Goat Coats and Beavers

 The Oaks Sugarloaf show turned out to be a happy surprise. The Mountain Refuge Landscape at the back
left sold to a lovely lady who will cherish it. I met lots of interesting people and, as always, my neighboring
vendors gave me a new perspective on doing shows.

                                  

The kids were shorn on October 27th. It turned cold with the Hurricane Sandy and now is dropping down to freezing at night. The animals who were shorn are all in the white barn. Parts of the barn are drafty, so I put t-shirts and sweatshirts on the kids and one adult. I also bought a heater to raise the temperature and dry out the barn. I have a few that I am watching for pneumonia. Unfortunately, their immune systems are weak due to parasites. I had to treat all but one of the kids yesterday. They are all looking perkier this morning.

 Above are Flower and Orphan. I have a hard time getting photographs of them, since they hang on me when I am in their area. The does all got Onsies. Easier to tall them apart that way!

 I don't know whether the beaver is still in our pond since he did not cover the grate last night. His lodge looks like it has more canes on top and more trees are down since the last time I checked.

I don't know where the top of the tree on the right went but, in my Internet reading, I discovered that beavers have multiple tunnels running into their lodge and that they can haul entire trees under water. They also do not hibernate. I do hope that he is still around. Natural live entertainment!

I will be home this weekend and will be at the Gaithersburg Sugarloaf show at the Montgomery County Fairgrounds next weekend.

Fiber

I noticed that I don't have any photos of what I do with my fiber. I spend most of my time spinning and occasionally knitting. The best sellers in my shop are yarns and the batts like the ones in the basket at left. These batts don't seem to show up as clearly as they do in other programs, so the blog must save space by putting lower resolution pictures on. These are shades of greens that I sell for felting - wet and needle. I have a Patrick Green electric carder, which I really love. It allows me to play around with colors and is professional enough to allow me to produce in bulk. I have to admit that not one of the batts in the basket is the same as any of the others. I use them to make landscape scenes like the one below. I teach wet felting on the last Saturday of the month for free with the purchase of fiber to make a project. My favorite felting is of landscapes of the Tucson area. There is something about the color of the sky here that cannot be found anywhere else.

The small piece above is in the initial stage of development. I needlefelted a basic layout of a sunset from a photo that I took earlier in the month. Seeing it in a photo helps me see where I need to add detail and colors. I plan to make a much larger landscape - 27x28 inches, using the same design. I have been wet felting my landscapes, but started to wonder what would happen, if I needlefelted them first and then wet felted. I have started needlefelting a large one and will leave this one as is, so I can make a comparison. I think needlefelting can become tedious, so I doubt that I will do many this way. Wet felting provides a quicker finished product and I like the surprises that I get in wet felting. I want a little more shape control, so I will try to needlefelt at least one.