...but maybe I'm just biased.
Kirby reminds me so much of her mom when she was little.
Farm Club members helped with vaccinating this morning but there were some distractions in the barn.
Kirby and Lisa looking at chickens.
Kirby set up her doctor office in the barn.
No, it's not time for cute lambs yet. How about cute grandkids?
Meeting Kirby at the Oakland Airport.
Holding her baby brother while Mommy gets the carseats strapped in.
We got home in the early evening and someone wanted to go right to the barn to see "sheeps and conkey".
I got a couple of photos with sheep but the donkey photo will have to wait.
Uncle Chris has the right touch to get a smile out of 7-week old Kasen.
Tracing Aunt Meryl's hand.
Letting Ginny clean up the egg that was dropped.
Papa Dan, Kirby, and Rusty.
Shearing was a few days ago and it's an event worthy of a few posts. I started talking about it in here but have been distracted by a major project which will take over my brain for a couple of weeks. I need a break from that so here are photos of shearing the rams. Thanks to Dona and Carole for contributing some of these photos.
This isn't a ram but while I was catching them John started with Mary's seven sheep.
Then it was Faulkner's turn. Faulkner is a Bluefaced Leicester (BFL).
Catalyst is a lilac colored Jacob ram. Lilac refers to the gray-brown color of his wool and the facial markings.
What a gorgeous fleece!
Bide a wee Buster is almost a year old.
It's been on my list to trim Buster's horn, but John did it before shearing.
That's another beautiful fleece coming off.
A shearer has to be careful in maneuvering those big horns.
Here is a close-up of Buster's fleece. Notice the difference in color of the outside of the fleece and the inside in the photo before this.
Joker was the last ram to be shorn.
This photo clearly shows the difference in the black & white and lilac color pattern in the Jacob sheep.
Next up--shearing the ewes.
We sheared yesterday (more about that in future blog posts). Here are some photos from this morning and some before-and-after shots.
You can fit more sheep at the feeder after shearing and it's sure easier to keep an eye on udder development and predict lambing.
The aftermath where the skirting table was yesterday. We were so lucky with the weather yesterday--no rain after continual storms. This water is from last night's rain (almost an inch).
Meridian Zoey. Zoey has freckled skin but not freckled fleece--that's two different things.
Meridian Fandongo. Notice how the sheep look like they have brown spots in most of the "before" photos. The wool has sunbleached tips. Underneath it is black, or gray if the sheep are fading, or gray-brown if they are "lilac".
Puddleduck Petra. A good example of a black fleece that looks brown when on the sheep.
Meridian Alice, a two year old ewe.
Meridian Bertha, another two year old. It will be only another day before the sheep look dirty again and you don't see that bright white against the black.
Shadow Mountain Shelby. Shelby is lilac. Her facial markings are gray, not black. Her spots are a light gray. I used my iPhone for this morning's photos so some of the sheep look like they have abnormally big heads. Maybe that's only partly camera perspective but partly that they no longer have huge fleeces around those heads.
Bide a wee Hallie.
Meridian Cindy, one of last year's lambs. Oops! It turns out that she is freckled. Those smaller spots are in the wool. You can't tell about freckling when the lambs are born. After a couple of months it will appear. I think it shows up in the secondary follicles instead of the primary ones and that's why you don't see it at birth. (I'd like to hear someone who knows explain if that theory is correct.) I also noticed it in her twin brother, although you can't really see it in the photo below.
Meridian Joker, Meridian Catalyst, and bide a wee Buster.
And here is what I saw when I first checked on the rams this morning:
That wall behind Joker is supposed to be attached to the 2 x 4. I found the drill and some screws and put it all back up and it was only then that I looked at the other corner:
Oh, that's a bigger problem. This wasn't originally a ram barn. It started out two calf hutches that I made. Eventually they were put on this slab facing each other with a space in between and another roof overhead and the kids show pigs lived there for a few months a year. Then it was Faulkner's pen and he was pretty easy on it. Now that the Jacob rams live there it needs reinforcement. Dan got the jack out to jack it up back on the cement and then reinforced everything inside with heavier 2 x 10's at about head-bashing level. It could still use interior solid plywood walls but hopefully this will get us by for a few more months.
