Tyler & Travis

Yesterday we sheared 3 of the cria from last year. If you remember we had two that looked a lot alike in the face. After much discussion & decision making I named them after Dennis' youngest grandsons, Tyler & Travis. I let the boys pick which one they wanted to be named after them. I named their "registered names" with a little more --------- Tyler Dennis & Travis Dee (Dennis used Dee a lot as his name with computer stuff). So named after grandsons with Dennis as a part of both. The lighter one is Tyler & the darker one is Travis.

Ranger

That's me on the left....................................................

An Alpaca Tale

We got Ranger in the fall of 2007. His mom died shortly after he was born (he was a huacaya out of two suri alpacas) and was bottle fed. Anyway Willie & I drove to Ridgeway in our explorer to pick him up and bring him home (stupid idea, the explorer ---- but then again I wasn't going to take the trailer either!!). I bottle fed Ranger until sometime in December when I contacted the person we got him from to say he was NOT wanting to wean himself at all. She said to do it immediately. So I worked on weaning him. Within 2 weeks of weaning him I saw him trying to nurse off of his friend's Mom. Cookie (Snickerdoodle's mom) finally allowed both of the boys to nurse off her!! Then it took us a while to get them weaned as there was so much snow it was hard to get them into a different area. Anyway since weaning them Snickerdoodle & Ranger have been very best of friends. Snickerdoodle goes where ever Ranger goes. They stick together like glue.

Today we sheared them. We sheared Ranger first & then Snickerdoodle. Ranger is still pretty friendly & would walk well on a lead. He was extremely "concerned" by what was happening to his friend. I'll post 3 pictures showing how close he got to the shearing & to Snickerdoodle. This is not typical for the alpaca to do!!

Shearing

Things have been busy just between shearing & getting ready to shear & other items. Due to rain we have had shearing problems. Alpaca need to dry off before shearing. We've had rain every afternoon almost. Dave & Ted, friends doing the shearing work full time, so it has been a challenge. We are almost half way through. Hopefully we will get a lot done today.

The garden is starting to grow, need to water today since there was no rain yesterday. I have pictures that I need to download & post............... I hope soon.

I'm working on a last couple of estate items, one of which has been a major item.

Keep my mother in your prayers. She isn't doing well and is having a lot of pain.

The Garden

Well, I need to run out tomorrow & take pictures of a number of things. The lilacs are blooming beautifully. Dennis really wanted lilacs and planted 5 - 6 starts. His pine trees are not doing as well, but some of them survived the winter. Dennis was a Colorado master gardener, getting his certificate in 2005. So I'm attempting to restart his garden. He has 5 raised beds. So far I've planted things in 3 of them. The other two still need to be weeded or perhaps I should say the grass removed from them. I totally need to rework the walk area around them to try and get rid of all the grass. In the meantime the flower beds are going strong with everything growing including weeds. It never ends.

The alpacas need shearing & hopefully we will get a start on that tomorrow. Way behind on that. I'm going to miss the Pagosa Fiber Festival as I truly need to start the shearing. Hopefully next year will go better.

Summer

Busy times. The water is on for the ditches. The heat outside has finally been turned on (thank you Lord) so perhaps summer is here. I'm trying to get gardening & flower beds worked on plus the grass...................seems like there is always something to do.

We dyed fiber in our guild meeting Saturday & everyone seemed to enjoy it a lot. Another learning experience for many.

I look around at all that needs to be done & look at how much Dennis has done each year. He had a tremendous amount of energy and got a lot accomplished during the time he lived here. I miss him.............more than words can tell.

Not much other news here, just keeping very busy.

Time Flies

Lots going on. Willie & I are taking two classes. One is hoop gardening through the extension office. It starts Sunday evening. The other is Internet selling through Adams State college community outreach. So this next week is going to be busy, as that's when most of the classes are. At least they are short & hopefully sweet. I'm working on the flower beds & hoping to get a better start on them than last year. Plus I'm working on Dennis' garden. A friend found a rototiller for me at an exceptional price & so far it works really well---except when it finds a rock & that rock gets stuck in the rototiller blade. Most interesting the first time around. Plus you must understand we live on the edge of Rock Creek!! Willie made me a turquoise necklace for Mother's Day. He couldn't wait to show it to me. He did a very good job on it. Sunday we'll take my Mom out for lunch & spend most of the day with her.