I need to buy a lottery ticket!

It's ANOTHER girl!!! That makes 4 in a row.

I'll head down there later today. First I have to collect the kids at the end of school, drop them at their respective activities and then I can head down there. Ethan will come with me so I'll have him take pictures.

Hmmmm.... need a name that starts with "D". Any suggestions?

Speaking of quick

Just after I posted my last entry, my cell phone rang. It was Wayne - "You have another cria on the way." The torture of having animals 40 minutes away!

That was quick

This morning I drove down to Hollister to check on my girls. Actually, I had to stop along the way at Costco to fill up the gas tank and buy a cat tree. Yesterday we were at this same store and the kids insisted we get our cats a tree. At $50, it was a steal but we didn't have room in the car for it so I told the kids I'd get it today. Ethan'll be thrilled - he made sure to remind me this morning of my promise to get it.

While at the ranch, I had 3 tasks to accomplish:
1. give Bliss her Naxcel shot for a bladder infection
2. weigh Ciara
3. catch Ciara visiting the poop pile to make sure all the plumbing works properly

I arrived at the ranch around 10:30am. I figured I'd be there a few hours trying to accomplish the third of my tasks. First, I cleaned up the pen. It gave me a chance to watch the girls. Kay (due sometime in the next few days or months) was laying down and shifting from side to side. Bliss is still going to the poop piles and peeing teaspoons at a time. Murphy is a phenomenal mom - she stands so well for Ciara when she wants to nurse, even moving a leg out of the way if it's needed. Ciara is growing like she should be. She was 19 pounds at birth and was a little over 21 pounds today at 5 days old. Perfect weight gain!

I've been giving Bliss her Naxcel shots (4 so far). This is a first for me - giving shots. Saturday we (Wayne and I) attempted to have me give the shot on my own (i.e. without him holding her). It didn't work - I wasn't confident enough. Today though, I caught her, haltered her, tented the skin, and gave the shot. When I was done, I looked at Wayne and said "Oh! I guess I did that all by myself, huh? Cool!"

A few minutes later, Ciara went to the poop pile and did her business. Steady flow of urine and a nice mass of feces. All's well on that front! Guess I'm done for the day! 11:30 and I'm outta there.

Look who showed up!

Thursday morning I got a call from Wayne to tell me I have a cria on the ground. Yippee!! But wait, it's not October. I wasn't expecting any deliveries until October. Hmmm.... I must have "misfiled" the information the breeder gave me. I'll bet she said she bred in October (which means deliveries in September) but I misheard it as they'd deliver in October. Oops. So while I was at the ranch checking out our new cria, I checked the other mom-to-be and sure enough she's bagged up. That means she'll be delivering soon. Or not - it could be a few weeks from now too. Darn alpacas refuse to read the instruction manual.

Oh - I guess you want to know whether the cria is a girl or a boy? Well, our first two crias were girls so we fully expected to have a crop of boys this year. Not so. It's another girl! We've named her Ciara - pronounced KEE-ra. It's Gaelic for "dark one" referring to coloring as in dark hair and eyes. The name definitely fits her!

Back from Alaska!

But when do things stop moving?

We spent a week on the Holland America cruise ship ms Amsterdam cruising around Southeast Alaska and the Inside Passage. DH took nearly 2000 pictures and is editing them for posting. I've seen the preliminary shots and he's got some that I'll definitely be getting printed and framed. My head is still occasionally "swimming" - apparently it can take up to a week for your equilibrium to work it's way back to normal.

As soon as pictures are available, I'll let everyone know!

Take Along Toys

As a mom of 2 active kids, I find myself "sitting" in the parking lot often. Waiting for school to get out, waiting for lessons to end, waiting for meetings to finish, etc. And with the cost of gas these days, I'm much more inclined to park and wait for the one hour lesson to finish instead of dropping off, going home for 40 minutes, and coming back. So I guess that means even more idle time in my future.

At the same time, I've been wanting to find something new to try. I wanted something that was small and easy to bring along for those idle times but I didn't want to go back to things I've tried in the past: knitting, crochetting, tatting. I thought about doing some embroidery but couldn't find something that inspired me.

Then I read in Tien's blog about the beaded beads her mom does. Now THAT sounded interesting. So I checked out the links to the beading sites that Tien provided and I was hooked! I was thrilled when I found the free bracelet pattern! Now I could try this new interest for a minimal outlay - since I already had beads and needles from other ventures, it only cost me a mere $3 for some beading thread.

I started the pattern last night. I knew I wouldn't have enough green beads to make a whole bracelet but I'd figure something out as I went along. I always do. About 4 rounds into this, I stopped and looked at the lovely beaded bead I had made. It was gorgeous! I could use something like this on my next designed garment. Heck, I could have used something like this on my final project a few months ago. I decided I'd continue and use up the green beads I had and then use the final piece in a simple necklace. The next hurdle would be in figuring out how to string a necklace together. I've never done jewelry before. Oh, but then I remembered I have some purple rat-tail leftover from my Draping Class's final project. That would work perfectly!

What do you think?

Trouble in Mac-land

Weaving of the towels is nearly done. But I've run into a glitch with the shafts. It's not a new problem - I've experienced this on every warp with this loom. I'm hoping someone out there can help. To recap - this loom was previously owned by a local weaver who passed on. I suspect the loom was either never used or rarely used. I was given the original invoice - it was manufactured in 1990. If it was sitting idle - that's a lot of years of deferred maintenance.

The problem is that sometimes when a treadle is pushed, one of the shafts (it varies which specific one) that ISN'T supposed to lift will partially lift. I can hand push the offender down to where it belongs - it feels "tight" like it was squeezed by the surrounding shafts into lifting. In other words, it's definitely not a case of something catching and lifting it. It's probably best to show you.

This is what I should see.


The black bar in the background is the top of the shaft that's partially lifting.


When there's a sticky shaft, the shed looks like this. You can see strings from the stuck shaft hanging out there in the middle.


I suspect the loom needs some lubrication. When I first got this loom I asked about that. Some suggested WD40; others suggested actual oil; and one suggested paraffin. Since my loom sits over carpet, I went with paraffin. I suspect it didn't work so well. It's the metal parts that I suspect need some help; I'm not sure wax was the right choice. Or maybe I just didn't do it right.

I have both WD40 and oil. In fact, I have some spinning wheel oil in one of those long needle bottles. Which do I use? And where do I put it?