Hazy Daze

Well it sure has been hazy daze around here. The air is thick with smoke in our neck of the woods. I can't understand yahoos who think that this is a good time to burn grass... that ended over a week ago. Teapot has not been burning for days. To the east of us poor Slave Lake is burning. I can only imagine how the people of that community must be feeling. I see the pictures of melted cars and thank God that that wasn't us last week when we had our brush with fire. I think that having snow right up to the May long weekend is not so bad in retrospect of what's been happening. We have a long summer ahead of us and a dry forest to the side of us... a worry for sure. It looks like we will get rain today... and I am praying for that.... and that it will move to the east of us and relieve some of those people with fire threatening them in Alberta.

Well, as you know, yesterday was Daughter #2's birthday. She turned 14 and what a day we had. Lovely weather and a trip to FSJ to go shopping.  She got herself some jeans and a top and a book. then we went for lunch and bought a cake at the Bakery and then headed home. She had wanted to go to the pet store but I'm a little too raw with Tootsie's death to go purposely looking at pets. Besides it's really hard to get out of the pet store with just a few pet toys, so I turned her down on that one. Then Opa took us all out for dinner at one of the local restaurants. She finished her book just as she was heading for bed last night. Even Daughter #1 got in on the celebrations and skipped school for some shopping in town. (Yes, I know. I let my kids skip school.... well, we only do it once a year! That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!)

Working back from there.... Hmmm... Saturday was a lovely day with a visit from the NPSW. We had organized a trip, as we do each year, for all the gang to come and visit their sister guild here in H.H. (which seems to be down to just me and CJ at the moment). We had a lovely day spinning and prepping wool for a fibre challenge. What's that, you say?! Well, I had come up with this idea to challenge everyone to stretch their imagination and bring 50grams of spun of unspun fibre to throw into the dye pots that I would have going when they got here... then we would pass around a little bag of scraps of paper with individual challenges on them. The challenge is to create something with your fibre that accommodates what's written on the scrap of paper that you draw. So the challenges went like this.

Weave

Knit

Felt

Crochet

Stitch

one of the following...

Celestial

Boreal

Terrestrial

Oceanic

Spiritual

Climatic

So for example if you received Weave and Celestial then you have to weave something with your fibre but you also have to incorporate something that represents the word celestial. I'm weaving a star pillow. with Northern lights represented somehow.... I think... (can you tell that I was the one who got Weave and Celestial).

So there you have it... it was a fun day. Sunday was a day to finish the level 4 homework (except for the 150 hour project), which I did. All I have left to do is work on a few write ups today and then tomorrow I will begin the 150 hour project in earnest.

So here are a few pictures from the last few days.

The new lambs gamboling about with their step sister and their mom....

My first Bucle....

My spiral yarn...

Another kick at the can for flax...

Shades of Grey...

Hopefully I can remove the pictures from my camera of Daughter #2' birthday... and post them tomorrow...

Holy Smack! How Did It Get To Be Monday!

What a weekend.... It's been a busy one with the NPSW here on Saturday that day passed in a flash. Then yesterday our community had an Environmental Extravaganza and that took most of yesterday. Good thing I still managed to get my spinning done. All I have left is the 150 hour project which I have already done some work on.

Today is a special day. Daughter #2 turns 14 today. We are going shopping but she doesn't know it yet. She thinks I have a meeting in town and that I am dropping them all off at school... but I'm not I'm just going to kid nap her and take her to town for a day buying clothes. We'll be home this evening hopefully with an ice cream cake.

I'm off in about 10 minutes so I'll write here later with more on what's been happening.... and some pics of recent spinning... and maybe other pics too.

The Good The Bad And The Ugly

A Few Complaints:

1. Why is it that I'm the only one who writes a fibre blog and never finishes anything. The Yarn Harlot who writes a blog and writes books and can finish the delightful shawl is way beyond me... and then there's The Spindle Princess who writes a blog and hopefully one day will write a book and still finishes beautiful shawls and spins tons of fibre etc... (I'm sooo jealous!) What do I have to show... no shawl, that's for sure.

