Tuesday, February 25, 2014

A Warm Bright Spot in the Cold Dark Winter

This winter has just seemed endless and I've been in the doldrums worse than usual.  Busy and working on fiber and things when there is free time but just slogging though the basics takes the bulk of the day it seems.

We lost old Danielle in early February. She had yet another TIA type episode and deteriorated through that night into severe respiratory distress so she was euthanized early the following morning.  She almost made it to 11 years.  We have a few other oldies who are hanging in there but winter is pretty hard on old animals even when they have good food and shelter.

Natasha was not handling the cold at all well, particularly the multiple days below 0 so I moved her to the wool shop.  She's thrilled and wonders why she didn't know about this place years ago.  She took right to the kitty pan although she had never seen one before and doesn't even look at the door. 

The dyed Cotswold I most recently sent to Acorn Works returned and looks great!  It practically spins itself and makes yarn that reminds me so much of a flannel shirt that I just had to name it.........
 
red/chestnut/charcoal roving
"Lumberjack"
 
We've gone through the flock and given all the bred ewes their booster vaccinations so they have time to put lots of antibodies into their colostrum.  We've ground corn, hauled hay to the lower barn and Andy's begun the arduous task of cleaning out the barns.  We normally do this earlier in the winter but the below zero temps were mighty discouraging to that sort of work.  He can't reach the field he wants to spread on nor does he want to take the time to spread each load so he's stockpiling the dirty bedding for later.  The material from the lower barn can be stashed in the unoccupied feed bunk but the ram barn litter has to sit outside for a while.  We're jokingly calling it Mount Crap-sta.
 
But the very best part of the whole winter was last weekend when our KY family Sara and Tim came to adopt Burrnie!  He is going to live at Equinox Farm and be a permanent resident of Punkin's Patch.
Lucky, lucky lamb.  He went in style Sunday morning.  Travel accomodations looked so cozy I wanted to go too.  (Well, I wanted to go anyway!)
 
 
He rode like a trooper, ate and looked out the window and didn't lay down until they were almost back home!
 
 
Talk about rags to riches!  Yay Burrnie!!

5 comments:

  1. Burrnie looks like he's having a good time in KY with Sara, St. Tim and the others from NY. Thanks for rescuing him!

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  2. I think this winter has been hard on all of us old gals (speaking of myself, of course). I find myself busily cleaning the toilets if that will keep me from going out into the icebox to do morning chores. And that is saing something. That yarn is absolutely gor-ge-ous! What beautiful colors! It's fun to keep track of Burrnie in Sheep Heaven (aka Equinox Farm). I think we ALL would like to go live there.

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  3. Burrnie's doing great :-). While it might sound silly to think teaching a sheep to eat cookies is important, that really gave him a jump start feeling comfortable here and fitting in with us and our sheeps. Like sending a kid to kindergarten already knowing ABC and counting. You did a great job rehabbing him. He says big thanks!!!

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  4. Wonderful to know you rescue sheep! My Cotswold arrived today, and it is sooo beautiful, the luster and the crimp and length! I'm going to have fun learning how it wants to be spun. Looking forward to future purchases from you! Hope Owens

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