My family

Me singing at my nieces wedding. Look at the beautiful colour of the lake imagine wool that colour.

Looking back over my Blog I am sure I posted a entry since the last one but I can not see it so I am thinking it is in Cyber Space floating. We have been incredibly busy here I have built two gates put in 6x6 x8 square fence posts so each gate hangs and joins in the middle at our bottom entrance I have painted them white so it looks real nice. We were hanging them in the dark last night with the light from the tractor ( there is just not enough day light these days)and of course it did not go smooth. So my husband and son were scheming how to make it open wide enough so the low bed and logging truck loaded can go through. I am not saying too much because we still had a lot to do and it was getting late and I just wanted it done. However there is always a reason for what I do it may not seem like it but always I have a good reason. The gate was built with small spaces between wood to keep out the neighbors dogs out and to keep my dogs in, to keep out the ranch below cows, the other neighbors Llama and the Reserve horses out and to keep my donkey in. Yet now my gate is hanging up side down bigger space now on the bottom and it is just plain back to front and yet I am still trying to keep the peace so I said "Oh it is okay I will just hang a wreath on it and it will be fine" My son starts to laugh and they flipped the gates moved them about and now they are all fine.
Did you ever notice that the simple things always seem to take the long way around yesterday we had 4 ice times a whole day of a refing Clinic and on the last ice time which was 2 hours long the coach then decides to add on dry land training it is Sunday night and no hope for a Sunday family dinner (on top of it we ended up in the concessions stand again) My poor daughter had to cook supper and after many, many phone calls supper was turned up turned down and then just turned off. I also ended up to the early morning practice with my youngest son to find his skates not there my other daughter had them and she was at a friends house...Honestly I could go on and on about our crazy weekend but it is just to long to type.
During our hectic weekend our little Yorkshire Terrier end up shook by a bigger dog which then caught his eye and made his eye ball pop out so it was a dash to the vet on a Sat. Which they close at noon so over time, surgery, medicine and thank God the vet did not have time to get the bill ready. I'm okay with ignorance, what I don't know will keep me calm :)
With all the busy things knitting has been put on the back burner but I did finish the fingerless gloves I was working on and I did spin up two bobbins of thick and thin Angora now I just need to ply them together and I am spinning some lovely Mohair that I dyed at our dyeing workshop.
On Wed. My spinning group is coming here for the day so that should be fun. I hope to post photo's but lately I can not get any pictures to post.

This is my one daughter who has not caught the flue yet she is trying to stay healthy.

Good Morning I am a little sick of tomatoes I put up another 40lbs yesterday this time I blended them and then put them into freezer Zip lock bags which would be no big deal until I was rushing because it was time to go to the School bus so I loaded all the bags into a large bowl and then promptly dropped one going down the back stairs and it exploded all over the boot room. The exploding was enough to make me mad but I just recently re-did the whole room in a lovely white with very white accessories (not very practical for 8 eight people who live on a farm). It is amazing you all did not hear me:)
I am dealing with sick children still this flue is going through the whole bunch of them I get one half way through it then another one starts. I can handle the sick kids it is waiting for it to hit when and where will I be near them or will they be at school and my one son could not hit a toilet or sink if he was paid, so how do I politely keep him out of the living room or out of his newly renovated room which he is on the top loft bed.
I have been working on some more fingerless gloves for my youngest daughter but she picked the wool I only have one ball of this fluffy purple/pink wool so I hope to be able to make them out of it. If I don't I guess it calls for a shopping trip to Kamloops which is about 1 hour and 20 minutes to an hour and a half away. It is very hard to find much in our town.
Anyways I am way behind schedule must go get the rest of the sleepy heads that are not up yet.

I had a Great time at our dye work shop even though it rained, thundered and lighting throughout the day. We were quite cold but what a lot of fun. I came up with some crazy colours and my Mohair dyed beautiful it takes the colour real well.
Tonight my three youngest children and I stayed home after I sweet talked my husband into going to hockey and to take the kids into town to the school dance. We went outside in the rain moved chickens to a different house, cleaned the chicken house and then raked out the barn and sorted our first bag of Alpaca to get it ready to head to the mill.
Today I washed, cubed 30 lbs of tomatoes and put them in the freezer, what a long job but it is done. Tomorrow I must do the peaches but I also must head into the bank and Oh my gosh I hate going to the bank I will do anything to get out of it.
The other night I had something get in top my very expensive Alpaca grain I had it in a large tupperware garbage container plus another container and who ever it was totally squashed my garbage can in half actually bent it right into two and then completely flipped the other bin over tipped all grain then threw it over and of course it rained all night so the grain is wrecked and did I mention you cannot buy that grain in our town. I am pretty sure it was a bear which the novelty of them is really wearing off.
Well I must go so have a Wonderful night and take care

My dad's harvest time

Starting already

It is the second week of school and I already have sick children my youngest daughter threw up all night and then today she had very bad stomach ache, no energy and a head ache. It was another day that was not in the plans but other than my poor girl being sick it was a good day. I did a lot of indoor stuff vacuumed, cleaned desk, filled more water into outside pond, Prepare my wool for tomorrow.
Tomorrow our guild is getting together for a dye workshop so I have my wool soaking in water and vinegar. I am looking forward to it I hope to take some photos that I can post. The only reason why I would not be able to go if any of my kids are sick but my mom said they could stay with her but I will just wait and see how things look in the morning. I will leave home around 8:15 am and not return home until 7 pm that is if my husband can do one of the meetings that I have to do. I pick up my middle son from school after the dye workshop do some banking and then school meeting at 4pm hockey at 5pm the I go home after hockey and my husband brings in my daughter for her meeting. I am pretty sure I wrote about this already but I guess in my mind if I keep replaying it , It will all fall into place.
I finished a lovely soft Angora hat today and I finished my fingerless gloves and now my youngest daughter would like a pair so we went out to the shed to pick her yarn we will be using synthetic not wool so we can wash them over and over.

