I Went to the Alpaca Farm

And all I got was this fabulous fiber!

This weekend, Shepherd's Purse Alpaca Farm in Mt. Airy, Maryland, is having an open house. That's 24 and 25 September, 10 - 4. There are lots and lots of alpacas!

Here are the girls ... 

And here are the boys ...

And mommas and babies ...

Inez here is blurry because she's so young ... she'll sharpen up later.

(Just kidding. It's just a bad photo on my part)

Here's My Gal Sal with her momma.

There are two more pregnant girls, too. Shepherd's Purse has mostly Huacaya, and a few Suris.

This is Sugar Baby. The babies are all named after songs, and the owner, Cindy, will sing them to you if you ask ... or if you don't ask!

Here's Dominga ^ (Or Domingo, I'm not sure which ... I just know it's a she, because this is her son ...)

With the exact same white mask! Son is "The Masked Avenger" (That's either true, or someone was joking with me, I'm not sure which)

I had a very enjoyable time. I couldn't really pet them, but if I had a handful of grain, I could get close while they ate out of my hand. I came away with some  alpaca yarn and three big ziplock bags of Nancy's two-year-old fleece:

The fleece pictured at top is from her, spring 2010. I am going to be cleaning, carding and spinning it up. I've spun lots of alpaca before, but I've never really had to clean it, so this will be a new experience for me. I love new experiences ;-)







So if you're in the greater Baltimore area, Mt. Airy is off of 70, before you get to Frederick. It's a lovely drive.

And if you want to know what it's like to have an alpaca put his nose right up to your face and sniff you, then be sure to say hi to Mr. X. He's very friendly.

Basic alpaca information can be found here. That's where I had to go to spell Huacaya correctly.


Well I'm off to learn how to clean the pounds of dirt out of the Nancy fiber ... stay tuned!