Fair Time!

So the fair comes to the Okanogan Valley again! I love fair.
This year we took the plunge and entered. Lars and Anna entered animals, I entered a crochet project. It's been a lot of fun, grueling, but fun. The kids are down at 7am to clean out pens everyday. Today they had their first taste of Fitting and Showing, more on that later, so we were there all day....oh boy. Two more days.
I'll know what I'm doing next year, so that should help. It's been a lot of flying by the seat of my pants the last couple of days and I do that soooo well *insert sarcasm here*.

In any case, I have to admit that I've really enjoyed just hanging out at the fair for a change! We've had the time to really look at the exhibits, split them up over the days and just meander. The kids have been able to watch their friends compete, congratulation them on their winnings, run around and just enjoy. Small town county fair, couldn't think of a better way to end a summer!

Bald Eagle on exhibit

"Mom take a picture of the Bald Eagle!" Granted, we don't see them this up close and personal, they're usually up high riding the wind. Of course I took the picture. These are rescued animals that are unable to sustain themselves in the wild.

Leif. He's been running around all day, so much to see, so many people to recongnize and he's stuck waiting for his siblings to finish their 1st tour of barn duty. We've been at the grounds since 7 this morning, it's almost 4pm now.....Dad and Mom are just about wiped. True to the 8 yr old, he's still got energy to spare.


Justin actually managed to sneak a picture of me. I'm working on a pair of socks I'm making for a knit along sock exchange on Homesteading Today. We were taking a break, catching some shade and waiting for Justin's parents to arrive.


HA! I caught him. This took some doing, but I caught Bruce being goofy with his brother.


Miss Meena, not to be left out adding her own silliness to the day.

So we're still in the thick of it, but that's fair! I'm not sure however, if I'm going to be coherent by Sunday evening.
I think that Monday I'm going to make the couch my best friend, say hello to the remote and find something brainless to watch on Netflix.

The kids are very excited for next year. The Superintendents of the Poultry and Rabbit barns were very helpful. On the poultry side, they spent most of yesterday working with the kids and their birds, crash course in showing. Lars has plans for a Call drake next year, Anna did but she's thinking about doing rabbits instead. Bruce hasn't quite made up his mind, although the thought of selling a market hog has his mental calculator going.

More to follow on the entries, but it's been a long day and I'm beat. Time to head off to a prone position.

Bee Happy??

Ooooo, so bad, I know. Really though, never thought I'd be happy to see bees. I was looking at needing to hand pollenate the plants. After the orchard hives were moved, we were sans bees. The girls and I had collected our feathers, courtesy of Dougall the Duck, when I saw some very nice girls doing the job for us! We're now all on produce watch. The green beans are about a week out. You know that first crop, takes forever to mature and then before you know it you're sick of picking every other day. The cukes have gone insane, for the first time I have a very impressive crop. I'm so excited! The melon bed, well it's a jungle in there. The watermelons are turning out to be very prolific, will definately be sharing these.
Amy is far enough along, that I can see the calf moving around in there! Yay!

So we've decided to keep the Berkshire gilt for breeding. Thus, she recieves an actual name, not menu listing. Are you ready??
Mrs Seaman Hornsby.
Why? Have you ever watched Operation Peticoat, Cary Grant, Tony Curtis.......yes? no? If you have, it makes sense, if not watch it and it will. ;)

Summer is progressing nicely! Before long I'll be up to my ears in the canner, taking daily steam treatments and really wishing for winter. Today apricot picking is on the to do list. A friend has a tree that I'm going to harvest from, I'm thinking that I'll be drying them.

High note. Goats got loose and ravaged my berries and plants. Happy side, the blackberries, grape, butterfly bush and moss roses are all coming back. Raspberries are gone, gone. Goats also don't like Petunias or Lilies....at all. It's time for new stake out stakes.

