Bag O' the Day

I've wanted to make this bag for a long time, but the heavy roll of fabric was at the bottom of the chest freezer was a little too heavy. Finally got it up to the barn and here we are. I don't mind making a mess when I end up with a good bag to put up for sale.

Mr. Haygood

I have a little friend who likes to help me type my blogs. Hannah named him Mr. Haygood after her soccer coach. Some cats just have wonderfully colorful personalities and that is Mr. Haygood. He races around looking for things to play with, or wreak havoc with, but when I pick him up he erupts into one big purr. What a sweety. He definitely is up there on the top-kitty list...a rather long list.

Old Fiber Never Dies

I found this batt in the tractor shed, some wool and kid mohair dyed by me and blended by Georgia Mommaerts at Quail Hill. Ohhhhh, it's so nice. I spin late at night and early in the morning in my jammies. How heavenly...Jan wants to knit some squares for me to make into purses. Works for me! I will give her this yarn to start on.

Milky Way Tonight

I went to bring the sheep in a while ago and was awe struck by the stars and the Milky Way. When I was living outside in the trailer I was much more in touch with the sky...couldn't help but go outside and look once in a while! I used to lie on the picnic table and look for meteors. The best viewing of stars takes place when there's no moon, but that makes it pitch black outside. We have virtually no glare here, and the only planes we see are way, way up there being far off any airport flight path. Venus and Mars are still visible, although not as bright as last winter. I watched those planets all winter. There's a nip in the air, ever so slight. That's enough to trigger the ram's instincts to breed. I saw a ram lamb checking out the back of a ewe today...no mounting but that will come soon. Time to seperate them! I mailed some fiber out to be spun into yarn today. I bought Hannah and Luke some school supplies, candy and toys for Luke's sixth birthday. He begins kindergarten this month. I crammed everything I could into two flat rate boxes, including soap for Annie. I bought him some thick "first pencils" and lots of cutsey erasers, sticky notes, erasers, pencil holders, doggie notebooks, etc. It was so much fun. On the way back from the mall I stopped to buy corn and not far down the road there was a field of sunflowers. Had to stop and take some pictures. They were past prime but still beautiful. Made me want to plow some of my land and plant some. The pond tonight was just gorgeous, air clear and crisp. Had so much fun with the doggies. Holly swims to the ball and will bring it to me sometimes. She is beginning to connect bringing the ball to me and getting it thrown again. After two retrievals she took off with the ball - bye,bye ball. Matt had surgery on his ingrown toenail today. Nasty, nasty. Worse case I've ever seen, with one side of the nail going straight down into the toe the whole length of the nail. I called this AM and told them what awful pain he was in and they took him in today. Got home from shopping and sure enough, he was laid out on the sofa with a big bloody toe sticking up. Heck of a way to get out of his chores. He has to go back in a month to cut some more out and deaden it so it won't grow back. YUCK!! I do most of the everyday chores anyway, but he has the skills I can't afford to hire in. Electric, plumbing, carpentry, he can do them all. It gives him job security and makes him cocky sometimes because he knows I need those skills to make my farm run. He signed on to this outfit and, so far, has not said "I ain't gonna work on Maggie's Farm no more."

Blogless

Checked six blogs tonight, only one was updated since the last time I looked (Greenberry House - my fairy web mother's blog). My kids started blogging a few months back but haven't updated in a month. Granted, most people are not rooted to the homestead the way I am with all these critters, and actually have a life. Speaking of critters. Matt snuck off to bed when I was watching the Princess Diana movie and didn't bring the sheep in (his job). It was kind of fun going up the hill with the flashlight and staff to coax them down into the barnyard where they are much safer. No stars out tonight, no moon. I hated to move them as they were lying all around in their little families here and there. I walk around hitting the ground with the staff and they take off. Must sound like a predator in the grass to them. Cat food out in four different places, take the dogs out for a last pee, then it's my time. Staying up late is a luxury to me and I do it whenever I can. My mother was a real night owl and so was her mother. The few minutes of Elizabethtown with Orlando Bloom and Kirsten Dunst looks interesting, wish I saw the whole thing. Diana movie was okay, a little disappointed. I will never forget when I heard the news about her. I am still in awe of her. The other day I tried to speed read Larry Kings book, "The People's Princess" which included many impressions of Diana from people King interviewed. I almost got through it but got so bleary eyed I had to leave with my venti cappucino in tow. Still miss Hannah and Luke so much it hurts but know they are happiest with their Mommy and Daddy. Luke asked his mother why they couldn't have as many kittens as Omi.

