Sunday Stills - Circles

This will be an easy one this week, you can find circles everywhere. For a real challenge find some circles in odd places.....

Part of our buzz pile.  As yet unbuzzed.  If we don't need it this year we will be all happy that it's seasoned for next year.

 

Circles within circles.

 

A circular tire that seems pretty darn happy to be retired.

 

And.......do you see the sheep face??

 

 

 

 



Nasty Nemo

Despite the name, this winter storm promises to be nothing like the cute and harmless little orange fish.  While we aren't getting slammed as many closer to the coast will be, we are still getting enough of a storm to to require some extra preparations.  Rolling doors have been closed where possible, enough extra hay was brought down from the upper barn to last a couple of days, the generator battery has been charged up, plans changed to eliminate a road trip.... in short, cover up and hunker down.

At least things are pretty at the moment.

The rams have the most exposed living quarters since the loss of the big rolling door to a bad wind storm last year.  Andy never did get time yet to construct and hang a new one.  Happily, the sheep could not care less that we can't close it up.  The jagged thing is a chunk of door hanging by the roller on the overhead track, silent testimony to the power of serious wind.  Since it's sixteen feet up it's not a hazard to anyone, just a reminder of a job that needs doing when possible.

The snow was falling fast and straight down - pretty and quite peaceful if you are wearing a heavy wool coat and sitting comfortably on dry bedding.

Little BB is now a full grown ram but still as sweet and affectionate as when he was little.  He loves to be petted and made much of.  We never did castrate him since he was so ill as a lamb and now it doesn't really matter since he can live with the big rams.  He gives as good as he gets, so he's certainly not bullied by them.  While common sense and experience eventually teach every shepherd not to trust a ram 100%, he really feels like the exception to that.  Two seconds after this picture he had his nose stuck in the camera.

The big Cotswold boys are trustworthy around people but they are so likely to suddenly turn to bash a fellow ram that it's good to keep an eye on them. 

I resent that.  This permanently drooping ear from fighting is just a coincidence.  Could happen to anybody.

 

Oh yeah?  Come over here, Curly, and I'll make the other one droop too.

 

He would, too.  Rocky is a chief instigator when trash talk turns to action.

 

Rams.  Sigh.

 



Sunday Stills - The Letter F

 

 

Four Fahrenheit.  Frigid.

 

 

Frosty Friends.

 

Fur.

 

Firewood.

 

Fleece.

 

Frog Pond. (well, it will be when it's carded to roving)

 

 



Sunday Stills - Big Sky

I follow a couple of amazing blogs that participate in Sunday Stills photography challenge.  I have a digital camera and use it with limited success.  Limited largely because I don't know what half the functions are or why I'd want to use them.  And the manual that came with the camera is full of explanations about how many times to push a button to get TO a function, but it doesn't tell me WHY I want that function.  I'm also not artistic enough to think of things like blurring the background or putting images into black and white.  I like all that stuff, I'm just not very clever in that regard.  I am photographically challenged by nature although I should not be - my mother never left the house without two cameras in her purse (yes, the purse was the stuff of legend and had it been a little bit larger it would have needed wheels and a license plate to be legal).  I think part of Kodak's demise was because my mom passed away.  But back to Sunday Stills!

Hoping that a firm goal every week will force encourage me to learn more about what my camera can do, I joined up!  This week the challenge is "Big Sky".....

So for this challenge use the rule of thirds and set your horizon in the bottom third of the pic and get some great sky shots. Day or night, cloudy or sunny. Cool blue or white from total cloud cover or spotty clouds. Even use sunrises and sunsets, the possibilities are endless….

 

 

I also like this one.  I couldn't figure out how to fit them  both into the same frame.  Challenged....yeah.

 



 

If I could have put them together I'd have thought it really nice.  Which one do you like better and why?

Tick Tock

I'd like to think we were halfway through winter but I know we're not.  Still, the season is marching along and we're marching along with it (more or less). 