Kids are busy running around doing the summer is fun thing! Life is good. I'm focusing all my creativity energy on the filet project I started a couple of years ago. I'm almost finished with it and it will be entered inot the fair this year. Justin has been busy with work and is working on permanent hog pens. One more month and we're back to school fun and fair!

Whoa!

This evening as I was getting ready to get dinner started, Lars walked in with a jar covered in seran wrap.
" Mom, say hi to Dragon."
"Who??" as I walk over to see what they've picked up this time. I'm expecting the usual, frog, grasshopper, maybe a praying mantis.......and then my eyes get very large once it registers. My son was very pleased with my response, which brought various other offspring galloping into the kitchen as well. It's always good when Mom makes that sound, whatever it is. There I stand staring at the largest moth I've ever seen in person. I'm also double checking the holes to make sure they aren't too big. While supressing the urge to start yodling, I grab the camera. I found it online it's a Big Poplar Sphinx. Big is right.

Wing span:
5 1/8 - 5 7/8 inches (13 - 15 cm).

More info here: http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/species?l=3416&chosen_state=53*Washington

For the record, that's a quart jar.

Finished!

It's finished and looks so nice in the kitchen! The measurements are: 2ft 9in long x 2ft 1in wide, 12 yrds of fabric and took about 20 hrs. The top photo is the side that my mom likes the most, the bottom is the side that I prefer although I like both sides. The green and yellow mottled section, I tossed the strips put them in a bag and didn't look when I took one. I found I was thinkng about it too much. I do have another one planned for the living room, but there's orange and blue wool waiting to be spun up for winter wear, so that's going to need to wait.

Yay! A rug that I can change with my moods, it's like reversable clothing for my floors. I can hear Justin groaning now. To give me credit, I haven't changed my cupboards around significantly since we moved here, that's 4 yrs folks! It's a record. I have rearranged the living room several times, but that's what living rooms are for and out of consideration, if I happen to do it while he's working the night shift I always leave the lights on so he doesn't fall over the furniture.

Happy Birthday Leif!!!

He's now 8........wow. Thinking ahead, he made sure the cars had wheels before he chose, it's the cake that keeps on entertaining! :) The bakery gals were just a tad nervous when he started inspecting the prospective cake, but really what's the point of getting a cake with cars that don't have wheels. That makes no sense at all.


Enjoying his day, while siblings wait silently wishing him to hurry up to the cake and ice cream eating part.

Group shot! All smiling and not from mischief.....okay Dad was being goofy in the background. I thought I'd take advantage of the moment, having lured them all into one place with the promise of sugar.

Do you ever hear the whispering wildlife show narrator start talking about your life??

"and here we have the fortune to witness a most rare event. All the
members of this pack, gathered together, enjoying eachother's company. This
occurance, so brief in duration, has only been captured on film a few times
over the last decade.........astounding."

*soft pretty music in the background as the picture fades and they cut to a loud obnoxious commercial*

Leif (at reminding his mother) got a new lego set, bike helment and a brand new bike, red. There's something to be said for a bike who's scratches and dings are all yours. (He was up at the crack of dawn the next morning, on with the helmet and riding as fast as his legs could peddle. )His brothers handed over the controler to the X-box for the whole day, watched his movie and let him choose the games to play (even the "we're going to just run in circles for 30 minutes and laugh our heads off"). The day closed out in about 30 seconds, snuggling on the couch with me and declaring he had a good birthday this year.

Officially a farm?

