Ohno Update

I am delighted to say that Ohno (and Alice and Jerry) have finally adjusted to each other.

And Ohno seems to be recovered from a very severe bout of barberpole worms. His eyes are now nice and pink (the under eyelids) and his who demeanor has changed. Now he boings like a sheep, runs, tosses his head in joy and generally makes a nuisance of himself. Most importantly, he is finally putting on some weight.

These guys get a bit of cracked corn mixed with something call Hay Stretcher from the Tractor Supply outfit. They each get about 2 cups of this mix each evening. In the morning they are getting fresh hay. Starting tonight they will also start receiving fresh privit hedge branches and leaves. This is their winter fodder.

The weather has been ridiculously cold for this time of year. Last year was also crazy cold with entirely too much snow for our area. I fear this year will be the same. Fortunately, all three sheep have put on a good thick coat of wool. Ohno's fiber is very, very soft and he does appear to have a rather critical break in it... but next year we will not have that problem as we will treat aggressively for worms early on and throughout the summer.

I'm thinking seriously of investing in diacotamous earth to spread out there. Short of moving the sheep and burning off the pasture mid spring, I'm not sure how else to get rid of the freaking worms. I will keep researching.

Okay, maybe somebody gets it

I am not happy that they are making money from what is the core of my spiritual beliefs and they are failing badly to admit that there is already an entire religious belief system devoted to this, but it is an interesting article, never the less:

Connecting to Gaia

Spice, K2 and other fake Pot products

News Release [print-friendly page]
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 24, 2010
Contact: DEA Public Affairs
Number: 202-307-7977

DEA Moves to Emergency Control Synthetic Marijuana
Agency Will Study Whether To Permanently Control Five Substances

NOV 24 -- WASHINGTON, D.C. – The United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is using its emergency scheduling authority to temporarily control five chemicals (JWH-018, JWH-073, JWH-200, CP-47,497, and cannabicyclohexanol) used to make “fake pot” products. Except as authorized by law, this action will make possessing and selling these chemicals or the products that contain them illegal in the U.S. for at least one year while the DEA and the United States Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) further study whether these chemicals and products should be permanently controlled.

A Notice of Intent to Temporarily Control was published in the Federal Register today to alert the public to this action. After no fewer than 30 days, DEA will publish in the Federal Register a Final Rule to Temporarily Control these chemicals for at least 12 months with the possibility of a six-month extension. They will be designated as Schedule I substances, the most restrictive category, which is reserved for unsafe, highly abused substances with no medical usage.

Over the past year, smokable herbal blends marketed as being “legal” and providing a marijuana-like high, have become increasingly popular, particularly among teens and young adults. These products consist of plant material that has been coated with research chemicals that mimic THC, the active ingredient in marijuana, and are sold at a variety of retail outlets, in head shops and over the Internet. These chemicals, however, have not been approved by the FDA for human consumption and there is no oversight of the manufacturing process. Brands such as “Spice,” “K2,” “Blaze,” and “Red X Dawn” are labeled as incense to mask their intended purpose.

Since 2009, DEA has received an increasing number of reports from poison centers, hospitals and law enforcement regarding these products. Fifteen states have already taken action to control one or more of these chemicals. The Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 amends the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) to allow the DEA Administrator to emergency schedule an abused, harmful, non-medical substance in order to avoid an imminent public health crisis while the formal rule-making procedures described in the CSA are being conducted.

“The American public looks to the DEA to protect its children and communities from those who would exploit them for their own gain,” said DEA Acting Administrator Michele M. Leonhart. “Makers of these harmful products mislead their customers into thinking that ‘fake pot’ is a harmless alternative to illegal drugs, but that is not the case. Today’s action will call further attention to the risks of ingesting unknown compounds and will hopefully take away any incentive to try these products.”

Hurry up Solstice!

Sigh... I feel like I haven't seen my sheep in months! By the time I get home from work these days it's dark. The sheep have been fed (thank you, Ken) and are settling in for the night. I do not bother them once settled or it disrupts their whole world.

Sheep are smart, by the way. Jerry knows how to tell time and at 4 p.m. starts pacing the fence line and yelling for his evening meal (they get hay extender with either cracked corn or beet shreds). It's also time for the shepherd to check out the animals.

In the morning I put out hay before I leave for work, but they aren't overly interested in hay and prefer to nibble grass. I know they eat the hay when no one is looking (either that or the birds are flying in to steal it during the day when I'm gone) because it's missing within 24 hours. But they pretend to be uninterested when I put it out there.

