Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Catching Up

I just can't believe my world is moving way to fast! The last few weeks have been taken up with cleaning the barn, the house and harvesting the garden. Plus we've had a few wild encounters! Late the night before Labor Day Bob went out on the porch to find one of the cats. Jake our LGD was out on the porch also and when Bob went to give him a pat on the head they both noticed a large black and white presence just in front of them and on the ground, a skunk. Jake knew exactly what to do, jump straight in the air over the skunk and off the porch. This left Bob face to face with the not so little guy who had his tail over his body and aiming right at him. Seems Bob was far enough away so he didn't get hit but the front porch did. What a smell!! It will wake you right out of a dead sleep, I know. We had to close all the windows and turn some fans on so our room could air out.
Here is a picture of Jake with the love of his life JoBeth the "verminator" Jack Russell. Jake is an Akitanees. His mother was Camie our Great Pyrenees we just lost this spring at 12 years old and the Akita who lived up the street.

The apples on our little semi dwarf apple tree are showing color almost ready to harvest. The corn is almost all in the freezer and this one pumpkin is all colored in orange and ready for Halloween. The other pumpkins are still green.
And speaking of color in between cleaning and harvesting and skunks I have been dyeing wool to resale for my "Feed The Flock Fund" . This is three pounds of Blue Face Leicester.
Here a few pounds of Corriedale X roving. Bottom roving is one of my attempts to make brown. This picture looks good but in the sun light it looks much more purple.
These last two braids of roving are merino, 19.5 microns, it is so yummy and soft. Even the way it takes up color is extra soft. The roving at the top of the picture is the BFL and the roving just below it is the merino, dyed with the same colors and the same amount of dye was used on both braids. Each braids weight is eight ounces. One difference is that the merino was dyed in a dye bath the BFL was painted.

6 comments:

Sharon said...

In a word - Wow!!! Great color. I must resist. I must resist. I must be tempted~

Purple Fuzzy Mittens said...

Can I reserve the far right BFL strand in the top picture? The orange one, pretty please?

Nancy K. said...

I LOVE Jake! What a magnificent dog!

Your braided rovings are gorgeous! I've never tried dying that way ~ in fact I've done VERY little dying at all ~ but find them especially beautiful...

~~Sittin.n.Spinnin said...

Poor Bob, I cant imagine that confrontation!
(as I sit here giggling)
Derek hit a skunk on the highway in the truck awhile back and it was days before my front yard lost the smell! I guess the spray has some kind of oil in it which makes it especially tenatious.
Very nice rovings! I guess I might be saving more than gas money by not coming to the Retreat ;-)
I will be sitting here missing you guys though...

~~Sittin.n.Spinnin said...

Hey Mim, do you have (or can you create) any very limey green? I have a project in mind of my new 'daughter' for Christmas. It can be varigated but it needs to be very very limey in places...

Leigh said...

This time of year does seem to go by quickly, doesn't it? Your roving is lovely! Yummy colors.