What Ewe’ll be Wearing this Spring

So yesterday, it was 50 degrees, the sun was shining, birds were singing and I really felt as though spring had finally arrived.

Today we had this

unseasonable snow

A completely unseasonal six inches of snow and temperatures in the 30-40s.

Which normally wouldn’t be a problem, but the shearer had come by a few days ago and sheared my three sheep.  (You can hear him talk about shearing BTW, in WeaveCast 37.)

They’d gone from weather-impervious wool balls to little naked sheepies.

naked sheep

When I checked on them in the morning to see how they were doing, they were huddled in the barn, staring out the door and looking at me like: “How could you let this happen?!?”  After a moment, I realized they were shivering.

Shivering!  And the snow was still coming down hard.  I could only imagine how much colder it would get at night.  My active imagination supplied images of coming into the barn next morning to find sheep-cicles.

I considered bringing them into the garage, and what kind of conversation that might spark around the dinner table.

Then I recalled something I’d seen shepherds do with lambs born during a hard winter.  My sheep are Shetlands, a miniature breed, so I thought it just might work.

I ran back to the house and rummaged around in my closet…and came back with three sweaters.

Now here’s what they don’t tell you in the funny-ha-ha-isn’t-that-cute-the-lamb-is-wearing-a-sweater pictures.

  1. Any sheep approached by a human carrying a pile of flapping fabric things will assume said human is there to kill them.
  2. Catching said sheep and forcing a sweater over its head will only confirm this suspicion. (Note: Experience dressing toddlers does transfer to dressing sheep)
  3. Sheep’s legs are much shorter than your arms
  4. You cannot roll a cuff on the sleeve of a sweater worn by a thrashing sheep
  5. A sheep wearing a sweater with uncuffed sleeves that are much longer than its legs is a hazard to self and others
  6. Cutting the sleeves off a perfectly good sweater can suddenly seem like the most brilliant thing in the world
  7. Do not try to cut the sleeves off the sweater while the sheep is wearing it.  This does not give the sheep a good impression of your intentions
  8. If you dress a sheep three times in ten minutes, they will eventually accept that the sweater might not be lethal
  9. Getting chased around a barn and repeatedly dressed by a woman carrying scissors who is probably trying to kill you will warm a sheep right up
  10. The shepherd gets warm, too

 

At last: success!

 

They were quite interested in each other’s new duds.

 

This, I might have to do some explaining about…

Eric's Sweater

That sweater is (was?) Eric’s.

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