Stupid rams. You should be grateful that you have a shelter to get into after shearing and you're not expected to stay out in the wind and rain.
It has dried out enough to take the dogs walking again. I haven't taken my camera lately because it's cold and I have three leashes and the Ball Thrower Thing and my hands are too cold. (Don't laugh if you live where it snows. I'm still cold.) Rusty wrote a post about his perspective of the latest walks. Here is what I see when I walk with the iPhone. You know those gloves with the special fingers that are supposed to let you use your phone even with the gloves on? I have some too:
Do you know what I think when I see these photos? Or when I'm looking at the ground while taking the photos? What if these were satellite photos and these were mountain ranges? Can you see that?
The rain has started things growing. This is in a huge patch of thistles.
There are a few mustard flowers blooming already.
Perspective again. What if that little red rock in the hole was really a house? Then those cracks are canyons.
Uh oh! That perspective thing would make this a very scary photo indeed! Raccoonzilla.
Speaking of another perspective. Three dogs and me.
We have a lot of new members in the Farm Club. This was the first official Farm Day of the year. The goal was to get the barn ready for Shearing Day next weekend and to get the sheep ready too. I never seem to get time to take photos during Farm Days so my iPhone got handed around and other people took most of these photos.
Right now cleaning the barn involves the trek around or through the mud and muck to get to the manure pile. We spent about an hour and a half cleaning and organizing the barn.
Then it was time to look at the sheep.
We caught each sheep.
We cleaned off ear tags so that the crew will be able to read them next week and won't have to find me to identify a sheep.
This is Onyx and Esmerelda, two of the BFL-Jacob crossbreds.
We brought all the ewe lambs (born last March) in to replace their lamb ear tags with bigger, more legible ones.
Two ewes had horns that needed trimming to prevent them growing into their faces. It takes one person to hold and one person to use the wire saw.
Last we went to the ram pen. I was standing with the rams and looked up to see everyone looking in.
The ram in front, Buster, had something on his mouth to look at more closely.
I'll call my vet about this on Monday because I don't know what it is.
A few people left before I rounded everyone up for a photo. This is the biggest group that we've had here. This is a great way to make the chores go quickly. Thanks, Farm Club.
Oooh! This sounds exciting... and maybe scary. Not really. But I came up with that idea while in said stairwell and thinking about Jason Bourne and Jack Reacher and all those other heroes who narrowly escape with their lives Every Time they are being chased. This morning wrote a blog post about being at TNNA. We stayed on the 5th floor of the hotel. On Sunday I had a little extra time before getting to the show and I thought I'd go up to the top floor. After checking out the view from the 26th floor...
...ooops! Turns out its the one that I misidentified in the last post as the view from our room...I decided to take the stairs down. May as well get a little exercise even though gravity would do most of the work. (Notice that I hadn't thought to take the stairs UP!)
I opened the door to the stairwell and there was a guy sitting on the floor facing away from the door. Beard. Backpack. I think that maybe he was writing something. That's all I noticed because I thought that maybe I shouldn't stare or otherwise engage...thinking about those books and movies. I started down the stairs.
Your typical stairwell, although cleaner than some. 8 steps.
8 more steps.
8 more steps. Sometimes at the landing I would make a turn clockwise just to keep from getting too twisted in one direction. 
Sometimes I walked back up a flight just for the heck of it.
Things changed when I got to the first floor.
Surprise! Notice the blue barrier at the bottom. There is a swinging gate there. The door to the right...
...is this one. Guess I can't go out there. So I went through the little blue gate.
There were three choices. Go down the next set of stairs or go through one of two doors.
Surprise again! Look at what is in Door #1.
Yes, it's a chandelier among all the pipes.
This was next to Door #2. The door was closed and I didn't open it.
I chose the blue stairs.
Another message of positive thinking. I chose not to go through that door because I kind of thought that I was where I wasn't supposed to be.
