The Spinning Guy: October 2006

Sock Progress

Or, the Spinning Guy still exists and he has actual knitting content.

Here is my first sock. There is obvious progress. (Amazing how a photo can be washed out and too dark at the same time. Yes, my digital camera is over ten years old.)

I'm working with cheap Walmart cotton, since I thought that would be a good practice yarn and that a nice, thick, cotton sock would still be useful. After all, it's nice to be able to use practice projects. Since starting this sock, I've read a number of blogs making comments about difficulties knitting cotton.

This cotton is proving difficult to knit at times. The yarn has basically no give to it. If I make a tight stitch, the next row becomes almost impossible. It's a good education for keeping my tension consistent and not tight, but it's been a bit frustrating.

I'm pleased with my progress, but I have this sneaking feeling I'll feel like I'm done after one sock. I can already sense "second sock syndrome" setting in. I find I'm enjoying knitting in the round and knitting with double-pointed needles. I really enjoyed the body of the sock when it's almost zen-like knitting in circles, but so far, I've failed to find any sort of rhythm knitting the ribbing. Any suggestions on minimizing the flailing of elbows as I purl?

Fiber, Fiber, Everywhere

With alpaca care requirements reduced to the four males, I have started to find time for other fiber pursuits. While I have touched the spinning wheel – mostly to move it around, but I did actually spin – in the past week, most of my efforts have focused on inventorying the fiber I have.

Quite literally, I have a room full of fiber. I'm less than halfway through the inventory and I can hardly walk through the living room. The good news, however, is I think I have all the dark fleeces out of the guest bedroom and most of the dark fleeces out of the hobby room. (I can't be sure until I move all the light fleeces.) Most of the dark fleeces are inventoried and I already have forty three pounds of alpaca fiber on the inventory.

Granted, much of this fiber is seconds and thirds – lower grades – and I'll probably use some of it as garden mulch, but the forty three pound figure doesn't include the several pounds already designated for that use.

I'm trying to figure out how to use this fiber. There are several special handspinning quality fleeces I really want to keep and spin for myself. Much of the rest, I think I will have commercially processed. At this time, I have no desire to spin my own alpaca sock yarn, but it sure would be nice to have some available. Once the inventory is completed, I will figure out what I want to have made.

Has anyone ever knit or crocheted with roving? I'm thinking some of the thirds I have might make a nice rug and I'm thinking about working from a slightly twisted roving about an inch in diameter? Thoughts? Suggestions? Experience?

The Bright Side

It's not all tears around here, although they do beckon every time I look at the pasture. I'm not giving up the fiber side of the alpaca business. Although it hasn't happened yet, my plan is to devote some of my increased free time to working with fiber.

One of the real constraints involved in raising alpacas is that as the herd grows, the time spent caring for the herd increases, and the time available for fiber decreases. When we first got alpacas – three girls – I could complete chores in under 30 minutes per day and do a really good job in well under an hour. By the time the girls left, absolute minimum chore time was 45 minutes and that meant no pellets. Average chore time was over an hour per day and doing a good job meant closer to two hours. Routine care like training, trimming toenails, worming, and all the other little things that are easy and quick with three animals become time-consuming chores as the herd increases.

Now that my beautiful girls have a new home in Tennessee, I have more time in my life for fiber. I plan to take advantage of it.

River of Tears

They're gone.

All my beautiful girls are gone. We put them on a truck Wednesday morning.

All my cute cria are gone. I carried them onto the truck to join their mothers.

My sweet Georgia who gives me kisses and her gentle daughter Anna are gone. On the truck with the others.

There are no alpacas in the front pasture.

The girls have a new home in Tennessee.

Some are going to be bred, while others are going to new homes. I expect I'll see some of them again some day. Some I'm scared I'll never see again. If I do see them again, will Emma and Morghan curiously sniff my hat? Will Georgia still give me kisses?

Tears well in my eyes every time I think about it. I feel like my cheeks are a tributary of the North Umpqua.

Some time ago, we decided to get out of the day to day business of raising alpacas. It was a very tough decision to make, and it's proved an even tougher decision to implement. Keeping this blog positive since the decision has been hard -- note how few posts I've made in the past month. At times I have felt almost hypocritical, praising my alpacas while knowing I'm getting out of the business.

Every time I look at the front pasture, tears threaten. When I come home from work and instinctively look for the girls -- they're not there. When I glance at the pasture and see no alpacas, I instinctively check the shed -- and they're not in the shed either. My first reaction is panic. Second is tears.

We don't have human children. Those alpacas are our babies.

Last Wednesday, my babies got on a truck. Today, they're frolicking in a new pasture in Tennessee.

And I'm crying a river of tears.

They Grow So Fast

Edited to add more pictures

We weighed all the girls today. As expected, the adults are running a little heavy. We know about that and we've been working on it. Chloe isn't as much heavy as we expected – thank you Cailin for nursing so much – and the other adults are only about ten pounds heavier than where we want them to be. Ten pounds heading into winter isn't that big a deal.

Theresa wrote:
Wow! Cailin is so big already. Such a beautiful collection of ladies.

Young alpacas grow very fast. We look for ¼ to ½ pound per day weight gain, and often see almost a pound per day among young cria. Another measure of cria health is doubling birth weight in their first thirty days. Cailin was 21 pounds when she was born on June 1, 2006. This morning, she is 71.8 pounds.

Cailin at six days old on June 6, 2006 (from the June 9, 2006 entry).

Cailin from the October 1, 2006 entry.

And this picture taken today shows that Cailin is both large and small at the same time.

Morghan and Emma are also growing rapidly. Morghan weighed 18.8 pounds at birth on September 8. Today she weighed in at 36.8 pounds. Emma weighed 15.4 pounds at birth on September 11 and she's now 27.0 pounds.

I've told a lot of people that cria are never cuter than when they're three days old. By three days, they've dried out and recovered from the stress of birth. They often lose a pound in the first day after birth, so at day three, they're essentially back to birth weight and as small as they'll ever be.

Sure, month-old cria are still very cute. Some of their antics are actually cuter because of the vigor and energy. It's just that they get so big so fast.

ps. In June of 2005, this blog introduced Anna to the world at around 21 pounds.