The majorette and the baby clown! What fun we had!

Off to the Halloween parade!

Last Sunday we went to the Ohio Cup Disc Dog competition at Riverdowns Racetrack (in the infield) The weather was awful- it was cold with no sun and a brutal hard wind blasting us across the filed all day. I packed a camping tent to shelter the baby and that worked out really well. Mom joined us with some meatloaf for lunch and held the baby in the tent when we went out and took turns trying to throw discs to Speck in the toss-n'-fetch. Everyone in the family, even Fiona, did better than me. My frisbees flew like turkeys thrown from a helocopter. Speck was fantastic and undistracted by the other dogs and people there. He did so well for John and Broadus that they made the cut to go on to the second round. Broadus wound up winning third place Juniors- and he got a beautiful ribbon and dogtag medal.

I photoshopped this picture as a joke to show what the weather felt like.

I have wanted to take a picture of the kids and the goat cart with the fall colors for two years now and today it was warm enough for them to wear their German costumes. I was kind of hoping to get something greeting card quality, but my focus and timing were off today. The kids did great modeling under the circumstances. (headstrong goat issues)

I made Fiona a hat in 24 hrs- it was a very rewarding knit to have a start and finish. I used some white unspun Icelandic yarn I had recycled out of a Goodwill sweater. Yesterday I dyed two small hanks with Wilton's dyes and by evening the yarn was dry and ready to knit.

The pattern is a really cute elfin little thing with a mitered ribbed edge and short row filling in the ear flaps.



The color pattern was just something I made up. This hat really hugs the face and nape of the neck. It's tempting to always put ties on an earflap hat- but for this design that would be overkill. I finished the hat by 9 AM and it was big enough to fit me- I popped it in the wash and it felted down really nice. This is going to be a WARM hat. I'll make Angus one after we get through haloween.

Last week I put a lot of work into rehabbing our chicken shed. I pressure washed the old paint off, took off the old rotted trim and replaced it with new, reframed the door and built a new dutch door (which was a trick because the walls are not plum), put in a concrete step and ramp, repainted the rabbit hutch and the shed- interior and exterior, changing the color from peeling white to neutral greens. I want to do the block pony barn to match before winter, and I hope that I get enough warm weather yet to paint.

Bianca the bunny has not been feeling well and she went to the vet on Saturday for snuffles. She is now in antibiotics 2x a day and seems to be doing better on them. At first I thought the change in her behavior had to do with changing the color of her hutch- but when she developed labored breathing I knew it was more than that.

I'll finish here with some pictures of Speck's frisbee antics. He is such a jock and a joker. We play with him every night and he brings us a lot of joy. He is even developing a backflip- but it's difficult to catch on film.








Speck's herding is also improving as we are now letting the goats go loose out of their small pen to the big horse pasture. Speck is getting better at listening to me when I ask him to gently drive them out of the pen and he backs off when I tell him. He also knows that penning is the goal when we bring them in and he no longer charges inside the pen behind the goats- now he stands proudly at the gate with a grin on his face.