2. Why do I have to have carpal tunnel flare up at this time in my ankle... no, the swollen ankles are not from retaining fluid... no, the swollen ankles are from treadling too much. Like what's that all about?! Now I have to wear a tensor bandage for the next little while and avoid treadling.... hmmm... like that's going to happen.

More Cheerful Thoughts:

1. I'm almost ready to start the 150 hour project. I'm three weeks behind schedule, but I'm going to have my books complete by Sunday night.... except for the 150 hour project which will begin on Monday morning. Ha and then they think I'm going to stop treadling.... I don't think so!

2. I love my Bucle.... it's divine... I got it bang on, the first try.  I also really like my spiral after the 4th time trying. I'm finishing the shades of grey today and I'm about half way through that one. Tomorrow will be a day to celebrate dye... when the ladies from NPSW in FSJ will come for their annual foray into the wilds of the Peace Valley. More about that later.

Two for two... hmmm... I guess that's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick...

I'm just glad that Blogger is back up and I can write about it here. I will be offline tomorrow as I have the NPSW coming for their annual.... well you read that above. We will be spinning and weaving and dyeing and I have a special little bit of joy ready for them in the dye pot... with a challenge for all and a full year to finish the challenge... cool eh! I will be back on Sunday to tell you all about it..

In the words of The Yarn Harlot (and actually considering that I live in this valley and have a better reason to say it) Peace Out!

It's Raining... It's Pouring....

The Old man is.... off to work actually. Teapot and the girls got off early this morning as Daughter #1 is heading in to FSJ on the bus for a tour at the college there. She will be checking out several classes in an effort to get a taste of what college is like. She had to be on the bus at 8 a.m. We never woke till 7:30... it meant a very hurried breakfast this morning. But they managed.

As for me, I got up at 5 a.m. and spun and then boiled up my flax yarn. I'm scouring it and it has one more hour to go in the pot. Then one of my samples will have to go back into a pot of Javex water to bleach it. Meanwhile I managed to finish the spiral yarn and start the Boucle yarn.  Actually it is all going well... I hope I didn't just jinx myself.

I've been waiting for a day of rain. We have had beautiful weather all spring with only one day of rain a few weeks ago. The leaves have been wanting to come out on the trees but haven't had enough moisture to make it. I was so pleased when it started to rain last night. Already this morning the grass has turned green and you can see that the leaves are definitely a little larger. There is a green-ness that wasn't there yesterday.  It certainly makes it easier on the eyes.

I'm looking forward to going to the green houses and picking out my flowers for the deck.  We have also decided to put in an orchard. Just recently Teapot has been cutting down a lot of the old dead Pine trees and where our driveway makes a loop there were several. Over the years since we have lived in this house we have often complained about the fact that our driveway round-about is too sharp a turn. For larger pick-up trucks they can't make it without backing up and turning their wheel a little harder. We had often said that the driveway would have been better if the loop were just a little larger. A few years ago when the Pine started to die we noticed that if five particular trees died then when Teapot cut them down we could actually enlarge our driveway with very little effort. Last year the Pine Beetle attacked that stand of trees and by mid summer they were all red and dried up. Teapot started on the driveway expansion as soon as the snow started to melt this year. He has the trees cut down now and we are burning out the stumps. Next will come the three truck loads of gravel that we will need to make the driveway viable, and the larger loop that is formed in the middle, will become our orchard. We will have to fence it as the deer will nibble everything, but that is ok I think, as it will also let everyone who visits know not to drive on the new trees. This will also mean a trip to Dunvegan Gardens (the best greenhouses in the vicinity) for several varieties of apple trees and a cherry trees. We will have room for four or five fruit baring trees with what is already there. Already Teapot has planted Green Gage trees which are a type of plum and we also have a Dogberry (also known as Mountain Ash trees to you up-alongs) there too. I may even try my hand at a few grape vines in there and certainly some raspberry canes along the fence. That is our big project for this summer. The other small project is to get the tin roof on the electrical shed which has been sitting on the ground for the last two years.

