until then

i so wanted to post before i leave very early in the a.m for my roadtrip to idaho with my boys-but alas i'm too tired,liam's camera is already in the car-wanted to show you my progress on buny buny the 3rd-no it is not finished-sigh and show you a picture of the packed to the hilt car and our trip mascots-oh well. i won't be posting on the road- i'm not that savvy-and that's okay with me- adios!

buny buny

okayokay-i have not given up on fibery things-summer is just so busy for me. thank the goddess school is done. in honor of the summer soltice i jumped on the band wagon for solar dying-thanks to pippi. something i've been really wanting to do-i've done it with kool-aid no problem. geez i swear that stuff would dye at the north pole with no heat-hey kids-have a drink-yum! so i did a practice skein of this ugly pale pastel green. i soaked the skein in warm vinegar water for 30 minutes. i put the skein into a small enamel pan and then i poured 2 dye colors(olive greeen and a gorgeous slate blue) and tightly covered it with syran wrap. i put it in the sun- i have tons! forgot about it and this is what i got-the picture does not do it justice as the colors are totally off.

the blue is more muted and the white is actually pale green. i look forward to more solar dying.

meet bunybuny the 2nd: he loves hanging about in the tomatoes.

i made buny buny the 2nd-for liam when he was maybe 4? he chose the colors. liam is now 9 and buny buny is the only stuffed animal he really bonded with-he's a serious guy!

now, i'm sure most of you are on the edge of your seats wondered who was buny buny the 1st. well, it's a rather tragic story. i made the original buny buny for carey-liam's older brother-who is 15. carey is my bonus son and quite an awesome human being-anyway-i made buny buny for carey when he was 5? sorry my memory fails me. anyway buny buny was tan with sea foam green ears and feet bottoms. carey-loved buny buny so, and took him faithfully back and forth from our house to his mom's house. well, a few years back carey forgot buny buny at his mom's and his little sister was worried that he would be lonely when they went to the peppermill in reno so she took the liberty to bring him with her when carey was with us. poor buny buny got lost gambling or doing other rogue buny activities while vacationing in reno,nevada(wink wink.)yes, it was very sad for all of us.

i am now embarking on buny buny the 3rd-for my bonus niece-elle(she's 2 1/2), whom i will being seeing next week when liam,carey and i head on an idaho/wyoming adventure. we will be camping at the tetons in wyoming and then heading to a cabin in idaho for family visiting. i'm stressing that i won't get her done in time. liam chose the colors.

here's the feet and the begining of the butt. i will knit it and then felt it in the washer. can i get it done-the count down begins-i have one week-besides getting all the chickens and garden ready for dear hubby to watch for me-thanks hon.!

you chicken fans out there might be wondering about hazel's new brood. well, things are going okay-i'm still stressed and a bit sad. the last chick to be born is kind of being shunned by the others. it has not grown like the others and is rather pathetic. mom ignores it and the other chicks seem to bully it. i'm letting nature take over and if it is still alive tomorrow-i think i will have to bring it inside. great, just what hubby wants-one more thing to take care of while i'm away-sigh! lucie and ruth are still royally pissed about the whole teen thing. and i fear i've made a grave mistake trying to increase my flock-i had beautiful hen harmony with only 3 gurls. and then there's luca brassi-remember? the devil kitty!(see past post) she is obsessed with killing the new babies. the minute she heard the peeping she has been on the roof of the coop extention tring to figure a way in.

hope i can relax during my 10 days away from the homestead-i'm already having nightmares.

proud grandma

i am the proud grandma of 5 new baby chicks. i went outside this morning and heard little peeps coming from the coop. there was one little black head peering out from beneath mama. i was so excited. but then panic struck-how is mama gonna get the babies down from the nest to get water? hazel wouldn't let me near her-growling and fluffing her feathers out like a male turkey! i quickly built a ramp. then, i started reading about the new brood and how the other hens could try and kill the babies-what horrid beastly little creatures chickens can be! i still love my girls but wow! such nasty behaviors. just then lucie walks in the coop and boy is she pissed at the little peeping sounds. not only does she have to deal with the teens but now, newborns.

