The East and The West

Just a few days ago, I was able to capture these shots of the sun rising in the east over the pasture fields while looking to the west, over the big barn, the moon was setting. It was a beautiful testiment to God's majesty!





We remain basically "snowless" here in Michigan while all around us other northern states are up to their ears in the white stuff! These clouds produced a few flurries, but nothing lasting:

I know I'm different, but the lyrics of "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas" keep running through my head!

Turkey or trimmings?

Sometimes there is more in the roaster than Thanksgiving dinner....

(Note: No food is ever cooked in this roaster for safety sake. It is dedicated to dyeing)

Serenity Farms Critters

I haven't posted many sheep photos this year, have I? Here are a few:






That third photo is of our new registered CVM/Romeldale ram lamb, Graham (the moorit with the blazed face) and his buddy, this years special bottle lamb Gordon (the white Corriedale) They are quite the pair! (Gordon would like to say hello to his special friend, Eva and her grandma)

And how about some other critters from around the farm? We have new chickens (Golden Lace Wyandottes, two hens and a rooster) These were the ugliest chicks but are beautiful as adults...



and we have ducks (Indian Runners). These ducks are constant entertainment, very smart (smarter than chickens, I think) plus are already giving us lovely bluish green eggs that are wonderful for cooking!:



Finally, our ever faithful mouse patrol, Christy the calico cat! She certainly has that fall color thing going, doesn't she?



We also have some new Light Brahma chickens and they are gorgeous and very, very personable. I need to get some pictures of them, too. Maybe when grandson Dylan comes for a visit. They are his chickens ;) I would definately recommend the breed to anyone thinking of trying chickens...at least I say so now. We will see how they are at laying time, how they do through the winter. We have been so pleased with the Wyandottes in the past.

Faith

"Though the rain may fall and the wind be blowing,
And old and chill is the wintry blast;
Though the cloudy sky is still cloudier growing,
And the dead leaves tell that the summer has passed;

My face I hold to the stormy heaven,
My heart is as calm as the summer sea,
Glad to receive what my God has given,
Whate'er it be.

When I feel the cold, I can say, 'He sends it,'
And His winds blow blessing, I surely know;
For I've never a want but that He attends it;
And my heart beats warm, though the winds may blow"...Author Unknown

God and I

(A quiet place in my room, with early morning sunlight..)

Getting ready to face a busy day and busy weekend...all in a good way, though, with family and friends gathering for a work day here at Serenity Farms. Good food and fun will be consumed and enjoyed. There is a welcome relief of cool fall air in the bright morning sunlight and as I gather myself for the day, I feel the call of God to my heart for some quiet time over a cup of coffee. Then a reminder from my morning devotional...

"Has thou ever pictured thyself the one remaining creature in the earth, the one remaining creature in all the starry worlds?....In such a universe thine every thought would be "God and I! God and I!" And yet He is as near to thee as that--as near as if in the boundless spaces there throbbed no heart but His and thine. Practice that solitude, O my soul.....Practice the stillness of thine own heart! Practice the solemn refrain "God and I! God and I!" Let none interpose between thee and thy wrestling angel! Thou shalt be both condemned and pardoned when thou shalt meet Jesus alone!" --George Matheson

And so my soul takes time to fill and refresh with God this morning and I am ready for the day. How about you?

I read this devotional online here - a wonderful resource!


(Green pastures at the farm, quiet woods and waiting cornfields....)

Prettiest Place...

This post is for any of my new friends from the farm tour who might be checking in to the blog. I talked about the Round House and the sheep and and my husband and his horses....some of these photos have appeared before here at the blog, but I thought it would be nice if you were able to just look real easily on your first visit ;)





The first photo is the Round House with just a glimpse of the big Burnham barn in the background. In the next picture you see my husband, taken a few years ago, driving out of the woods and into the lane with a team of Percheron draft horse mares (and notice the wagon loaded with fence building supplies near by!) You see what I see when I step out the back door at our house in the spring time...ewes and lambs on green grass! And then another photo of the Round House and Burnham barn in winter.

