Polly is nice and short, too, so I won't have to lay on her neck when going through the forest around here. :-)
On a cashmere note, I got my fiber back from Zielingers mill last month, and it was all noiled and pilled and unfit for spinning. 5 lbs of it! Luckily it needle felts really well, so I will be doing a lot of that. I like felting with that better than the wool I've been using, it's much smoother, and way softer! I can get better detail with it, too. I can't really get any refund or anything from the mill since they say on their website that "cashmere and musk ox may noil and pill when going through the dehairing machine". Although I had asked for the different batches I sent in to be put back in the bags they came in and to save those bags. They didn't do that, they put it in different bags, and it wasn't the same batches exactly. They did send my bags back, plus, they sent me a whole bunch of torn useless bags from other people back for some reason. So I paid postage on garbage I didn't want or need. Obviously they don't want my business ever again, which they wouldn't get anyway. Funny thing is, I used them before I got my dehairing machine and they did a good job, either that or I didn't know any better. It was long enough ago that I don't remember exactly what the fiber looked like when I got it back. Lesson learned. At least I sold my very best fleeces raw, so it wasn't a total loss. Everything happens for a reason, so I must be meant to use cashmere in my needle felting now, and focus on that more than spinning yarn and crocheting. I am enjoying doing that more than spinning and crocheting right now, so it's all good.
The days sure are getting shorter now. The fall colors are pretty on our road. We have lots of Mountain Maples which are nice and reddish gold, and the aspens are mostly gold now, too. I thank the Universe every day for planting me here.
The great "forest thinning project" is coming to a close. One more day of cutting down trees, then when open burning season starts, lots of slash pile burning and then it's done. The whole lower half of our place will be nice and open and the fire danger way down since there won't be much to burn if a forest fire comes through. We've had three close calls over the years up here, so now we are finally mostly prepared for a fire. I don't think we would lose any buildings, at least not the main ones. It would still be pretty darn scary, but we'd survive.
The garden is still producing a little food for us. We've had a couple of light frosts, but we had covered the green beans, so they survived and there is one more good harvest in those. It's warm again now, so we should get a good amount of produce still. I noticed a couple of zucchini plants even have fresh growth! John's greenhouse is full of tomatoes. Tons of them.
Well, that's it for now. Hope you are enjoying autumn!
