Being a Smallholder

Sheep pre-natal check up

2012-02-05T21:25:00.002Z

As the first of our sheep is due to lamb on the 14th March, just over 5 weeks away. Now is the time we give the pregnant ewes their final pedicure, wormer and pre-natal check up. Thankfully, due to the mild weather we've been having recently, the ewes are in good condition, which considering their ages, ranging from 3 to 7+ years, is a good thing to see. Now is the time to start giving the ewes some feed concentrate, we give them one that is high is glucose to help against twin lamb disease, and by the time the majority of the ewes lamb at the end of March, they will be given a 1lb of feed each. We have been giving them some feed concentrate since we put the tup in. We always do, as it gives us a good chance to watch the ewes come to the feed troughs and we can quickly spot any problems as well as who's been covered by the tup. Now the feed troughs have been moved into the lambing barn to get the ewes used to being in the barn again as well as us moving amongst them, though as far as Allium is concerned, there is no way she is coming into the barn whilst we are there. She is like this every year, when she's in lamb!

The Camper van

2012-01-29T20:14:00.005Z

On Thursday we did a 600 mile round trip to Wokingham, via the M1 and M25, to visit 321 Away, who import Mazda Bongos and convert them to camper vans. Well after a good look round and a test drive, we've bought this Mazda Bongo....

It has to be registered with the DVLA and once that happens we will have a registrations number so we can sort out some insurance

Inside the front of the Bongo

We are having a side kitchen fitted, with extra seats to that we can carry 6 people.

These are the extra seats at the rear, and you can also see the wardrobe/storage space at the side of the fridge

Once the back seat is removed and the middle seat turned round, this is the space it creates, bearing in mind the side kitchen still needs to be fitted. But I think I will have plenty of room to pack all my fibre in to.
It's going to take 321 Away a couple of weeks to refit the Bongo out and get the registration details from DVLA. Once that's all done we will take the train to Wokingham to pick up our Mazda Bongo Friendee Camper van, and drive it all the way home. I can't wait.....

Keeping New Year Resolutions

2012-01-15T19:30:00.002Z

I don't normally make New Year Resolutions, but this year I've decided to list one or two things that I wanted to achieve at the start of this year. One of those things to do is to list all of the fibre that I have for sale on my Folksy and Etsy sites. Well I'm half way there to getting this achieved. All the photos are taken and all the Alpaca, Plant Fibre and some of the Merino Blended fibres are listed on both sites. So it may be worth taking a look. www.folksy.com/shops/willofibre
My other resolution is to find more Farmer's Markets to attend and so far things are looking promising, though I won't know for certain for another couple of months, so fingers crossed that it all works out.
On the smallholding things are just ticking over, the hens are starting to lay and one of the young cockerels that I hatched is starting to get aggressive, so he will have to go. The sheep are looking well and we start lambing (Missy) on the 14th March, which isn't too far away and in another couple of weeks we will have to start upping the amount of feed concentrate we give them, which seems strange when there is so much grass around, but it's not very nutritious for a pregnant ewe.
We've also had a couple of house viewings this week, but not heard anything back. We know that if the couple who came in July can sell their house, then we are on the move, but until then we will keep showing people round. It's tiring as we like to keep everything neat and tidy, just in case we have a viewing. So if we start a job we have to get if finished as quickly as possible.

What a difference a year makes

2012-01-08T20:39:00.002Z

We've been out delivering Yellow Pages again this year, and how different the weather is this year compare to last. High winds and mild days, where as last year we were battling through the snow. The high winds made for some interesting waves at Sandsend at high tide on Thursday as we sat in the truck having lunch, and some difficult walking conditions the rest of the week. But today was calm and warm and after we had finished delivering the last of the Yellow Pages this morning, I spent the afternoon in the garden replanting some strawberry plants and rescuing a gooseberry bush that we found when our next door neighbour demolished their shed in readiness to build a new one. I had Holly and Deefa with me, so they had a great time running around and just getting rid of some pent up energy.
I had one piece of good news this week, My application for a stall at Wonder Wool in Wales has been accepted, so along with my stall at Fiber East in July, I'm now just waiting to see if I get a stall at Woolfest in June to make it a hat trick of fibre events for me this year. Looks like I'm going to have a busy summer.