What? When did that happen anyway. Could this be the reason behind the nagging fatigue, random moments of vague anxiety, my obsession with weather and the feeling that someone somewhere has change the 24 hr day to 12 which causes the place to look like the aftermath of the Apocalypse??? Okay, so I've always been obsessed with weather and at the last head count there were still only 5 progeny running around so I know another one hasn't snuck in without my knowledge.
Justin ran a list of the various animals running around about the place and it kind of took me back. Here's the list:

Bovine for eating
Bovine for milking
Poultry, including one duck (because Lars has held fast since he was 3, it's not a farm unless there's a duck)
Caprine for eating
Caprine for milking
Equine
Porcine for eating and a possible for breeding
Feline for catching the Mus musculus
Okay so in English this time:

Cows, chickens and duck, goats, horses, pigs, outside cat for catching mice. Check. Huh. Guess that explains a few things. I think the Apocalypse tryout is simply the result of having 5 very active children running around. Feed 10 cats, 1 gallon of pure caffeine each, put them in a 10x10 room filled with feather pillows and string one small fish from the ceiling, leave for 30 minutes.
You know that when you return, there will be nothing to allude to the existence of anything remotely resembling a pillow, there will be feathers in places Albert Einstein couldn't reason out how they got there, the fish and all evidence of it will be gone (including the string) and all 10 cats will be calmly sitting there, looking innocently at you with that "What?!" look on their face.

Don't forget the garden, at least I think it's a garden. I have a faint recollection of planting corn in there with Lars. I can get back to you on that, right now the weeds are winning.

This year was my trial year for the pea variety "Wando". Always makes me think of the Where's Waldo cartoons. Touted as heat and cold tolerant, heat was my main concern. They win. Surviving a late frost and pulling through high 90's heat that would have made my other varieties wail in agony and die, they got a little droopy but after a good evening watering bounced back and are still spitting out peas. Nice and sweet, even after the peak pick time. I would suggest not picking them early, the early peas taste great, but at maturity they have a wonderful flavor. They've run the gammit of weather this area offers with flying colors. Definitely a keeper.

Cantaloupes, Burpee's Ambrosia. These were the first that I planted and plant no other. Their flavor is beyond compare. Mine are flowing at the moment and it's going to be hard to be patient while they ripen on the vine.
Everything else, I'm still trialing. I have decent cukes for the first time in 3 yrs, time will tell if they do well for pickles. The new beds are doing wonderfully! That's the spot for growing the veggies. The boys don't disagree, it means less yard to mow. ;)

This years flock, Speckled Sussex, is growing well! I've been noticing some early sparring, and iridescent tail feathers are starting to show. Their size and growth have been impressive. They'll reach a nice size by butchering time. Something I really like seeing is their personality, very friendly without being obnoxious, accepting of other breeds. They're also turning out to be fairly hand tame, not adverse to being picked up and snuggled. If I can't find the girls, they're usually to be found out in the chicken yard with 2 or 3 chickens roosting on legs and shoulders while the rest mill around looking for a spot.

Well that's the news for now. Enjoying what's left of the maintenance time of year. Soon the produce will start flying and it will be time to start preserving. Ugh. Love eating it, but does harvest have to come at the hottest time of the year??? ........... Don't answer that, it's a rhetorical complaint. Ah well, such is this life. One guarantee though, no one will bug me while I'm in the kitchen and canning. Of course I don't want to be in there with myself either.....but I'll let someone with a degree figure that one out.

Picked up a new skill

As I was browsing through a forum at Homesteading Today the other day, a thread title caught my eye. It was about "Toothbrush Rugs".
.........................

Huh?? Never heard of such a thing, so off to the web I go. Google is my friend. I love Google. Google reminds me of Tony Curtis's character in "Operation Peticoat", you need it, it will find it. It will find things you didn't know about, things you'd probably rather not know about.......rabbit trail, but they're fun.
Anyway, 3 minutes later I'm watching videos and reading up. Cool! I found a site with pictures of a lady named Maymee (I'm a poet and don't know it. I've got feet and they're longfellows.....and my childhood out in Bayne strikes again.) and how she makes hers. Looks like fun, looks useful, I love braided/rag rugs, looks like a good way to spend the hot, hot hours of summer when breathing sucks your will to live. Now is the time for that internal dialog:

"You need to learn a new pastime like you need hole in your head.."
"Sure, but I've always wanted to learn to make braided rugs."
"Again, repeat the last thing I said. You're already running an hours of the day deficeit."
"It's not a pastime, it's a skill! If I can make them, I won't have to buy them and they'll be the style and color I want. It's affordable, I can start by using up all that fabric we've been packing across the country for the last decade or so."
"................dang it."

