Good bye Bit o' Honey and Licorice...

This afternoon Bit O' Honey and Licorice were loaded into the back of their new owner's mini-van and headed west.  As I stood at the back of the van making sure Licorice didn't come out while the 'moving team' got Bit O' Honey out of the barn, Licorice came to me and buried his head into my shoulder.  He has NEVER come to me without the lure of food, and I stood holding onto his horns amazed at his parting gift of tenderness. 

Good-byes are hard, but I am so excited for them to be welcomed onto a farm where 2 young men are planning on taking them in hand.  They plan on  training them to show at the fair AND the sheep will be taking part of historical education events.   Their new 'shepherdess' plans on spinning their wool. 

Since a field trip in first grade I've dreamed of having sheep and spinning wool.  I lived that dream for five years, and though the sheep have moved on, I'm still spinning.  I am blessed.

Spinning through changes...

Normally I spend Monday afternoon/evenings in Oneonta while Katelyn is at orchestra rehearsal, but today Wayne took "orchestra duty" and I spent the afternoon working on a couple of projects...

I'm trying to whittle down my 'stash' of fabric and fiber this year.  This quilt is from a pattern I found in my 'stash' of quilt magazines using denim from discarded jeans and LOTS of scraps from my cotton collection.  I still have 36 more denim/cotton blocks to add to these, but I think I'm going to like the end result.

This afternoon I broke the news to Ian that the sheep are going to be moving to a new home this weekend.  He is not very happy with their leaving, but I think he finally understands that it's for the best.  After talking with him, I realized that he has only known life with fiber animals.  He was a baby when the adventure began.  I'm REALLY dreading breaking the news that the alpaca are next.  As hard as these changes are to make, I know it's the right thing to do.  We plan on keeping the angora rabbits--I can handle those on my own--so we'll still have fiber animals, but the farm is certainly going to be different.  As I ponder all this, I find spinning to be therapeutic.  I may just get through those bags of wool yet!

Springing Forward...

The last few months have held a lot of activity which I'll use as an excuse for not posting.

December 31,2014 the Unadilla Artisan Guild officially closed.  Though sad to see that chapter of life end, we are excited to see where new paths will lead.  After taking the month of January to get our bearings, clearing out the shop in February, we are ready to spring forward in March!

Here are some of the projects that have filled the cold days/nights of winter...

Ian & Rachael made an Olaf snowman.

Wayne took a picture of the above glass piece from outside our dining room window.  Matthew helped pick out the glass when he was home for the holidays.

This penguin piece was for a fellow church member's birthday gift:

 I decided to take a break from knitting, spinning, and sewing to do a project in punch embroidery...

 These long, cold winter nights do make me 'itch to spin' so this is the latest creation from my spinning wheel made from roving I acquired from a fellow fiber fanatic in the Albany area...

'Looking forward to the hazy days of summer, but for now we have much to be thankful for in our warm house in the river valley...Keep warm!