The start of 2012

2012-01-02T20:31:00.002Z

And on the 1st day of the New Year one of my Maran Chickens has started to lay, and today when I checked the nest boxes, there were 2 more eggs, one from the Marans and one from the Cream Legbars, now I know the days are getting longer.
So far this winter has, for us, has been very mild but with some very strong winds and the occasional days of rain. We could do with the rain and we've not know a winter without being at least ankle deep in mud. The sheep have hardly touched any of the winter straw or spent much time in the barn, though with lambing only 10 weeks away, we are feeding the sheep in the barn as it will be easier to catch any of them should we need to and they get used to the barn for when they are penned up for the 24 to 48 hours before they are due to lamb.
For us Christmas and New Year has, as usual, been a quiet affair. Though we went to the village barn dance between Christmas and New Year. A good time was had by all.
So what are our plans for 2012.... Well hopefully we will move, though not before we lamb, so until we know what is happening with our smallholding we will just continue to maintain the land, hedges, fences and house until we hand it all over. On the fibre front, I'm hoping to increase the markets I attend as well as be more proactive with selling on line via Folksy etc. But what ever this new year brings, I hope it brings good things. A Happy New Year to you all.

Wind, Snow and the final market

2011-12-18T21:46:00.003Z

We started the week off with the high winds that had been battering the rest of the country. Thankfully, to date, we have not found any damage, despite having gust of wind at around 30mph. We had already moved the sheep so that they now have full access to the barn, so feeding them is an easy task, but at the moment as they are spending time out in the field, so the weather can't be too bad, and considering that this time last year we had lost the barn roof and the snow was a good foot or so deep we really can't complain about the weather at the moment.
Saturday was my final market of the year at Botton Village and as I was driving over the moors to get to Botton it started to snow. Not a good sign as this market is out in the open I was not sure what to expect, but when I arrived they had arranged for the stalls to be undercover. I and another stall holder, Sue, were in the bus shelter. We had a quiet day, thanks in the main to the weather, which we all expected. But when you have made a commitment to attending a market I feel obliged to attend, despite the weather as you never know who will attend and what sales you will make.
The market at Botton Village was an experiment, on their part, for a year to see how it would go and as it has gone, in the main very well, so they are continuing them next year, starting in January, and not in March as other markets do. So where I thought I had a couple of months off to stock take and catch up on the knitting of hats, scarfs and head bands etc, that isn't going to happen. So the knitting needles will not be put given a rest over Christmas, they will be in action at every opportunity.
As next Sunday is Christmas Day I won't be blogging, so all that is left is to wish you all a Happy Christmas.

Saltburn Christmas Market

2011-12-11T20:43:00.002Z

Not a brilliant shot of my stall, but you get the general idea of the colours of my hand dyed wool, and if you look carefully you can see the Christmas lights between mine and Jill's stall.
Despite the bad weather earlier in the week, thankfully the weather stayed dry and calm, if a little cold. But what do you expect for December.
Like last month, this market was another good one for me and the other fellow stallholders. Lorna, who organises the market, does a really good job at advertising the market and is very particular about the stallholders she invites, so as a result the market is well attended every month.
All the stallholders were very "christmassy" wearing Santa hats and dressing our stalls with Christmas decorations. I also had some mistletoe to sell, which simple flew off the stall. Pauline, a fellow stallholder had made 10 lovely holly wreaths, which by lunch time she had only 1 left.
So that is the last of Saltburn's markets for this year until March next, and next week is my last market for the year at Botton. Let's hope the weather next week is as kind to us all again.

The latest markets

2011-12-07T21:13:00.002Z

At the weekend I was at two markets. On Saturday I was at the Brunswick Centre in Whitby, which was cold and very dull and I sold nothing. Which is most unusual for me. There was also no interest in my wool, again most unusual, so I doubt if I will be visiting this market again.
Then on Sunday I was at a local Christmas Fair at Lythe, the next village to us. It was a different affair, people were interested in my wool and I had some sales, which was a lot better than the day before.
On Saturday I'm at my usual market at Saltburn which should be good fun.