Ha! I just won, or lost depending on how you look at it. That gets too confusing and my brain starts hurting, so I don't think about it too deeply.
The battle has been fought and I'm off to find an old toothbrush and fabric. Found both, defiled Justin's tools to craft my "needle". The kids told on me when he got home, little tattle tails. :)
So are you wondering what these things are?? Just what the name implies, you fashion a needle of sorts from an old toothbrush and use torn strips of material to make a sort of braided/knotted rug. I've included a link at the bottom to the page with instructions.

Here's my needle. I used a Dremel and a sander, finished off with sand paper. You can whittle it down then finish with sandpaper, but then you don't get to use power tools. ;) It took me about 20 minutes to make this way. I used an old child's toothbrush, but the traditional style would give you a larger/thinner needle. I'll make one of those next. This part was fun all by itself!

Here's the patterned material. I was never going to use this, so into strips it went.

I found a sage green knit fabric, bulkier, but hey I'm experimenting. Remember that nightmare dye job??? Can't find out new things unless you experiment. ;)

Here's what I have so far. This went very quickly! I worked on it during the heat of the day and again in the evening, a little this morning. I will say it took me almost 45 minutes to figure the directions out! I was ready to start talking to the walls (they're very good conversationalists though) and then it clicked. It reminded me of when I was learning to tat, couldn't figure it out, then it just clicked into place. I like the look of it! There's a hint of braided rug, without the worry of the braid sewing coming undone. The underside has a raised pattern, I'll need to get a picture of that later.

And the close up.

If you have some scraps, unused clothes, etc. I would give this a try! There are a couple of other methods out there, but I think this is my favorite.

Info site: http://thelibrary.springfield.missouri.org/lochist/periodicals/bittersweet/sp81g.html

There are also some tutorials on youtube, just run a search for "toothbrush rugs".

New Venture

Yeah, yeah, I need a new venture like I need a hole in the head (ever wonder how that saying came to be?? It's mistfied me since I was a kid....rabbit trail, but good scenery.) Anyway, these are something I've been thinking about making for a while. Beads, creativity, simple, fast....perfect. So here's the first set, my muse seems to be taking a holiday so they're pretty standard, nothing unusual really, I do like them though, very summery. :)

Kermit and more

As said, I finished plying "Kermit" up last night. Specs: Navajo 3 ply, 239+ yards, 14 wpi. There are another 3 batts waiting in the wings, so there should be a good amount of yardage when I'm finished.

Next that proverbial list comes the dyeing for winter warmness. I'm having the kids help in this process. They're helping to pick, dye and card. I'll do the spinning and knitting. :) I'm still doing the Wilton's and still learning at that. This is Lars's color choice, orange and royal blue. One thing about the food colorings is the blues tend to seperate and this batch has unfortunately. I think I'll move to commercial dyes for some colors.
The orange is a mixed color to gain a deeper hue. Now to see how they turn out.


Dye Ratios 1 part=1/4 tea Wilton's food coloring

Kermit: 2:0 Kelly Green

Orange: 2 no-taste Red: 1 Golden Yellow: 1/2 Brown

Royal Blue: 1 Royal Blue: 1/4 Black

Summer has begun

The gardens are growing! This is the first year that I've had decent cucumbers since we've lived here. The tomatoes, watermelons and peppers are all blooming, the berries are forming up nicely. Unfortunately, the corn is turning out to be sporadic. Oh well, it will all come together one of these years! Maybe I should dig up some more lawn for the corn patch since it seems to be working so well for everything else. :)