Soon, they will start getting privit branches which is their favorite food of all times. They will love Ken with all their hearts and believe him to be bringer of all sorts of wonder until Spring when the privit stops coming and they start getting manhandled for their hair.

But I am waiting for Solstice when the days finally start getting longer again. My internal cycle is shuttling me off to bed around 8 or 8:30 at night and when I don't get home until 6 or so, that makes for a short evening in which to get things done.

China Study Discussions

Since someone asked about this, I thought I should share this link about the flaws being discovered in the China Study. The China Study promotes lots of soy and low fat... but it does include fish, fruit and vegetables which is all good stuff.

Now, I'm of the belief that one should not believe everything one reads. But I also believe that if you do enough research for yourself (including reading other people's research), you can at least attempt to come to an educated decision.

Differing tastes

My husband is a purist.

He likes his eggs fried, over easy. A little salt, a little pepper and maybe a piece of toast to sop up the yolk.

I made some mint chutney the other day from the Nourishing Traditions cookbook and when it was ready for refrigeration, I tasted a little. It was very, very salty. It was salty enough I thought for a moment that it was inedible. But under the salt was a lovely mint and nut flavor coming through so I kept it.

This morning I decided I wanted an extra boost of protein for my breakfast and scrambled a couple of organic eggs in lard (how daring for me!) and dressed the plate by topping the eggs with a teaspoon of the mint chutney and a tiny dab of butter. I put a small square of raw cheese on the side and cut up an apple to go with it. It was yummy, just yummy.

I made the same thing for Ken when he got up. He was not impressed. He ate it all, but insisted he likes his eggs plain.

Busy morning

I woke up this a.m. at 5. This is my normal waking time.

I got up and had a cup of coffee with stevia. I'm avoiding the artificial sweeteners as much as I can. I grew stevia about two years ago in the herb garden, harvested the leaves, dried them and was overwhelmed with the sweetness. I kept a jar of whole leaves thinking that I hated to waste them, but did not touch them again. Now, I know to grind the leaves with a mortar and pestle and use just a half a pinch to sweeten coffee and tea.

I looked over the list of things recommended at the workshop we attended at Wise Traditions on Monday. I made a batch of Crispy Pecans already this week by soaking raw pecans in salt water overnight. I put them in the food dryer on Friday morning before I left for work and when I got home I had two cups of wonderful snacking nuts. So, this morning I put on two cups of raw almonds and two cups of raw sunflower seeds on to soak this morning with salted water. Tonight, before I go to bed, I'll put them in the food dryer.

I also started a batch of fermented catsup this morning as I already had the ingredients.

Then I took out two eggs to go room temperature for mayonnaise. While I had the eggs out, I put three in water to bring to a boil for coddled eggs for my breakfast. Then I warmed up some raw milk to try my hand at yoghurt again. Ken picked up some yoghurt starter for me in Kilmarnock yesterday at Higher Health Foods. So while the milk was coming up to 110 degrees, I pulled out the oats and put them on to soak for my oatmeal breakfast over the coming week. I make one big batch and reheat what I need each day.

So, I got the yoghurt going and decided to see about dinner. I found some pork ribs in the freezer. Not organic or even pasture fed, but meat. I put that into the crockpot with an onion, some blackberry vinegar (from some blackberry mead that went a bit too long), sea salt, a glob of my catsup (not fermented yet, but would not fit in the jar set to ferment), and some water. I put the crockpot on the lowest, longest setting and anticipate it coming out in shreds at dinner time.

While I was in the freezer, I also found some organic whole wheat flour and smelt flour. I pulled those out and discovered a gallon bag of frozen blackberries. So I got out about 2 cups of blackberries and plan to make something wonderful with yoghurt cream cheese (from the first store bought batch that I made Tuesday evening).

I also started a batch of sourdough bread from the sour dough starter I made before leaving for the conference last week.

So here it is, 8:30 a.m. and I have eaten my breakfast, cleaned up my kitchen, am drinking my second cup of coffee and waiting for the bread to rise. I go the the Tavern for the Spinners and Weavers Guild today from 10 until 4. When I get home, supper will almost be ready. I will likely stop at the store and pick up some organic salad greens.

I have some sweet potatoes that will be lovely for a side dish. The bread will be ready for the oven and all will be right with the world.

I am off to make my mayonnaise now. Wish me luck.

Finding food for healing

I am feeling much better.

I was formally introduced to the Weston A Price Foundation last weekend when my friend, Angel, took me (and a couple of others) to the W.A.P.F. Conference in Philadelphia.

