Finally Some Rain

Well happy dance for me. We have had rain over the last 2 weeks in a good amount, but not too much too fast. It was about time too. It has been 2.5 months with nothing.

Now the humidity and mosquitoes are high and fierce. We are usually on the arid/dry side on the humidity levels.

The rabbits are coping well. Taking off their coats early was the best thing I could have done. The nights stay in the upper 70's into the 80's so the fans are going 24 hours. The air movement has been enough to keep them comfortable.

I will be teaching a class at the Winter Fiber Retreat in February 2011. It is called "hand carders vs combs". I haven't formalized the content yet, but it should be fun and informative.

The Heat and the Silk

Well the weather is completely full on summer heat wave. Three weeks early we went into upper 90's and 100. Did I mention no rain. We haven't had rain in weeks and none is forecast for the next 7 days.

I clipped all the rabbits down a month early. It was just too much to ask them to bear as the humidity was also higher than normal. I got 9 clipped down in 3 days and they look really pretty good. None were nicked. I use a small pair of pointed scissors. I can remove the coat with no 2nd cuts with them and with enough patience and technique the result is a smooth finish.

Muga Silk Top and Eri Silk Top have been added to my selection of hand spinning fibers. These fibers are so beautiful.

Quad Amadillo Family

Not a whole lot of change with the rabbits. I have kept them in full coat since the weather has been pretty moderate this year. We have had good rain fall amounts this spring and this is the first week we will see low 90's during the day.

This morning I did find one of my jr rabbits had died during the night. This was a cull rabbit since the doe had a hernia from birth. It ruptured during the night and the rabbit died. It is unfortunate I didn't get her put down in a more humane manner.


On the lighter side, there is a family of armadillos living under the house deck. I generally find them annoying since they did holes in the yard, and disrupt the flowers and garden. But, these 4 little ones were so cute and I have never seen such relaxed armadillos as shown by the pics.





I haven't seen them in groups this size before. I have seen two chasing each other through the yard. They jump amazingly high.



They sniffed my feet pretty throughly and decided I wasn't something to eat.

Rescue Pet Raffle

The American Animal Rescue Society group is holding a raffle to generate funds and if you are a knitter or spinner the prizes are excellent and, of course, a worthy cause. You can view the prizes here. They have Golding Spindles, a Namaste bag with all the trimmings and some very nice yarn.

Reducing and reusing appliances

We are the proud owner of a used, but new to us, dishwasher. One of our neighbors upgraded their kitchen to stainless steel appliances and they were removing a perfectly good white dishwasher.

Our old dishwasher is black and in bad physical shape. The door had corroded away at the edges and it was causing leaks. It became so bad I had to do the dishes by hand or mope the floor after every load. We were reviewing the dishwashers over the last month on the market and I wanted a white one.

I was visiting with my neighbor after checking the mail and when I mentioned my problems with the dishwasher they offered theirs as it was just sitting in the garage and they were actively looking for someone who needed one. Talk about fate and timing.

So we now have a great "new" dishwasher and instead of 2 dishwashers going to the dump only one will go. Reduce and reuse.