Teapot will also be working on the paddocks that he started last year for the animals... there are two new paddocks that have not been used yet. One has fencing wire around it the other has two sides done but requires work on the other two sides. I'm also concerned that the fencing is just straight wire and not page wire. The sheep can fit through the fence and worse the dogs or coyotes could get in, no problemo. So it is not really good enough for them... however the alpacas will enjoy being out there.... and we'll just have to bring them in at night. I might put low page wire there later on, when I can afford it, but that stuff is really expensive!!

See what a little bit of green does to me.... I get all excited and start planning..... hmmmm ; |

In the meantime... It's raining, it's pouring the old man is snoring..... oh for pete's sake.... no one is snoring in this house.... well maybe the cat.....

Three Posts In One Day... Weird!

Well, when I've got something to say, I say it I guess.  That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

I just finished the second lot of flax samples and to be honest they are much better than the first ones.  I discovered a little secret... the Fiddle Fiddle technique (this is a highly technical technique... my tongue is pretty far over in my cheek right now!) really works well when you're trying to make a join in flax. It really helps to make a linen yarn smooth. So I fiddled and fiddled and my new yarns look quite nice actually... I also realized that less is more when spinning flax. Always remember.... go thin.

That's it I'm done.... I've nothing more to say at this time... except I'm off to try another spiral yarn... the last one fell apart when I washed it.... argh!

A Little Something To Say About A Book I Just Read

Remember Clan Of The Cave Bear? I do. I saw it on TV years ago and that's what turned me on to this series. I loved it. Then Valley Of The Horses came out and I loved that one too. Then out came The Mamoth Hunters and I figured I had found the best writer of all time. All great books. That's where it ends. The series steadily went downhill from there. The last installment of these books just came out and even though I've been disappointed in the last two I decided I'd give it a read and see if it had improved and returned to the awesome writing of the first three. NOT! OMG this was worse still. While J.M.A. is got great ability to describe that does not make a writer. Her plot line never really got started until the last two hundred pages. I slogged through the first part of the book in the hopes that at some time the story would actually start. It did but I was so disappointed with it when it finally did that I kept thinking that no wonder there will be no more in this series. As I turned the last pages I just sat there and thought, "well that was pointless."  If you are thinking about reading it.... well I'm not one to tell you what to do but I'll say this... find a better book because almost anything would be better.

It's almost as if J.M.A. started writing the books because she had a lovely trip to France to see the caves that she describes in the book and then decided I had better write a story around my descriptions. Problems is she didn't seem to be able to bring the story together. Instead of spending so much time on descriptions she should have paid some attention to the actual story. 1000 pages of description of cave art while very enlightening and is cool, but it makes more for a text book rather than a novel. The main characters story lines were .... well, quite honestly lame. The ideas behind them were excellent... but J.M.A. just couldn't pull them off. The story lines were pathetic and contrived. I realize that a novel is a contrived thing but the story lines at least should seem realistic or at least explained for the time and cultural conditions... but they weren't.  I really don't want to give away any story lines because I know that there will be a bunch of you who will want to read it no matter what. But sadly I do have to say that it was a big disappointment. I kept thinking, well that was stupid! When Ayla received her call, it was ok... but then she confronted Jondalar when she found out he was cheating and that was pathetic. There was very little emphasis put on the relationship between Ayla and her Daughter, and then J.M. A. dragged in some characters from previous books which had no real reason for being there. Their story lines kind of just drifted off. Then there was a scene where Ayla was convinced to consume a root for the purposes of experimentation. It turned out to be life threatening and there was a whole vision scene which never got talked about again but it would have been nice if J.M. A. had expanded on that a bit. Then there was the whole knight in shining armour thing when Jondalar came rushing to Ayla's rescue which was more than lame. There was no real reason for her to come back from the brink of death since Ayla's and Jondalar's relationship hadn't even been resolved at that point.

I'm sorry to say that I don't recommend this book... spend your time more wisely... it's just not worth reading, unless you like long winded descriptions of pre-historic cave art.

Top O' Da Marnin' To Ya

I've been working on Flax samples. Trying to catch up and get them done and out of the way. I still have a little bit to do today to finish them up but three days goes by awfully fast and I figured I had better get back here and let you all know I'm alive and kickin'... or on the green side of the sod as my Pops would say.