Back up the pretty blue stairs...
...to what I recognized and through...
...the door to the second floor.
Uh oh! Do you ever open a door to a stairwell or the back door of a commercial building and wonder if you'll ever get back in? Is that door locked from the other side? In this case I came through the door on the right, but wanted to make sure that the door on the left would really open or I'd be stuck forever in this little room with no window. Before the first door shut completely I made sure that the other door would open.
Whew! I made it into the safety of the hotel.
Please don't judge me. I've told you before that I write blog posts in my mind all the time. You can be thankful that many of them never make it to the keyboard. But now you see how I sometimes amuse myself.
Every January I meet up with my long-time friend, Irene, who owns Cotton Clouds, a mail-order business based in Arizona, to go to the Winter Show of The National Needlearts Association. Since I've been going it's been in San Diego (2016 and 2014) or Phoenix (2015 and 2012) or Long Beach (2013 and 2011). This year it was in San Jose, only an hour and a half from here (on a weekend without commute traffic), so Irene flew to Sacramento and spent a few days here before we both drove to the show.
TNNA wasn't the only thing in town on Saturday.
There was plenty of pink visible.
Other colors too. Why does Irene always look more excited in these photos of us together?
Big fat yarns seem to be the new thing this year.
I managed to find a few sheep.
After spending a few hours at the show we checked into our hotel where we had a room on the 5th floor.
This is the view...
...and this is the art work on the wall.
We went back to the convention hall. We had been seeing groups of young (mostly) men (mostly) wearing black (mostly) who were attending something in the convention center but didn't quite fit the demographics of the yarn buyers and sellers. Irene spoke to one group and we found out that they were competing in the Super Smash Brothers Tournament, a Nintendo gaming event (if I'm using the right terminology). It's worth looking at this link for a view into an obsession a little different than the fiber one (maybe takes up less space?) A quote from the article: “For video games you don’t need depth perception at all,” he explains, sounding almost Baudrillardian, “there’s no depth: it’s just right there.” Put in perspective, that quote is from a gamer who is blind in on eye. We may bring out fiber swatches and knitting needles. They bring their own controllers.
Back to the Fiber Hall.
I love how this sign was made.
Very clever.
I like the look of this fabric...
...woven on this loom which I have in the shop and eventually on the website.
We talked with a lot of vendors. This is Francis Chester-Cestari who has sheep and a fiber mill in Virginia and promotes American grown fiber. Irene is looking at some of his U.S. grown cotton. Notice the book on his table. That's his memoir.
I didn't come away from this show with all the new products that I usually do, although I do have some lotion bars with sheep on them (see photo in one of the collections above). There weren't as many vendors and I really don't need more yarn. What I need is a better way to market what I already have before adding more. So my investment this year is a new modern website! You'll be hearing more about that in a month or so.
In a previous life I raised cows. When I married Dan he was a partner in a family-owned dairy. My daughter recently asked for photos of Grandma and Grandpa, preferably with cows, so that my 2-1/2 year old granddaughter would have an association with something memorable she looks at pictures of her extended family.
The dairy we worked on was sold several years ago and the cows were moved to Orland. That dairy was sold recently and the milk cows are all gone. There is some young stock left at the home place. These are Milking Shorthorns.
I have always loved this tankhouse. This one has been recently rennovated.
A young bull.
Stuart kept a couple of steers to be trained as oxen. This photo doesn't show their size because they are standing lower than Stuart. They are huge as were the steers that I had when we first moved here.
This is Lauren.
Before ...
...and after shearing last February.
I came across her washed and partially carded fleece yesterday and decided to finish it before this next shearing. The funny thing is that I have looked several times for this sheep as I was taking photos of all the sheep for my annual Flock List for Farm Club. I couldn't ever get a photo of her but I could have sworn that she was on my breeding list. Looking back through my blog posts to see if I had written about keeping her fleece I found this post in which I said that I hadn't planned to but I traded her for a sheep when I was at BSG in Oregon. No wonder I couldn't find her! I also see that I never wrote the story of Fleece from Start to Finish about Honey's fleece. That will be another post.
