pnfcashmeres.com Blog

A lot has happened since the last post. John got back from his Alaska trip. He rode his bicycle from here to Haines, then rode the ferry back to Bellingham, WA, then rode home from there. He had a great time.
I held down the fort here while he was gone, as usual. Most everything went well after the first week. We got just enough rain to save the gardens. I froze quite a bit of peas.
I’m down to 51 goats, or I will be when the last two are in the freezer on the 1st. Now I will be hauling hay again starting this week, I think.
The Farmers’ Market is going okay. Last week I did quite well, this week, not so well. But, it will all work out in the end, it always does.
I’ve been doing some spinning. Working on some Alpaca I got a couple of years ago. I cleaned out and reorganized the fiber shed today. Found some more good cashmere to spin and/or sell! So I will hand pick through that and get the rest of the guard hairs out and spin some and sell some for others to spin, or felt with.
This week will be soap making week. Although I’m getting low on Olive oil. I only use the high quality organic stuff, and that isn’t available here in stores, at least not in bulk so it is affordable.
I’ve been taking the goats out into the neighbors’ places to eat. (with their permission) They like getting out there and eating all the good brush and stuff. They come in pretty full.
It’s that time of year when the rats start coming around. I set the trap tonight in the hay shed. I can smell one in there, and I see it’s poops. Stinky things. They are so disgusting! The cats have already killed a couple of them. This one will be the third one to come around. We usually get 9 or 10 a year.
We now have a mini horse. He’s a nice looking little gelding named Rascal. His feet were so over-grown when I got him, it was awful! I spent two hours trimming them so far, and they still aren’t all the way down to where they should be. At least now they are straight. I’ll be finishing it soon. I gave him some time to get used to having straight legs again, and now I’ll trim them the rest of the way so he can move normally and be able to run and buck, etc. He’s a very vocal horse. He has a nice musical whinny that he uses whenever he sees us. He reminds me a lot of Prince, my Arab I had for 20 years. I hadn’t realized how much I missed hearing him, until I got Rascal and heard him. Prince used to yell at me whenever he saw me, too.
Well, that’s about all that is happening around here now. More when it happens….

We are back to the hot weather now. The wind is blowing a bit, too, which is drying everything out quite rapidly.
Yesterday I went up to the Eureka Fiber Festival. It was Sunday so hardly anyone was there, but on Saturday I guess it was quite busy. It was nice to see fibery people again and catch up with them. Most of them I only see at the festivals, so it’s nice to be able to visit. it was warm up there, too. It’s always warm there, though.
All the goats were in their proper places when I got home, which is a good thing. Sometimes when I’m gone for hours, I come home to minor disasters. The goats get out and eat things they aren’t supposed to, etc. But, yesterday all was well. I had fed them a bit extra in the morning so they would be able to munch all day. As long as they have food and water, they stay in.
I now have 57 goats. by winter I will be down to 55. Then next year there will be babies born, and the number will go back up again. Then I’ll sell a few to get them back down by winter.
The garden is really full of weeds, but the veggies are growing in spite of it. I am harvesting a ton of peas. It’s hard to keep it watered enough with the warmer weather here again. With only one sprinkler at a time, there isn’t quite enough watering time to get everything. But, I’m trying. The peas sure are good. We had a good strawberry patch this year. I harvested some more last night. It’s starting to wind down now. The yellowjackets are really thick in the garden! I didn’t get stung at all, thank heavens. They are leaving the berries alone this year, which is good. I’m finally getting raspberries. We haven’t had any of those for around 3 years because of yellowjackets. They are pretty good!
The green beans have some blooms on them now. We might get a few beans after all. The corn is only a little over a foot tall, so I don’t think we are going to get any. It’s a lost cause trying to grow corn up here.
Well, that’s it for now.