Darla Came Through!

I was really hoping Darla would lamb before I left for the knitting retreat, and she did!  She had twins at 3:00 AM.   I was so happy she lambed, I didn't even care about being up in the middle of the night.  Now David won't have one more thing to worry about while I'm away.

She had twins, a ewe and a ram.  Since both heat lamps are in use, I made little coats for them out of some thick felt fabric I had. They work great!

I also made coats for Bean's twin ewe lambs, born yesterday. They seemed chilled even with the heat lamp.

Dixie and her ram lamb got moved out to the "hog pen" behind the barn, and I moved Barley in with them for company. She's due to lamb fairly soon, but I don't think it will be before I get back on Sunday evening (knock on wood).

I wanted to share a couple of pictures of Rocky, the rabbit. He has been free in the barn for the past several weeks.  He finds ways to entertain himself, like harassing the does. He likes to climb on top of under the cages.

And when he gets tired he curls up next to Tucker under the heat lamp.

Bean's Lambs

We're getting more snow today, probably around 6" or so.  I went out to feed the sheep this morning, and heard little voices.  Not voices in my head, but lamb voices.  Bean lambed shortly before I arrived, out in the main shelter.  I'd been checking udders on her and Barley, but neither looked ready to lamb.  In fact, I would have estimated they'd lamb in about 2 weeks, based on udder size.

Bean didn't want to wait that long, apparently.  It's uncanny how ewes will be affected by the weather.  Perhaps the barometric pressure changes affect them, or perhaps they just think, "Hmm...let's pick the worst possible time to lamb because lambing on nice days would be boring."

I'm just glad today is a snow day for me, so I didn't have to rush off to work.  I kicked Dixie and her ram lamb out of the jug, and put Bean and her two ewe lambs (yay!) in with the heat lamp.

I briefly thought about putting Dixie and her ram lamb outside, but tonight is going to get down in the low single digits, and though he'd probably do fine, I figured one more night in the barn wouldn't hurt him.   So they're loose in the barn, since Darla is in the second jug.

After lambs are born, I typically strip each teat (that means milk out each side of the udder, just a bit) to make sure the wax plug is out (which can keep lambs from being able to nurse).  I also like to check to make sure the ewe has decent colostrum.  I couldn't get anything from one side of Bean's udder, and I got dark colostrum (brown, not yellow like it should be) out of the other side.

For now, the lambs are being supplemented with cow colostrum that I had in the freezer, but they're also continuing their nursing, even if they're not getting anything.  I'm not sure what's up with her udder, but I'm hoping her milk will come in soon.  I'm thinking perhaps she lambed a bit earlier than she should have, though the lambs look normal.

I'll massage her udder, and hope that helps stimulate milk let down.  Since I'm going out of town this weekend, poor David will have to bottle feed the lambs.  I could think of worse chores to do.  ;-)

Darla was jealous of the attention.  I'd be happy to shower her with attention if she'd just go ahead and lamb...preferably in the next 16 hours.  That's not too much to ask, is it?  She's looking very close, but I feel like I've been saying that for a week!

UPDATE at 8:45 pm:  Bean's got normal colostrum on both sides of her udder now, so the lambs will be fine and my lucky husband will NOT have to bottle feed them while I'm away.  :-)

Ok Winter, Time to Go

I love winter usually. Everyone complains about the cold, and I secretly love it. I feel like it's a nice break from the oppressive heat and humidity of the summer. I can't feel guilty for not doing more out in the garden, because the garden is dormant.  Evenings are long, so it feels like we have more time to relax. 


Except I'm through with winter now.  Done. Ready for spring. 


We have had record breaking cold weather this year, along with most of the northeast.  We were getting through it, running the pellet stove and cussing because the heat pump was using so much electricity.  It wasn't enough, though, to combat the extreme lows and brisk winds.  The water line to the upstairs bathroom sink froze and busted.  Ugh. 

