Hello again from Maybelle Farm.  It's Friday March 23 and another sunny, beautiful day.  I cannot believe this is March in Vermont!  I'm 64 years old and I do not ever remember a winter like this and especially this hot, sunny weather so early and no snow!  My daffodils have opened today, which is about a month early for them.  I am concerned about the trees, shrubs and flowers budding out and blossoming so early too! What if the weather goes back to a hard winter and ruins all the plants?  Oh well... just another thing for me to lay awake nights and fret about.

I've moved sheep into pastures so everyone can be outside.   My very old, sweet Blake made it through the winter to be able to lay out in the sun and snuff around the pasture.  Tally is out in the front pasture and even ran to come back to the barn when I called to her.  Arly, my sweet white Shetland ewe, was out in a side pasture and caught her eyelid on a piece of wire and tore the lid!  There isn't really anything the Vet can do as it wasn't big enough to stitch, so I put warm salt/water compresses on it and an antibiotic ointment in her eye.  Today it looks like its really healing well which is a big relief for me, as she is one of my special girls.

Wednesday I UPS delivered a large box from Zeilinger Woolen Mill in Michigan which was filled with my sock yarn.  It is a beautiful dark gray.  The Mill is also making between 8-10 doz. pair of Shetland wool socks for me.   I'm attaching a picture of the yarn to this blog.   I just can't wait to get the socks!   I'm also going to try to make some socks with the yarn.  It is such a nice thing to get something made with your own wool.  I know the socks will sell really quickly.  I had some made before and sold them all so fast.  I have been having a lot of activity on our Etsy website shop recently.   I'm also getting things together to take to a shop called "Six Loose Ladies" in Ludlow, VT.    They take consignment items and I'm hoping to sell a lot of the beautiful roving and yarn that I have.  It would help to pay for shearing!

We are waiting to hear back from Craig & Philo, our shearers, as to when then they can come.  We asked for April 16 or  20 - which is during our school vacation week.  I just hope this works out as far as when lambs are due?  Our friends Olivia and Emma will bring Flopsy, Maggie and Cedar here to the farm to be shorn too.  So we will have Bill, Agathe, Olivia and Emma to help us that day for shearing.  I dread shearing and stay in the house and make drinks, snacks and watch my grandchildren.  Its such a relief when its over with all of the bags of wool weighed, labeled and lined up according to color.

Well, that's about all the news at Maybelle Farm for this time.  I will sign off and go get busy.  So-long from Maybelle MaMa

Hello again from Maybelle Farm.  Its Thursday March 1, 2012 and we are having a lovely snowstorm!!!!!  All the schools in our area are cancelled so its a playtime/snow day for lots of people.  I just love snow days as its an excuse to do some fiber fun things!  Not that I need an excuse to put off cleaning... just to putz around with wool!  I'm going to try to get a few new things added to our Etsy.com because it helps get more people looking if you add some new things......

Rowan (my granddaughter) had a sleepover here at Yaya's house last night.  She got breakfast in bed and can stay in her pajamas all day if she wants too!  I had to get dressed and wallow through snow up to my knees.  By the time I had climbed over the snowbank and rolled over the other side like a fat old Polar Bear, I was out of breath!  I had to wallow out to the barn and was puffin like an old steam engine by the time I got there!  The sheep are not going out of the barn!  When we get this much snow, it starts to slide of the metal roof and it really spooks the sheep, so the just peek out the doorway.  The three boys (Custer, Chet and Cecil) are in their little manger, happy as three little peas in a pod.

It's been so long since we've actually had lots of snow that you forget that it's still winter.  Darcy is going to put on a couple of pictures up at the farmhouse.  My nephews Norman and Tim are sugaring this year using my Dad's old sugar house.  Its so nice to think that it's being used and the smell of maple syrup is nice too!  When Darcy and David (my children) were little, my Dad would pack the snow down outside the sugar house, he would whittle wooden forks for them.  Then we would have homemade donuts that my mother made, sour pickles and sugar on snow!  I can taste it right now just thinking about it.  Last year David, Austin, Ella, Darcy, Rowan,and Declan took me to Jacksonville to the Maple Sugar breakfast and then we went to two different sugar houses and then to Whitingham school for a craft fair.  I hope we can do that again this year.

Well, we are trying to get a date set for shearing in April.  The Vet will come give shots to the three ewes that I hope are going to lamb early May.  I could do the shots but I like the Vet to just check the girls, as it makes me feel better.  There is nothing so cute or more fun to watch than tiny little lambs, "boinging" around the pasture.  My old Tally will be 15 yrs. old if she can make it to April, but she is looking and acting very old and tired.

The fiber classes that I'm teaching in Townshend with my friend Jenna are going so well and the students are very excited to learn about raising sheep and working with fiber.  I think this will help increase enrollment in our summer fiber camps.  I've started working with some of my fiber friends to set up classes for spring/summer/fall at the farm. Please check out our website to learn about more classes that will be happening.  We will keep adding classes as instructors sign up.

Time to go get busy for the day.  I had to sit down and write this blog to rest up from my trek out to the barn.  Too old and too fat for this much snow!  :-)  So-long from Maybelle MaMa.