On Days Like This...

When it's so bright and hot and sunny like this I dream of the Jersey Shore. I never got there enough while I lived close enough for a day trip there. The men in my life have, for the most part hated the beach. When I met Matt it was a different story. He loves the ocean but sitting on the beach and doing nothing is not his cup of tea. Matt has been a wind surfer most of his life and if he's going to be near an ocean that's what he wants to do. We got to the Sandy Hook State Park a couple of times, a wind surfing mecca of NJ. There was a father and son trying to figure out how to get the board going in the wind. Matt went over to give them a hand. I went back to my book (my favorite shore activity) and looked up a few minutes later to see Matt zooming across the bay headed for Manhattan. It had been a while since he wind surfed and it took him a bit of doing to get back again, but it was wonderful for him. I took him away from all that, and he hasn't complained much. It's all or nothing for him. If he had a board he would have to live near the wind and water. He doesn't have a board, and lives about five hours from the ocean, so it doesn't pull on him. Today I contented myself to sew on bags for my fall shows. Once I get going it's so totally absorbing the time flies by. From time to time I had to take doggies out, check on sheep, etc. My satellite CD stations are amazing and I heard some fantastic music today. I keep thinking about Mia and how I would like to be helping her move into her apartment today. She has lots of help and a terrific roommate who does more than her share. Monika's mother lives an hour away, not four hours away like me, and has been there helping out. I have to be content to wait for pictures and look for fabric for curtains I will make for them. Mia has had three nicely decorated college dorm rooms, all custom designed by Mom. I told her I can't give her a lot of money, but I will make sure she always has new drapes, pillow shams, duvet covers, etc. I did give her a few bags to take to NJ and sell, which she did to enthusiastic co-workers, friends, etc., to cover some of her moving expenses. I'm so lucky she loves my work and is not reluctant to use what her mother makes. She just gave her high school friend, Rachel, who went to LA to work for Teach for America, a Bundaflicka Bag for a bridal shower gift. Many of her high school friends and moms were there and raved about the bag. It made me feel good, even though I couldn't be there I was represented by my handiwork and it made Mia proud.

Sunday Morning With Velvet

As Matt was leaving for work he announced, some of the sheep got loose!, and there I was in my jammies, not ready to face any calamities that might happen where sheep and lousy fencing is involved. I threw some clothes on and ran outside to the picnic table area by the windows where the sheep were grazing, happily cutting my "lawn" for me. I decided to get one of the books Jan brought me and give myself a treat. I sat down at the picnic table to read. Well, that was the perfect invitation to little Monkey Face Velvet to join me. She wanted to know all about the book I was reading (one of the spooky ones about haunted houses, good for me to read that kind of book in the sunshine). She also wanted to eat my book. I kept gently nudging her away. It's hard to be annoyed at this little mass of black curls with blonde tips and big blue eyes that look like jewelry beads. I am absolutely entranced with her and am trying to enjoy her while she is little and cute. Celeste's baby, Babette, from last year is a big girl now and I can hardly spot her when she is running with the other black goats. I know someday Velvet will be a big girl and have kids of her own. Then she might look at me like, are you somebody I used to know? and go about the business of being a mother. So I let her help me read my book, and hope that Jan will understand the corner of the page bitten off (I have a feeling she will).

Ship It Out

I got a big shipment out to the mill today. It included wool, mohair, angora and some alpaca I've had for a couple of years now. Vivid colors including magenta, royal blue, kelly green, lime green turquoise blue and yellow, to be blended with a natural black wool, Merino and Bluefaced Leicester. I can't wait to see how it comes out. It's always a thrill to open the box and see those one pound balls of roving, fresh and new. I'll be getting some yarn spun, too, but that's very costly and roving is cheaper to produce. But there are many people who don't spin and look for yarn at the wool shows. I try to have something for everybody. It took me a week to wash, dye, wash again and dry all the batches of fiber. Must have been about 50 pounds. I used all the dyes I had in the house. Piled it all into the truck and off I went to Staples and bought shipping boxes. I assembled them and packed the fiber in the parking lot. I did get some looks from people, understandably. "Look at that woman standing in the rain playing with all those bags of colorful stuff, Mommy!" Well it had to get shipped and I got it done. After our doggie pond time and chasing goats away from the road I got the chores done and groomed three bunnies. I'm almost finished with them and my reward is happy bunners and more luscious angora to dye. Now they can rest, eat, be cool and grow more fiber.

