Alpacas!

So my aunt is an animal lover. She rescues animals constantly. We would say it’s because she has a big heart. She would say it’s because she’s a sucker with a big heart. Amidst taking care of her parrots, chameleons, ferrets, horses, dogs and cats, she helped a local rancher with her fledgling herd of alpaca.




Sonny was born last spring and needed to be bottle-fed for a while. Because of my aunt’s relationship with the rancher, DeeAnna, we were able to go and frolic with them for a bit on Monday. This was the highlight of my Memorial Day weekend. They were sweet, soft and so much fun.


I got to take several samples of their fleece with me so that I could decide which animal’s fleece I wanted to buy. All proceeds are going to go back into raising the herd. I didn’t even know I wanted to spin until I met these guys. (And according to some of my spinning expert friends, washing and carding Alpaca is relatively easy)


Alpaca feels so amazing, both on the animal and after being sheared off. I got to pet Sonny quite a bit and his fleece felt soft and clean. I would pull my hand back after stroking his back and there wouldn’t be any hair on my hand and there wasn’t a greasy feeling. That’s apparently the difference between wool and alpaca. Wool contains lanolin which makes it itchy and oily and slightly dirtier.


When I got back home I met with my knitting buddies and shared the squooshiness (yes, squoosh is a regular verb around fiber fanatics) and someone said, “Oh, if you’re going to be spinning you need a drop spindle,” and gave me one! They are the best knitting buddies in the world! They gave me some cheap wool to practice on and then when I’m ready I’ll get some alpaca sent to me, I’ll have to figure out how to process it (clean it and card it) and then start spinning!




As always, my friend Paula has taken me under her wing and told me I needed to read these books on spinning, including Spinning in the Old Way.


Oh, and here are some other fun pictures from that little visit to the ranch.




Taking a Shower. Alpacas LOVE water. They saw DeeAnna's husband getting out the hose, and they very quickly made their way over to him.


They call Bebo the "alien," because if you come out at night, his face would be glowing, and that would be the only thing you could see. I really like how the fleece on his neck grows out "frosted." So neat!

Everybody has a garden right now. It’s like trés chic to grow your own veg. I’ll admit, I’m excited about it, too. I’ll be using my two hands to make food, coaxing nutrients out of the dirt. I’m trying to switch our family diet to more whole foods because I hate going to the megastore to get tomatoes and they’re bruised, flavorless and expensive. Why do we keep buying this crap!? Well, mostly because we want tomatoes when we want tomatoes, and screw growing seasons!



I have three heirloom tomato plants in the ground, as well as dill, basil, green onion, spinach, green beans, corn, oregano, pumpkin, hot banana peppers and jalapenos, and marigolds. I know I’m not putting them in the ground in the right order and I’m doing it really late, but I’m a recovering perfectionist, one of those people who used to be crippled by perfectionism. So, instead of being stopped by the fear of not doing it right, I just do it! So, I’m throwing some seeds in the ground and we’ll see what happens! If I fail, then I’ve lost a couple of dollars on seeds and a couple of plants. That’s part of the beauty of starting small.
Caleb is so proud of his corn. I had him plant it in the dirt outside the box because it should get pretty tall. We’ll see if it takes. He loves helping me water the garden, too.



I can’t wait to eat those tasty tomatoes, green beans and use those herbs. Here’s to fresh produce and trying something completely new!

Update: I have ONE tomato. That is all. :D