Mid January News from the Farm

There is nothing like.......

Hello Colorful Friends:

Welcome to 2024 at the farm. I hope your New Year is off to a good start and that you had a nice holiday season. We are easing into the New Year here at Leyden Glen Farm. Each January I try to take a break from regular life to spend time with the books I have gotten over the last year that I never had enough time to read or look at. It is such a luxury to spend a couple hours reading and looking. Books rekindle my interest and enthusiasm into so many of my interests - craft, art, food, design and life. Most of the books I invest in (with the exception of the cookbooks and biographies) are full of color, spare amounts of type, inspiring photos and art, and perhaps a bit of how-to.

There is nothing like a real book that you can hold in your hands……. the act of cracking open the cover to discover the end pages, smelling the fresh ink, reading the introduction to learn what is to come, turning a page to see what is next….. The physical act of turning the pages, leafing through to glimpse a preview - it brings me great joy. There is such anticipation in a new book. I fear that generations to come will not discover what a pleasure it is to spend time with a beautiful book.

We had our first major snowstorm of 2024 last weekend. It was a beautiful couple of days. There is nothing like a snow day. Hibernating inside, venturing outside to watch the flakes come down, and then back inside for a hot drink. Snowstorms really do give me the chance to be still and enjoy my warm and cozy house near the woodstove.

When I woke up the day after the storm, the snow had stopped. The sky was bright blue and there was sunlight flooding through the windows. I immediately thought to myself - WOW! Mother Nature created a gorgeous painting overnight. The clear blue sky, clouds of white snow on the branches, a giant bright white down pillow covering our world. It was stunning.

Here at the farm, we are expecting lots of new life. There is nothing like lambing season. The anticipation of new life, seeing a little one slide out of a wooly sheep, watching the mother lick and nuzzle the new life, watching the lamb in 15 minutes go from a slimy yellow lump, to standing up on its gangly legs to look for its first colostrum, to seeing it the next day all dry and curly coated nudging its mama’s udder for its next meal.

Four lambs were born around Christmas with many more expected soon. Our sheep live in a greenhouse and wooden pole barn we built decades ago on land that has been in my husband’s family for over a century. Our sheep have always wintered there because the useful, bare bones, if not the most photogenic, infrastructure has been paid for. Sheep don’t need expensive housing - they wouldn’t know the difference. They need food, water, and a place to escape the elements although they are capable of existing 100% in nature. It’s a 5 mile drive from this farmhouse to the barns but it’s a beautiful ride on an unpaved, old-fashioned road. This year, for the first time in many years, we have about 50 sheep in the pasture outside our farmhouse. They are last year’s lambs that were born late in the season. They are thriving. There is nothing like walking outside to feed my chickens and seeing the field of sheep happily eating.

This past summer, our 12 year old Border Collie Kate passed away. She had a long, good, happy life and was Mark’s constant companion. Sheepdogs love their boss. They live to help and to make the shepherd’s life easier. Mark wasn’t ready to replace the hole she left in his life and I wasn’t going to push it. In November, our friend Bob was visiting and Mark asked Bob and I for help moving the sheep. The “plan” (I say “plan” loosely) was for the three of us to move 150+ sheep “just down the road” to a fresh piece of grass. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? With wet snow coming down, the three of us six and half decade year olds did the best we could. Two hours later, some of the sheep had moved but two splinter groups were having a good chuckle at the three of us trying to get them to move. After that afternoon, Julia and I went into rapid search mode for a new sheepdog pup. In early December, we drove to the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont to pick up a seven month old female Border Collie. Meet Annie.

There is nothing like a Border Collie puppy - the energy, the anticipation, the training….. Annie was bred by Steve Lyons and her heredity is pretty impressive. Steve imported her Mom Erin from Ireland and her Dad Ben from Wales. Her Grandad was Aled Owen’s Llangwm Cap, winner of the 2015 International Supreme Sheepdog Trials. She’s a lot of dog, for sure. We are hoping we can do her justice. She’s incredibly smart and is showing a lot of promise but it will be a bit before she is put on the sheep. Steve had started training her so she has a nice foundation to build on. Here’s a video of Llangwm Cap, her Grandad. There is nothing like a Border Collie. They are de rigueur if you farm a couple hundred sheep.

