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Wake up and demonstrate the effectiveness of the new teeth.
After breakfast (the point was taken) and before school, play with Rocky.
After school, help Dad in the studio.
A bath and laundry is in order before bedtime.
I spent the morning and part of the afternoon spinning on the back patio. I've mentioned the robin(s) who have lurked in the gardens. The other day I watched a robin gather vegetable matter from the front gardens and fly off with it. I wondered if the robin was nesting in the new trees across the street.
I heard the squawking of a really irritated robin today and went to check it out. No robin. A ferruginous hawk** has been soaring around the neighborhood today and yesterday the crows chased one of the red tails. I figured the robin took exception to a hawk.
What she took exception to was my neighbor messing around in her domain. I was opening the windows, looked over the fence instead of into my gardens and there was the robin.
I steathily sneaked outside to take a closer shot thru the fence.The gate was removed when the new yard fence was built on the south
side of their yard. The robin chose a perfect nesting spot - on the
north side of the remainder of the south fence post, on the east side
of the house which shelters her from the prevailing winds and the hot
late afternoon sun.
Along the way I appreciated some blooms in the gardens. We should have a good strawberry crop if the robins don't clean them out - which could happen. 
These orange tulips are under the service berry tree.
Now the skies are clouding up, the wind is howling and we are due for a nice spring storm. The lilac blooms were frozen the other night which is a shame. Several big lilacs were covered with flowers ready to open. I'll miss the fragrance but now I hope the heavy spring snow doesn't break down the leafed trees and plants.
As I write this, a robin is chirping somewhere nearby but no robin is on the nest. I can see I'll have another bird family to keep an eye on. The first bird family is the house finches nesting in the trellis on the south side of my house.
OH! And Cyndy surprised me with this book along with a box of other goodies which I need to properly photograph (a Fred Hattan hand made crochet hook, a felted crochet hook bag, a cutting from one of her plants and a bad of gorgeous black alpaca fiber). I have to admit I didn't "see" the sheep head just below the button (which is from either our Granny Smith apple tree or our Newport plum) - I saw it on her blog and slapped my forehead! I think this is one of the most meaningful gifts ever - and I will treasure it for a long long time! Thank you so much Cyndy!
**Speaking of the ferruginous hawks, our favorite local pair (there are several sorta local pairs!) are hanging around their nest a few miles from our house. It will be exciting to keep an eye on the nest.
The next time someone says "fiber blog? how dull is that!!" I have 2 words for them:
Invisibility Shawl
I'm about burned out on spinning the stash. I am finishing the "mystery fleece" (actually, roving) from 07. You may recall that I crocheted a top down raglan vest of part of this fleece earlier. I originally dyed the washed fleece a coral red then had it processed into roving then over dyed the coral for the subtle purples/blues for the vest. Not too long ago I over dyed the remainder of the roving darker blues/purples - I love this color way, too. I have enough for a sweater...maybe knitted of singles. Maybe lace (Barbara Walker's books mock me every time I walk by them!)
I decided to drum card silver/gray/white (nice fleece!) alpaca (Vandy from 
Benders), white Shetland lamb (Myrtle from riverbend/Shelly Nussbaum) with peachy/red/orange silk. Carol Bliss taught me to put the fine fleece (which the alpaca and the Shetland are) on the big drum rather then thru the tray. This produces less neps and a better batt. 
The Shetland has a bit of VM which still falls out. I only run about 1 oz thru each time so the batts aren't large but they are fluffy. I layer the Shetland, then the alpaca then the silk, alpaca again and finally Shetland. I don't run the batts thru a 2nd time. I'll pick out whatever neps there are when I spin.
Now I gotta figure out why the fiber arts web ring appears several times on my sidebar. I didn't notice that before...
April which is usually our 2nd wettest month turned out to be the 5th driest on record. I hope the drizzle settles in all day but I am not counting on it. Ironically (or not), my new neighbor is putting in sod and another is upgrading a sprinkle system. They say my yard with
the gravel and the mulch is pretty but they don't want all the fussing with flower beds. I guess maintaining a lawn is not fussing, is it, Sue (I so love your post about this!!)? And are all these beds necessary for everyone? No. We brought in dirt and compost so I rarely weed except when the neighbors' grass sneaks under the fence. I definitely do not need to water as frequently as they do. I guess I'll get off my soapbox now. :-)
M took a terrific photo of the service berry last week while it was in bloom. The local robins love the berries and have already been in the yard checking the progress of the fruit. They have a while to wait.
I promised Jacqui a better photo of the recently finished crocheted top. It was perfect over a long-sleeved shirt this morning.
I'm spinning the stash. I finished 8 bobbins of a turquoise Shetland (I put 3 bobbins on each paper towel tube and 1 per toilet paper tube) and am now spinning a gray Shetland, black alpaca, white angora, turquoise silk blend roving. I probably have a 1 1/2 lb of it. The photo of this yarn didn't come out well. The angora is a bit nubby so the yarn isn't smooth but oh, it's luscious to spin. I forgot how much angora sheds, tho.
Other then spinning and hoping for several inches of rain, today promises to be a quiet one for me.
I thought you'd like to see my kitchen window. M brought the sheep pot while I was sick - before shearing - which amused me. He baked sugar free cookies yesterday. Between the sheep pot, the shearing, the cookies and the pot of coffee he made this morning, I am feeling extremely blessed.
Yesterday, I finished a quick crochet top using a size D hook of 3 1/2 skeins of Red Heart luster-sheen which was on sale. I like the colors and it will go perfectly over some of my summer sleeveless tops. I hate going into an overly-air-conditioned building in a sleeveless top - too chilly. I'll keep this top in my car as a pullover. Naturally the photo is horrendous but M is sleeping so we'll have to make due with what photo we can get.