September 11

Five years ago everyone of has a story of how we heard, what we were doing, how we felt,and today we relive every emotion and we get that same sick feeling of not being able to make it go away. My heart goes out to everyone I truly believe no one in this whole world was left untouched. I wish you all peace and happiness.
Today was a crazy day at 9:20am my mom phoned me that my miniature pony who is not up to my knees was up on our top property laying on her back with her feet in the air. My dad found her when he was looking for our crazy ungrateful cow. I went out and I started to walk her but before that I had to find a halter, so on went a goat rope halter (which is useless) and I continued to walk her till 2pm. As soon as we would stop she would lay down and roll and again she would look just like she was dead. I had to cancel my appointment to meet someone, phone my husband to come home early so he could go to hockey for me and the walking would be easy for 41/2 hours if I did not have to drag her and pull the whole way now all I have is a sore back and sore knees but a live horse. At 2pm as soon as my husband drove in the driveway with the logging truck I put her in the shade and she smelt the water dipped her lips in it and tried to eat grass. I honestly thought she would not make it but she is standing however she is very tired looking.
I did go to hockey and when I was gone a huge pine tree that had been killed by bugs fell down and just missed our chicken house NO WIND! Which then scared Donkey who tried to run through the wire fence and made the dogs go crazy. Then later on out of the blue, down comes the crazy cow bellering on top of her lungs and still has the fire in her eyes of fear so we move goats around open gates and now she is in the corral. Our property if fenced for goats and sheep not crazy red headed cows. So we will tip toe around until she settles. Then my oldest son takes the old truck that we are going to restore for a drive down to the river to look at a large spawning Salmon and breaks down so he is late for hockey or late for the time the coach would like them there, not a good thing on the night of the first cuts. Now I am waiting for my oldest son to come home to see if he made the first cuts of the team. All of that today so no knitting, no spinning except the spinning I did before I woke the kids at 6am. I had great plans but I will do them tomorrow. Have a wonderful day, be thankful for your families and count your blessings. Talk to you all soon.

We have accomplished a lot this weekend today we dewormed our goats and sheep however we ran out of Ivomac before we could finish so we only have 9 left to do. It went well actually it went real smooth nice when it goes quick. Then I groomed 5 young Angora's, one adult and sheared one adult. The above took me the whole day and I was so dirty after it was done. I also went looking for our MIA Heifer my mom and dad brought her home we unloaded her two seconds later she jumped the fence and broke the top rail and now is as wild as can be on our top property. Cows are very ungrateful!
My boys had hockey all weekend now Monday night is the first cut for Midget Rep hockey so we will see where we stand after that and I think Pee Wee Rep's first cut is Wednesday. Then Thursday all our hockey starts Heaven help us it will be a night mare around here. All six of our children will have ice time, some will get double till they make the teams and our last will end sometimes at 11pm.
On Wednesday we have to be at three places at once hockey, CMS School, and an Advid Mss school meeting. During the day on Wednesday I am going to a dye work shop with my spinning group so I am trying to prepare for that now.
On my spinning wheel I am plying my Shetland and silk it is so beautiful I hope it knits up as nicely as it has spun.
Talk to you all soon have a great evening.

Threading wool through my wool counter onto my umbrella swift
Spinning Shetland lamb and silk
Fingerless Gloves

Renovations done
First day of school

Back to routine

Well school has started, hockey has started, 7 lunches a night has started and all seems well. The kids seem to have adjusted okay they were all a little nervous the first day but they met up with friends, wore new clothes and are trying to accept some of their teachers think they are GOD.
My renovations are down it looks quite nice but my goodness what a lot of work to do with one job you mess up three rooms and I had three jobs on the go so you can imaging the mess. I really hate to paint I have decided it is a lot like labor once it has started you can't stop you just have to push ahead to get it finished but when it is finished there is such satisfaction.
We have gone down to the auction sold 5 goats, 4 roosters and at the same time sold our 14 laying hens and three banty hens to our neighbor.
My Angora rabbits are due for a hair cut so it is time to work on getting the fibre off. My two Giant Angora X's have beautiful fibre and I can't wait to shear them and spin it. With the three breeds of Angora that I have I find the Giant x German are easiest to work with, then French and then the English. The English is very, very fine and I find it hard to control but they are beautiful rabbits and very friendly. I find my English Angora Does are my best mom's.
I have to run now because I just thought I might not have turned off the barn water.

Here are photo's of our trip last weekend The Enchanted Forest, my son in church waitng for the wedding and my other son with a lot of cute attitude!

Hello

What is this no sleep thing I have going on I do believe it is becoming a habit. Last night 3 hours sleep we had a coyote right out front and it sounded like screaming and I had thought it got one of our dogs. So my husband I went out with flash lights and he drove the van around at 1am and he has to go to work at 2am. Then tonight or actually it is now early morning I think we have bear. My dogs have barked the whole night so of course I have been awake since 2am. I lay there worrying about the animals because I know I can't run a gun and my dad is away and I am not too sure when I go out what I would do if I come face to face with one. My neighbor a few years ago has lost sheep and an Alpaca to bears. I don't like to have to shoot them but sometimes they just become to aggressive. So I have cleaned up the house, I am printing pictures, caught up on my e-mails.
I am renovating I have taken down the walls and while I was in the process my heart was beating so fast because I knew I was too far gone to turn back and all I could picture was me wrecking something real bad. Then my husband came home and after he tried to ignore the fact I had torn the house apart he helped me. We are going to paint the walls which is a huge thing for us a little scary but I will keep you posted.
Well must run have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the last few days before school.