Friday, February 20, we had gone to run some errands and do some shopping.  It was Friday night and we were excited to get home and watch a movie and relax, maybe pop some popcorn.  We got home at 7pm and walk in with groceries in our arms.  As soon as I got into the kitchen, I could hear a roaring sound....like the bathtub faucet was running.  I immediately knew what it was...BROKEN PIPE!!!! 


I ran farther into the house, and yelled to David, "HOW DO YOU SHUT OFF THE WATER?!!!!"  He immediately ran down to the basement to shut off the main water valve coming into the house.  The water stopped gushing, and we looked around. 

I have never in my life felt so panicky as I did in that moment. It was truly awful.  We love our house, and seeing a big chunk of drywall on the floor and water everywhere was heart breaking.  Water poured out of the ceiling, onto the hardwood floor. It then not only ran down the stairs into the basement, but also seeped through the floor so it was "raining" in the basement.

All of my yarn and soap business stuff was in the basement. Luckily, most of my yarn was bagged or in totes, and I was able to dry what got wet (an amount that would fill 2 trashbags).  

The bathroom ceiling was also dripping.  You can see almost the entire ceiling was wet.

And insulation splashed everywhere!!  The entire floor had about 1/2" of water on it.

I have to admit, the shock of it all got the best of me.  I remember starting to shake (like trembling, not convulsing, ha), and David and I sort of just stood there, looking around the soaking wet basement.  I went upstairs and called my mom, in tears.  I couldn't even think straight, and I just needed someone to tell me what to do.

Long story short, a plumber came out and put a valve in the line to the upstairs bathroom so we could restore water to the rest of the house.  Some very good friends came over and helped with the clean up. We focused our efforts upstairs, to get the hardwood floors dry and get all the drywall and insulation cleaned up.  After several hours, we collapsed on the couch.

We called several companies like Servpro and Service Master, hoping to get someone in to help get all of the wet carpet and drywall out.  Unfortunately, this whole area had such bad problems with pipes freezing, we got put on a waiting list and have STILL not heard back from either company.

We spent the weekend clearing out the basement of the wet carpet and padding, soaking wet dropped ceiling, and anything else that was ruined.  We took LOTS of pictures for the insurance company. Luckily, they have been great through this.  Also, David's brother has been a HUGE help to us. He and David did most of the ripping out of carpet and ceiling tiles.

Now we're calling around and getting prices for repair work. There's going to be lots of drywall replaced, painting done, new carpet, etc.  After the initial shock of Friday, and the denial of Saturday (as in, "Do I really need to get out of bed? If I stay here I can pretend it didn't happen.), I quickly moved on to the "oh well, it is what it is" stage.  Now I'm sort of excited at the thought of a project.

It will be a hectic few weeks (or months?) repairing everything, but I know it will look great when it's done!  And I keep thinking it could have been worse. We were only gone for about 4 hours. What if it had been all day at work or something?  We could have been displaced from our home.  Luckily for us, it's just an inconvenience.

I will say, I will really try not to complain about the heat this summer.  :-)

The First Lamb!

The first lamb of the year has been born!  Of course the ewe waited until 9pm on Sunday (March 1), after I was home all weekend, but hey, I guess she can't exactly schedule it either.

Dixie had a single ram lamb, same as last year. Once again, she had a textbook perfect lambing.  The lamb was up and nursing within a half hour.

I sat and watched them for a while, and the cats watched with me.

I set up the heat lamp for him, because it is still pretty cold.

Here's a short video shortly after the little guy was born.  So cute!

C'mon, Lambs!

No lambs yet, but we're getting closer every day.  Well, we can't be getting farther, amirite?  Darla and Dixie had been outside in the "hog pen" separated from the other ewes because they needed extra grain.  We just got about 4" of snow the other night, but worse than that, temps have been extremely low for this area.  It's been hovering around zero, with windchills below zero over night.  I don't want to chance them lambing outside, so I brought them in the barn temporarily.

If you remember, last year I built 2 nice jugs that would be perfect for them, except for one thing....well, 3 things.