This is Lauren's fleece spread out on the skirting table.
This is what the underneath side looks like. It looks browner in the first photo because the tips are sunbleached.
Here is what the staples look like.
Here it is after sorting into colors before...
...and after washing.
That was all done in the spring and I had started to card it. Today I finished the carding job (I thought). I had a lot of black wool and a few batts of white and gray. 
I spread out the white and gray batts as evenly as I could so that some of each would go with each the black batt.
Then I carded a third time keeping the white somewhat separate from the black.
The pile on the right is 3 of the finished batts stacked up. I kept all the other batts rolled up in the sleeves that come with the Clemes & Clemes batt lifter. That's 11 batts next to a pile of three! It totals about 1 pound 5 ounces.
I felt very productive now that I was ready to spin all that wool. But look at what I found shortly after:
I thought that the proportion of black to white wasn't right. This is the rest of Lauren's fleece that I hadn't picked yet.
There will be another report later, hopefully when I finish spinning this BEFORE the next shearing day on February 5.
Rusty wrote in his blog a couple days ago about his own private lake in front of the barn. Once it stopped raining, the water in this area drained off quickly. 
The next evening things were back to normal near the barn.
This isn't so normal. Why in the world is this rose choosing to bloom now, in January?)
This scene is normal behind the barn in a winter when we have rain. The sheep avoid the deep mud when given a chance. Another storm was due to come in.
And it was a doozy. I haven't seen water like this here in several years.
This is the area where the dogs were standing in the first photo. Fortunately the barn and those smaller buildings stay just out of the water.
For anyone who has seen what this is normally like these photos are dramatic, but we really can't complain. The shop (behind the tractor) and the houses (out of sight here) are built up off the ground so we don't worry about water inside them. We have never had to worry about the serious flooding that other people have. It is especially amazing to realize that this is not water from a creek overflowing or a levee breaking. It is just a lot of rain over a period of days on flat land that is already water-logged. Some of this water comes from the property to the north because the only drainage is at the southeast corner of our property (see this post).
One problem we have is that our cellar floods when the ground water is high and that's where our water heater is. We keep a pump going but during yesterday's storm I decided that I really need to reroute the water somwhere other than this field because it's too close to the houses and seeping back in, as well as causing trouble with the septic system for the other house. So I wired this PVC pipe to the fence at an angle and put the hose from the pump in the upper end.
Now that water drains into the ditch which is taking water away from the houses. It's really just a drop in the bucket (uh...no pun intended) but it makes me feel like I did something pro-active in the face of all this rain.The pump hasn't turned off in at least 36 hours as it continues to try and drain the cellar.
Today the sun was out, the driveway and the area that looks like a lake in the upper photos have mostly drained. I taught a weaving class today...
...and when I'm in the shop the dogs take turns at the spot by the door.
This is from tonight while doing chores. I cleaned the ram shed and while I was in their pen Ginny tried to get my attention. She succeeded. Drop the ball in the water through the fence and chances are I'll get it out for her.
I have to look back at my blog posts to know how long it is that Farm Club members have been going to San Francisco for an annual one-night retreat. It seems that the first one was in 2011 so this is the seventh. As always we had a fabulous time. Eight of us met at the NDGW home Friday afternoon (see this post for some views of this fabulous home) and then went to FC member Stephany's home in the Glen Park District of San Francisco.
Stephany and Ian invited us to see the recent addition to their yard, half of which has been inaccessible since they have lived there except for going half way around the block and through the property behind them.
This spiral staircase, which was lifted OVER their house by a crane a couple of months ago, gives them access to the upper level.
From the top of the staircase you cross this bridge to get to solid ground.
There is a spectacular view of the city and the bay and Stephany and Ian have a wonderful garden spot with a sunny exposure that is often above the fog line.
After enjoying afternoon snacks with Stephany she led us on an urban hike. The first point of interest was this tiny garden.
Only two blocks from Stephany's home we saw the 78-acre Glen Canyon Park.