I ate like I was starved all weekend. The first night before the conference we all ate out at a really nice place near the conference center. The price tag was a bit insane but the food was very refined, delicious and beautifully presented. Little did I know at that time, we would be eating like Kings and Queens at the groaning board all weekend long.

The theme was "The Politics of Food" and I felt oddly proud to be a Virginian as we were well represented.

The first day I felt like I was cheating. Everything I heard the first day seemed completely counter to everything I'd ever learned or lived. I could hear my mother's voice saying that I would get fat if I ate fat; and here were all these people telling me that I NEED to eat fat in order to be healthy. I had always been taught that the healthiest diet was low fat and might be vegetarian.

When I attended an all-day series of sessions in which the speaker, Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride, reviewed study after study done in Europe that de-bunks the whole low fat, high carb U.S.D.A. food recommendations, my ears really pricked up. She talked about bowel problems and memory problems and circulation problems and autism and learning issues, hyperactivity and attention deficit and epilepsy and a host of other health problems including cancer. She talked about leaky gut syndrome and she made a very solid case against low fat/high carb diets. She also pointed out that in addition to low fat/high carb diets, we are also dying from poisons like plastic, GMO foods and over medicated meat animals.

Two things stood out: The French eat very well and are some of the healthiest and long lived people in the world. The same can be said of primitive peoples. Both of these groups eat high fat, high meat and low carbs. Both groups also eat fruits and vegetables but limit their grain intake. Both groups also eat fermented and pickled foods. Soy is avoided unless well fermented and aged. All refined sugars are avoided. Plastic is avoided or is unheard of.

I already knew that over pasteurizing ourselves lowers our immune systems. We have become so bacteria phobic we can no longer fight off even basic germs and more and more micro-organisms are mutating and becoming immune themselves to anti-bacterial soaps and antibiotics.

I also already knew that there were serious side effects from antibiotics including allergic reactions, rampant yeast infections and other problems including disruption of digestion and elimination. I have never trusted our government's assurances that vaccinations were safe.
I know that almost all pharmaceuticals have side effects and can point to both my parents who suffered from damages caused by long-term use. Plastics I know can leach out of wrappings and into our foods and fill us with toxins.

Dr. Campbell McBride recommended the GAPS Diet to help heal the gut. Most remarkable about this diet was the central position of RAW milk.

In all of my 51 years I have never had the opportunity to drink raw milk. It's delicious!

I was skeptical until the end of the weekend after eating all their foods (prepared in abundance and served buffet style to the 2000+ people in attendance at the conference.) . As the days past, my ever present hunger decreased. By Monday I was surprised when they let us go for lunch. I was not feeling sluggish, grumpy or desperate for food even though I had eaten a very light and early breakfast and we did not go to lunch until 12:30 p.m. Driving home that night I did not get hungry again until nearly 8 p.m. and then I was fully content with a piece of cheese and an organic apple and some vinegar water with a little raw honey.

But let me back up a day or two... I was also introduced to raw cheese, fermented vegetables, raw butter and caster oil! After the second day I noticed that my digestion was smoother with minimal farting, smooth defecation-- unusual when I'm traveling as I have always been a sufferer of hemorrhoids and constipation despite lots of water, high fiber and an otherwise "healthy" diet. My doctor's solution after examining my diet and declaring it perfect, was to give me stool softeners. They helped, but who wants to do that? Now, for two days I had eaten a LOT of cheese and milk and fat. Yes, there were nuts, fruits and veggies as well, but very little fiber in the form of cereals and breads. I expected to be bloated, plugged and miserable. And there was none of that.

I began to look around and realized that most of the conference attendees were of two groups... new to this program and seeking a solution to their health problems or folks who had been following this way of life with raw milk, slow foods and organic sources for nutrient dense meals. Everyone I saw there who had been on this path for any length of time was calm, moved gracefully and was alert, intelligent and their weight was perfect for their height. Their children were well behaved, calm and beautiful.

I came home enthused, excited and ready to help my family move away from the poisons we had been eating and incorporating into our lives real food.

When I returned to work on Tuesday EVERYONE in my office wanted to know what had happened to me. I was calm, I was focused. I could remember things! Let me tell you, this is really remarkable.

I also lost 2 pounds from the previous week.

By Wednesday I could go up the stairs without my knees screaming at me. By Thursday the swelling in my sinuses had reduced around my nose.

By Friday morning I'd lost another pound.

