Fleece!

I feel bad about not posting more,but it's been so crazy around here! Yard clean up is nearing it's end,which means we can start on the barn. We have had lots of scouting activities to either participate or bring Zach to. I have been busy reading up on things,designing labels,and yesterday I made some laundry soap-one batch for us,and I did make another so I can begin to sell it. I did have a nice overnight trip with my Dear Friend Michelle to Sharon Springs NY for their Garden Party and to visit the Beekman 1802 store and chat with Josh and Brent and get autographs (more about that on my next post).

A few weeks ago,the NH Farm Museum held a shearing demonstration,so I went. Rick and Zach were at the Boy Scout Spring Camporee that weekend,so I was by myself. Tim and Lisa,who own Heart Stone Farm over Milton,were giving the demonstration ( Tim sheared,Lisa discussed the fleece). Come to find out,their farm is only about 5 minutes from us. I was able to chat with Tim and Lisa after he sheared one of the Museum's sheep,ask a few questions,and glean some insight into the world of shearing one's own sheep. I told Tim about how we came about becoming farmers,Rick's disability,etc,and he mentioned that his wife was a veteran as well. Both he and Lisa suggested that we have our sheep professionally done first,then take shearing classes because it looks easier than it is.

After liking each other on Facebook,I received a message from Tim saying that he and his wife had been talking and because Rick was a veteran,he was offering his shearing services for free. He mentioned that many times,shearers don't like to shear small flocks,and won't go to a house with only three,but he like to help us out. Well,that was so kind of him,and we were a bit nervous about attempting it ourselves,so we happily accepted his offer.

One thing we have noticed is that the sheep owners circle around here is not very big. In fact,I originally wanted Babydoll Southdowns because they are small and I felt that would be better for our size of land,but I couldn't find any on line and knew no one who would have a clue as to what a Babydoll Southdown was,let alone point me in the right direction. Come to find out,Tim and Lisa have Babydoll Southdowns! Right now I am happy with my Romneys,but getting one or two Babydolls at some point may not be out of the question.

Because the circle is not very big,everyone who has been in this circle that we have come in contact with are more than willing to help in anyway possible,because they remember what it was like for them starting out and having no local resources whatsoever. Lisa offered to show me how to skirt fleece at their place,and Tim told Rick he would show him how to give the sheep shots when the time comes. He even trimmed their hooves for us,and showed Rick how to do that.Morning,noon,or night,if we had an issue with the sheep,we can call them. If sheep get sick,they tend to go down hill very fast. Now we have two great contacts-Priscilla,who sold us the Romneys,and Tim and Lisa.

Tim did tell Rick that our sheep are in excellent health,and that they have beautiful fleece. He can tell that we care for our animals.

It's amazing how small the sheep look once they are shorn:

This is Starlight's fleece. She has some lovely reddish color in it:

This is Violet's. She is all white/beige:

This is Woolsey's. Woolsey has darker wool with some tan and reddish color in it.

 You can see the lovely crimping that each has in their wool.

My next step is skirting,which cutting the nasty areas off and taking out the big pieces of vegetation,etc. Then,the fleece gets cleaned,Once it's dried,it gets "filcked" which means the smaller pieces of foreign matter get cleaned out,then it gets carded so all the fibers go in the same direction,then the fleece gets spun into yarn. I am not going to  dye these,I am going to leave them their natural colors.

Today it's raining,but it gives me a good chance to putter around inside and get caught up on some housework before I have to bring Zach to the Dr's for his camp physical once he gets out of school.

I will leave you with this lovely sunrise we had yesterday!

Morning Stroll

When the weather is nice,we take the goats for a run up the Class VI road that runs along our property. There are only 5 houses on it,and it's a dead end,so it's not busy at all. 

Since Zach was in school,Rick was the runner this AM:

Our neighbor who lives behind us had her Great nephew visiting,and he loves our goats. She has brought him down on a few occasions to visit with the animals,and he adores the goats. He had to help Rick with the morning run:

It's great to introduce little ones to farm animals,and wonderful to seem them have fun!

