Cookie Monster

I am constantly asked for updates on Sunshine, more pictures of Sunshine, videos of Sunshine... She's definitely brightened all of our lives.

Sunshine is doing just fine. She did not outgrow her physical issues as we'd hoped, but she sure hasn't let them slow her down. So why doesn't Sunshine make the blog very often? Because unless you sneak up on her, she won't let you take her picture.

Sunshine is out in front of the group and I'm hiding behind the trees.

Well, I shouldn't say that. She's more than happy to have her picture taken. You just can't get her to stand or sit still long enough to do so. Why? Because she's a cookie monster! As soon as she see me, these are the pictures I get.







And what does she do when she gets to me? (I'm only posting this because I want to try out the blogger video upload...and it's Sunshine. Please turn your sound down because I'm talking to her in my Sunshine voice and sound like a complete dork and with the camera that close to my face, I sound like a loud complete dork.)

So why is she so addicted to vanilla wafers? When we realized we were probably going to have to wash her cute little behind for the rest of her life, we wanted to make sure she would be easy to catch. The Jacobs don't tend to be as chummy as say Woolliam, Buddy or the other long wool breeds. They do tend to have a pretty good sweet tooth though ;-). However, with as many cookies as Sunshine would eat if we let her, she'd soon not have a tooth in her mouth.

Just for goodness sake, DON'T RUN OUT! Even if it's in the middle of an ice storm and you. can't. get. your. car. out. of. the. driveway.

What's That Smell?!?

Or, how to tell if you too might be a crazy sheep lady.

I spent the afternoon washing part of a beautiful black Icelandic fleece from Flat Creek Wool and Pottery (beautiful blog as well I might add!). Especially in the winter time, when I'm jonesin' for a wool fix, washing wool is a special treat. I just love the way the whole house smells like a wet sheep.



Crazy, eh? Well, I don't think I'm the only one. In fact, I got a note last week from someone who had a Wensleydale/Cotswold fleece they thought I might like and she said "I have it in the back of my car (I love the smell!)". Direct quote. Copied and pasted straight from her email!

I remember a couple years ago a friend got in my car and said "I just love to ride in your car. It always smells like sweet feed and saddles." Horses do smell good, just like sheep. Even in the middle of winter when they haven't had a bath and they get a little sweaty.

Horse and sheep breath smells good too - when they put their soft noses up to your face as you are scratching a particularly good spot under their neck. Dog breath? Not so much, but dog toes smell good - well, not straight in from the barn maybe. Cat fur? You bet. Good clean hay? Can't beat it. Fresh shavings? The best.

What are some of your favorite "odd" smells? And aren't you glad you've been given the wonderful opportunity to know the answer to that question? Even if you don't particularly like the smell of wet wool.

Adventures In Shipping

I need to ship nine pounds of quilt batting to California. To someone who has the coolest sounding house no less! And, after I started looking into the shipping, I thought why oh why couldn't I just hand deliver it - argh.



Here it is - and where, obviously, things start heading south. It's the bag of wool that ate a sofa. Not only can I not find a box big enough, but if I could, the shipping was going to be completely outrageous. Completely!

One of my genius friends suggested a Space Bag, which, using just your own vacuum cleaner, sucks all the air out and compresses things down to ridiculously small sizes.



Here it is now. Way small enough to fit in a fairly standard shipping box and save an incredible amount on shipping fees. Not only did it easily fit in the box, but I was able to let enough air back in to let it puff out enough so it could become it's own packing material (gotta love wool for that, eh?) and also give it a little breathing room - so to speak :-/.

My only concern with all this was if it would be bad to compress the wool so much. So, as a test I let it sit for awhile and then opened the seal and presto - whooooosh! Right back to where it started. Just amazing.

I learn something new every day.

ROGMMS

New internet farm slang - Rolling On Ground Making Me Smile :-).















Anyone want to play along? Either coming up with new fun farm acronyms...OR rolling around in the warm sun!

The Bird Of Spring

Is not amused.



The pussy willows seem unfazed.