i just finished the coop extension yesterday. but i realized i better use it for the new brood and the teens would just have to deal as these babies were so tiny about 2 inches tall and no match for lucie-she packs a mean peck! so, i had to figure out how to get the new family into the new room. hazel is very protective-i grabbed a baby and the little thing let out a blood curtling screech- i put it in the extension thinking mama would come to it and the rest would follow-no such luck-utter chaos. i tried luring hazel in with treats-no go-she associated this new room with power tools and hammers-she wasn't going near it. and i'm not helping by freaking out and feeling totally sure that all the chicks would be dead by morning.-first time grandma here. i guess i'm a bit fatalistic.

i calmed down and got a big board and kind of herded them in-yea! they have food and water and are separated from the others. i will sleep better now with no visions of canabalistic chickens. hazel is a great mom-i need to relax!

one thing i thought was totally cool is that hazel cleaned her nest after the births. at first we thought only 4 were gonna hatch, but then several hours later the fifth one happened and hazel brought all five down the ramp. i thought she might eat the shells but i found them stacked one inside the other in a neat little bunch-very cool.

gurl's bestfriend

geez-seems like forever since i've posted. my eye is so much better-i can computer again(computer is verb for me.) well, i finally kicked the teenagers out of the house-they were driving me nuts! my bathroom is once again mine-yea!

look at these lazy bums-ha!

i've been in rush mode to get the coop extension done. it's not quite there but almost. hazel is still setting and i don't know what to do if all 5 eggs hatch. she is beside herself with the teen invasion and i've been dealing with hen intervention trying to introduce the new flock. lucy and ruth are pissed cause their baby food tastes better than their laying pellets.

here's the coop as of today:

i could not have done it with out my dewalt 12 volt- a gurl's best friend!

well, we already reached triple digits on my side of the hill and i'm ready to hit the road and spend the summer in ireland- i want, i need, i have to have-mist, drizzle,fog, clouds and beer. i must have a sun allergy. but when it's hot and you want a cold home brew- be careful about the quick chill-sigh!

now this is what i call a cold beer!

i have not been fibery lately-due to my eye injury(previous post) i know-piss me off!!!! i did harvest some calendula and started soaking it in olive oil for my healing salve.

i put them in the sun for a few weeks and let the magic happen-maybe i will do a quick post on how to make healing salve. later. all work and no play makes "woolydaisy" a crazy bitch so little son and i hit the grass valley blue grass festival-( this is Not big son's cup o tea-he's 15)- we had a ball!

i want to get a group of spinners to come out next year like we do for the celtic festifal-imagine how fast we could spin with all that quik pickin!

now i'm trying not to be jealous or anything but shit, when these 14 year olds get up and blast a hole in your pants with their banjo playing you gotta think they came out of the womb with a banjo in their hands! like this cute little one-sorry i don't remember her name as they were not on the schedule-she's pictured here with a guitar-but she rocked on the banjo!

it's so inspiring. liam lucked out and got a guitar. a beautiful red 3/4 size made in canada-with the right price-from the thin man(where i got my banjo.) liam plays mandolin and really wants to play guitar too. so i forked it out and he's in heaven.

my favorite band of all was "the greencards"-they are amazing-not traditional-but that is okay with me. i love trios!

the mandolin player was so hot-that liam's mandolin teacher actually said-"i gotta go home and practice." i was floored with their performance. check them out please! they did the best remake of "50 ways to leave your lover" i have EVER heard.

geez-gotta go! but i will leave you with some awesome liam shots of the bluegrass crowd:

this baby was all over liam's mandolin case:

just call me blanche

i probably shouldn't be attempting to type right now,as i can't see very well. i feel like blanche: one eyed!

this picture is from a book i'm reading: "the family story of bonnie and clyde," written by phillip steele along with claude's sister marie. blanche is clyde's sister in law -part of the barrow gang. her eye was injured from glass during a shoot out. i've always been fascinated by gangsters even as a child i pretended i was toting around a Browning Automatic Rifle in my violin case. no, i wasn't involved in a shoot out -my dear chicken lucie pecked my eye ball and i have a scratched cornea. bluury and double vision-it's quire painful and nauseating. she was sitting on my shoulder as she often does and blam she came from the side-i did'nt even see it coming. it was not a malicious act-chickens peck at everything, she probably saw my eye move and thought it was a tasty snack-ugh! the kids are having fun making up "far sides" about it. i'm laughing now but not at the time. here's my eyeball-i got the picture from the eye doc.-the greenish mark is the scratch.

