Alpacamundo Monday: Momentous Occasion, part 2

Back in January (2019), we dropped off our first-ever load of fleece for mill processing.  It has now finished processing and was received over the weekend!

There is beautiful yarn and roving.

It will take me a few days to get everything photographed and labeled.  Then the next step is to set up our online store!!

Holy Moly, I am excited!!

Garden 2020, part 1

Since I was grounded about 3 weeks ago,

• All of the extroverting activities I had scheduled thru April have either been cancelled or postponed,
• the San Francisco Bay Area (where my day job is located) issued a mandatory Shelter-in-Place order for 3 weeks effective 3/17,
• the State of California issued a mandatory Shelter-in-Place order for an unspecified period of time on 3/19/20.  Although the rumors are for 8-12 weeks, which would put it in the May/June time frame, and 
• both the State of Colorado and my county of residence have also issued mandatory Stay-in-Residence orders, with the latest extending to 4/17.

So it is pretty clear that many of us will be in a work-from-home situation for longer than a few weeks.

With St. Patrick's Day passing a couple of weeks ago, it is now our unofficial time to start planting early-season seeds... and since I did not plant my garden last year due to time constraints, I have most of the seeds I need to plant a full garden.

We had a storm on the first day of Spring, that took a few days to melt...

but I was able to turn the soil,

and plant the first round of early-season seeds over the weekend.

About 1/3 of my garden is now planted with varieties of Fava Beans, peas, carrots, onions, leeks, shallots, garlic, beets, spinach, mixed greens, and Swiss Chard... about 15 varieties in total.

If all goes well, we should have some fresh greens in a few weeks.

Fiber Arts Friday: New Normal, part 3

With being home due to COVID-19 concerns, my New Normal project has been my primary project for the last couple of weeks.

Since last time I have completed 23 more years (1896 thru 1919) and the first of three pages of instructions.

Of the 16 colors in the project, the first to be retired is the darkest blue (Solstice) in 1917.

Since my day job is tied to aviation, I decided to add a few life lines to this project highlighting a few aviation-related milestones.

The first to be captured is 1914, when commercial air travel began, but I neglected to include the Wright Flyer's First Flight in 1903.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!

Fiber Arts Friday: Submitted!

I've alluded recently to a long-term project I've been working on.

Last year I was preparing my Handspun Twinned Tibetan Mastiff Mittens for the Fiber Celebration.  While I did complete the project, I did not meet my intended deadline and the event was ultimately cancelled anyway.  These mittens were given to their intended recipient last summer.

So I have been working on another project since last March.

The Fiber Celebration is a juried event and this is my first entry into something beyond the County Fair.

The deadline is April 2nd.  I completed my entry last weekend.  Artist notifications are scheduled for May 9th.  The show itself, begins in June.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!

Fiber Arts Friday: New Normal, part 2

I have started working on my  New Normal Tempestry Project.

As a general rule, I'm not crazy about kits... because they remove the figuring out part, which I think is the best part... but in this case, I think the message is extremely important.

The data begins in 1880.  I am currently knitting 1896.

I really like the slow color transition that Linen Stitch offers.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!

Grounded... for a while

With the spread of COVID-19, I am officially not travelling for the next several weeks.

Certainly parts of my day job are easier to do face-to-face, but with prolific video conferencing and chat tools, my travelling is not essential.  So in light of the current uncontrolled public health concern, it doesn't make sense to continue with risky behaviors.

As a farmer, I am already a diligent hand-washer and don't get sick often.  But now that I don't have to pass thru airports, sit on airplanes, ride in rental cars, and stay in hotels, while having an erratic sleep schedule, I feel much better about our situation and readiness.

... and since a couple of people in my family are part of the 20%, it's imperative that I (1) stay healthy, and (2) don't unknowingly carry COVID-19 (or the flu, or common cold).

My comapany's EH&S officer shared this graphic today.  I don't know the source, but it is pragmatic in showing the similarities and differences between COVID-19, Influenza, and the Common Cold.

It also states what we know and don't know about the Corona Virus currently.

As far as I can tell Sudden and Abrupt mean essentially the same thing, with Abrupt "lacking grace."  Not sure how grace applies to medical conditions though.

I also find this map by Johns-Hopkins useful.

Stay Healthy, my friends!

Fiber Arts Friday: Estes Park Wool Market 2020, part 3

Swatching Complete

My Swatching Homework is now complete for the Finishing class I am taking later this year.

• 4  4-inch Stockinette
• 4  4-inch Garter
• 1  3-inch 2x2 Rib
• 1  3-inch 1x1 Rib
• 4  started, but incomplete Stockinette

The instructions did not ask for the swatches to be blocked, but since some of them were very curly, I decided to wash and block all of them slightly.

I also left all of the tails out since this is for a finishing class.  ;-)

I'm a little dismayed that I only had two stitch keepers long enough to keep the unfinished swatches flat, but I don't use these very much so I decided not to buy more.

Most of the white yarn was consumed.  The red will be the contrasting color for the class and the beige is now being used in another project.

I'm glad I started working on the swatches right away, because they took longer than I anticipated and now I don't have to worry about them until class starts in June.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!