In the evenings, when I’m not reading and looking at books, I’ve picked up my Crochet Hexagons again. It is such a great winter project. Here’s my bin full of hexies waiting to be pieced together.

This is the first crochet afghan I made several years ago.

You can watch the Crochet Hexagon Project video series I did with One BIg Happy Yarn Company if you want to learn how to make these. They are so easy - even for beginning crocheters. The five videos in the series are here. Here is the longest video with the basic how-to crochet a hexagon instructions.

One Big Happy has kits available of five different Hexagon Projects composed of the gorgeous wool and alpaca Ultra Alpaca yarn to make the featured projects in the series. Check out the kits here. If you only want the PDF instructions for the Farmhouse Blanket (shown below, you can purchase that HERE. There are five different projects using the Crochet Hexagons - Farmhouse Blanket (shown below), Hexagon Garland, Flower Garden Cowl, Big Hexagon Blanket, and Vintage Hexagon Christmas Stocking. Each link goes to the PDF Pattern and on those pages, you should find links to the kits.

Here’s this week’s list of links of interesting things…….

• I’m enjoying the Sheep Shepherd YouTube Channel from Ireland created by a father and son sheep farming on some mighty difficult terrain. Eight generations of farming history is a good video to start with.

• It’s comfort food season here at our farm. I have made this Lasagna Bolognese twice. Yummy! It uses a classic bechamel sauce instead of ricotta cheese and we really liked it. The first time I made the homemade meat sauce as given. The second time, I used a mix of store bought and homemade tomato sauce. FYI - I used Barilla No Cook Lasagna Noodles and they were good. I doubled the recipe so the noodles would work in a 9 x 13” pan. It was excellent.

• I’ve been enamored with marbled paper for years. When I was in Florence for the Pitti Filati Yarn Show many years ago, I discovered an old school store Giulio Giannini e Figlio and bought many beautiful pieces of marbled paper that I have used for special projects over the years. Here’s a good video showing the technique and the store.

• Here’s a good podcast to listen to called The Hidden Powers of a Sheep.

• My friend Sandi Rosner has started a new Substack Newsletter called A Good Yarn which covers a myriad of topics. Sandi is a knitting tech editor by trade. She is so smart and witty and her newsletter has the same vibe. It’s not all about knitting FYI.

• The Roslindale Branch of the Boston Public Library is having a Yarn and Craft Supply Sale on March 7-9. Info here. This is a really good sale. If you would like to donate good yarn and supplies you no longer need, you can ship them to the library. Mark the box: ATTN: YARN SALE. All kinds of yarn and supplies accepted but please - no yarn with moths. Location: Roslindale Branch Library of Boston Public Library, Attn: Yarn Sale, 4246 Washington St, 02131 Mark your calendar if you are near Boston - March 7-9. FYI: Worth the trip.

• TECH: I found this article interesting - Why tech upgrades are now mostly downgrades

• Terrence Conran invented modern home retail. Now his legacy is crumbling. I was a big fan of Conran’s on Newbury Street in Boston and always shopped Habitat in London when I was there. There are still the books…..

• A little self-promotion…. me on the Long Thread Podcast HERE. Season 7, Episode 8: “The knitwear designer and creative director on creativity, fiber arts, and why she’s not farming yarn.”

Next week, I’ve got some big exciting news. In the meantime, I hope you have a good day and week ahead. Thank you for reading and for your support of my work.

Here’s to a colorful 2024,

p.s. Recently, I’ve had a big uptick in readers and subscribers. Thank you for joining me. If you’d like to learn more about me and my life here on Leyden Glen Farm, here’s a 7 minute video to watch.

This is the video about Annie’s GrandDad …..