Guess Who WON'T Be Going To The Fiber Festival

Punkin's Patch is once again sponsoring the Hug a Sheep Booth at the Kentucky Sheep and Fiber Festival this weekend.  Spud, Hershey, Andy, Petunia, Woody and Murphy have agreed to be on the hugging list and we'll pick three or four to take over (probably depending on who we can trick into the trailer ;-) in the morning.  Of course Bullwinkle will be there, too.

In discussing who would go this year, Maisie's name came up and everyone fell over laughing.  The little darling...  We could bring her, but she'd have to be transported Hannibal Lector style to keep from turning it into a Get Punched In The Kneecap (And Probably Bit And Maybe Kicked As Well) By A Sheep Booth.  Sweet Hershey is a much better choice!

I think the booth looks nice.  I created several new items this spring that I'm pretty excited about including a new Mug Shot Mug, a special My Favorite Sheep tote bag with matching note cards and note pads and new Lamb Camp cards.  There will be several really nice fleeces, a small amount of roving, lots of Lamb Camp yarn, Punkin's Patch t-shirts...

The forecast is - big surprise for spring weather in Kentucky - not great for tonight and part of tomorrow (which is why we aren't bringing the sheep until tomorrow morning), but Sunday is supposed to be nice and it's already slacking up to the south of us, so maybe tomorrow won't be a wash out either.

Regardless, almost everything is under cover so the sheep shopping, sheep shearing, sheep spinning, sheep hugging... should be lots of fun.  There are even tents down the hill at the Bluegrass Classic Stockdog Trial with a handy shuttle going back and forth.  Speaking of sheep spinning, there are several workshops with openings if you are interested in learning something new!

Please come out and see us and hug a few of your favorite (wet ;-) sheep!

Yarn Along - The Mystery(s)

I would say "It's still Wednesday somewhere!", but geography ain't my strong suit and probably it's actually already Friday there... ;-)

I really don't have time to be knitting anything right now, as anyone who's ordered a t-shirt can tell you as it's not showing up in their mailbox.  However, as anyone who's ever raised a bottle lamb or lambs in general can tell you...it's always something.  

Poor Liddy started acting punky the other day.  I knew something was wrong, but couldn't figure out what it was.  No temp, but she wasn't running and playing like she normally does and just looked like a lambie who didn't feel well.  I gave her a little banamine (like aspirin) and put her to bed, but by early morning she had a fever and was coughing, so the vet and I assumed she had a summer cold and started some antibiotics.

This morning, after I sat her back up from her morning shot (when I'm by myself, I sit her on her butt like she's being sheared), my hand came away with blood on it.  Not from the injection site, but from her lower right hip.  Huh???  Upon closer examination, she had a nasty abscess that had just burst. Back to the vet!

Of course, being sweet little Liddy, she hopped herself into the car, jumped up on the back seat and settled in for the ride over.  She hopped out, tootled into the vet's office, sat on my lap as we waited to be seen and charmed everyone in the waiting room.  

They said it looked like a fence nail prick.  I know my kitchen's a bit treacherous, but... We'll probably never know.  Hopefully now though she's finally really on the mend and will be feeling better very soon.  In the meantime, while she was needing extra momma time, I got to knit the entire first clue from the Hole and Sons Isle of Purbeck Mystery Knit-a-long.

Look at the lamb in the picture on far right!

I ended up choosing some Jacob yarn I'd spun during the Tour de Fleece last year.  This would have been a top choice from the beginning, but I didn't have enough yardage.  I finally decided that in the grand scheme of things I'd probably take forever to get through even that much yarn (if at all!) and if I did, I'd just spin some more, maybe a darker gray.  If I'd actually had enough yardage, I can tell you that I'd still be on row 8, not 58.  

The medium gray is some early Jester and the almost white is some very early, maybe lamb shearing, of Beanie Baby.  I love the little hint of gray mixed in. We'll see if I keep cooking along, but the pattern is fun and pretty and I'm excited about working on it.  And, stopping for a few minutes to knit some lace is a good exercise in focus...that I'm sorely lacking right now.

Isn't this pretty?  And those petunias?  They are all volunteers from last year!  I've never had so many seedlings come back up.  