Manic dyeing, a day out and a poor market

2011-11-28T19:01:00.002Z

Most of last week was spent dyeing 13kgs of knitting wool in readiness for the next few weeks Christmas markets. I got it all dyed, priced up and packed away into bags by Friday, so I was feeling suitable impressed with myself, especially as I had the Teeswater Sheep Breeder's newsletter to produce and get out by the weekend as well.
A Day Out - On Thursday I went to the Knitting and Stitching Show with Carol, Judith and Sarah from the Tuesday night knit club. We left our house at 7.30 and arrived in Harrogate at around 9, managed to park at the Exhibition Centre before having a cup of coffee and a discussion on our "plan of attack" to ensure we saw everything at the show. We split into 2 groups, Carol and I wanted to look at all the wool and textiles before looking at the exhibits. We kept meeting up with Sarah and Judith every 2 hours to swap notes. We finally left the Knit and Stitch at 5.30, when it closed. We all had a great day, even if our feet ached terribly. It's a few years since I've been to the knit and stitch and I'd forgotten how big the show was and how inspiring the exhibits are. We all came away with our heads buzzing with ideas.
The Poor Market, on Sunday I was at a Christmas Market, along with my friend Jayne (the lady who does amazing cut glass work), as the initial contact was through Ravelry we were expecting a well organised, well publicised market. What we got was something entirely differently, 16 stalls in a sports hall, which had no sign outside to say there was a Christmas Market inside. Driving to the venue we saw no signs for the market and friends who knew I was going to the market and lived in the area could find nothing about the market either. Suffice to say, takings were poor. We did manage to cover the cost of our stalls, but I think we were the only ones who did and some stallholders left just after lunch. The lady I felt most sorry for was the cake stall. Her cakes looked lovely, very seasonal and a lot of work had gone into making them. She took most of them home!
I know from arranging the North Eastern Textile Event, just how important advertising/publicity can be and it is not something that can be done lightly or half hearted, needless to say next time either Jayne or I get a contact via Ravelry asking if we are interested in attending a market they are arranging, we will be extremely cautious.

Another Market and a bargain Spinning Wheel

2011-11-20T18:36:00.005Z

Yesterday I was at Botton Market, it's one I've not been to before, but despite it being outside, (I managed to get a stall in the sun), and a little bit off the beaten track, it was a fairly sucessful market, so I will be back there in December, the weekend before Christmas.
All this weekend in Danby, there have been two Christmas Fairs, one at the Village Hall, run by Esk Valley Enterprses, which we felt was a bit of a let down, the stalls were nothing outstanding and very "samey", which I think gives Craft/Christmas Markets a bad name.
The second of the Christmas Fairs was at the Danby Moors Centre and a couple of friends had stalls as this fair. Whilst we were looking at the stalls we found this spinning wheel

It's an old Ashford Traditional, in need of some TLC, which, after some haggling I bought for a 10th of the price of a new Traditional. Ashford do repair/maintenace kits, so we've ordered one, along with some oil to treat and feed the wood.
The flyer is going to take quite a bit of work as it's very rusty, but I have found a new one on the internet for not silly money, which if we have to buy will mean that for less than £50.00 we've been able to repair this wheel. The only other thing I will have to buy are some bobbins. Once the wheel is repaired Tim is talking about having a go at spinning?

Christmas is coming........

2011-11-13T20:48:00.002Z

I was checking my diary this morning, when it suddenly dawned on me that from this weekend and every weekend until Christmas, I am attending either a craft fair or market, and after my sales yesterday at Saltburn Farmer's Market, I'm going to have to ring my wool supplier to top up my diminishing knitting wool stocks, which will mean loads of dying to do as well. I'd better check my dye supplies as well just to be on the safe side.
Now that the days are getting shorter, the hens are laying fewer and fewer eggs and some have started to go into their annual moult, and so are looking very bedraggled.
Hotpot has now covered all the ewes he's with, so tomorrow we will be changing his raddle colour to blue, this way we will know if any of the ewes have failed to take the first time round. But it's 3 weeks since Frea, Missy and one of the Scotties were covered with the yellow raddle, and they have stayed yellow, so it's more or less safe to say they will/should lamb the middle of March 2012, and if the rest of the ewes hold, we should finish lambing around the 1st April 2012. A nice tight lambing, hopefully.

