Thanksgiving

It's been the most beautiful Thanksgiving weekend here in Ontario. 

Saturday morning was 25C and sunny.  I had a booth at the last Saturday farmer's market in North Bay.  I was looking forward to the nice weather for my outside booth, instead of huddling against a wet, cold, wind like usual.  Usually, my warm woolie goods don't sell as much in the warm, sunny weather, but for some reason, I had a super sales day.

Having a booth at the market is often a hit and miss for sales.  Some friends wonder why I would bother lugging my car full of goods, tent and tables, along with my sleepy teenager to the market for 4 hours of promotion in all kinds of interesting weather on a Saturday morning.  Sometimes I've wondered myself.  However, I always feel great after the market.  I talk to wonderful people, some are local, some are tourists from all over.  Many have an interest in the animals that I raise and the process of making fleece into yarn.   Most are appreciative of quality handcrafted goods.  Some are die-hard fibre art addicts like myself.  I always have great conversations there.  I've been involved on an occasional basis for 3 years now, and I've come to know many of the other vendors.  We are a committed group that know that our offerings of locally grown food,  quality handcrafted products and a great shopping experience bring value to our community.

 I have saved my seeds from my squash, lettuce, beans and tomatoes this year.  Packaged and labelled, they will go into the drawer for next year.  You may notice in the farm shot above that the middle small pasture has been tilled.  Part of that pasture will become a vegetable garden next year.  We will take the lessons learned from our little garden and expand next spring.

Saturday afternoon we went to the lake, cooked steaks on the open fire, then watched the stars over the lake into evening.  We slept with the windows open to a warm breeze.  In the morning, I took my coffee to the lake to watch the sun come over the hill and take the mist from the lake.  The lake was like glass reflecting the forest of autumn colours.  (Yes, you guessed it, I forgot to bring my camera.)  It was an incredibly beautiful scene, made even more special knowing how unusual weather this was for mid-October in Northern Ontario.

Somebody got massacred on the picnic table yesterday at home.

I spent part of today dyeing some beautiful colours while the turkey cooked.

I have much to be thankful for.

October Stay-cation

One thing our family does really well is work.  Declaring a "day off" is difficult.  As the "mom" of the household, I declared Sunday morning that we were going to have a much-needed "fun day".

With so much to do around here, it's hard not to commit to an hour or two of labour before taking the rest.  If it hadn't been for a broken ax handle, we would have put in an hour of chopping and piling our winter wood before hitting the road.

It's seems funny to say that on our day off from the farm, we drove to an agri-tourism destination called Leisure Farm.   The farm is a popular day-trip around our parts, although mostly for families with small children.  Our tall, teenage daughter still loves it though.  It was a beautiful, sunny October day.

This pig was hilarious.  He had his own pile of reject pumpkins that he was pigging out on.  Most times, he had his whole head stuck inside a pumpkin, and would then emerge with an orange-pulpy face.

There were about eight turkeys this size, trying to snooze in the sun by the parking lot.  It never lasted long, because some young children would invariably wake them up so that they could chase them through the parking lot.

The farm had wagon rides, a corn maze, a playground, a kids craft room, a marshmallow roast, and a kiddies haunted house.  You could also buy pumpkin, apples, lunch and baked goods.

This year, I reluctantly paid $14 for my daughter and I to go through a haunted house.  The sign said that you had to be at least 12 years old, so I thought it might not be too corny.  Well, my daughter and I had a very good scare.  My hats off to the young people that put it together, it was very professional.  There was always something touching you in the dark and the scenes that you came upon were very realistic and scary.  I probably have a bruise on my arm from my daughter clutching me so hard.  We screamed a lot in the dark and then laughed a lot when we got outside.  It was worth my money.

Here is a picture of my multi-tasking last week.

Judith McKenzie's "A Spinner's Toolbox" made is easy for me to get through peeling 10 lbs of carrots.  I had a hard time making time to finish watching that video, so having to sit to peel carrots was a good excuse to multi-task.

This video is a must watch for anyone who spins without the benefit of a good workshop or lessons.  I've been spinning yarn for about six years, and I cannot beleive that there were so many basic things that I did not know!  She covers worsted, semi-worsted, woolen, semi-woolen, slub and boucle styles.   I'm anxious to do some slub and boucle yarns as my next spinning projects.  I highly recommend this video to any spinners.

O Tannenbaum!

O Christmas Tree! It's fake - can you tell? I promise I will never buy another one...well, maybe if it comes with the lights already installed. 10 more days until Christmas. Our community public school had their Christmas concert tonight. The countdown is on.

Here's a spinning project that I've been wanting to try for some time now. I handspun the alpaca\merino blend singles and now I am plying them together with a polyester thread strung with beads. I'm finding it kind of tricky to hold the beaded thread in one hand to pop a bead off into the yarn while plying. The tendency is to hold back on the thread itself, so it is much tighter than the singles yarn. I'm thinking that the colour beads on the white yarn looks kind of clownish, but perhaps it will make a nice edging on a scarf or shawl someday. Come to think of it, it looks a little Christmas-sy itself.






Our chickens are not loving the winter...although they do venture out of the chicken house to get fresh air.

















The rooster Big Red is a handsome devil, isn't he?
The hen's name is Elsie.

People ask me whether alpacas like the Northern Ontario winters. Well, they do like the cold weather of December better than the heat and humidity of our typical August. They need shelter from the wind and from getting too wet, but other than that, they do very well in our climate. Today was a mild winter day, but when the sun started going down, it got cooler. In the twilight - which now happens about 5:30pm - I could see this 6 month old weanling and another running about playing and pronking. It's fun to watch.