I'm eating real butter, whole raw milk, meat fat, ghee, coconut oil, whole sour cream, whole cream cheese, cod liver oil, sauerkraut, meat, fresh fruit, raw honey, and eggs. All of it is organic. What I am not eating is cereal and only one or so slice of bread a day. I have eliminated soy altogether.

I do not crave sugar at all. I don't want cookies, cake or chocolate. I am satisfied when I eat my food.

Seems utterly crazy... but what if it works? I'm going to find out.

Blue Ribbon!

I don't know why I'm so excited by this, but I won a blue ribbon at the Virginia State Fair!

I also won a red (second place)!

I won the blue for the "Spinner's Workbasket". For this entry, I spun up enough (plus a little) shetland fleece in heavy lace weight to complete Brandywine. I skeined up the yarn so it was pretty and labeled each skein with weight, yardage and date spun. I purchased the pattern and tucked it into a plastic sleeve protector. Found a nice rustic basket. I saved a few locks from the fleece and tied them together, added a circular knitting needle and finally knitted and tied on a swatch. Anyway everything went into the basket and I had it sitting in my house, ready to go, for about 6 months. Finally, off it went.

Now I want to knit the shawl and perhaps enter the completed project in next year's fair.

I won the red for a skein of sport weight yarn spun from Alice's fiber. It really is a pretty heathery grey and I'm working my way through the rest of her fleece. I was hoping I would have enough for a sweater, but it's looking a little shy of that. Perhaps a vest for a young, skinny person... This is her lamb fleece, so I want it to go to a special project. But I will have to wait and see how much actual yardage I get.

New Face

Back when I first started spinning, I saw a sweater that had been hand knitted. It was a yoked pullover sweater with an beautiful stranded pattern in the yoke and was made up of three or four natural colors of fleece. It looked sort of like this. I have always coveted that sweater.

Then, one year at Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, in the contests someone had entered a gorgeous sweater of just that type -- all handspun.

Then I started raising a few sheep. I started out with two, added a third then lost one. But three was the original goal. If I were to fence my ENTIRE yard, I could easily do five, but I really would be divorced and probably broke as well.

Alice and Jerry have two different colors. Alice is pretty evenly white and grey with a few patches that are darker and a few that are almost pure white. Jerry is white and light brown. As a lamb he was a chestnut color but that faded and he has only a few small chestnut spots left. Both have beautiful fleeces.

But I really wanted a dark colored, non-fading Shetland.

And last year I met Katherine Davidson of Potosi Sheep Farm near Lancaster, PA. We talked about sheep. I talked about wanting a non-fading lamb. She told me she might have one and for a very reasonable price since her daughter was in a town near me, she would be willing to even deliver it. So, we struck a verbal deal. She would bring me a little black wether named Ohno as soon as he was weaned.

I think he weaned in June. That was just about the same time the East Coast began cooking under weeks of drought and 100+ degree temperatures. It was not safe to transport a lamb in the back of a pickup in these conditions so we put it off.

Finally, yesterday, there was a break in the weather. It cooled down to a pseudo comfortable 88 and Ohno began is trip to me in a dog crate in the back of a pickup.

He arrived safely and immediately got an ear tag.

Katherine and family were running late at this point and were supposed to be meeting family halfway across the state in the other direction and not realizing how far East my house really was, were now about 2 1/2 hours late. I paid her, we agreed to exchange the rest of the shot record and information by email later, and off they went.

And Ohno got to meet his new sheep family. As I feared, Alice and Jerry were very rude. I know it is sheep behavior to put the new guy in his place and establish who is dominate to whom in a flock, but when Jerry nearly squashed him by jumping on him, I pulled Jerry out and put him back in the larger pasture. When Alice started beating him up too, I pull her out and left Ohno in the adjoining pasture and let them talk to each other through the fence. Both had food, water and shelter, so I wasn't too worried.

Just before dark, I put Alice back in with Ohno so he would not be alone over night. He was a gentleman, kept his distance, gave her space and she did not bother him over much. They did not sleep together, but seemed okay.

So, this a.m. I put Jerry back in. He immediately started abusing Ohno again. And he is much rougher than Alice. And once he got Ohno down, he would not stop, so I grabbed Ohno up, put him in the big pasture and left Alice and Jerry in the little one for now. I will later put Alice in the big pasture and leave Jerry until later this evening. I may need to figure out a way to provide Ohno with a "safe house" some where he can get into for protection that the others cannot. He is half their size right now. But he would have to figure out quickly not to venture to far from home base. I will have to think on this a bit.

Clearly, they will need supervised play time for a while. I just hope eventually, they will all adjust. I also hope the adjustment is sooner, rather than later.