Beaver Creek Buttons

Jan has started a button business. She calls it Beaver Creek Buttons and they are absolutely adorable. That girl is so talented. The presentation of her buttons is beautiful. I will display them at my booth at future shows. Yesterday we were in the creek wading around sifting through the bottom, looking for clay to make buttons (I know, kinky idea - that's why she loves me) but the creek bed is loose rock and gravelly. Enter polymer clay! Jan chose colors to compliment my rovings, another terrific idea. That girl is amazing...

Hot Buns

August is a good time to get that angora off the Bunners. This shy doe does not want to smile for the camera. For some reason, I always shear my bunnies in the living room on a comfy chair in front of the TV. Then we have time to relax together before I bring them back to their cages. Angora is one of my favorite fibers. It comes off the bunny perfectly clean and goes right in the dyepot. Not too many animals fibers require no preparation. Angora soaks up the dye fantastically and washes squeaky clean afterwards with no problem. A little angora to a wool or wool/mohair blend is heavenly. I call my roving "Mother Fiber" because it is always mostly wool, as "Wool is the Mother of All Fibers," but angora is the close second. A German angora gives a huge amount of wool and is so easy to keep. It doesn't require fencing or vaccinations. A little black oil sunflower seed in the feed keeps wool block away. I love my bunnies and haven't really given them enough credit in this journal. I hope to have my insulated bunny barn room done before their bottles freeze this winter...one can only hope.

Visit with Jan and Dave

We had a lovely visit with Jan and Dave, walking around lush and beautiful fields around Brookfield and talking about what our dream house would look like. Jan brought me a box of goodies, which is so typical of Jan. She is so thoughtful and always thinking of things I could use or would like. I had been thinking about reading at least one book this summer and couldn't find one that tickled my fancy. Jan brought me three that I know I will enjoy. One of them is even about sheep! It's called Three Bags Full by Leonie Swann, a German writer. The story is told by the sheep, who set out to find who murdered their shepherd! Can you stand it? I will start it tonight! The other two are books about real life hauntings. Jan and I share an interest in the spirit world. Living here alone over last winter had me looking over my shoulder a little too often in the dark, spooky hay mow. I would always try to get my chores done before dark so I could hunker down in the trailer with the dogs. I didn't dare read spooky books then, but now I will enjoy them immensely! After our walks around Brookfield we went to our local restaurant, the Beaver Den. Jan and Dave headed home with green fields and possibilities on their minds.

Jan is Coming

My dearest friend Jan and her husband are on the way here to look at some land. They are seriously considering moving up here if they can sell The Million Dollar Palace. Jan totally understands me and is very amused by my wild fiber artist willy-nilly life style, but Dave is the fastidious type-A control freak. Everything has it's place and in my world hardly anything has a place. I am working on it, honest, but I just got my first chest of drawers in a year and I haven't even picked out a drawer for my underwear yet. I have to meditate on it and find the Feng-Shui in my bedroom before I can stake out some drawers. I know, excuses, excuses. Matt is the ultimate blue-collar husband who wants a wife who will a) cook like a pro b)keep the kitchen floor surgically clean and c) be hell-on-wheels in the bedroom. Oh,let me add letter d) bring home a big fat pay check. He has a bad habit of leaving for work with the dogs loose. This forces me to get out of bed and get dressed. I am always fearful of some kind of catastrophe requiring my presence (dogs run over by cars, attacking Sister's cat, whatever) and I will be braless. My worst fear is having to face a calamitous situation without my brassier on. My bra is my body armour. The Sports Bra was the greatest invention for me - I am ready for anything! So here I am dressed (with sports bra in place) and trying to clean up a bit. How can I produce all these wonderful things I produce to sell without making a mess? I was teaching in a classy summer program in Morristown years ago and had a big quilting class. There was always a waiting list for my class. We had two big rooms combined and there was fabric everywhere. I remember once stopping dead in my tracks when I noticed the director and the superintendent of schools standing in my door with their mouths open. The room was buzzing with activity, girls and boys cutting and running those sewing machines. Some were lying on the floor taking a break on the pillows they made. But what a mess. They walked away and I thought there goes my job. But guess what? The director started bringing guests to my room all the time. There was something wonderful going on there. The other classes looked boring compared to mine. I said to her, remember, the creative mind is seldom a tidy place! She nodded and smiled...