What do you think? Aren't these places beautiful to look at? They are a certainly a blessing and a joy for us to live...We hope you can all visit us in person one day soon! I hope to post some photos from our trip to West Michigan here in the next day or two. I had a wonderful time and enjoyed meeting each and everyone along the way...now we all need to get some sleep ;)

Brother

Last Friday, with the greatest of joy, I attended a Relay For Life event. To celebrate the survival of a very special person that I have known most of my life and all of his...one of my "little" brothers (I am lucky enough to have three). That is him, of course, being silly for the camera ;)

I never think of him as being a younger sibling, he really is more like an older brother to me...the one you turn to and rely on and ask advice of. That is what my brother Darin is for me. We were cohorts as children, and I don't remember ever fighting, although I'll bet my folks would remember differently ;D


This picture is of him with his wife, truly his partner for many many years now. They have two wonderful boys, young men. All were there in full support (as they have been each step of the way)

The emotions you feel at one of these events are so huge they are hard to explain. Different for me, as a sibling, then they are for each other person there I'm sure. Like I said, very hard to explain and still with me nearly a week later. I will never forget it, and I shouldn't. I took other photos with some of the other family and friends but they didn't turn out (I wish they would have...maybe my hands and heart were shaking to much)

Congratulations, brother of mine. We love you so much...

His first horse ~

Thanks to a collaborative effort between his Mama and his Alaska Aunt, we once again have a saddle horse here at Serenity Farms.

Getting Familiar ~


First Lessons ~



Still grinning, and looking with amazement at the tracks he and his horse made in the sand ~


Isn't that smile, from a shy little boy with a big heart, worth it all?


What an inspired idea his Mama had! Here's to all the life lessons and joys that can only be learned from time with your horse ~

A Short Study of Wool

CVM wool, as a matter of fact, along with other wool junkies at The Knitters Book of Wool group over on Ravelry. By the way, if you don't already own The Knitters Book of Wool by Clara Parkes, run right out now and purchase it for your fiber/knitting library...it is fantastic!

CVM (or California Variegated Mutant) wool was an easy one for me, as I have several Corriedale/CVM cross sheep in my flock, including one of our rams, Derek:

Handsome Derek, with his cool hair-do, was officially chosen as the June mascot for the group...a title he carries with honor ;)

Anyway, I knew I could use Derek's wool for my project and I am very familiar with it but I wanted to do more and realized that I had never worked with 100% CVM or Romeldale from the raw stage to yarn. A call to my friend Bonnie at Sheepy Thyme Farm confirmed that she did have some raw fleece available (as well as several new lambs on the ground) so a "field trip" was arranged! Now, two trips later ~ LOL ~ not only do I have some raw fleece, but I also have planned some new additions to the sheep flock! How does this happen? Well, its almost as easy to collect sheep as it is to collect wool and yarn, especially when they are so lovely.

Here are some of the fleeces I came home with:


That gorgeous moorit, above on the right is from a lovely new ram. And below are a few of the ones I have already washed sample locks of (on the left are unwashed locks and on the right, washed:



Below is some of Derek's fleece to sample:

I am having so much fun and trying to take good notes...look for more here in the next week or so as I comb and spin the samples ~ oh my!

Is it Spring or Summer?

Some recent images from our gardens ~






(An old green bench, a recent find at a yard sale for only $5 dollars!)
How are your gardens growing these days?

In Honor ~ Memorial Day

With thoughts and prayers and thanksgiving to all who have served and are serving our country, and to their families this Memorial Day and every day.










Do any of you remember this recitation? When I was a girl growing up it played on the country music stations. It still gives me goosebumps when I hear it. I thought of all the people who may not have heard it, and thought I would share the words here. I understand it has been recorded in more recent times as well.

DECK OF CARDS (SPOKEN):

During the North African Campaign, a bunch of soldier boys had been on a long hike.
They arrived in a little town called Casino and the next morning being Sunday, several of the boys went to church. A sergeant commanded the boys in church.

After the Chaplain read the prayer, the text was taken up next. Those of the boys that had a prayer book took them out. One boy had only a deck of cards, and he spread them out. The sergeant saw the cards and said, "Soldier, put away those cards." After the service was over, the soldier was taken prisoner and brought before the Provost Marshall.

The Marshall said, "Sergeant, why have you brought this man here?" "For playing cards in church, Sir," was the response. The Marshall asked the soldier, "And what have you to say for yourself, son?" "Much, Sir," replied the soldier.
The Marshall stated, "I hope so, for if not I will punish you more than any man was ever punished."

The soldier said, "Sir, I have been on the march for about six months. I have neither bible nor a prayer book, but I hope to satisfy you, sir, with the purity of my intentions." And with that, the boy started his story ...

"You see, sir, when I look at the Ace, it reminds me that there is but one God.

And the deuce reminds me that the bible is divided into two parts: the Old and the New Testaments.

When I see the trey, I think of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

And when I see the four, I think of the four evangelists who preached the Gospel: there was Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

And when I see the five, it reminds me of the five wise virgins who trimmed their lamps; there were ten of them: five were wise and were saved, five were foolish and were shut out.