The Ladies see us running with the goats and they call out to us..."BAAAAAAAA!!!!!" They let us know in no uncertain terms (very loudly,I might add) that they are hungry and ready for breakfast. We tell them to please be patient,the little ones have to come first.

Patience is rewarded by some fresh water and tasty feed hay.

While they are still a bit skittish,yesterday I was able to pat Starlight for a few seconds,and when I got a quick pat onto Violet and Woolsey,they didn't bolt away from me like before. They just backed away a few inches. I guess they are finally getting used to me :)

Happy Mother's Day!!!

I can't believe it's been so long since I have posted.Between Boy Scouts,Dr appts,reading up on "how to" do this and that, running errands,and taking care of the animals,it seems like time has gone by in the blink of an eye.

We are finally out of the throes of winter,the snow is gone,and the leaves are now coming out on the trees,the forsythia is blooming,and the weather is getting pleasant-thank goodness! It was a long,snowy winter,and we are finally to my favorite season-Spring.

The Girls are now laying on a regular basis,and we are letting them free range once again. I love the way they scratch at the ground and eat the bugs they find-their fluffy bottoms are quite cute ( am I the only one who thinks that? )

The goats are doing very well. Scout,Rick's wether,is on his last week of bottle feeding. We are down to one bottle feed a day for him. On Friday,Blizzard,my wether,goes down to one bottle feeding a day. By the end of the month,all the goats will be off the bottle. We have not found another doeling yet.

The Ladies are doing great.I went to a sheep shearing demonstration at the NH Farm Museum a couple weeks ago,and chatted with Tim,who was doing the demonstration. Come to find out,he and his wife,Lisa live only about 5 minutes from us. His wife is also a veteran,and he offered to to shear our sheep for us for free so he could show us how to to do it so we wouldn't have to attempt it by ourselves at first. I thought that was pretty nice of him!

Last week we had a bit of rain and a rainbow appeared-it started not far from our house. I have never been so close to a rainbow before.It was really cool. It started a few doors down from us,then went over the edge of our yard and across the street!

Today we are going down to my sisters house for Mother's Day dinner. Since she and my Mom are moving down to TN in early Fall,this may be the last Mother's Day we have together. Aside from that and the basic dishes and sweeping,I am not doing a darn thing all day! Today I am Queen!

I hope all you Mom's out there get spoiled like you deserve! I got a lovely breakfast served to me on the deck this AM,and a back massage coming this evening from my hubby :)

Rutger Heirloom Tomatoes

My Rutger tomato seedlings are nearing their transplant stage ( well,most of them). Some of the seeds didn't take,but most of them did. I planted 78 seeds all total.

Rutger tomatoes are an Heirloom tomato,meaning,the seeds have been around a long time,and they are not hybrids or GMO's. The are indeterminate,meaning they don't all fruit at once. Last year I started making a conscious effort to buy only heirloom seeds,and if I couldn't find heirlooms,then I would buy organic.

Heirloom veggies don't look as "pretty" as others.That just proves that they are naturally grown!

My seed starting system is very basic. I use an old freezer for a table,a fluorescent light,a timer,a heating pad,and some seed starting pots in my basement. That's it. I bought the fluorescent light and timer at a box store,and the heating pad at a pharmacy. I did have to make sure the heating pad was not one of those that shut off after a period of time,though. You really don't need a fancy set up.

Sorry,this isn't the best photo,and as you can tell,it was before I watered them!

We decided to cut back on variety this year. Since we have to get the barn built, the less time we had to deal with the garden,the better off we would be. The only things we are growing this year in veggie land are tomatoes,cukes,green beans,carrots,potatoes and lettuce. We started our garlic last fall,so that is a done deal.

I am hoping to sell some seedlings this year as long as enough of them sprout!

The Goats Have Arrived!

Last Thursday,we were able to pick up Nigerian Dwarf Dairy goats!