Saltburn Farmer's Market

2011-11-12T20:20:00.002Z

These markets seem to come round quicker each month, but thankfully the weather, yet again, was mild and stayed dry. It's hard to believe that it will be Christmas next month.
The market today seem a bit slow first thing, but it did give me chance to do buy some Christmas presents, then all madness seemed to be let loose, everyone seemed to want knitting wool and the sock and scarf packs that I'd made up also went down well with people shopping for Christmas presents either to make or give. It looks like I'm going to have to order some more wool as I've got another 4 markets to attend before Christmas!!
Today I was on the next stall to Wold Pottery from Loftus, and between customers we have come up with a new product for Jill to make, with a knitting theme, hopefully they will be for sale at the next market in December, just in time for Christmas. Watch this space.

North Eastern Textiles Open Day - and other things

2011-10-30T21:13:00.003Z

This happened last Sunday and this year's event proved as popular as the last 2.
We're not sure if as many people came through the door as last year, but all the stallholders were saying that they had had a good day with sales, so that's always a good sign. It was good, as always, to meet up with customers old and new, and many thanks to the ladies who brought their spinning wheels and spent the day spinning and chatting. There was a fair mix of wheels.
We will be doing this event again next year, in actual fact we are going to do 2 events, one on May Bank Holiday Sunday at the end of May and the 2nd in October, but we are moving the venue for the May event nearer to Pickering to give people nearer to York an opportunity to visit. As for the venue for October, well the jury's out on that one for the moment.
Hotpot has been busy again this week. He's covered another 4 of the ewes so he's now covered half of the them, and this morning whilst we were trying to change his raddle colour (it's now orange) he was sticking very close to Anya and a couple of the Scotties, so it wouldn't surprise me if they don't have orange bums before lone.
Today we took 2 of the cream leg bar chicks that were born in July to their new owners, Ian and Elaine. The hens are our wedding present to them, a few months late, but we had to wait until Ian & Elaine had their chicken house in place. We've already given them 2 maran hens, who have just started laying, another set of friends have given them 2 bantam hens, so with these latest 2 hens it means that they have a lovely little flock of hens scratching around in their garden.
I've got a load more dyeing to do in readiness for Saltburn Farmers Market in a couple of weeks time, but in reality I've only got next week to get it all done, as the following week I'm supposed to be working in Newcastle all that week! Well it'll keep me out of mischief if I've got lots to do!

Yellow Bum count

2011-10-28T20:45:00.003+01:00

I meant to post this photo on Sunday

It shows that 3 of our ewes have been covered by Hotpot
Which means these ewes will be ready to lamb early March 2012.
It's good to know that he knows what to do.
We'll soon know if he's working when we change his raddle this weekend

Playing with the dyes

2011-10-16T19:20:00.002+01:00

As it's the North Eastern Textile Day at Danby Village Hall next Sunday I've got some dyeing to catch up on.

This is 100% Bamboo yarn that Freyalyn helped me dye up at the end of September when she was here. The colours are really vibrant and I'm very pleased with the results, despite feeling that the dyeing process was so wasteful of the dyes. I'm used to dyeing my yarn through to "resist" and having no dye left in the water. But with dyeing this Bamboo, there seemed to be loads of colour left in the water.
This photo and the following ones are of the 3kgs of British Falklands Merino sock yarn that I dyed this week. The yarn has taken the colours very strongly and if I dye some more another time I think I will have to reduce the amount of dye powder used to get less striking colours.

All the same I'm pleased with the colour combinations.
Will have to see how well they sell next Sunday and at the next 2 Farmers Markets at Saltburn
I'm also going to put them up for sale on my Folksy Shop in readiness for Christmas.