i gotta go back tomorrow to make sure it's healing. it sure messed up my weekend. i had so much work to do and i missed spinning saturday AGAIN! blurry and double vision make driving a challenge and worst of all i can't even knit, read or spin-too nauseating. i'm trying to get my coop addition completed the gurls are getting so big. too big to still be sleeping in the bathroom-that's for sure. here's what i've done so far:
well, i can't stare at this computer anymore-too weird on my eyes-i leave you with a picture of sweet lucie. i guess her shoulder sitting days are over.

the long way home!

liam and i particularly liked this image painted on a back of a van in yosemite.

we broke camp friday morning, the 1st. said our goodbyes and headed home. the long way home. we left via tioga pass. stopping by tuolumne meadows. this part of the park was very mellow-nice! liam got carsick and needed some down time to recover: see above photo. rhodie wanted to take us to "Bodie."which is why we took the long way home. she thought we'd like it. we loved it!!!!! bodie is an old ghost town now a state park. upper desert-about 8000 feet with a gorgeous view of the eastern sierras. i was in heaven-i love the upper desert. the sage was strong and we met a shepard on foot with his 2 dogs and 800 sheep. that's another one of my dream jobs. sorry no pics-this was not something liam thought worthy of snapping-OH MY GAWD-is he really of my flesh and blood-obviously he takes after dad!)i took many shots but i'm still in the days of film.

there is only 5% of the buildings still standing-this place is awesome-antiques galore!-but you weren't allowed to take anything-liam said that bodie was his heaven and hell. he loved it but he couldn't take any of the treasures he found. i tried to explain that if everyone just took a little something pretty soon there would be nothing left. but i have to admit i had to slap my hands several times-there was so much cool stuff lying around. and when you peeked in the windows-my god! old sewing machines, woodstoves, beds-etc.! argh! but we were really good and didn't take a thing-man that was hard. here's more pics-


nice wooden spokes, eh?

here's the gold mine-liam loves taking pics in sepia.

this doll leg is my favorite picture!!!!!!

the best part of all we were surrounded by thunderstorms! it was incredible-lightening cracks and dark gray clouds-my favorite weather. when we viewed the museum they had a tribute to "rosa may" one of the local brothel owners. she was a beauty. little 6 year old raena was mesmerised by the displayed-taking tons of pictures of the "princess"-we all a great laugh-especially the rangers. i noticed she was buried outside the cemetery walls. next time i go i'm gonna put flowers on her grave.

we still had a long haul home so we had to hit the road-we drove thru lot's of smoke from a fire in topaz.-we watched the helicopter drop water from the lake. it was intense. we were starving and just couldn't eat fast food- we made it to reno to the wildoats deli right before it closed. god we were tired. we finally made it home -12 minutes past midnight-it felt good to be home.

yosemite!

as you can see i had absolutely no down time on this camping trip-this is as far as i got on my green faulkland handspun socks! oh damn! the trip was amazing. it was my first field trip with ralph(past post) and i'm still spinning from in. got in at midnight last night.

here's an abbreviated travel journal:

tuesday-the 29th, liam and i carpooled with rhodie and her kids-she drove. we got a late start. we left at 10:00(way too late) got there at 4:oo. many stops-hey we got kids! we were suppose to meet the rest of our homeschool group at 2:00. oh well. we quickly set up camp. and my new air mattress with the build in pump rocks-(camping after 40-it's an necessity!) ralph and the kids made an awesome bean burrito dinner which we quickly ate as we had to rush off to glacier point for sunset/moonrise photo shoot. i could go on and on about the spectacular,awesome incredible visuals of yosemite-but, you just gotta go see for yourself! this was taken on the way to glacier point. by the way liam took all these trip pictures. we were on a digital photography field trip with our home school charter.

the above pic is the beloved half dome at sunset from glacier point. on our way back to camp it was dark and we could see the lights from night climbers lanterns on el capitan.-sorry no pictures of that. we jumped into our cozy sleeping bags when we reached our camp. only to be awaken by a bear in our camp and later an effin car alarm!