I had no idea that something like this exists in the middle of San Francisco.
Note the rock climbers on the smooth face of that rock.
This is us on the other side of that same rock.
We walked a loop trail and returned to Stephany's for more scones and brownies. We had dinner at Green Chili Kitchen, only a block from the NDGW Home...
...and spent the rest of the evening knitting and spinning in the parlor.
Janis showed off her snazzy handspun/handknit socks modeled after the sheep-motif Baable Hat.
Three of us are knitting the Fleece Flight KAL. Mary is working on the third triangle. Stephany's is in blue and mine is the small one in Jacob wool.
Our plan for Saturday was to have No Plan.
Well, there was one plan. Every year we have lemon pie for breakfast. We have bought pies across the street but this year Janis offered to bake them. I think this is now our regular routine. Lemon meringue, blackberry, and apple. Way to go, Janis!!
The serving line. We each had a piece of all three pies. Of course.
And while not eating pie we chatted and worked on projects. Amy almost finished a sock...
...and I made progress on my Fleece Flight shawl.
What an inspiring, fun 24 hours. We may expand this to a whole weekend next year.
We're finally getting rain like in the old days...that is, before the several drought years. One thing that is different in the last few years is that the news media now has days of coverage Before The Storm. It's good to have warning of hurricanes, floods, etc, but sometimes I think that there is a little overkill on the Before reporting. There must be other news...oh wait, I guess if it is the political climate instead of the atmospheric climate maybe I'd rather hear about the weather after all.
I was gone Friday night (that's for another blog post). Heavy rain had been predicted rain through the whole weekend. The scene below is not abnormal for a regular (non-drought) winter here. We don't handle winter well at our facility.
The first thing you'll notice in this photo is the pink line. That's my new discovery--that I can draw on my photos!!! Yippee! More fun with photos! I'll try not to overdo it once I'm done with this post. The pink outlines the waterlogged wet area behind the barn, around the Mt. Meridian (the compost/manure pile). The arrow indicates how that water eventually has to drain IF it can flow away. Or it eventually evaporates or soaks into the ground. That is a slow process with our clay soil that is already waterlogged.
This photo is taken from the same location as the last but at the fence that borders the ditch (irrigation in the summer, run-off in the winter). It's hard for me to tell if the water level around the manure pile is lower or higher than the level in the ditch right now. At times when I'm irrigating the irrigation water flows backward into the barn area because it flows through gopher or ground squirrel holes. I don't want to dig a ditch if it's going to drain the ditch water back towards the barn area. So I started digging. The water was flowing the right direction.
Here is where I cut through to the ditch. You can see the water flowing into the ditch although the levels aren't that much different.
The water has to flow east in the ditch and then south. It leaves the property near that tree by going under the driveway to the south and into the canal.
Even in the summer I have a hard time getting the ditch to drain quickly. I walked to the ditch going south. You can see where the water has to go. There is much less water here than in the east-west ditch. This one is much smaller and full of grass. I started digging out dallisgrass clumps. I walked the whole ditch back and forth looking for the next problem spot--where the grass seemed to be hindering the water flow. I didn't by any means dig the whole thing bigger and deeper but I think I made some difference in the flow.
This is taken when standing in the corner near that tree and looking west. The arrow indicates the tail-water ditch where water flows after irrigating. The pastures are saturated and some water is flowing there now, but notice the overgrown dallisgrass.
While I'm almost on my dallisgrass soapbox I'll point out the green parts of these last two photos. This is a Mediterranean climate and that means that we have winter rains and dry summers. When it rains in the fall the grass and forbs start to grow. This growth is dependent on temperature and light. When it warms up in the spring the grass takes off and grows like crazy. By May or June things dry out and grass sets seed and it dries out. So...in the spring I count on that annual growth for feeding sheep. I count on the clovers and trefoil (which I have because I irrigate) to sustain us through the summer. Dallisgrass is a perennial grass that grows in the summer and eventually gets out of control and too coarse and fast growing for the sheep to keep up with. The last few years I have mowed after grazing to keep it manageable. These photos show why that is important. The green parts in the photo above shows green growth in the paddocks I mowed. Where it is brown is the overgrown dallisgrass where hardly anything grows. Same with the photo below. The roadsides are covered with green grass and forbs but the overgrown dallisgrass that wasn't eaten or mowed blocks everything. That means less feed.
