Where Have the Sheep Gone?

For the past month or so, the sheep have been grazing our neighbor's fields. They got rid of their dairy cows a few winters ago (you can read about that here if you are new to the blog). They hay many of the fields, but sometimes the hay doesn't get taken off and winter comes. If the fields don't get mowed, small trees, shrubs, and all kinds of plants will grow up quickly. It doesn't take long for a beautiful green pasture to become scrub land.


When The Farmer asked them if he could put the sheep on their land, they relished the chance of having the sheep mow and fertilize the fields. Every day, The Farmer heads way up the hill to check to see that the sheep made it through the night and that no incidences occurred. Incidences around here mean sheep jumping the fence, coyotes getting over or under the electronet fence. About a month back, we lost one adult sheep and two lambs to the coyotes. It is never an easy day when one of the sheep is killed.

Try as you may, this kind of stuff happens on a farm. I don't write about it too much because it seems to upset people quite a bit. I have had to get used to the death and destruction while living here close to nature. To tell you the truth, I can't believe how used to it I have gotten. I grew up a suburban girl but I can surely say now that I've become a country girl. When I got involved in farming over 25 years ago, I was really upset everytime a coyote killed a lamb. I didn't see the sense in it. But as I listened to The Farmer who has always lived with nature (and who happens to be the Voice of Reason in this household), I began to understand that every being has to eat. And when you raise sheep, they are sometimes food for the local coyotes, hawks, and bears - or whatever else eats our sheep and chickens. I'm telling you, sometimes I think I am living my life on "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom" or a "National Geographic Wildlife Special."

So back to the sheep..... Disgusted as The Farmer was, and always trying to keep the wildlife out and sheep safe, he has now invested in a super high voltage charger for the electronet fencing. The snafu with this is he has to have a source of electricity to charge this high voltage system (or as he says "it will knock you down on your behind if you touch it Kristin"). Right now he is using an outlet in our neighbor's abandoned milkroom. The electric wire is strung a really long way. It crosses a wood road and he has it marked with some red cotton yarn of mine, hoping noone will drive a truck through it (shotgun deer hunting season starts next week). It's all a bit cobbed together but it is working for the most part and we haven't lost a sheep or lamb since he purchased this charger. The downfall to this thing is he always has to have a source of power. Previously, he used marine batteries to power the fence and although they are effective, they didn't throw enough current to keep the coyotes out.

I'm sure the coyotes will get in again and have a tasty dinner but for the time being, things are working. Eeyore, our guard donkey, does his job somewhat although stuff still happens. I got a first hand lesson in Eeyore's coyote techniques the other night when I was taking these photos. Julia and I were just about to leave the field. The sun was really going down quickly. We had to walk a wood road and get back to the truck. Wildlife starts coming out when the sun goes down. I know there has been a big bear in the vicinity and I really didn't want to run into him in the dark. I had the two dogs with me so I felt pretty safe.

As we were climbing over the fence, I turned around and Eeyore was stamping on Phoebe, our older Border Collie. He was then trying to pick her up with his teeth and throw her on the ground. Luckily I was able to call him off by screaming madly and rushing towards him but I was pretty scared for Phoebe. I know he is only doing his job and this is what he does to the coyotes. I suppose he thought she was fair game because she is a canine.


So there's a little farm update for you all. It is all in a day's work.

Thanks to everyone who came out to Webs. What a great bunch of people you all are. It was fun to meet everyone and show you all the projects from both Kristin Knits and Color by Kristin. The comment I liked best was - "Wow, the projects look so beautiful in the book but they are so much prettier and more amazing in person." And yes, I do agree with that, everything is always better in person! Being on this hill the other night taking photos of the sunset and the sheep - it was all even prettier and amazing in person.

Have a good weekend everyone.


(The house in the photos is a long ago abandoned house which is slowly decaying into the ground. I love to take photos of it - it has such a Andrew Wyeth quality to it, doesn't it?)

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Early November Colors

Beautiful late fall days here on our gravel road. I've been enjoying being out and about trying to soak up all the late autumn color. I know too soon that it's going to be really cold and not so pleasant for walking.

Red sumac against the cloudy grey sky


Tarnished yellow apples against grey bark


Changing sumac leaves against the gray forest


Leftover leaves before the wind blows


Rusty colored leaves against evergreens


An abandoned sugar shack blending into the gray and brown landscape


The abandoned house high up on top of the hill


From the field by the above house, the sky and landscape was so colorful


And finally, a sunset that was spectacular



Hope to see some of you tomorrow evening at Webs from 6 to 7:30!

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Book Launch and Julia Yarn Giveaway!

