Mud Season

Yes, this is a recognized season here in New England! The only issue I have with it is that normally it comes in April or May. Last week it was in the single digits----like 6 or 3. Yesterday it was around 50 and today around 40. While that may sound cold to some of you, it's warm for here and the snow is a meltin'. Hence, mud season. It's messy and ugly. Today was the first day that I put the halter on Tripper, the new alpaca baby. I didn't completely put it on but held the nose piece on him then took it off. I did this quite a few times. Baby steps. Do you remember Michael Vick and his fighting dogs? Last night on Nat. Geo. they showed 'dogtown', a vet clinic/kennel, that is rehabilitating his dogs. What a great thing!! All of the dogs had trust issues. Duh!? Anyway, I'll sign off as I have to get ready for my trip tomorrow. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

King Arthur

Finally! King Arthur arrived on Oct. 14th. I had been off from work for about a week but when I finally went back to work that's the day he decided to arrive. I called home to remind Marshall to check on Drama (the mama) and to look for the signs of imminent birth. We had just hung up when he called me back and said 'the babie's coming!' I was away from home for 2 more days. I couldn't wait to get home and see him! Since our farm name is Camelot we just had to name our first boy King Arthur. Alot of breeders of any animal have very fancy names for them and then have a short nickname. So King Arthur's nickname is Tripper since he has born while I was on a trip! He is a handsome boy. Since he's the only baby he gets alittle lonely for someone to play with. Sometimes it's myself or Marhsall and other times it's one of our other alpacas that he annoys enough to finally play with him. By the way, the peruvian word for baby is Cria. Baby alpacas are called crias. Hopefully I'll write again sooner than March!

Baby coming

Hi,

It's been awhile and alot has happened since I wrote last. It's now October and we're not so patiently waiting for 'Drama' to have her baby. Drama, a female alpaca, is due around October 20th give or take a week. It was perfect last year when Queenie was born---the sun was out and it was a typical New England fall day. I'm hoping it will be the same this year. We just celebrated the 2nd National Alpaca Farm Day on Sep. 27th/28th. The weather was awful and the crowd was not there but I had fun anyway. My store finally got set up so I enjoyed knitting ,needle felting and some rug hooking with my alpaca yarn. Those are my favorite things to do with my alpaca yarn. I'm also going to do some dyeing. One of these days I'll get around to putting some pictures on here. If you haven't arrived here via my website then here it is: www.camelotalpacafarm.com.

See you next time,
Sunny
A fiber faerie

Good Book

Good afternoon,

I'm getting ready to go to work but first I wanted to share a quote.

"The yarn forms the stitches, the knitting forges the friendships, the craft links the generations."
Karen Alfke

I got this from a book a finished a couple of weeks ago. The book is 'The Shop on Blossom Street." by Debbie Macomber. I loved it. I'd recommend it if you like to knit and want an easy read. It also includes a baby blanket pattern. Very cool.

Have a great day!
Sunny

Paso Robles

After having an article written about us in a local paper Marshall and I received an email from a complete stranger who was in NH visiting her grandma. She wanted to come by and see our alpaca farm and yarn as well as our grapevines. Especially our grapevines. The reason? For one she's a knitter (and yes she did buy some yarn) and the other? She and her family have a vineyard out in California! They started it 6 years ago and are selling now. And you want to hear something really wild? Her farm is in Paso Robles, Ca. The wild thing is that that was where I was born!! It's also where my mom grew up and where my dad first fell for my mom! What a funny coincedence huh? Marshall and I are now planning on going out there to help them harvest so we can learn something.

Why Peyton Place?

I named this blog Peyton Place because of my house. It's not that there's alot of drama. It's because the author of the book, Grace Metallious, used to live in the house that I now live in. It's a very cool house. It was first built in the 1750's. That's before the Revolution!!! I believe Gracie bought this house in 1956 and added on alot. It was basically a small cape and now it's a very long house that has 5 fireplaces, 4 bedrooms, a solarium, a butler's pantry (but no butler) and a 3 car garage. It has loads of character. We even think it's still haunted! The spirits seem to like us though. One of our neighbors knew Gracie really well and tells us lots of stories about her. Apparently she was a very smart woman. Her book wasn't well received here in Gilmanton because the townspeople thought she was writing about them. Maybe she was. Maybe she wasn't. I wasn't around but I love hearing about her. I did read the book and I really enjoyed it except for the part about the men in the cellar. I liked her writing style. You read the first line and you instantly feel the season. If you haven't read it you really should. It's tame by today's standards but good writing. I'll write more on the next blog, maybe even a picture!:)

Rainy Day

Blah blah blahhhhhhhhhh

May 30 in California

Good morning!

This is the day I've finally set up my blog. I'm sitting here in my hotel lobby (free wi-fi) on my layover. Woohoo! It's kind of like a snow day to be able to get things done while I'm here. Anyway, thought I'd tell you about a spinner I found at the Hopkinton Sheep & Wool Festival this month. His name is Jan (pronounced yahn). He spins thick,bumpy yarn and then dyes it these fabulous bright colors. I bought one of his skeins in alpaca of course. I've been too busy yet to knit with it though I'm itching to. Its in fabulous shades of purple. I've asked him to come to our farm on the 2nd Annual National Alpaca weekend on Sep. 27/28. He happens to have the weekend free so he'll be spinning and maybe even dyeing at my barn on the 27th and then on the 28th he'll be at my friend Jessie's farm (Simply Alpacas) also in Gilmanton. I can't wait.
Please feel free to join me on my new blog. I would love to hear from you about anything fiber, alpaca, spinning, knitting, farm life, etc.
Heres to more blogging and sharing at Camelot!
Sunny