All is well on this home front...
Lambs..... check. Bouncing around like bean cakes.
Forest fires... check. Out and not a bother any more. We even made the CBC news.
Mother's day... check. A fine day to share with my family.
Hay.... check. We have enough to go on with for now. 2 bales and one more coming.
Swollen ankle.... check. Gone down though still a little swelling there. Hopefully improving.

Ok so what did I not write about out of that. Lambs... well you've all seen them by now. Fanny in the end popped them out like there was nothing to it. The only thing I can figure is that she must have gotten pregnant right before the ram left the pen for the winter and even then she would have been a little overdo. Still, she had them and all is well. The story on their names goes like this.... the day they were born two of my friends from FSJ were visiting and one of them said that Fanny looked like she was going to have them at any second. That night they were born so I had to call one of my friends and let her know that Fanny had finally given birth... we were talking about names and she suggested that Rene was a good name which just happens to be my friend's name. Worked for me... so I named the lambs after my two friends that were here and predicted Fanny's imminent birth. Rene and Linda are great wee lambs though they are not always sure about Honeydew (the llama) and look up at her like she's a serious giant.

Forest fires. Almost. Last week on Thursday I'm sitting in the living room working on flax when I hear the fire trucks heading out the highway. Usually this is significant since we lose lots of people in accidents on the highway between here and FSJ, and if the vehicles involved catch fire then our volunteer fire department gets called out. It wasn't till later by about an hour or so that I noticed a very hazy sky which turned out to be of course smoke. The smoke seemed to be coming from a source quite close to my house! Alarm bells went off in my head and I thought I had better go and investigate.  I took a walk down through my property and discovered that there were several fire trucks and whole pascal of firefighters working diligently to keep a grass fire getting into the trees. In particular the trees of my next door neighbour's house and the crown land to the west of us. It was quite a shock to see fire so bad that close to us.  One of the fire fighters who is a close friend of the family came over to my fence line to talk to me. He let me know that if it got into the trees that I would be evacuated. Well I kept my fingers crossed and took faith that these boys who were friends and neighbours were doing their best to keep the fire out of the trees. All I could think about was, "how in the hell am I going to get out of here without a car or anything." and,  "What will I do with all of my animals." I stood there all afternoon watching and waiting as the fire flared up in the wind and then died down and then flared up again and firefighters dragged hoses and poured water all around the perimeter. Finally Teapot came home from school and we walked around the fire area at one point we caught flames starting to lick up a tree and almost reaching the branches. teapot grabbed some snow and put those flames out and then we saw a quad coming checking the tree line and putting out hot spots as he went.  As evening came on the wind died down and slowly out went the fire... though there were logs burning for two days afterwards. I'm glad we didn't get evacuated. Here's a little map to give you an idea of how the flames went...

You can click on it to enlarge it.

Mother's Day was spent on the deck enjoying sunshine and family... and I didn't spin one darn thing.

Hay we picked up the second bale and have one more to get... that hopefully will be enough to see us through to the summer and the new hay season and hopefully it won't be so bad this year. Hopefully hay will be more plentiful.

Swolen ankle... or ankles... yeah not sure what that one is about. It has been a little bit of a worry as heart issues are prevalent in my family and for the first time in my life I'm completely out of shape and needing to walk and get my self in better shape. It also could be because of damage to my leg from falling through the floor in the winter and doing some pretty bad damage to my leg since on of my legs was swelling worse than the other.So now it is diet time in earnest and get myself in shape in earnest and... crap.... I might as well face it... I'm getting old. I have to get off my arse more and stop spinning long enough to go for a walk... right?! Right! (sigh) Well spring is here and the trails are finally clear so I will be walking more now... let's hope that helps.

Today is a fine morning and the grass is turning green though the trees have stopped their growth since there hasn't been rain in ages and the snow has melted and there's nothing for them to grow on... I see I will be praying for rain daily again this year. I think I could move to a wetter region easily.

Rain please come soon....