Speaking of so many of something, if you live in an area with fireflies, chime in if you are seeing way more than normal this spring!  And if you haven't noticed, go outside tonight and find a grassy field.  I've stood outside for the last three nights and just been amazed at the thousands flying over the front field.  It's the most I can ever remember and I've enjoyed them tremendously. Don't miss it!  

And just to make this as random and scattered of a post as possible, here is a close up of my brand new knitting needle.  I loved knitting with the Addi Natura needles I used for the Maisie sweater and treated myself.  The yarn started catching on the end...and I noticed a "perfect" little chomp mark.  As long as she's feeling better... ;-).

For my book this week, I'm listening to Bill Bryson's Notes from a Small Island and he actually mentions the Isle of Purbeck!  As are any of his books, hilarious :-).

Joining Ginny...

Tee Peek

The t-shirts turned out really cute!  I decided to go with the plain white shirt because I wasn't sure how light blue the light blue shirts were going to be.  That ended up being fortuitous because the festival's t-shirts this year are light blue.  Whew!  

The artwork...since the thoughts were pretty mixed with that as well, I decided to go with everyone actually standing out in a field ;-).  Besides, the blue and green is kind of my signature non-Christmas card look and heaven forbid I try to stretch myself a bit ;-).  Speaking of Christmas cards, there is a tag in each shirt bag with a diagram of all the characters, just like the Christmas cards.  

The shirts will be $15.  I will have them at the festival this weekend and then available on the website after that.  

Hope you like them!

Who's My Big Brother?

Why it's Baaxter Black! :-D

LannieK was the Random.org winner for her guess.  She'd guessed Woody (a good guess) and also asked how Woody and d'boys were doing.  They're all a little jealous of Liddy (or maybe it's just Baby B who's jealous ;-), but I think they understand she's their little sister and especially Spud loves to stand at the gate talking to her.  

They are also getting excited about the Kentucky Sheep and Fiber Festival this coming weekend! They'll be there working hard (they hope) in the festival's Hug a Sheep booth to benefit the local FFA and 4-H groups.  The hugging booth will be "open" from 1:00 to 3:00 both Saturday and Sunday and the rest of the time they'll be free to mug you for a FEW cookies and crackers.

I'm getting excited about the festival, too.  I have several fleeces I think are competition worthy and a skein of yarn to enter.  All the 2015 fleeces are skirted and look great.  The t-shirts (!) are supposed to be delivered today and I'm very nervously waiting for them.  Saint Tim's working on the new set of Lamb Camp cards and Auntie Reg and I are working on some hand painted spinning aprons.  

Liddy has been helping with sleeping through (which really is a help!) everything, especially the skirting.  I even had to hold her for her Mug Shot.  That's supposed to be the Maisie sweater I'm wearing and a white turtle neck...although now that Auntie Reg has pointed it out to me, my neck does look really long.  Long and thin!  Yeah, that's what it is ;-D  

Come see us!

Any Thoughts?

After a bit of confusion with the replacement Mug Shot mugs, they are all finally here and look great :-). Now to go back through emails to make sure I don't forget anyone.  If you are either waiting on an ordered mug or waiting on a mug to replace one that got damaged in shipping, it probably wouldn't be a bad idea to "remind" me.  

In the meantime, as things got confusing and drawn out with the re-order/replacement of the second group of mugs, our printing rep (you know you're a problem when you get assigned your own rep ;-) thought the design was cute and offered us a good deal on some t-shirts.  Yikes.

T-shirts are cute, but they're a bit complicated to order with what color, what size, what style of shirt, what design...  Mugs are easy.  Order white mug, insert coffee (with milk and sugar :-), enjoy. At the risk of sounding like I'm turning into a garage sale, is there any interest in t-shirts?  If so, any thoughts about these possibilities?

1.  A Mug Shot design - on white or colored t-shirt?

2.  New possible design with no criminals....except one of those crazy Adventure Chickens leaving the scene ;-).

3.  No black line around outside?

4.  No background, but printed on a light blue shirt?

5.  No background, on a white shirt?

See what I mean?  To make things even more stressful, if I want to do this, I really should have them ready to sell at the Kentucky Sheep and Fiber Festival next month (aka less than 30 days away :-o) so I need to be making a decision very quickly (not my strong suit).  More coffee!