New Rovings and a Grandbaby

 This month turned out to be really busy. I washed and carded mohair and wool the past 7 months and took it to the mill. The natural colored roving is already back and I am spinning batches to determine pricing. Some fibers are gorgeous when spun up and washed. I have learned over the years not to jump to conclusions about the quality until it has been washed.

 The above is a Merino Suri alpaca blend. It has a little vm, but it spins up beautifully. It is a great fiber to practise over dying. It is ecru, so has shades of pale yellow will tone down jewel tones.

I just got back from Nevada. My daughter had a a baby girl on August 14. She did a bathtub delivery and it was cool to see the baby pop up. I am glad that I was able to participate.

My next spin in here at the farm is September 4, 2016 from 1-4 p.m. All are welcome to attend, just shoot me an email to let me know; jmarckathy@aol.com.

Animals for sale

 I am no longer breeding my alpacas and would like to sell a few of them. This is Maryland, an intact male born four years ago. $1,000 without papers. He was just shorn and had a beautiful fleece. I also have two Huacaya and two Suri females for sale. They will not breed, so think of them as pets.

 Four French angora rabbits were born  last month. They will be available the first week in August. I also have four 1 year old rabbits for sale. I plan to keep several but, since they are all lovely, i will keep the adults and any babies not sold. We plan to get a rabbitry built soon.

 Angora goats and sheep of all ages are also available. This has been my healthiest and loveliest group since our move. Email me at jmarckathy@aol.com to set up a visit and talk pricing.

 Four pea chicks were born this week, I have three males and one female available. that are a year old. They will not be breeding pairs since they share the same parents. Everyone talks about how loud peacocks are. If you are on a farm, you will know that sheep, goats and dogs are much louder!

This chick was born three days ago. There are three more under the hen ready to rest for the night.

If you would like to visit and are not shopping, please be aware that I charge $5 a person for tours. Children under 2 are free.

Beware Foxes at Play

Some workmen spotted animals moving in the alpaca pasture. I took this with my 60X zoom lens. He identified them as fox kits playing.

I walked out into the pasture and spotted the mother. She was too quick, so no photos of her. She ran away from where her kits were playing. I moved out slowly and managed to capture one of them on camera.

 It just stood there and looked at me. Caught lots of photos but these are the best. The hole to the left of the it is the entrance to the den.

 This was the exit to the den.

 This is the entrance that the kit was standing next to and which it entered.

 I am pretty sure that this is the third goose that came this spring which we have not spotted in a while.

Anyone know what this skin is? Looks like a fox skin, but I am not sure. It was next to their exit hole and dried up, so it has been there a while.

I moved the sheep out of that area a month ago when I saw a fox hiding in the shrubs. It would not have been able to take down one of them, since they are adults, but moms sometimes pop lambs when you are not expecting them. We just let the kid goats onto the large pasture and I will be running them into the barn every night. The kids are not great about hanging with moms. My Great Pyrenees are pretty good about keeping predators out, but there is no reason to tempt the foxes. I believe in letting wildlife be as long as they are not bothering my animals. My birds are also in aviaries, so no worries there.

Around the Farm and New Colorways

 This week the angora goats and Shetland/Merino Crosses are mowing the front yard. Next week they will move to the lower garage pasture. I hope to keep them parasite free by moving them to taller pastures frequently.

 A close up of one of the moms with her kid. It was a pain to have all of the animals in the barn  over the winter for delivery, but it paid off. All of the kids and lambs are much healthier this year. They have well formed horns, lovely fleeces and are much larger than they have been since we moved to Maryland.

 We had a fox in the newest pasture, so I hung out with the goats while they browsed. The alpacas decided to join us. You can see how tall the grass and other plants are. Five of the goats were so happy, that they refused to return when everyone else did. The above photo is of one of the streams running through our property. We have a nice soothing waterfall just above where I took this photo.

 I am listing lots of roving on Etsy. This is a different color than the previously listed fuchsia orange mohair. You have to read the specifics to know the fiber content. This one is a blend of kid mohair and Merino.