When I see the six, it reminds me that in six days God made this heaven and earth.

And when I see the seven, it reminds me that on the seventh day, God rested from his great work.

When I see the eight, I think of the eight righteous persons that
God saved when he destroyed the earth: there was Noah, his wife, their sons and their wives.

And when I see the nine, I think of the lepers our saviour cleansed, and that nine of the ten didn't even thank him.

When I see the ten, I think of the ten commandments that God handed down to Moses on a tablet of stone.

When I see the King, it reminds me that there is but one King of Heaven, God Almighty.

And when I see the Queen, I think of the blessed Virgin Mary who is the Queen of Heaven.

And the Jack or Knave is the Devil.

When I count the number of spots in a deck of cards, I find 365, the number of days in a year. There are 52 cards, the number of weeks in a year. There are four suits, the number of weeks in a month. There are twelve picture cards, the number of months in a year. There are thirteen tricks, the number of weeks in a quarter.

So you see, Sir, my deck of cards serves me as a bible, an almanac and a prayer book."

Time To Wake Up!

From what feels like a long winters nap, or at least a slow awakening to spring!


I came out of the barn the other day and looked up the hill to see the rooster (with our neighbors flag behind him), still crowing at ten in the morning! I happened to have the camera with me (taking pictures of lambs) and couldn't resist this shot. It seemed like it was a nudge to me to shake off winter and wake myself up!

"Cause me to hear Your loving-kindness in the morning, for on You do I lean and in You do I trust. Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk, for I lift up my inner self to You..." Psalms 143:8 (Amplified Bible)

Flowers and grass are growing, trees are budding ~


We are done lambing, finishing with thirty five live lambs. Some glamorous whites and wild colors:


We lost two, one at the beginning and one at the end of lambing season. I only had to assist with one birth (with timely help from friend Mary). We have one bottle lamb this year, an endearing little fellow (now wethered) named Gordon that you will see here one of these days. Two sets of triplets, the first set triplet boys from Amanda and the second set, three little ewes from Ava, sired by Autry! The plan is to keep all three of them. Didn't have to help with either of those births!

Yes, it is time to wake up, there is lots to do....always lots to do. But maybe it would be okay to have just one more snooze in the sunshine before getting started...


(Ava's triplets, sleeping in the sun...one is a grey badgerface, one a solid black and one white! Way to go Ava!!!)

Updating Progress and FO's

Thanks everyone for the encouraging comments in my last post of projects! I thought it would be a good idea to show you some finished things and progress notes, just to keep the ball rolling you know!

First the finished February Two Needle Baby Sweater from Knitters Almanac:


I'm happy with it - it was especially fun knitting something with my own handspun, and the Lenten Rose was a beautiful fiber. Then I found this "Rose Quartz" color of Lambs Pride superwash...wouldn't it be a lovely complement to the sweater, to make a pair of the baby leggings out of this? Hmmm....

Then, a FO from a project that began some time ago - this is my take on Jane Thornley's Feather and Fan Organic Wrap. I only had a few rows to work on it, and ignored some other things to get it off the needles. Sigh...it just makes me happy to look at!


Now on to the progress of items not yet finished - my Moc Socks, that I made a foolish mistake on ;( Lost my rhythm and have yet to fix it and pick the socks back up:


Then there is my Bountiful Bohus sweater which is way, way far behind schedule. There is no way that I will be ready to cut the steek by class time this weekend! But I am plugging away on it:


The pattern is Bountiful Bohus by Chrissy Gardiner. You can actually find the pattern free online (something I wish I had known before I bought the book Big Girl Knits, where it is also published) Oh well, you can never have enough knitting books and there are some wonderful hints about making items to fit in the book... The yarn is our own millspun Corriedale, mostly from our dear ewe Ainsley, and I call it coffee bean brown ;) The colors for the yoke are handspun from our flock and I added some angora for that authentic "Bohus" look and feel. The class is being held at the Yarn Garden in Charlotte, my home town so I get a chance to visit family on the same day I go to class. I took the class to have some hand-holding for working and cutting a steek! Janeen, our instructor, is wonderful as is Lindsay, the shop owner. I missed last class and keeping my fingers crossed that I don't catch the grandsons colds and have to miss again.

Have been doing a bit of spinning, too, when I don't feel like knitting. My daughter helped change sheep coats this past week, too, and when I looked at my sheep calender I realized that we could begin lambing in just three weeks. Oh dear, time to call the shearer....