How Cool is That?

This last week has been pretty darn busy.  The new year started off at a dead run and so far I'm keeping pace reasonably well.  (I know it's only 12 days into the year, but it's my little fantasy and I'm holding onto it as long as I can.)

So far this year in Sheep-land we have disassembled the partitions between all the breeding groups and combined the ewes again.  We've changed up coats on all ewes who needed it (most) and washed the dirty ones. Andy totally cleaned the barn and I tidied up all the alleyways and walkways that had accumulated chaff.  Amazing how much better the hay cart rolls!  Manure is stashed in the long, empty, former feedbunk until the ground either freezes up or dries out and it can be spread.  A batch of dried hides has gone out for tanning.  A group of lambs has left the farm for processing.  Pelts from earlier lambs have returned and been stashed in inventory.  Wool has come back from the mill and samples are spun up already!  (Kind of had to - Roc Day is Saturday!)  A starter flock of ewe lambs has gone to a new home in Ohio.  Quite a few orders for raw fleece or pelts or roving has been sent out.  Holly had her annual check up and vaccinations (she loves going to the vet - EVERYone is a new friend just waiting to be met).  And I was able to get enough more gray Cotswold dyed to send a good-sized box off to be made to roving.

Peacock colors

I kept on with using both blue and yellow dyes together in the pot hoping for better greens.  I still lose a little blue component in the exhaust, but I get this crazy gradation of color.  I'm hoping it somehow translates in the roving.  I suppose a chemist could tell me how the weathered ends of the wool have physically altered scales that allow bigger (or smaller) color molecules to attach first and the other colors and sizes fit into the rest of the fiber in progression as more time elapses......or something like that.  I'm happy with "Ooooh, that's so COOL!"

Biggify to better see the yellow/green at the tips and blue/green at the butt of the lock

Now come a few tedious days where I compile all the farm financial bookwork in preparation for the upcoming tax season - receipts in and expenses out.   I have it all here in chronological order right down to receipts for the lightbulbs in the barn, it's just a question of categorizing and totalling everything.  I know I should do it monthly, it's just never the priority du jour.  Oh well, when the weather's crappy outside it's not the worst thing in the world to sit at the table with the radio on and a big mug of coffee.  Or two.

A couple of days of concentrated effort and I can continue to say I'm caught up not falling farther behind.