 This is a batch of wool and mohair that I just took to the mill. I carded and spun some up and really liked the combination. The Merino Shetland cross was white, gray and had white tips. I dyed it along with a white kid mohair. Can't do without my mohair. The sheen takes yarn to a new level.

 I am experimenting with a tutorial on spinning gradient yarns and how to use them. I will be publishing a pattern called Watermelon Shawl as soon as I finishing proofing it.

I still have a few Shetlands for sale. They are purebred, but I will not be selling them with papers. They are intended to be a spinning flock. They are all of the more modern style with very soft fleeces and lots of crimp. I also have two East Fresian dairy sheep for sale. Not enough time to make cheese. Email me at jmarckathy@aol.com  

I will be teaching my Spinning Freeform Yarns class on June 20. This will be the only time I offer it this summer. I teach how to spin a novelty yarn with loads of texture in it without tying knots in one skein of yarn. They are my best selling yarns. Anyone, who can spin a decent (not perfect) single, will enjoy this class.  

Farming is not just animals

In three days, my plants grew 3 to 12 inches. I did a show in western Pennsylvania, which is not worth doing again, and came back to find my garden is almost a jungle. Some seeds from last year sprung up as volunteers, so the chickens will have more to enjoy. wouldn't you figure that they would be the vegetables that tasted horrible? Lots of pumpkins! 

Winter and Thanksgiving are due at the beginning of August They are getting testy, so we are keeping a close eye on them.

The chickens that I bought for feathers are doing well. I love the color variations. I am fairly certain that a few of them are hens.

The latest project on my Majacraft Dynamic loom. Using a 10/2 in the weft sure adds time to the weaving, but the end result will be worth it.

Hope everyone is enjoying their summer. Very weird on in terms of weather.

Greater Baltimore Weavers' Guild

This is the time of year when I get really busy. If you look at my schedule, you will see that I have a lot of shows over the weekends between now and mid December. I am not going to set my shop up, if the shows are back to back - unless you call and say you are coming. I did the Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival this past weekend and sold most of my freeform yarns, so I will be working on new ones starting Wednesday.

Tomorrow evening I will be giving a presentation to the Greater Baltimore Weavers' Guild on Fiber Connections: Art and Science. I will be talking about how I got the nerve to call myself an artist. I designed two shawls to illustrate some of my points. I used funky yarns in both and elastic yarn in one of them. The photo above shows what happened when I took it off the loom. The ripples are a natural result of the elastic yarn. I never waste - so the piece above was woven to finish the warp. I will be dyeing it at the meeting.

This is one of the finished shawls. I used a variety of white fibers - all whites are not the same color. This piece includes Rambouillet, Suri alpaca, kid mohair, Merino, and tencel. The shawls will be available for sale after the November Textile Museum presentation.

Shear Perfection

Shearing is now done until October 27, when all of the angora goats and some ram lambs will be shorn.

Thanksgiving is getting her hair cut by Nathan Good of Shear Perfection. He did a superb job. No stress for the animals or for me (most important!) While shearing Maryland, the cria born May 5th, he mention that "he" had a lovely fleece. Based on how he squatted to pee and no obvious testicles, I thought I had a girl. I do not breed with the intentions of papering my alpacas, so I will keep him, if I don't find a buyer. His fleece is as lovely as Thanksgiving's so with plenty of pasture, I am not under pressure.

Nathan was also willing to grind down teeth, so Jennifer went to the dentist without leaving home!

Marc held Winter, Maryland's mom, so she would know where her baby was. I think of the alpacas as large animals, but they are not once shorn and especially being held by Marc!

I am still doing lots of freeform - between spinning, washing fleeces and gardening. I am also checking out the various knitting and spinning groups in the area. So far, the spinning group associated with the Baltimore Weaver's guild has my vote. I plan to check out the Columbia Sip and Knit group that meets next Tuesday at the King's mall.

I have signed up to be a vendor at Spin Quest on August 25th. You can find more information by going to Spin Artiste's website and Ravelry pages.