Back to the issue at hand, which is water and ditches.
This photo shows where the water leaves the property, flowing under the driveway to the south and into the canal.
After doing what I could in that ditch I walked back to where I had started digging near the barn. Water was still flowing.
So I went into Faulkner's pen and started digging north towards the manure pile and barn. Here is a closeup of some of my ditch from the other direction. The fence is at the top of this photo. You can see how the water is flowing UNDER the surface through rodent hoels.
My ditch isn't nearly big enough to drain everything, but it's better than nothing. At least it feels like progress.
There will be another blog post later about my fantastic Friday/Saturday AWAY from the farm. Maybe fewer marked up photos too. Right now I am going to Higby's to get new rubber boots because mine are too old and water is seeping through at the ankles.
Every year I put together a Flock List for the Farm Club members. This includes photos and a little information about each sheep (and dog and other characters) on the farm. I like to get current photos of each sheep and I'll share a few here. Shearing Day is in just a month so they are in almost full fleece. I'll have to get before and after shots of them as well. 
Zoey.
Alexandria.
Sonata.
Ears.
Cascade.
Jean.
Two almost 2-year-olds, Honey and Zinnia.
Marilla, a 2016 lamb, and her mother, Marilyn.
This photo was taking during the summer of two of the sheep I bought from flocks in Oregon. That is Kenleigh's Sheena on the left and Shadow Mountain Shelby on the right. I found this photo while I was looking for another. It is a good example showing a lilac ewe (right) and a black and white ewe.
Most sheep eyes.
Some of the lilac sheep have striking blue eyes
I'm in the Austin airport now waiting to board. Back to my other life.
This is the first time I haven't been home, where ever home has been, for Christmas except for maybe one or two years when I lived in Arizona. I took these photos on my walk this morning, Christmas Eve day, along the 2 miles road from the highway to my daughter's house.
This is the reason that I'm here:
Kasen Allen, born 4 days ago.
Big sister, Kirby, in her new Christmas PJ's, hanging stockings on the tree (in lieu of a fireplace)...
...and leaving pie and milk for Santa and a carrot for Rudolph.
Merry Christmas from Texas!
Every year at this time I create a Cast of Characters for the Farm Club members. So I took sheep photos today. Here are some of them:
I started before chore time in the morning and had to chase all the sheep out of the barn. They weren't too happy about missing breakfast.
And they don't like the deep mud so they all stayed on the cement that Dan poured behind the barn this summer.
This is Janis.
Mud Ranch's Foxglove. She is a lilac ewe.
Alice.
One of the 2016 lambs, Virginia.
Another lamb, Cindy.
This is Windy Acres Bronagh, another lilac ewe.
Bide a wee Buster, and March ram lamb.
Ears.
While I was taking photos, my DIL was throwing the ball for the puppies, Sawyer and Finn..
Ginny ended up with their ball.
It's dry enough now to ride my bike Across the Road. I take Ginny to try and wear her out a bit. Yesterday I took a different route and decided to veer off the road that borders a walnut orchard. I don't know why I haven't done that before--veering off the road. Maybe because at other times of the year it's muddy or weedy (including puncture vine, also known as goats' head that puncture tires and dog feet) or being harvested. Or because I'm not the sort of person that goes off the trail. Maybe it's that I am not a big fan of orchards in this area. Almond orchards seem to be taking over the valley and the landscapes that I love are hidden once the orchard has been in a couple of years.
Anyway, it was beautiful view from within the orchard.
Peaceful.
Colorful.
Orderly.
However, I still love the broad landscape that is outside the orchard. This is one of the few black walnut trees remaining around the fields.
The mountains are almost obscured by the young almond orchard that is across the big canal but at least I can still see the sunset.