We had ordered three doelings from Tiny Hill Farm in Milton Mills  last year. When their does started birthing,it was clear that it was the Year of the Buck. They had been hoping for at least five doelings,so they could pick out which ones they wanted to keep and then sell us at least two,which makes sense. They only got three,so they had none to sell. They did,however,have plenty of bucks,and we decided to buy three so each of us could have a pet goat. Tiny Hill has a friend who has bought does from them,and her does are in the process of birthing this month. One doeling was born in late March that she wanted to sell,so we bought that one. Tiny Hill has been so kind in helping us out.They are keeping us in the loop regarding other doelings. We really would like to get two more. The bucks are fixed,and all the goats have been debudded.

Since we don't have a whole lot of space,we decided to go with the Nigerian Dwarfs. They are half the size of normal goats,but the females,once bred,can give up to a 1,000 gallons of milk a year. We are going to wait until Half Pint is at least nine or so months before we breed her (9-12 months is a suggested time for first time breeding). I didn't want unfixed male goats because when they go into heat they pee on their faces,and the smell is less than pleasant.The main reason is that if the males are not kept far enough away from the females,the smell can work it's way into the milk,giving it an odd taste. 

We bottle feed them twice a day with a goat milk replacer,and will do so until they are past 8 weeks old.We do have fresh water on hand for them,and give them a bit of goat feed if they wish to have it (which they really don't at this stage). We keep them in our garage for now in a 6 ft high link fence enclosure (just like we have for the sheep).We keep the floor covered with pine shavings,and have a an igloo dog house for them to curl up in at night,which we also laid shavings down in. We do take them out to run around the yard or up and down Avon Lane,much to the delight of our neighbors. Honestly,who wouldn't love seeing these cute little things running,jumping,twisting,and hopping?

                 (From bottom left clockwise:Blizzard,Barrett,Half Pint (our doeling) and Scout)

  
It's funny to see folks driving by slow down and watch the goats on the front yard. Thankfully it's not a busy road!

The goats love to chase people. Zach ran around the house with the goats right behind him:

 Rick Shaw,the Goat Whisperer!

Too cute!

Mud Season

I love when he weather starts getting warmer and the snow melts. We have had it with the snow and cold.This week,temperatures are in the  upper 50's-low 60's.That's practically tropical!!

The downfall to the snow melt and the showers that April bring,is the mud. Yes,mud season is upon us.

Mud everywhere! Deep puddles of water,several inches of mud. One has to have Muck-Muck boots to walk around the yard. The other day,everything was wet and there must've been a hundred birds in the yard singing. It was very early,I was still in my nightgown,but I had to be outside to enjoy the beautiful chorus-of course,when the Ladies heard me close to the door to the deck,they started bleating-breakfast time!

Muck-Muck boots don't have to be Plain Janes. They can be very pretty and fun!!!

I'm sure the birds enjoyed them....and the Ladies heartily approved!

Look Out,Ladies!!!

Look out Violet,Woolsey,and Starlight.......

Our new purchase was a set a electric shears from Colonial Acres Farm,where we bought the Ladies.Priscilla told us they have only been used a few times-for the amount of sheep they have,it was too time consuming for them and they decided to have someone else shear their flock. Since we only have three sheep,we figure that we can give it whirl. The Ladies were sheared late last summer,but they look like they may need it again. This winter was pretty cold,and their fleece looks a bit long and thick. We did buy coats for them to keep their fleece clean,but at this point,we are not going to bother putting them on until we shear them. Once they are sheared,we are going to wash and card the fleece,then I am going to try my hand at spinning. That's the plan,anyway!

We have been watching videos on line of sheep being sheared,and the shears come with a step by step instruction booklet. Whether or not we make a shearing stand remains to to be seen. I guess we will just have to wait and see how bad it is on our backs doing it on a covered area on the ground.

We don't have a date set yet to start this process. We are in the beginning of what we refer to as "mud season" and we still have quite a bit of snow left ( our barn is not built yet,remember).

 Poor Ladies...they might look funny after  our first attempt. Don't worry,it will grow back!