Evening Walk

The heat and humidity seemed to subside a bit toward evening so I decided to risk our evening walk. How could I explain to the doggies that Mommy is too hot to walk up the hill? We followed the goats up the hill - they turned left at the pond, our destination. I have a chair up there now and enjoy relaxing while I throw Bodie's ball. One game we play is for me to demand that he bring the ball right to me. He would rather make me get up and walk over to it, but I am firm. I keep saying, "ball HERE, Bodie" and point to the ground right in front of me. He will drop it a little farther away to see if he can get away with that, then I say ball here and he drops it a little closer, and on and on. Finally he puts it in the right spot and I throw it. He loves that game. The White Boys stand in the water and watch us play. Jasper runs singing his Georgia hound dog song through the woods, and Holly and Tanner play on the edge of the pond. Holly is an excellent swimmer and sometimes snatches the ball. She doesn't understand the "ball here" part and can mess up our game by running away with the ball and losing it in the grass...so I generally try to throw it toward Bodie, while letting Holly have some fun. We followed the goats back down the hill. My land is kind of up and down with little hollows here and there. The goats love it because lots of little bushes and funny grasses are growing here and there. My land has not been hayed for years and seeds have come floating in from here and there and planted themselves. I have some ornamental things growing down by the road which I will try to remember to pick and use them for Christmas decorating.

Heavy Weather

Good Lord, this weather is wild. People in NJ with floating cars and no power. Record heat up and down the east coast. I'm glad I am here on my hillside farm where gentle breezes soften the blast of the heat somewhat. The only water I have to worry about fills the two ponds up the hill from me and what's left goes down to the beautiful creek across the street. An earthquake in Indonesia now, what next? Life is precarious...this time last year AJ was driving me and my belongings up here when we were caught in flood waters on route 88. We were heading south when rushing water coming off the mountain started cars floating all around us. AJ, who had just finished a year of driving a Humvee carrying his 50 caliber machine gun around the island of Cuba for a year, gunned the engine of my F150 and blasted through the flood. I think he saved our lives that night. Just up north from where we were route 88 opened up over a ravine and two truck drivers were killed. AJ was truly an "Army of One" that night. I better spin some wool right now and count my blessings.

Made In Peru

Kathleen knitted three beautiful hats for me to sell this winter. I sent her the yarn and she went to work. Kathleen is a Colorado farm girl who grew up on a farm with lots of fiber on the hoof. She went to Peru on a humanitarian mission with the Air National Guard several years ago and fell in love with a Peruvian citizen. So there she stayed! Kathleen's sister has an alpaca and angora goat ranch in Colorado She longs for the farm and the animals. Kathleen lives in the city now, and knitting with natural fibers gives her a taste of the critters back home. I'm so thankful to her for doing this contract knitting for me. I just can't knit as much as I want to, and love having some natural fiber knitted items at my booth. Thanks a million, Kathleen!

Sleepless in Brookfield

I've got to figure out how to get some sleep. For the last two nights I woke up in the wee hours. Couldn't get back to sleep for love or money. So much to do and need to feel good. Post traumatic stress from the move last summer maybe? Winter coming on. No hay in the mow. How to get the tractor out of hock. Catch the rams and bucks and get them seperated from the girls soon. Can I get enough soap made in time? Dyed fiber has to get out to a mill but they tell me there is a six week wait...too long to make the September shows. I wanted to make one hand bag a day but seem to spend more time cooking for Matt than sewing. Okay, no more coffee after lunch time and I'll drink camomile tea in the evening. What else? Try not to worry so much - it that possible? Work is great therapy, but if I don't get enough sleep I can't work as much. Maybe I will catch a nap midday if I'm lucky and the dogs don't bark or the sheep escape.

The Summer 2007 issue of Wild Fibers was in my post office box yesterday. What a gorgeous magazine. The photographs of New Zealand are stunning. I keep saying what a publishing genious that Linda Cortright is and I mean it.

Saw Matt off to work on the bathroom in Sherburne. The owner is a Long Islander who bought a cottage in the country. He's putting up tile in the shower, tedious work, and he always does a perfect job. The guy's got skills.

