Mona

It has been forever since I posted anything on here for all of you to read!  Things have been moving right along here in Indiana kinda smooth right not but I am sure that won't last long.  I have 2 new litters of Giant Angora babies in my colored breeding program there are both Blacks and Chestnuts.  Lambing should start sometime in April not really sure when the lady I bought my sheep from never gave me any dates so here goes nothin I guess LOL.  Shearing I am hoping will be done next weekend.  I ordered shears back in Feb but the company I ordered them from never told me they were on back order till a couple weeks later.  So ended up canceling my order and ordering a pair from another company.  They will be here first part of next week.  Maybe it would have been easier to call a shear but we have this "Do it yourself" attitude around here.

Today I picked up my first Toggenburg milk goat named Mona.  When I picked her up this morning Joyce gave me a milking lesson then Mona and I had our first loan milking tonight.  All went smooth and between both milking she gave about 2.5qts of milk today.  I think her milk will increase as she gets use to being milked out everyday, she just started giving milk last week.  Here is a pic for ya taken with my cell phone as soon as we got home this moring.  I will try to get some better pics soon. God Bless Dustin

More Black Giants

Here are a couple of pics of my latest 2 hopeful keepers out of my black Giant project.

Dusty's Solomon so far he is the biggest out of the 2 so I am hoping he will be a nice big buck and be my next herd sire.

 Dusty's Jael a little smaller than her brother but does not fail in type or density.  Both of these go back to black Germans that were imported in 2006.  What I love about working with some of the black Germans is how well they keep color all the way to the skin.  They wont stay coal black like they are now but they will stay a nice darker gray color, my crosses with other other breeds fade a lot more and some have been very pale colored.   Of course the more I breed "true for color" the better the color stays.  Texture on the black Germans is not quite as soft as I like in my Giants, but what they do for color and density more than makes up for that.  I was able to get another black German recently from my friend Joyce that has very nice texture and make 10lbs very early, so I am anxiously waiting to be able to breed her.  God Bless!

New Hat Pattern

This is a new hat pattern I got a couple of weeks ago.  It looks kinda difficult but its all knit and purl stitches and you move the stitch marker to the right and recenter every 4 rows, very simple.  I like knitting hats because they are fast and I dont get bored or loose focus before they are done like I do big projects.
 
This is my yearling ewe Martha.  I am not totally sure what color she is yet but I am thinking Mioget.  Shetland have lots of colors and patterns I am going to have to learn now to.  The little ewe in the back is a black ewe lamb named Chi Chi.  As you can see I did not use sheep jackets this year so I will have lots of picking to do on the fleeces.  I hope to have everyone covered next winter.  God Bless!

Habakkuk

For some reason the name Habakkuk came to mind the first time I saw a pic of my ram.  So from that time on I knew that would be his name.  It's kinda odd though Habakkuk is the name of an Old Testament book and he was a profit, but other than that I know nothing about him and I have not read the book of Habakkuk yet either.  I guess it was just God saying "I am letting you have these sheep and this is what I want you to call him."  So it that is how Habakkuk got his name.

 I never seem to remember to take my camera out with me while doing chores so I missed getting pics of the sheep running around and jumping after their evening meal.  Habakkuk would take a short run then bounce like a pogo stick bend in half in the air and then start all over.  The ewes thought he was a little crazy I think.  While I was out watching them I noticed some wool on the fence.  Turns out it was from Habakkuk and a nice little sample as well.

 I am guessing it is from his neck wool since it is a shorter stable than the wool on his midsection, but as clean as it is it may not be either.  No matter where it is from it is so very soft and makes me not wanna wait another month till shearing time.  I am ready to get that fleece on the wheel!  Shetland have 3 different fleece types and I have all 3 of them here.  Habakkuk is a "longish wavy" fleece.  I have 2 kindly/single coated ewes and 1 double coated ewe.  All have very soft wool but all will be make a different type of yarn.  I cant make up my mind if I wanna sell any of my wool from the sheep this year or if I wanna horde it all to myself.   Hope you enjoyed the pics God Bless!

Bee Hive Hat

I have been knitting hats lately for the Hat Ministry we started up at Church.  We are giving hats to cancer patients, homeless people or other people that may be needing one.  Here is the pattern for the Bee Hive hat I just finished.  I think the yarn I used has too many colors in it to really show the pattern but it looks neat in person, its 70% Alpaca and 30% Angora.  Here is the pic. God Bless!

What I have been up to lately

Its COLD here in Southeastern Indiana the past couple of days with lots of snow.  Since I am off today I am spending it in the warm till I have to do more tending to the animals.  I got some new roving back from the mill back in Nov but have not got any plied till today.  It is 41% Moorit Shetland, 29% Agouti Angora and 30% Llama from Gama's cria fleece.  If you have never spun Llama wool before its not as soft as Alpaca but it has a slicker feel to it making it more elegant in my opinion.  This being from  a cria fleece is extra soft.   I also made some felted soap bars.  I made 2 with alpaca but only one turned out the way I wanted and I made another with Lincoln sheep wool.  I like the Lincoln the best since it is a little scratchier I think it will work better for a scrubber.  Here is a pic God Bless!

 

When I grow up what....

Color do I wanna be?

I have blue gray eyes, was born blue but have been changing colors for about 2 weeks now.  Both my parents are black.  On my sire's side there are some Tans, and an otter, REW and one steel.  On my dam's side there is only black and REW.    Here are a couple more pics.  Hope you all had a Happy New Year!  God Bless!!!