Business and Pleasure

Sometimes business for the angora bunnies just comes out of the blue. It really isn't that way, because it usually is some other breeder has given my name to the customer. But the phone call, when I do get it, seems out of the blue.

That happened this week. We were out in the orchard Tues morning picking apples. I had plans to make applesauce that day, since I was off from work. When we came in and Ted checked the answering machine, there was a call from a lady interested in Satin rabbits. Ted is doing that, oh damn I forgot to tell you, dance. Seems she called the day before and I was at work and he said I would be by the phone the next morning. All's well that end's well though, we finally made phone connections.

Turns out she raised rabbits for many years but was now down to one lonely little english angora. And she was interested in the 'new' satin breed. At the end of the conversation she had arranged to buy 10 oz of the satin fiber, to see if she liked spinning it. If she did, she was going to call back and try and twist my arm into selling her a breeding pair.

Oh dear, my best satin doe is probably going to go to a new home. She is a lovely copper color. I have no reason to keep her, I am not going to breed any more rabbits right? Still it is going to be very hard to sell her. The breeder wants the doe to have a litter right away, and that would be a good thing, the doe needs to be bred again this fall, or it will forget how :)

As to the pleasure part of this post, I had a chance to have lunch on Friday with my spinning group, and an internet acquaintance. There were five of us, for a great lunch at Rafferty's. At one point, we had baggies of shetland fleece, homemade soaps and pictures of fiber pets spread out over the table. Our waitress just had to come over and investigate, she said she thought she was going to have to remind us that pets were not allowed in the resturant! But the waitress was kind enough to express an interest in what we were sharing. The waitress was very impressed with a knitted swatch, wanted to give an order for a sweater right then and there. It was a lovely swatch, several browns and cream colors. The shetland was also very lovely, and from our friend's flock. I confessed to not liking shetland before, but I have only ever spun it from roving and it really did not make a very nice yarn. With my new found skill of spinning from locks, I can see how Shetland can turn into a lovely lace yarn. And this shetland was a lovely silver color. I just adore those gray colors that are almost silver.

Instead of dessert, we went to the local yarn shop. I dithered alot about all the new eyelash and ribbon yarns, the colors are really beautiful. More so in person, than the yarn catalogs. I just can not justify the expense right now, nor does it fit into my budget plan of buy one skein and try and duplicate it by spinning. So I went with my old standby and bought yarn for two different pairs of socks, and a pair of mittens (the pattern is on the yarn ball, it seems it will self stripe as a mitten too) I found a hunter green wool on the sale table, two big balls worth, which should be enough for a hat to match the mittens.

One of the group asked me if I was expecting a cold winter....well, some folks may judge the upcoming winter by the woolie worms. I think knitters judge it by the stack of knitting stash.

CW