What's Fiberton Acres Up to in 2020?

First and foremost, Happy New Year everyone!  I am excited for 2020...which has already been quite exciting!

The new year finds me in Colorado for a couple months or so for shearing bison hides.  Bison fiber has unique qualities and is crazy warm (as it is their winter coat that we shear) and makes for some awesome gloves, hats and socks.  And it is a great way for me to become more adept at shearing!

Which brings me to....

What's Fiberton Acres Up to in 2020?

I don't like making resolutions.  But I do like making goals.  These are my goals for 2020!

1) Shearing, baby!

• The next 5-6 months are going to be filled with shearing!  I am shearing bison hides for the next couple months, and then on to assisting Shorn Shearing Service in alpaca shearing.  I help hold the animal while it is shorn, and this year my goal is to get better at shearing myself.  I am feeling more confident all the time (thanks to great training from Shorn) and hope to be semi-fluent in alpaca shearing by the end of the shearing season!

2) Do a freakin' pull-up and train for a run...

• Shearing has gotten me into the best shape of my life.  With that, my goal is to be able to do a pull-up!  I am hitting the gym fairly frequently and hope to hit the one pull-up mark by mid-year! I've also been thinking that learning to rock climb may help me reach that goal, too...  It has also been too long since I have trained for a decent length run.  So that is gonna happen this year, too!

3) More travel!

• This year I have a goal to visit a new country.  I plan on taking the ol' van to new places, checking out cool new places with shearing, and checking out a new country.  I have been lucky to go to Australia...the next one I really want to visit is a South American country, but I also have never been to Canada, so I have a good back up plan. 

4) But also more gardening...

• I realize though that I also need something that grounds me, and putting my hands in the dirt and getting to grow something is a big deal for me.  So this year I will be begging friends to let me come play in their yards in return for some veggies. :)

5) Revamp the Etsy Shop...

• And the Etsy Shop will be undergoing a bit of a ravamp!  It will focus on products and tools for yarn crafters, including organizing solutions, knitting needles and crochet hooks, drop spindles, yarn bowls, kits, new yarn packs and more!  These changes will happen over the next few months, and I will make sure to let you know as they happen.  I will still do custom handmade knit and crochet items but they will be by custom order only.  Just contact me through the Etsy Shop with your ideas!

What are your goals in 2020?  I love sharing my goals, as it makes me feel more accountable.  I would love to hear what you will be working toward in 2020!

I leave you with this.  I can't find who to give credit to for this awesome quote/image.  But it is pretty much my fav.

- Ash

Hitting the Road... Part 3 in the New Adventures for Fiberton Saga!

After I returned from Australia, I took two weeks to hang out with my parents and friends in my little town of San Miguel, CA. At that point, I had already packed everything up for the most part, so I worked on deciding next steps in my crazy little adventure.

December gardening with friends in Cali!

Winter on the Road...


I decided I'd first make my way down to visit family for the holidays in Prescott and Prescott Valley, AZ where I was born and raised. This was a perfect maiden voyage, as I followed my parents from San Miguel to there.  We were able to address bugs with the van as a small group, as life on my own for the first time was quite intimidating.  I didn't really want to let on...but being a single lady on the road by myself was a big change from my 17 years of marriage in a house or RV.  I knew I could do it, and was excited for it, but I welcomed not doing the first leg of my new life on the road alone.

Jazz Hands! (Thanks, Dad!)

The van did well overall, and I even spent a few nights sleeping in the cold AZ nights in the van to see how it might be. At that point it was not insulated, and, while I found out that I could do it if I had to, the cold outside and the heat from my body created condensation on the metal that was pretty significant.  That would have to be addressed for future comfort for sure.

Following mom and dad to SLC

After a great week or so in AZ, my parents followed me as far as Salt Lake City.  There we parted ways after (another) tearful goodbye and I decided to head to Colorado for a bit.  I had heard that there may be some shearing work over that way, and I wanted to check it out.

Wyoming in late Dec.

