got this picture this morning, although you can barely tell there are 6 piglets here:

Dad is exhausted:

We were very pleased with how smoothly everything went. There is still a chance Sassy could accidentally roll on the piglets but my husband said now that labor was over she was being very careful to tiptoe around them when she got up. Cross your fingers.

There's been a lot of stuff going on, farm-wise, lately. Both of our hen turkeys have been laying eggs, although only Trixie is actually sitting  on hers. My husband took four eggs from each of them and has them in an incubator in the house. We may be lousy with turkey poults in another few weeks.

My husband and BIL devoted the weekend to setting fenceposts for the cows' pasture. You may be able to see a bluebird box on a post to the right of the fence. The boys had to move this, with a nest and four bluebird eggs inside, while putting up the new fence. Mother Bluebird flew around during the process but settled back down when it was over.

Dave the Peacock supervises:

Daisy:

An actual flower picture proving that spring is coming to Vermont:

Although things are turning green very slowly, the weather has been absolutely perfect all week: high 70s to low 80s, breezy, and sunny. We so deserve this.

Lilac buds:

Ed and Lars:

And, Milo, doing what he does while off-duty:

While I'm blogging, I'll throw in a couple pictures of my handspun April socks, made with my BL Sophie/merino yarn. I'm doing the second cuff now but here's the first:

These are the Diagonal Cross Rib socks from Interweave's Favorite Socks book.

I am doing these on 0s, thanks to my loose knitting, but they are a bit snug. I could have used 1s like the pattern calls for. However, I like a rather close fitting sock, so I'm quite happy so far.

Yesterday morning, one of the cows got out and ran laps around the barn until my husband got home and settled her down. (I now call him the Cow Whisperer.) Then once we got her in the barn, we found someone had left Sassy and Fudd's gate open. Fudd never woke up, but Sassy had waddled over to the hay and was sleeping against a round bale. Then that afternoon, all the turkeys crossed the road and in my efforts to herd them I tripped over a branch and ripped my leg all open.

And most annoying of all, I was trying on a dress I bought online. It was way too small, and the stupid spandex thing with built-in bra top was so tight I kind of got stuck in it. In my effort to get it off, I think I may have torn something important in my shoulder. Fashion can be deadly.

Today is much better.