wed. may 30, the sweet forest birds woke me up at 5:30(along with my bladder!) we all had a quick breakfast-uh-big mistake-instant organic oatmeal-nasty shit! i could have cooked the box and it probably would have tasted better. but we needed to get to el capitan meadow for early a.m. photo shoot. we left the group(liam and i are not big on groups-we are solitary beings.) we headed the opposite direction-to the base of el capitan and watched climbers.

after this photo opportunity we headed to curry village. this was the starting point of our first ever ralph vertical death march. all he tells us is we are hiking to sierra point-the trail was closed ion the 70's-but he knows the way-he just has to find it. okay. well this hike was a short mile hike but it was vertical climb of maybe 800 feet and much of the trail was gone due to landslides. it was intense! it was more climbing than hiking- and ralph almost got beaned or rather bashed in the head with a rather large falling rock- more rocks came down liam hid under a big boulder ledge and janie, morgan and i realized we were right in the line of fire-we had to pull ourselves up and against the cliff wall-that's when i started getting a bit nervous-we had many small children-youngest-age 4. we continued our ascent very slowly as not to lossen more rocks which was nearly impossible. we learned to yell "ROCK" when one one went tumbling down so people could cover their heads. after searching for the trail and finding what little is left of it we finally made it to sierra point-"holy effin mother of all"-the view was spectacular and breathtaking.-you could see 4 water falls. wow!
a very exhausted liam once we reached the point! we had a wonderful lunch at the top and headed down-ugh! going down is harder than going up! i totally tweeked my knee; each step down was a red hot poker searing the inside of my knee. not to mention rubber leg syndrome. i was in charge of 4 kids-and all i could think of is-don't let any of them fall off this chunk of granite. remember-i'm the worry wart! we all made it safely down-yehaa!(sage an 8th grader did it barefooted!) andwe were greeted lightly with a thunder storm we headed back to camp for dinner and saw a bear.
we ate a quick dinner and then headed out to olmstead point for early evening shots. this place was awesome. smooth granite-you can run right up a dome. liam was in heaven-his body forgot all about the strenuous hike. and was climbing like a mad man. we saw marmots and i finally got to see in real life-a pika! i have always wanted to see one of these-i love them!

liam took this pic of the back side of half dome from olmstead point. from here we headed to tenaya lake-sorry no pics of me and karen mooning each other from opposite shores. after sunset photos we had campfire and marshmallows and collapsed in our tents-zzzzzzzzzzzzz!

thursday may 31: thurs. plans were to go to lambert dome-(did i mention we were camping at hogden meadows? far from everything? so we had a lot of drive time involved getting to these places-the kids were getting tired of driving) when we woke early and had another long drive lay ahead and another short but very STEEP hike lay ahead and my legs were jelly and my knee was tweeked and i didn't want to wreck the rest of my summer with a bum knee-i opted out-so did rhodie and her kids. instead we did our own thing. ended up in yosemite valley as i wanted to see the "obata" exibit. but was very disappointed to find out that it did not open until the 9th. we did the tourist thing. met up with our group at three and climbed up to devil's bathtub. i think this a view from there-sorry no pic of the actual tub!-too many kids in it and liam would not take the pic-ha!

while we were in yosemite village rhodie and i tried to find info on our hike to sierra point and got scolded by several rangers as the reason the trail was closed was because it was too dangerous. here's a blurb i did find out though:

"In 1916, at the age of 14, Ansel Adams took his first trip to Yosemite and wrote in a letter to his Aunt Mary in San Francisco, that 'yesterday I went up to Sierra Point and enjoyed lying on my chest and looking over the edge-about fifteen hundred feet down-perpendicular.' He also reported that he had already made thirty photographs with his new Kodak Brownie-his first camera. The pictures were nothing special, but this trip inspired him to keep returning to Yosemite for the rest of his life. You'll be standing at the same spot that inspired Ansel Adams many years ago." wow- we felt pretty special and thankful we were all safe.

we had pizza in the village and headed out to our last evening photo shoot.

this pic is my favorite-well-the family is grrumbling about dinner-gatta go-i will continue our adventure later-the long way home!