The big news continues! To celebrate the Book Launch of Color by Kristin, the fine folks at Webs and I are having a contest all this week ending on Friday. Kathy Elkins and I will draw a random winner on Friday. The winner gets a fabulous prize - a signed copy of Color by Kristin, the yarn for a project of their choice in the quantity for their size (if applicable) and the necessary needles, notions, etc. Pretty cool, huh?

Here's what you have to do to enter.

1. You have to read through this post over on the Webs blog and leave a comment.

2. Then you have to answer the following two questions leaving the answer in my comments section.

Question # 1: Have you ever done a steek and cut your knitting?
Question # 2: Have you ever added embroidery stitches onto your knitting or crochet?

Any more fun tid-bits you'd like leave are also welcome.

Remember, you must comment on both The Webs Blog and my "Getting Stitched on the Farm" blog.

Good luck! And as Kathy wrote, "let the commenting begin!"

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Starving for Julia? The BIG News! And Book Launch for Color By Kristin

I promised you all some news. So here it is... A few days late but exciting all the same.

On Thursday November 5th, I’ll be at Webs in Northampton, MA to launch my new book Color By Kristin from 6 to 7:30. This is the Book Launch - where I send it out into the ether and hope it flies! All of the projects from Color By Kristin will be there as will projects from my last book Kristin Knits.


Last Wednesday I taped a podcast interview with Owners Kathy and Steve Elkins from Webs. You can find the interview here on the Webs Yarn Blog. Kathy is delightful and enthusiastic and I thank her for inviting me to be on the show.

In addition, for all you internet readers and shoppers, I'm excited to announce that Webs is now carrying my Julia Yarn in their store and on their website. You can find Julia on their website here.


In addition to the Webs source for Julia Yarn, check your local yarn store. Here in the Pioneer Valley, Webs is just one of my local yarn stores and so it is very exciting for me that they have decided to carry Julia. Near you, your local yarn store may also carry Julia and I would hope that you would support them. Local yarn stores are quite like local bookstores, local clothing stores, and more. Local businesses have to fight to survive. Chain stores seem to rule America, as much as I dislike many of (but not all) them. It takes grit, determination, creativity, a possible bit of insanity and much more for a local yarn store to survive. Support them or they will disappear and you will be sad.

Sometimes I hear from knitters who would like to buy my Julia Yarn. Their local yarn store does not carry it and they want to knit the project just as I designed it in the colors I envisioned. They want to order the yarn from me. I’m not interested in selling yarn direct to knitters. I have no infrastructure for such a project, nor do I have the space to house bags and bags of yarn. My family would go mad and the cats would sleep amongst the balls of yarn. How would that be? Sounds like a nightmare for me.

I also strongly believe in the local yarn shop concept. So many yarn store owners are friends who I have know through over 25 years in the "yarn biz." I feel each and every knitting community needs a yarn store to service the knitters who live there. A yarn store is a great place for warm and fuzzy community. It certainly helps when I am in a needle crisis and can run right into pick up a spare set of 7 double pointed needles. (Tell me, where do they go? They seem to disappear at an alarming rate!)

There’s not a lot I can do from here on the farm to get yarn into your local yarn store. My Julia Yarn gets into your local shop via a sales presentation by a local sales representative who works for the fine folks at Westminster Fibers. My Julia Yarn is sold under the “Nashua” brand and those Westminster sales reps also sell Rowan, Gedifra, Regia, and more. When they call on a shop, they have less than a few hours to present all the lines they carry. Some of those reps choose not to show the Julia Yarn to the shopkeeper. And there goes your chance to buy Julia at your local store. Sometimes your local shop owner can’t afford to bring in another yarn and so they say no, maybe next year.

Me, sitting here on our farm, as you can probably understand, I have nothing to do with all of this. I send my Julia Yarn in beautiful colors out into the world, hoping the sales reps will show it and the yarn stores will buy it. If it doesn’t happen, I won’t know nor will I be able to do anything about it for you. For a fact, I know that there is not an inch of my Julia Yarn in the NY/NJ Metro area. What can I do….. Not a lot. Complain, oh yes. How far does it get me? Not far.

Color by Kristin Yarn Kits at Webs
So now, if you are living in those “Julia-starved” areas of the USA or Overseas, you can now purchase Julia from the fine folks at Webs. The very cool thing is that Webs has also built a Kit Option for all the projects in Color by Kristin. Each and every project from my new book along with photos, yarn amounts, needle sizes and more is listed on the Kits Page on their website. The website amazingly extrapolates by size each project, adds needles, the book and all. You can customize the order (don’t need needles, no prob). I can’t imagine how much programming this could have taken so the whole presentation totally blows me away. Check it out here and listen to the podcast if you like.

