St Patty's Day and the Sun is Shinin'!

Rowdy and Z the Border Collie wrestling in the living room

This past Saturday I brought "Zorro" (Z) the border collie home from the shelter to see if he had herding instincts and to give him a bath.  We also took him on our daily hike in the woods.  He and Rowdy had a wonderful time together.  We have had several inquiries about Z lately, so keep your fingers crossed he will find a good home soon.

It's wonderful to look out my window and see the sun shining!  I sit here at the computer and think of all the things I could be doing if I were at home now.  It's frightening to realize how many of those things involve poo and a shovel. 

Speaking of that, there is a mountain of poo waiting for the manure spreader.  We usually spread twice a year and somehow time got away from us this fall and the job did not get done. This job requires more than a shovel, which is why some clever person invented a front-end loader for a tractor!!


I don't think I mentioned in my blog a couple weeks ago about my trip to the vet's that started with getting the 4WD truck stuck in the yard and also resulted in a flat tire on the trailer, which I discovered once we arrived at the vet's office, about an hour away.  Never had to use the spare before.  Anyway, it was decided by Sam and agreed upon by myself that our 4 trailer tires are the originals that were on the trailer when we purchased it in 1993, so they are probably in need of replacement. Voila, we found the perfect replacement tires!
Now you might be a red-neck if......you have a van up on blocks in your yard.  I'm not sure I qualify as a full redneck yet.  The tires on my good old van were in good shape when we decided it was becoming too difficult to keep the van running and parked it and started using it for feed storage.  This was not too long after the back axle fell off just as I arrived home one day.  I do miss that van.  It was a great road trip vehicle when the kids were younger and Ian drove it quite a bit in high school and then it became the " 'Paca Van" and went as far as Nebraska and New York and Virginia on alpaca deliveries and pick-ups.  The guys at the feed store hated loading feed into it (as opposed to the pick-up truck) but they loved my bumper sticker:

My favorite aunt got that for me at Mackinac Island.  I think she needs to go back and get me another!


It makes me think of my son Ian's Swiss friend, Leonard, who spent a lot of time with us (and in that van) while he was here as a high shcool exchange student, who said to us once, "In Europe, people do not have old cars in their gardens".  Ah Leonard, I hope you'll drop by if you're ever in Ohio again.


Everyone is enjoying the nice weather today.  I am sure the alpacas are soaking up the sun.  They like to sunbathe, I need to get a photo of that.  But in the meantime, a photo of the tulips coming up will have to suffice.  My neighbor

partway up the hill has literally thousands of daffodils coming up all along the road.  Need to get a photo of those as well once they are in bloom.  It's rather pretty.  Our creek is also safely back within its banks for the next day or 2, until the next heavy spring rain.  I think rain is forecast almost every day for the next week or so.  Spring showers and all that........

On Tuesday I took a road trip to Columbus.  This time I was going to look at a loom I found on Craigslist.  I was just tired of the constant fight with my ancient Union Loom and want to enjoy weaving, not suffer through it.  The loom I went to look at and purchased is bigger than the union so will weave a 46" width and has more "harnesses" so I can do more things with it than just rugs if I like.  It is also at least 20 years younger than the Union loom and I think was better cared for.  We disassembled it and loaded it into my CR-V.  That's the whole thing!     It was fairly easy for me to reassemble in my loom room at our office after I re-arranged (I had to move the old loom and some other stuff around since I need to keep the Union loom assembled in case someone wants to come look at it).  It's a bit tight in there, so hopefully someone will come and take the Union loom off my hands soon.  Otherwise, off to the barn with it!  But for the time being, both fit.  I will be warping again very soon!!

loom room with "new" LeClerc loom and old Union Loom

I sent my boys a care package in the mail last week which included the hand-dyed hand-spun yarn for Michelle, Ian's girlfriend, and also a quart of syrup and one of my hand woven alpaca rugs.  I think they are enjoying it all out in Lake Tahoe.  


I am still working on the lace shawl, but taking a break to knit up some hats, which I will post photos of later.  I also washed up a rose grey fleece that I bought at an alpaca show in November and plan to spin up.  It is a gorgeous color, almost lavender, and oh so soft!  Can't wait to start working with it.  It's on the drying rack today.  I will next card it on my drum carder and then start to spin.


Happy St. Patrick's Day!