A sure sign of summer is a tent in the back yard. They've all been sleeping out at night, with a dog or two. :) Of course the night's outside have begun a new pastime for the children, "Night Games". How are they played, well much running, laughing and shrieking are involved. They're great for getting the heart going. A firm must to is to try to raise your siblings fright level above your own, without making them so scared that they don't want to sleep in the tent. That of course would mean that you would have to sleep out there all alone, which is "no fun" and won't be done...even if the dogs are willing. ;)

The highlight of my summer, the stay of the Hummingbirds. I haven't seen the variety this year and I have in the past. My favorite is the Calliope and I haven't had one. This year it's been Roufus and Ruby Throats. There were a couple of others, but I haven't seen them lately. I decided to give Fuscias a go again this year. They were a must for years, but they didn't do so well for a few years and I stopped buying them. The back patio has a nice amount of shade with a little sun. They seem to be doing better, one more so than the other. In years past, the Hummingbirds played with the fuscias, so I hung the feeders on the bottoms of the baskets. There has been a lot more activity with this than previous years! I'll keep doing this, even if it's not fuscias.

So the rest of life? Same kind of crazy! Amy is giving 2 1/2 gallons of milk steady. Now that the chicks are hitting pullet/cockeral stage they are doing a good job of eating up the excess milk. I'm letting it clabber and they really like it. Next on the list is using that clabber to make hard cheese.

I'm starting to dislike my list, never seems to get any shorter. The 80's weather is coming back again so more wool washing is on that dang list too. I have some dyeing ideas for more of this fleece I'm working on (it's on the list too). That California Red fleece is beckoning from the closet as well. I'm thinking a nice thick, comfy sweater is it somewhere. Oh and the filet crochet project that has to make it to the fair this year, I have 17 rows left on that.

The kids, aside from camping in the backyard, are enjoying their break....or so they tell me. ;) Lars has had a break from his irrigation job, 1st cutting just came in off the fields. We're settling into our routine finally, so it's calming just a bit.

Latest Fiber Fun

Kermit

I've had this dyed for some time, but finished the first bobbin today. There were so many ideas going through my head while I was spinning this! Beading yarn is something that I want to start playing with, in fact I beaded a small portion of this to see. I used light translucent beads, thinking of daffodils. Still, it just wasn't quite right. The thought that it reminded me of something kept running through my head. It hit me yesterday. Kermit the Frog! So, this will stay bead free and Kermit green.

Finding a moment

Moments seem to be getting lost in the larger picture lately. I can't believe that June (and with it the end of the school year) has arrived already!! We've been super busy here, so as I sit here in the company of my morning coffee cup I thought I'd take a moment to share what's been going here.

Lars would like to enter Dougall the Duck into the fair this year. However, this means being able to handle...or at least catch said victim. Bruce has become our resident winged creature wrangler. He can round up chickens faster than anyone I know, apparently he's branching out to ducks. ;)
Here we have a clash of wills, can you feel The Force????

"You are no match for me and my brother, Darth Dougallous."

Like so many stories, they all live happily ever after...in some form. In Dougall's case, it was getting a new pool to play in. I think that's the most duckish behavior we've seen in him! Dougall suffers from species confusion, I guess it was bound to happen. The sole duck in a flock of chickens, we really should get a hen or two for him. I'm sensing a summer of trauma for the Dougall.

June has arrived and it heralds it's own kind of insanity. The end of the school year, beginning of summer vacation and a child high that surpasses any sugar known to man. Children and teens across the nation evacuate their houses of learning with shrieks of glee and in the background you can hear the quiet sigh of parental groans.
Okay it's really not that bad. I'm looking forward to having them all home, come the end of August I'll be really happy to have them all back. The timing works out well.
There is one thing, however, that I always seem to block from memory until it's upon me. The last two weeks of school. There are more events, picnics, field trips, just-because-we-don't-want-to-be-here happenings and to dos than the whole year combined....and they're all crammed into a just shy two week time period.
I guess I've started humming the circus music, unaware. Malina asked me the other day if I really liked the circus "Cause you sing circus music all the time!" I guess that must be the case. Life will settle into the summer routine and it will be better.