Now just to get the 4kgs of BFL & Bamboo sock yarn dyed and then labelled in time for next Sunday!!!!!

Teeswater Sheep Annual Show and Sale

2011-10-09T20:31:00.002+01:00

This took place last Thursday, and for me, as their breed secretary, is one of the busiest day of the year.
We had 120 sheep put forward for the show and sale, and despite the heavy rain, most members managed to get their sheep into their respective pens without getting them too wet. All sheep have to be inspected, to ensure they conform to the breed standard, and once inspected, the grooming and washing began before the show, which started at 10.15am. Not all sheep entered are shown, but it still took over 2 hours to get through all 5 classes.
Once the show was finished and the Overall Champion and Reserve Champion were photographed for the 2012 Flock book, there was time for a quick cup of coffee and then it was on with the sale.
Prices, as always, varied from as little as £50 guineas to the overall champion being sold for over £800 guineas.
Apart from the Annual Dinner, held in January, this is the only time I see a lot of the Teeswater members, so it's good to put names and faces to the voice on the end of the phone.
If you click on the link below, it should take you to the photos I took of the show.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/68447127@N05/sets/72157627730366453/

Catching up

2011-10-09T18:21:00.004+01:00

I seem to have been a bit behind with my blog writing just recently, so I thought I'd better do a quick catch up on what's been happening.
I've done some dyeing of a wool that has some stellina sparkle in it. I think you can just see it in the picture

To be honest, once the wool is dyed, the sparkle seems to disappear, so I don't think I will bother too much with it again.
At the end of September our friends Freyalyn and Mark came to stay, along with Lunil, Bill and Jasper. As it was high tide at Runswick Bay when they arrived, we went off to pick some sloes.
.

This was our half the haul of sloes of around 7lbs, which are now in the freezer so they will be easier to make Sloe Vodka with. Not sure what Freyalyn and Mark were doing with their half of the haul. Though Mark was muttering something about going down to Aldi for some cheap gin.
The walk with the dogs at Runswick Bay on the Saturday afternoon, was not a long one. But low tide on the Sunday morning was around 9am, so after our usual breakfast of sausage patties, bacon, eggs and toast we had a good long walk along the beech.

We picked up some limpet shells that had holes in the top to use as Dis' to create narrow rovings for spinning. Not sure how effective mine will be but I will give them a try as I have a good selection of hole sizes, as you can see from the photo.
Yesterday I was at Saltburn Farmers Market, which thanks to the rugby world cup, was a little slow to get started. But once everyone arrived sales certainly picked up. That was until the rain and a busker with a squeeze box, who, not only played badly, but also so loudly you could hardly hear yourself think. I decided to pack away around 1.30 as my wool was starting to get damp.
Finally on the house sale. After a quiet August and early Setember, viewings seem to be picking up again. We've had one couple round twice, second time with a builder and they are just waiting for quotes from him to finally decide if they want to buy, and yesterday a couple round who are looking to start a livery business. They seemed impressed with our house and land. But time will tell if they put in an offer or not. We will just sit and wait. We do know that we have a definite buyer, once they have sold their house. I'm hoping we can get it all sorted before the bad weather of the winter sets in.

And then there were 21.....

2011-09-23T20:54:00.002+01:00

This is number of sheep we have left at the moment. This week we sent some "culls" and "fatties" to the mart on Monday morning and today Tim took the last of the Shearling Gimmers to the Horned Ewe sale, at which we got £74 each for them, which we are pleased with. The cheque for the sheep we sold on Monday also arrived this morning, which was a pleasant surprise.
We've only got 4 masham weathers left to go to the mart. We didn't send them with the other "fatties" on Monday despite the fact that they had reached the magic 40kgs weight as they felt too thin, so we wormed them and put them into a field that has a lot of grass and hopefully they will fill out over the next month, so we can send them to the mart at the end of October/early November. We want them away before the bad weather arrives, which if the the local farmers are to be believed, will happen before Christmas, as yet again the ewes are coming off the Moors fat and our remaining ewes are starting to pile on the pounds. So we shall see what happens.

Foraging....