It worked out that I could help out with some bison shearing while I was there, which was a total trip.  During my time in Colorado, I generally stayed in AirBnB's rather than the van.  I did stay in the van one night and woke to this...

Meh...what's a little snow and negative degree weather...?

Needless to say, without the van being converted yet, it was not super nice to stay in it in the winter months.

Try and make the best of it! 

Springtime Travels...

After Colorado, I got the super cool chance to go on the road with Shorn Shearing again, this time getting to go first to the Southern Loop (FL, GA and AL).  I've always wanted to go to Savannah, not only did I get that opportunity, I got to do it during a tornado warning.  I felt like this was so much more authentic!  As Audrey Hepburn says in Sabrina (my fav!), "You get yourself, not a drizzle, but some honest-to-goodness rain..."  That's what Savannah gave me!  It did not disappoint me one bit.

\

I <3 Savannah!

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil is one of my very fav books and set in Savannah!

During shearing I got to see a lot of the country that I had not seen... mountains and valleys, rock formations and rivers, animals and much, much more.  It just reinforced my love for the road and getting to travel and experience as much as I can.  Van life was looking more and more up my alley.

I got to practice some llama shearing at Ranch of the Oaks in AZ

Prescott, AZ

Navajo Monument in AZ

Moab, UT area

Pretty river in Utah.

So now what....?

Upon my return to Montana in early June (where I had left my van to go on my shearing adventures) I jumped straight into truly converting the van. And that, folks, is where I pick up next post!

Ash

PS - In future posts I will cover some of the places I camped that were super cool, like the Navajo National Monument! Stay tuned!

Australia bound...New Adventures for Fiberton Acres...part dos...

So where did I leave off....

Hitting the road in my sort-of-converted van!

Well...let me back up a little.

After my split, I had decided to begin a whole new career. As you are well aware of if you follow my blog or social media (or Etsy shop), I am an avid yarn crafter and love working with animals.  About 5 years ago or so, I met an alpaca shearer who I was quite impressed with at a shearing day and I caught the bug.  I asked to help out whenever he came through the area.  It was fascinating work, and it dovetailed so well into my passions for travel, animal husbandry and fiber arts. And it was a physical challenge that I loved.

And in 2018, I was invited to be the worker for Shorn Shearing on all of the California and Arizona loops of the shearing season. It was an eye opening experience, and I was excited to begin learning to actually shear.  I sheared my sheep at the time, and then those of a friend with a small herd.  I was slow and it kicked my butt, but I loved it.

Shearing Champ, my wether ram...very slowly...

Then I got the invite of a lifetime for a girl who wanted nothing more than to see the world and do this work.  Working with the shearer at the largest recorded alpaca farm in the world...in Australia.

Me?!  Could I do it?  Could I keep up and work with 150 lb alpacas all day long for close to 4 weeks straight?  I knew I could, or at least I knew I was stubborn enough to do everything I could to make it happen.  There was no f'ing way I would let this opportunity pass me up.

So that is when I quit my day job, made the difficult decision to find loving homes for my animals, and made some tearful goodbyes to family and friends.

I took a train from Paso Robles down to LAX and then boarded my 15 hr Virgin Australia flight to Sydney one late October evening.  Is there a word that means scared/excited/self-doubting/eager/proud all wrapped into one?  Because that was me. (Scexselfdoeagpro...? No...that sounds like something weird you'd find in an unsavory location online...hmmm....don't google that. lol)

Soon enough I found myself on a new continent for the first time in my life.  I got into a car on the wrong side, and drove down the wrong side of the streets, which was both exciting and terrifying after sleep deprivation.

A cool alley in Cooks Hill, New South Wales

Merino sheep sculpture/building!

I spent my time there getting to do some sight seeing, as well as working the hardest I had ever done.  I liken it to running a marathon (which I have only done a full marathon once)...you question what you're doing (and why) over the course of it many times, but you feel an overwhelming sense of pride and accomplishment at the end.  My hands were swollen to the point where I had to cut several rings off and I was exhausted but I grew quite a bit stronger, both mentally and physically.