This house came with all kinds of wonderful little surprises. One of them being a built in ironing board. I don't know why this tickles me so much, but it does. I found that it's a great set up for the drum carder though. A few days ago, while I was getting some wool through and ready to spin, I just let it set up in the kitchen. I'd been cleaning up and discovered Nani, I guess she found the perfect napping spot.

"Don't disturb me, can't you see I'm engaged in highly important research?"

The summer fun has started for the kids. Malina has been busy searching for "Tadapoes" or tadpoles. We don't have as many this year since the pond is dry. Last year I had a couple of 5 gallon buckets filled with them, the kids believe in catch and release, catch and release....much to the chagrin of various life forms here. Leif is awaiting the frog hunting season. Anna has taken up beading and is working towards being able to sell some items at the Farmer's Market.

Lars is contemplating band, drums.........oh dear.

Bruce is looking at Football this season. He's also starting to count down to his driver's permit. *gasp*.......how did that come around so fast????!!!

Justin is still pretty busy at work and the summer celebrations are going to be coming up soon. We'll also need to think about fertilizing the pastures again next month, possibly if Potash has come down in price any. He's finished the lawn system! Yay! It runs twice a day for 15 minutes on each section. No need to worry about it, well unless you're out wandering around checking plants and it happens to come on. There's still the backyard to finish, but the kids talked me into a copper butterly sprinkler when we were out flower shopping. It works, it gets moved around to water back there and the kids and duck play in it.

I'm still engaged in the wool battle. The Cotton Candy yarn is almost finished and I have an interesting green that's sitting next in line. Other than that, it's that wonderful down time between planting and harvest. Putting some finishing touches on the recovering the house. Bruce, Justin and I all worked and finished cleaning out the barn after winter (some wonderful compost in the making there). So the big Springtime jobs are wrapped up finally! Ahh, big deep breath.

It's looking like a windy day here in the valley, good day to catch up on some laundry and get those sheets on the line. Mmmm, gotta love the smell of line dried laundry!

Color Yarn

Wonders will never cease! I made some time yesterday afternoon to ply up the extreme cotton candy dye job from the other day. It hasn't stopped me, I currently have a very vibrant green drying in the kitchen. On the upside, the vibrant colors are really helping to combat the weather! Today is really reminding me of my childhood and my Aunt's kitchen. Something about quiet rainy days, wood stoves and all the smells that go along with it.

This is a very interesting yarn. I could take pics of it all day and pick up the different colors in it, depending on what the light is doing out side. The riot of color has been tamed, but not broken. Still have more to spin up, but I'm thinking I'll have about 400-500 yds of this when I'm finished. I haven't mastered guesstimating this yet.

Some Color!

Au Naturale has it's place, but you really don't want to see it walking down Main street right? Same goes with yarn, while I love yarn in it's natural hues, there are those times when life needs a little color and sometimes you get a little more than you were prepared for.

Do you ever have those moments in life where Bob Ross goes floating by the edges of your consciousness saying "Remember, there are no mistakes, only happy accidents."??
Well I had one the other day and all because I thought I'd dye some wool. Keeping in mind I've played with Kool-Aid (people really drink this stuff???) and had wonderful results, but the spectrum is limited and they go and change them all the time. Off to the internet/web (depending on how much your inner geek is speaking up) I go. Food dye, frosting dye, oh joy. Due to the gregarious and curious nature of the young offspring roaming free about the house, I'm keeping the dye stuff to the semi-toxic at this time. Wonderful people in cyber land have provided instructions by the ton. Okay. How hard can this be? Just follow the directions. Check............oh wait..........directions??.......me..........riiiiiiight. Have you never watched me cook?