2011-09-12T21:31:00.003+01:00

Yesterday, with the pending weather warning of severe winds, we went out foraging for the wild plums/bullaces from some trees on the common land and the trees in our hedges.

This is the result of our mornings work which amounted to a staggering 43kgs of fruit. We're making some in to wine, but the rest has gone into the freezer to use up at a later date.
Now that the strong winds have arrived today, if we had not picked the fruit I doubt if much of it would have been left today.

British Wool Weekend

2011-09-04T20:15:00.002+01:00

The British Wool Weekend was at Harrogate this weekend and as the Shetland Sheep Society were selling some of my Shetland Humbug for me, going to support the show today seemed the right thing to do. I'm glad I went, it was interesting, and I got to meet up with some old faces and talk about wool and it confirmed my decision that I should have a stand there next year, if June, the organiser decides to run the event again. I know that is was a big commitment on her behalf and it could have been publicised more, but the stallholders that went enjoyed themselves and were talking about attending again next year.

Peace and Quiet

2011-09-03T21:04:00.002+01:00

All is peace and quiet here today, as we took our 5 Maran Cockerels to Thirsk Auction Mart this morning. It meant a 5am start to ensure we were at the Mart by 7am. Last night we put the Cockerels into their respective carrying cages to save time this morning, but it didn't stop them crowing in the car as we were driving over to Thirsk. But as Cornflakes (our Cream Leg Bar cockerel) no has no one to compete with, he's just happy quietly clucking to his ladies. I've left the 2 remaining Maran hens in their original hen coup as I suspect that one of them has a slight attack of leg mite, so I want to treat her before putting all the hens together.
The cream leg bar chicks that were in the barn have now been moved outside into the plastic Solway hen coup to run on and grow on before I sell the 2 young cockerels and create one flock of 10 hens for Cornflakes to preside over. I might put leg rings on his daughters so in the future, if I decide to raise chicks again, I will be able to remove Cornflake's daughters from the run for a couple of day so that I collect fertile eggs from unrelated stock.

That Autumnal feel...

2011-08-28T20:30:00.002+01:00

There certainly is a feel of autumn in the air and after 22mm+ of rain on Friday, and Saturday being not much better I was hoping that today I could spend some much needed time in the veg garden. But with the wind blowing at around 20mph, that put paid to that idea.

I decided to catch up on some in door jobs and something that has been "haunting" my sewing machine for a few months now are some small bags made out of curtain material to hold your latest knitting project etc, to make.

Here are the finished bags, both of which are lined I had enough left over curtain material to make 4 of these bags
I found this material in the bottom of a drawer, of which there was enough material to make 2 bags. I originally cut out 3 bags, but I ran out of the curtain liner I was using to line the bags, so the second and slightly larger bag has the same frog material inside and out.

The bags measure approx. 11" x 12" and I've squared off the bottom slightly so that they look better.

Will be posting them for sale on Folksy tonight. Let's hope they sell quicker than I took to make them.

Digging up Potatoes

2011-08-23T21:33:00.002+01:00

After helping sort out the sheep yesterday, today the Hobbits helped me dig up the remaining potatoes in one of the deep beds and as you can see it produced a good crop of quite large spuds. Now just need to find somewhere to store them.

Sucessful day at the Mart, and the Hobbits

2011-08-21T18:52:00.003+01:00

On Wednesday we took our ewe lambs to the store's sale at our local mart. They made a good price, averaging out at £48.00 each. Needless to say we were not disappointed. Let's hope we do as well when we send the next batch in a couple of weeks time.
The Hobbits arrived today and one of the jobs they will be helping us with tomorrow, will be the weighing and sorting of the the weather lambs into stores and fats. I can see lots of running around tomorrow, for 2 middle sized boys.

Wool Dyeing

2011-08-14T22:10:00.003+01:00

As the weather has not been too good this last week or so, I've been busy dyeing up the 2kilos of Bluefaced Leciester/Bamboo sock yarn in readiness for Saltburn Farmer's Market in September. I've also taken the opportunity to upload them onto my Folksy shop site www.folksy.com/shops/willofibre
Have a look and see what you think.