I’ll be at Webs in Northampton on Thursday from 6 to 7:30. Stop by if you are local or if you are up for an early November adventure! I’ll be happy to help you pick yarn for a Julia project and sign a copy of both Color by Kristin and Kristin Knits.

And... if you have been waiting to hear from me, I’m sorry. My modem broke two Thursdays ago before I headed off to Stitches. It is finally fixed and I am now back on-line digging through all the e-mails I haven't answered. Thanks to all for your patience. Julia Yarn at Webs Link Color By Kristin Kits at Webs Link See you all at Webs on Thursday Evening from 6 to 7:30!

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Interview with Kristin at Yarn Market News

Back in August the lovely Karin Strom interviewed me for a profile in Yarn Market News, THE magazine for yarn stores in North America. Karin is the Editor of this fine publication and we have actually been friends for probably 20 plus years! Karin and her husband came to visit us this past summer to do research for the piece from the October issue. This article is part of the roll-out for my new book Color By Kristin published by Sixth and Spring. You can read the whole article here if you like.

Don't you love this yarn apple on the cover? Karin and Joe Vior, Soho's Art Director, dream up the best ideas - turning yarn into art. I wish they had some kind of archive of all the covers to use as down-loadable wallpaper for my computer.

If you want to see a different kind of preview from Color by Kristin, check this out. It's been viewed over 4000 times! Wow.

I've got some big news I'll be announcing on Friday or Saturday. Stop back soon.

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Skeets and Another Color by Kristin Preview

The other day when I was at Stitches in Hartford, I was checking my e-mail. In the subject line there was one word - skeet. I opened the e-mail very curious to see why someone named Stacy was asking me about skeet shooting. In fact, I had to look up the definition for you because I didn't know exactly what it is: A form of trapshooting using clay targets to simulate birds in flight.

If you were like me, you are probably wondering why the heck someone was asking Kristin about trapshooting. Well, Stacy wasn't. After reading through the e-mail, I realized that Stacy really wanted to know about a knitting technique called "steeks." I rolled over laughing my head off. But actually, I totally understood her confusion. When I first started knitting, I didn't know what a steek was either. I answered her back and sent her the link to my Steek Tutorial I did back in January of 2008.

What is a steek? Here's the definition from Merriam Webster
Middle English steken to pierce, fix, enclose; akin to Old English stician to pierce
But what a steek is to knitters is found here.

The word and term Steek has been in my vocabulary for years and years. I think I first learned about it from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitting Without Tears. The more I learned about traditional knitting, the more I saw steeks used in different knitting traditions throughout the world including Scandinavian and British styles of knitting.

I learned to sew before I learned to knit so the "fear of the dreaded steek" was never something I had. I have always been comfortable sewing and cutting my handknitting. In fact over the years I have corrected many a sweater problem by cutting and sewing things back together.

When I started talking to Trisha at Sixth And Spring about Color By Kristin, I told her I envisioned working most of the projects in the round and that I would use steeks for the sweaters. She told me to not do too many because she feared it would scare off some book buying knitters. I guess I didn't listen too well because both of the projects shown above use the steek technique.


Quite simply steeking was the best choice for the knitting and construction of each of these project. I have confidence that knitters will dare to steek both the "Over the Top Shawl" and the "Southwest-Style Wrap with Sleeves." Steeks are actually used for the fringe section in each project and no sewing machine is needed.


I also used steeks for the Norwegian Dreams Pullover shown below. The steeks are worked at the sleeve openings and the neckline opening. Quite simply it is the easiest way to make a multi-color Fair Isle Pullover like this. You will need a sewing machine for this design though.


So, are you afraid of steeks? I'd love to hear your comments....

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A Knitty Surprise from Kristin

Taking a break from the Color by Kristin Previews and onto another preview of a Knitty! kind. The lovely Amy and Jillian asked me to be part of their Fall surprise. Here are what I call "mukluks" but what those clever girls have named Macarons. The instructions are up on the new surprise! Check it out here.


When you do projects for Knitty you have to supply your own photos. That is always a challenge to me. First I shot them a bunch of still-lives of the Macaron Mukluks. I sent them on over and although Amy liked them, she wanted legs. Those tree branches didn't quite cut it!

Lucky for me, one of my good friends Shalee brought her legs and feet to the rescue early one day last week before she had to head off to work. Here are the Macaron Mukluks with Shalee's feet and legs in them.


The slipper sock bottoms came from Fibertrends and you can check them out here.


This project is extremely do-able. Quick to knit, fun, and happy. A perfect gift for a friend who lives in a cold climate and a chilly house. The yarn is of course Julia and you can find it at your local yarn store. If not, ask them to carry it!

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