Sunday, December 26, 2010

2011 Fleeces - Sneak Peek!

With the New Year approaching rapidly, your shepherds at Grace Valley Farms are preparing for a New Wool Year.  To whet your appetite, we have taken some sample photographs of the wool on five of our sheep.  You can see these pictures on the 2011 Fleeces tab.  We've also had numerous "sneak previews" of our other woolies ... wow, are there some nice fleeces under development !

Benjamin hugs Darby the lamb just before her wool was photographed.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Grace Valley Farms!!

  
The Meyer Family

“For God so loved the world, that he gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

One Frosty Morning

After a day and a half of foggy weather, the fog lifted and revealed our beautiful frosty surroundings! Since the temperatures were quite cold, the fog clung to almost everything. These pictures were taken at 0 degrees.

The view down our driveway

Frosty clothes pins on the clothes line.

Frosty Aspen trees 

Frosty Blossom

Autumn

Hello from Edison!

A frosty hay bale

Elmer, one of our Black Angus steers, was frosty too!


The frosty grass in our pasture was a beautiful sight!

Friday, December 3, 2010

Snow, and More Snow!

Last weekend we had a major snow storm blow through our area. The storm dropped 8-10 inches of snow in one day!

Benjamin shovles snow away from the barn.

Cecelia and Clover peak out of their snow-covered shed.

Since the snow was so deep, we kept our sheep in from pasture. We couldn't even see the grass in the field so we figured the sheep would have difficulty finding anything to eat. As a result, we fed them hay for a few days until some of the snow blew off the pasture.

Benjamin spreads hay for the ewes.


Breakfast time!

Carolyn munches on hay.




Bullet, our German Shepherd, loves the snow.

Friday, November 19, 2010

Winter Is Here!

After a beautiful, long fall, winter has finally arrived. This morning we awoke to find a nice blanket of snow on the ground. With more snow and below zero temperatures forecasted for our area, we set to work preparing the animals quarters for cold weather.

Even though we have plenty of shelter in the barn for all the sheep, most of them prefer to stay out in the snow!

Bernie chose to stay outside

Dora chose the barn

Edison and his flock of girls munch on fresh hay while Benjamin carries a bale of straw into their shed.

Spreading fresh straw in the sheep sheds.

Emily carries extra straw back to the barn for later use. 

Blossom prepares to go out to pasture.

Our flock of sheep meander out to pasture. Even with the fresh snow, the sheep know how to find plenty to eat.

Carrots, Parsnips, & Potatoes

The last of the garden is now harvested! Our root crops were still in the ground, so we dug them up just before the ground froze.

Ben and Doug sort through the carrots and parsnips.

The orange carrot harvest.  

Ruger (our lab puppy) admires the red carrots.

Ben displays our two largest parsnips. Together they weighed almost 4.5 pounds!

Purple, red, and gold potatoes.

Our Yukon Gold potato harvest.

Flowering kale 

After harvest, Benjamin relaxes with two of our dogs, Rocket and Ruger.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Daniel, a Lawn-Mowing Sheep!

One day while the lambs were in the barn, we noticed something unusual. Upon closer observation, we saw that there was a sheep standing on our riding lawnmower. The mower happened to be in the barn at the same time the lambs were, and Daniel had decided to try out the mower.

Normally the sheep mow our grass by eating the grass. Daniel, however, wanted to drive the lawnmower.

Daniel

Daniel attempts to drive the lawn mower while his friend Dixon waits for his turn.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Sheep May Safely Graze

Our sheep have been enjoying their green pastures. They go out to graze in the morning and come in at night with big, fat bellies!

Foreman (foreground) takes a rest from grazing while Corinna, Caramel, and Belvedere munch on grass in the backgraound.

 Cathy

Charity, Cathy, Rachel, and Blossom (foreground)
Annie and Curlianne (lying down)

Christina likes to eat the sanfoin in our pasture.

Heather, Cathy, and Charity

Meet a young spinner!

One of our sweet customers sent us a few pictures of herself and her grandson Graham spinning Betsy's wool. Graham wanted to learn how to spin so Grandma began instructing him.
Grandma teaching Graham how to spin. 

After a little bit of learning, Graham takes over and starts spinning. 

"Look, I did it!"
  
Here, Betsy's wool was spun into yarn. The little skein in the upper left-hand corner is Graham's skein. The big skeins are Grandmas.

This is Betsy's 2010 fleece, the one being spun in the photos.