Andy has started bringing hay down from the upper barn to the lower one as what was stashed away there is nearly gone.  It's nice that we've had a thaw so the snowbank shrank enough that the elevator could be gotten where it needed to be without too much trouble.

 

Our January spinning guild meeting is always a fun, well-attended event.  I saw 51 names on the sign in sheet.  Besides wanting badly to get out of the house, and added enticement is that January is our Chinese Raffle. This guild fundraiser is a way for members to turn their unwanted stash into someone else's treasure and put a bit of money in the coffers by way of ticket sales.

 



 

Every little brown paper bag is there to receive tickets for one submitted item.  You can buy as many tickets as you wish and put them in as many (or as few) bags as you want. 

 



 

There were tables covered in bags around to the right out of this picture, too.  There were very few items that didn't get at least one ticket in the bag.  Those that were orphans......went home as doorprizes to people whose names were drawn from the basket where allll the spent tickets had gone.  We just might see those goodies again on the tables next year.

 

And so the winter wears on and the wind keeps time in the snow with a weedy metronome.

 



Overcoming Cabin Fever

The Roc Day gathering was an excellent outing and a great event.  Although there was heavy fog along the way the weather was otherwise uneventful which was a great change from the ten-below-zero temperature of one year, the ice storm of another, the general blizzard another time..... this year it crept up into the low 50s during the day which brought out a sizable number of people.

I opted for a 2-table booth and it worked out well - fiber and pelts on one side, small items and scale/receipt book/cash box work area on the other side.  Julie was a great help as she has a good eye for display.

 

The room was set up to have half the area available for the spin-in and while the chairs were empty when I took the picture, they were later all full and then some. A good contingent of GVHG members came out - more than a dozen - and everyone was in a festive mood.  It was a potluck to boot, so with all those attendees the lunch tables were full to overflowing.  I did notice that there were more desserts than "real food" dishes, but no one complained :-)

 

                      

The other half of the room was set up with vendors and there was a nice variety of goods for sale and everyone seemed quite busy.



 

Another fun aspect of the gathering is the raffle table.  The vendors all contribute items and the guild members do also.  There were well over 30 items for raffle ranging from ready-to-spin fiber to books and very nice finished items.  There was even a small drum carder and a skein winder.  There were a lot of happy winners, but alas I was not one this year.  That's OK.  It's not like I NEED more things, even nice fibery things.  The fun was in participating.

 



 

Anyone within driving distance of Lansing, NY should mark their calendars for next year and plan to come out for some fiber fun.

When Will I Learn....

....that you can't leave a clipboard with paper on it anywhere that a sheep can reach?  We had just set up the scale this afternoon to weigh the lambs to see how they are growing.  We heard a vehicle pull in so we stepped outside to see who it was.  The clipboard had just been hung on a nail about five feet off the ground.  We were away for maybe 15 minutes - plenty of time apparently for the lambs to get bored, spy the clipboard and reach it by standing waaay up on their hind legs, front feet braced against the post and grabbing the paper off with their teeth.  By the time we returned the sheets were scattered through the pen with dirty hoof marks on them and pieces chewed off.

I have lots of charts set up for various groups through the year so there must have been thirty pages of info hanging there.  Happily they didn't destroy anything really vital and the bite marks are kind of endearing.  Kind of. At least it seems better to think that than get all mad about it since I DID leave them unattended.  This is the second time I've neglected to remember what  %&$*#!! clever and curious animals they are.

 

The big rams were uninterested in the hoopla and happy to sit and think deep thoughts.

"String Theory or Loop Quantum gravity......I'm still pondering"

 

Mr. Lincoln in the back - "What??  Like there's any question?  Isn't it obvious?"

 

We are going to have some warm weather in the next day or so, and the bright sun dog this afternoon does seem to indicate a coming change.  We wouldn't mind seeing a lot of the snow go or at least settle, and as I'm trekking to Roc Day in the Ithaca area Saturday it would be nice to travel for once in good weather instead of the usual snow storm.

 

Must be our January thaw, right on schedule!