It's getting late (by mother of 5, farm wife, starting to feel on the ragged side of young terms), but I'd like to have something to play with the next day. I decide to e-x-p-e-r-i-m-e-n-t. This is how I trick my perfectionistic voice into keeping quiet...er. Soak the wool for about 20 minutes in a vinegar/water bath. Get the dye bath ready. Drain the wool and stuff in said dye bath. Now I'm thinking, some parts are going to be more saturated with the vinegar than others, more color variant, fun. I'm experimenting right????? So I let that stew away on the stove top, plenty in there for a project. Oh, color. I specified to my darling husband that I'm playing, what color should I choose??? Playing? Try violet. Sure.
Wool is simmering away. Yay? P-brain starts whispering.
"You did not soak for specified time."
"I know, I'm experimenting, either way as long as it's not mud colored (I'm sure I could find something to make with that anyway) it will be fine."
"The water is still blue, you didn't soak it long enough, you need more vinegar."
"It will be fine!!! Be quiet."

About this time of my self-arguing, my helpful husband came in and started stirring the wool. Did I over react? Yes, judging from how high everyone jumped. Oh dear.

Well, I get curious and gently scoop some out........uhhhh.......
"Told ya so."
"Shut up P-brain. Where did I put those paper bags?"

The night has worn on, P-brain is chirping in one ear and I keep my mantra up. "This is a learning experience. I'll be able to take something away from it, I'm learning and HAVING FUN!" It's entirely possible that I was foaming at the mouth slightly, maybe a little wild eyed. The rest of the family had evacuated to the living room and I think they may have even had an emergency exit strategy in place.
I'm tired now, officially tired. The last of my energy has seeped from the marrow of my bones and breathing has become akin to climbing Mt Everest. I drain the wool.....................

No one should underestimate the power of adrenaline.


That's not Violet. It looked like cotton candy from the 3rd dimension.

"Told ya so."
"Bite me."

Maybe it will look better in the morning. In any case, I'm tired and P-brain is happily chirping away. Ugh.

I get up the next morning and I'm greeted by the spawned wool. I need coffee.
Apparently P-brain and Bob don't. They both start in. Now there's two of them twittering and chirping away in there.

Fan-flippin-tastic.

Now, apparently (said sarcastically) I'm a bit stubborn. IF and I say if, that's true I would prefer to think of it more as persistent. That has such a pleasant ring to it, don't you think? At this point in the game, you've already jumped off the metaphoric cliff. So there are two options, close your eyes and scream in terror....or......keep your eyes open and hope you spot the road you were looking for in the first place, may as well enjoy the view too. I'm persistent and an optimist. ;)

Well the caffeine hasn't quite woken me up and Mutt and Jeff are still chirping away. I start teasing it all out, noticing though (oooo this is where all that persistence and optimism starts to kick in) that not only has the whole batch been dyed in a wide variety of seemingly unnatural colors (if they are natural, Mother Nature is keeping them well hidden), but the locks themselves are sometimes multi-colored.



Well, well, well. This puts a new twist to things (oh dear, spinning and puns). So as I spin, I'll have a guaranteed variation because the locks hold different colors. This could be fun. Miss P just stammered a bit. Of course she quickly points to the blinding shade of magenta.
Sending it through the carder, set me back a little, but I'm still seeing promise. At least the heathering has toned some of the more obnoxious shades down a bit.
No time to give up, keep on going. What's the worst that's going to happen? It doesn't look nice? Live and learn, at least I'll have learned what NOT to do.
Time to get it on the wheel, within the first few drafts I can see that this is going to turn out well. Bob, sensing that his work here is finished, ambles off to find some happy flora, Miss P huffs off into silence with a trailing "I still told you so." and I keep filling the bobbin.

The end result is violet in appearance, in that I was successful....kind of. There are, however, shots of very vivid colors. I left the nubs in (oh, come on it's what I spin) and a bit larger than single than normal. I'm thinking a nice cool summer night wrap for one of the girls.