They're already occupied!  The goats have not been handling these frigid temps very well, and even though they've got a cozy shelter and plenty of hay, I saw them shivering a few times.  I figured since I had space indoors, they could come in the barn until the really cold spell passes.

So, where are the sheep?


They're just kinda hanging out.  There's not a whole lot they can get into, and I had been telling my sister they were so much better behaved than the goats, because the goats look for everything possible to get into.  The sheep were fine!

Until this afternoon, I got home and saw Darla had been playing with the tub of cracked corn. I use plastic storage totes to hold grain in the barn...each holds a 50 lb bag of feed really well.  There wasn't much corn left, and Darla had been rolling it around trying to get it open. It'd spill a few kernels here and there, and she'd root them out.  She reminded me of a dog playing with those treat-dispensing toys.  So I put the bins of feed up high, out of her reach.

Since the cats are in the barn, with the heat lamp, I sectioned off a small area to keep the ewes out of the way of the lamp.  The cats can sneak behind it and the sheep don't bother it.  (that's a stuffed toy tiger in the background, by the way).  The bunny in the picture, Rocky, is in temporarily as well. He's got a big hutch outside, but I was worried about it being too cold for him.

And the does are in for the winter, since they didn't have adequate wind breaks outside.

Back to the sheep.  They're starting to look rotund.  (Darla, below)

Dixie isn't as big, but it's only her second time lambing, so I think probably her ab muscles are more toned than Darla's.  I still hope she has twins in there.

Wide load, Darla.

Udder pic! Darla is pretty bagged up. I've set up the video baby monitor so I can keep an eye on them at night.  When I leave for work, I can aim my laptop's camera at the baby monitor and have an adequate view of them while I'm at work (streaming from Ustream).  The channel is called Ewe Tube.      Darla is on the right, Dixie on the left.

Kiki has to sneak around, because Dixie does not like her and will try to give her a butt.

Temps are falling again tomorrow night. I do believe the last forecast said the windchill overnight will be around -25*F.  Yikes.  I have to admit though, I kinda like it. I never want to rush summer, because I really don't like the heat.  So, I try to enjoy these frigid temps while they last, because I know soon enough I'll be sweating at 6 AM wishing it wasn't so darned hot outside.

Wordless Wednesday

The hawk was in our yard, eating a song bird.  Maybe a house finch?  Hawks have to eat too, I know.

To Da Beach!

In just a few short weeks, I'll be heading down to the Outer Banks to attend my first ever knitting retreat!  I'm very excited. Not only will I have a fun filled, knitting weekend, but I'm also going to be spending time with my sister AND my Aunt Linda AND Debbie (from our MLK weekends).

Oh yeah, and I'm going to be teaching a class and a demo!!  I'm going to be teaching a needle felting class, where we'll all create a beautiful felted scene, and then I'm going to be teaching a demo on how to create a felted bar of soap. That's where you wet felt wool around a bar of soap...it's like a wash cloth and soap all in one!

I'll be vending Purl & June soaps, lip balms, and lotion bars there as well.  My aunt had the great idea to create a custom soap for the retreat.  She suggested something beachy, since we're going to be on the beach.  I thought that was a fabulous idea, so I started doing some planning.

I came up with something really special, and I cannot wait to bring it down there to show everyone!

I did some experimenting with colors and tried to create a beach sunset scene! I think it came out pretty well, especially for my first try!  It's a Beach scent, which smells like warm sand, surf, and a hit of sunscreen. It really makes me want sunny days!

And today, since I was home (snow day, yay!) I spent some time making up needle felting kits for the class.  I'll also have some for sale in the Etsy shop fairly soon.

I color coded the different needle sizes, since you can't tell just by looking at the needle which size it is.

Now the kits are just about finished. 

Oh, and I recently did another needle felted scene.  I was inspired by a picture someone posted on a fiber arts forum on Facebook.  She dyed some yarn, using the picture for inspiration.  Here's the picture she used:

And here is my needle felted version:

I guess I've been in beach mode since thinking about this retreat!