The wind from the backside of the big storm quieted down last night. What a relief. There were 80 mile an hour gusts which knocked down a number of pine trees. Thankfully we didn't lose shingles or tree limbs. And when I opened the curtains at dawn this morning I spotted 2 hawks in the cottonwoods across the street. One was munching on breakfast and the other was ever-so-hopeful. I couldn't ID the raptors with the sun in my eyes. We've had a pair of redtails hanging around tho.
My front garden looks good - I fussed over the white bleeding heart (it and the pink were here when we bought the place) and this is the best it's bloomed in 6 yrs! The purple iris are getting ready to bloom as are the fancy tulips. I was told to consider these tulips annuals and here they are - blooming for the 5th spring.
The daylily seeds I tossed into the leaky muck bucket sprouted - it will be fun to see what comes up. I put a clematis cutting in there too - it may not have survived the winter
.
Today, I have spinning on my mind - this is Suri alpaca/Anne angora/silk and Shetland blend (2 lbs - I went a bit nuts with the size of the blend) that Woolly Knob processed for me several years ago. I'm cleaning out my stash to send more fiber to the WK Mill - Marjean Bender says they are shearing their alpacas next week and I have a fawn fleece and a black fleece on order. I'll blend some with silk and some with silk and wool.
Frisko took over my spinning chair. He can sit on my lap while I spin til the day warms up enough to walk the dogs. I've had the humidifier going for the last week - amazing how much easier it is to draft and spin when the air is soft instead of the under 10% humidity it has been.
I hope the sun is shining and the storms moved thru your neck of woods without damage.
My garden path is filled with drying fleeces. The green is from an aged fawn Shetland ewe, the red is the Cheviot - I looked at my sock drawer and realized I needed some red crocheted socks. 
The white is B's white Shetland ram (the guy was bottle fed, is a pet and is named Nubby - nice fleece!), the gray is my karakul cross and the fawn is B's Shetland to finish her vest.
The washing machine and laundry tub have more Shetland soaking and I lost my mind and threw a trashy aged Shetland fleece into dye
kettles. Who knows how it will turn out - that's the fun of messing around with dyes and with fleeces, isn't it?
The humidity is about 8% or I wouldn't get away with any of this (I only have the 3 Barbados fleeces left here to wash... and that can wait til tomorrow). March, April and May are our wettest and snowiest months - we are down on moisture. I may as well take advantage of it while I can. Maybe Thursday's storm will catch us up and I'll happily be indoors spinning clean fleeces.
Speaking of spinning, this is a fawn Shetland out of stash. I don't know what it'll grow up to be when it's spun/2-plied - there's about 8 oz total. Doesn't matter, really. It'll be either knitted or crocheted project next winter.
It's pretty bad when a person forgets their typepad password. I haven't been showing my projects since they are top-secret. But the serviceberry is in full bloom and the sky is blue... 
The lilacs look wonderful. Dori like spending time in the gardens.
I'm washing B's fleeces from Saturday's shearing - she ended up with 3 Corriedales, 3 California Reds, 3 Barbados Blackbelly and 2 or 3 fine wools (or mystery fleece as we like to call it). She doesn't have the set up to wash fleece so I brought some of her fleeces home. Last year I got all those fleeces, put them into roving and ended up giving most of the roving to B after we dyed it. I really don't like those breeds. Well, Barbados is a hair breed and this is the first time I've known anyone who sheared it rather then letting them shed. So of course, I had to try it. B's thinking of Barbados Blackbelly rugs. She is spinning fawn Shetland for a knitted vest and ran out of fawn. There was a fawn Shetland lamb fleece (the offspring of the fawn ram provider of the fleece B is spinning) so I washed that for her today. I also washed a white Shetland ram's fleece for her so she should have enough fleece to finish her vest. I got a gray karakul cross (with rambouillet?) fleece that I washed today. It's really pretty - we'll see how coarse it is after it's dried. The sheep was a bit cranky during the shearing but remarkably there aren't many 2nd cuts. I wish we had gotten a photo of the karakul sheep - it was cute.
And a special friend has a birthday today. I hope it was a great one, Judy!
Yesterday we helped with a shearing. Mike's camera batteries died shortly after our arrival but this, at least, gives you an idea of what went on.
Not a whole lot of color left in the flock - quite a few sheep were sold the day before. High gas prices, high feed costs mean the possibility of more sheep sold in the fall.
Today we are catching up with yard work - that is raking the mulch, watering the gardens and lounging in the sun - wonderful!
One of my favorite places to walk is among cottonwoods along a western river. This time of year, before the trees are leafed out, 
I walk staring at the cottonwood tree tops.
We have 2 bald eagle nests and a golden eagle nest within 5 miles of our house
as well as 2 other eagle nests (bald? golden?) that are not close enough to walk under and gawk up at (to identify the birds) but I can see the nests from Highway 287 just north of Loveland. In fact, that's how I realized what was nesting - I saw the big birds soaring close to those nests (the nests are about 2 miles apart). There are 2 ferringous hawk nests (still unoccupied) close at hand too - haven't gotten a photo of them. Today I did spot a ferringous perched near a prairie dog town and the other day a red tail hawk floated down to nab a prairie dog just off Highway 34. We can guarantee to see the raptors in action when we are cameraless - the other day we watched 2 adult bald eagles soar just east of Ft Collins. What a breathtaking photo that would have been - the sky the intense blue, the shining white heads and tails of the birds.
Other birds are here, too.
The geese are paired up and make the river look homey.
We saw a lone pelican soaring above the Cache La Poudre river so stopped by a lake to see if they were in it. They were. There were 4 pelicans swimming with 2 cormorants.
A 3rd cormorant sat on a floating stump with the gulls.