Petunia Came Home

Petunia disappeared for several weeks and scared me half to death. She is a beautiful calico kitty, the daughter of Lydia and some unknown beau. Petunia is one of the "Coffeetown Kitties," found in the bushes on Coffeetown Road near the last place we lived. Petunia is shy like her mother and the trailer was so crowded. Sure, I have a 20,000 square foot barn for the cats to live in, but some cats are inside cats who need the order and safety of the house. The world outside is a big scary place and the law of the jungle prevails. Shy kitties are targets for stronger, assertive cats who take over the barn and chase away the ones they don't like. Petunia ran away before we got this apartment finished. I saw her again about a week ago, sitting on the fence behind me, shaking all over as if to say, here I am, here I am. We hugged and got reacquainted and I let her eat from the food I have stashed up high from the dogs (which Pavarotti, the rooster, likes to steal). I made the mistake of letting her go. Last night she was back but the dogs got excited and chased her away. Tonight she was there in the barn and I snatched her up and brought her inside. I gave her the salmon and tuna with sauce I bought today and she ate and ate. Petunia will be the inside kitty from now on. I don't want to lose her again. She's very contented lying on my sewing machine cabinet and purring all over. I can't pet her enough. The dogs don't bother her and she seems okay with them. I better go prepare a cat box...

Cute Kitties

The kittens living in my future work room outside the apt. have fun with our work boots. It brightens up any day to see their lively antics. They pile up on the bristly mat right outside the door to sleep, so we have to be careful not to step on them. No mice, no rats, no snakes. The big kitties keep all of them away. Matt picked up a tarp next to the picnic table and a big garter snake slithered away, but I didn't see it.

Hot and Steamy in Central New York

Heat and humidity are keeping me from maximum productivity here. I had a box of mohair to send out for socks and decided the closet UPS drop off was right next to the Barnes and Noble in New Hartford. Hmmmm, I wonder if settlers headed west from Hartford, Ct., and named the spot where they stopped after the spot they left. One would think they would pick out a new name. Oh, well. I treated myself to a little AC on behalf of B & N. I gathered up a pile of magazines I didn't want to pay $8 apiece for and drank my cappucino in peace. It was wonderful. I allowed myself two magazines to purchase, Quilting Arts and Vanity Fair. It wasn't long before guilt overcame me for having so much fun and I went to Wal-Mart to buy food, human, canine and feline. The lime ice pops made the ride home to the hot barn more bearable. Then I had to pay the piper. Velvet, who I thought I secured in with the other goats, squeezed through two fences and ate Sister Grace's geraniums. Sister Bernadette met me in the driveway with the bad news. AND the dogs ate the second Direct TV remote control. I paid $15 for this one and will have to buy another one now. Oh, joy, manually sifting through 600 channels. No, thanks. Then I dropped a gallon of milk trying to carry in too much at one time. I have to go through three doors and rooms to get to the kitchen until Matt builds another entry door. It's a long haul with anything I bring home. I fluffed up my fiber, got the sheep out, did my fence guarding routine, then took the White Boys and the rest of the dogs up to the pond. Rain was forecast and sure enough, when he hiked back down the rain started. Fine with me, we need cooling off. Can you believed I cooked tonight? What is wrong with me? Matt has me well trained, I guess. Off to do evening chores. Nothing accomplished today in terms of fiber, soap, or bags. I can't afford many days like this or I will have nothing to sell this fall.

Buttons on my Mind

Jan and I are thinking about making buttons from creek bed clay. For years when people asked me why I would want to spin yarn from animals that I've raised, when there are so many nice yarns to buy in stores, I would tell them that it's like a potter scraping her clay from the creek beds instead of buying it from the art supply store. They would still look perplexed. Some people still don't get it, like the people who don't know the difference between acrylic and natural fibers. But that's okay...if everyone spun wool spinning wouldn't be so special, would it! Jan might be coming up end of this week and we will put on our boots and see what we can find in the creek, besides snapping turtles. We don't have poisonous snakes here in Central New York but we do have plenty of unpoisonous ones. Gives me the willies when they swim by me!! Jan is a potter and stained glass artist. I've been dragging her into the fiber world by her hair, and it's not showing signs of working for her. I think I better let her stay in her medium - so you will see us with buckets and shovels in Beaver Creek!