The morning was crisp and cold at 4:30 a.m. when Dan drove Chris & Meryl and friends Ish and Daizsha to the start of the California International Marathon in Folsom. I stayed home to take care of animals but showed up for the finish at the capitol in Sacramento. 
Dan caught all three looking cheerful at Mile 5.
He and Daizsha found them again at Mile 17.
They had separated by this time. Meryl points out that the Sacramento Marathon is NOT flat, even though everyone says it is.
There is Meryl at Mile 26. Only 2/10 mile to go.
I got to the finish about an hour before our first runner came in. I don't know anyone in this collection of photos but they caught my eye. These were all taken as the runners turn the last corner and head to the finish line which was behind me. Top left to right and then down: A "guide" running with a visually impaired runner, a pacer (the clock said 3:23 as he crossed the line--amazing), the women's finish line with the 3:28 pacer crossing the line, two guides with another visually impaired runner, women's finish line at 3:35 (Boston marathon qualifying time), a dad who brought his young son across the finish line with him, a flag runner, a flag wearer, runner promoting the Sacramento soccer team.
I started to worry that maybe I'd missed Chris because I was at times distracted by the very impressive police horses. (Dan failed similarly at his pit crew duties at one event when he was distracted by airplanes overhead.)
But there he was, running a very respectable pace considering that he had done little training for this one.
This was Chris' seventh marathon...
...two of which were at the end of Ironman triathlons.
Spectators can follow their athletes (on the other side of the fence)...
...to waiting family and friends.
We worked our way through the throngs of people to the women's finish chute in time to catch Meryl...
...finishing her first marathon.
Ish was close behind her but on the men's side so I missed his finish. This was his first marathon also.
Walking back to the cars we were passed by the magnificent police horses. I didn't realize that they were using draft horses for police work. Can you tell how large that bay horse is from the stirrup position of the rider. I can always be distracted by horses!
Four BFF's heading back to the car and looking forward to In & Out burgers.
Dan and I were in our car and were stopped on the way out of Sacramento by the drawbridge. I've never seen this one in the up position with the whole roadway up in the air!
I guess that would be one reason that the marathon isn't routed over the bridge.
What an inspiring day this was! We had a full house here for Spinners' Day Out. It was cold and windy outside and somehow we all fit in the shop. Then people started pulling things out of their bags! What talent! That inspired this blog post.
Janis knit this baby hat and booties for my soon-to-be-born grandson. This is yarn she spun during our Spinzilla week. She said that this pattern was one passed down from her grandmother and the booties actually stay on babies' feet.
Dona wove this scarf on the rigid heddle loom. It is full of wild yarn including a designer leash that I made a long time ago (note clip on the side) and a beaded necklace.
Alison has been going wild on her loom, exploring weave structure and color. She has woven all these scarves in the last week or two...
...in addition to this v-shawl that she wove in a class here. (By the way, photos were a bit challenging today as there was a strong north wind. Can you tell from the movement of this shawl?)
Gail wove and dyed this beautiful shibori scarf.
Lisa showed us her mushroom dyed yarn...
...and modeled Mary's knit cowl, as well as her own Fleece Flight shawl knitted with Jacob yarn for our ongoing KAL in Ravelry.
Mary's daughter, Maggie wove this Jacob scarf on the rigid heddle loom as her first-ever weaving project. Look at those edges!
Dona brought her quilt that had pictures of all the goats that she used to have.
This is the back of the quilt--very cute fabric!
I just finished three black walnut-dyed shawls.
Later in the day a few of us decided it was time for the annual "dress the animals in Santa hats" but that will be for another blog post.
This is a preview.
At Meridian Jacobs farm we raise Jacob sheep and sell locally grown wool fiber, yarn, and handwoven goods. We teach fiber classes and sell Ashford, Clemes & Clemes, and Schacht spinning and weaving equipment. We encourage farm visits with field trips and our unique Farm Club.
Search blog posts since 2019. If the search says it can’t find a post try putting in your search word a second time. I don’t know why but the second time it seems to work.
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