My first day...and first view of a truly full shearing shed. Soon to be much cooler alpacas!

After cutting my first ring off...

And after the first week and an empty shearing shed!

Our biggest day!  113 alpacas sheared! 

I also proved to myself and those in the shearing shed that I could do it. (I was the first female worker they have had in there in that capacity...) And I made some awesome new friends.

It was bittersweet heading "home"... I knew I was going back to the uncertainty of my new life...to a packed up van ready for new travels but to places I was still unsure of.  I was also excited to see my friends and family back in the states and recount some of the tales...like of the crazy (to me) animals I saw, and the lovely beaches I relaxed on and the great food and show off my new muscles.

Beach in Terrigal, NSW

Just a normal sized lizard to Australians...

And a 'small' spider...

At the zoo...these are like seagulls over there!

Sydney Opera House

Blowhole rock feature in Kiama, NSW

A koala at the Taronga Zoo in Sydney

So really...it was then I hit the road...

More soon!

Ash

Podcast Episode 10 - ¿Como se llama?

This week we talk LLAMAS!!!  Yay!  I want one so bad!  Check out this week's episode here at Soundcloud, or on your preferred podcast player!

Not a llama, but Ric begged me to post this.

Some of the things we reference this week...

Fiberton Acres and New Products

Shorn Store and Shearing Service

Our Patreon Page!

Our Email List!

Keeping Up with the Clampetts Podcast (and previous intro and outro music musician)!

All the Apparatus, our intro and outro music!

We leave you with this....

Llama Cheese...its a thing

Alpaca Shearing Fun Time!

Alpaca Shearing Fun Time!

posted May 1, 2015, 9:08 PM by Fiberton Acres [ updated May 1, 2015, 9:13 PM ]


Ok, I know I promised you more about Fiberton in a previous blog post, but I have been
busy the past week with something FARM related.... alpaca shearings!



Now, had you asked me when I worked in politics if you thought in the future I'd be traveling around the county, going to random people's houses to help someone shear their alpacas in 90 degree weather and enjoy it, I would say....well, I'd probably say that it would fun. But I'm sure I would be surprised by the question. I mean, even now trying to explain what I am doing to folks it seems rather strange. "What are you doing this week?" "Oh, I am heading out about 30 minutes drive from where I live to this ranch that has 30 alpacas and work ropes while someone shears them. It's a blast!"



And it's seriously true. I love it. Last year we went to a shearing kind of by accident. We met someone with alpacas, and told them we were interested in fiber arts and fiber animals. They invited us out to their upcoming shearing, and when we arrived, we were immediately put to work. I was on the ropes, helping to secure the alpaca so they would be safe while they were shorn. Turns out I am not half bad at it, and the shearers asked if I might join them at other shearings. I had so much fun meeting the owners of the alpacas, as well as chatting and joking with the shearers, that this year, I made sure that I was invited back. (AKA - I totally asked everyone if I could come again.)




Sunday through Thursday I had so much fun traveling all over the place, enjoying the warm weather, windows rolled down, blasting music until we rolled up to a house, where I'd don my gloves and head over to help with ropes, chat with people and play with alpacas. I'd bear the smelly green spit and occasional knee in pee to laugh with the folks around me, and more often than not get to bring home some of the spoils of fiber to play with at home. We would always come home completely filthy, which makes taking a shower and veging in front of the tv so very rewarding.



We finished our last day yesterday with the awesome shearers, but they move on to other cities all over the country. Gotta say, both the hubby and I are a bit jealous. I am sure if we did it longer we might feel differently, but I'd like to think not. We are already looking forward to next year. Now to figure out what goodies to make with these bags of lovely fiber.


Ash

PS - If you are in the market for folks that will take care of your alpaca and make you smile while they shear, or if you want to check out some pretty awesome stuff made from fiber they sheared, then definitely hit them up at www.shornstore.com!