Day 175

Well, apparently it's time to fix the fence between the home paddock and the back pasture. It's obviously sagged low enough that Mooser (the holstein steer) got over it easily enough to feed off of the pigs grain this morning. I had banished him and the other two cows into the back pasture, as I'm tired of feeding extra grain to the pigs and they've basically been having a hissy fit ever since. The moo and mope all day long. Silly cows.

The sheep in the orchard got moved to a fresh pasture today. Now we can finish mowing the orchard!

 Also, the turkeys are now finally ensconced in their pen and hopefully they'll stay there. I'm tired of going out to put turkeys away at 11 pm! Just as I'm ready to head to bed, it's ooops, I forgot about the turkeys. Sigh. I've lost two this week thanks to problems with the electric fence and one night I think I got out there too late. Which meant that after coming home from volunteering at Champoeg for 6 hours, I got to slit a turkeys throat by moonlight. How romantic, right? The poor turkey had a dislocated projecting coracoid (wing) bone, which looked rather painful and the only solution seemed to put it out of it's misery. Daniel trooped out with me to the processing trailer to supervise, since he's a pro, but I did the actual dirty work.

Day 292

1. Saying Good Morning to Bessie Dearest. Every few days I feel that I notice an improvement in her tameness. Who knew that watching John Lyon's horse training videos years ago could come in so handy?

2. While the parentals are on vacation, we are too, ie, I don't feel like homeschooling. So we are doing outdoor school, ie gardening. We have very long flower bed that is in dire need of improvement and we have a load of plants waiting to go in. This afternoon, we got the non-yellow jacket infested section completed. Tonight's mission? Take out the yellow jacket nest that Jacob unknowingly dug into this morning. Ouch. Poor guy.

Day 213 (Wednesday)

written on 8/2/2012

1. Taking time to smell the roses on a walk in Beaverton

2. What else... Lap swimming in the morning - working with Jacob on improving his swimming and having Andrew and Daniel perfect their strokes, running errands in Molalla afterwards, chasing after and then putting halters on Brownie and Mooser (the calves), taking Mom to Beaverton for memory testing, enjoying two hours of solitude, including a nap, reading and errands, continuing the Olympics  marathon!

Day 194

1. Moozer reluctantly sporting his new handmade-by-me rope halter... he got to wear it while I did farm chores.
2. What else? Ugh, we are still getting through the stomach flu's domino effect on our family. Dad was kind enough to come out and help me with chores tonight. :)

Day 128

1. Moo-ser drinking some water
2. Outside the Airport Cafe 
3. Jacob & ice cream at the Airport Cafe
4. What else? Rand installing a new stove top... which as these things always go, seems to be slightly defective so now we are waiting stove-less for a repair guy to come out tomorrow, thus dinner at the cafe tonight, homeschooling, working outside in the glorious sunshine (priming a flower box, weeding, organizing and of course, directing other people!), Mom selling/getting rid of a bantam hen & rooster, an impromptu farm meeting over dessert, and thanks to Rand - rediscovering the luxury of changing the water temperature in the shower with the flick of a finger instead of grappling around with two hands praying the whole thing didn't fall apart...  

Day 125

1. Beautiful blossoms. Walking through the apple orchard in the evening smells AMAZING. Nothing like the fresh scent of apple blossoms.
2. We are trying something new this year, and I don't know why it's taken us so long to do it. We're pasturing several of the ewes and their lambs in the orchard. This time of year it always seems like we are doing nothing but mowing, so the sheep are definitely saving us time, plus it's so much fun to see the babies from the back yard!
3. Jacob's birthday... we finally celebrated his birthday (April 25th) over a week late. I was out of town, and then people have been sick or gone in the evening. He has been amazingly patient for an 11 year old. 
4. What else - I didn't blog yesterday, so the sad news first. Our poor sick calf died. Our vet thought it was going to be okay, but I guess not. Sniff. Sadness. Now we just have one poor lone cow. Hopefully we'll find a friend for him! Not much else for today, I've been on antibiotics all week and it's making me more and more tired. And they're making me sleep 10 hours a day, (argh!) so I'm pretty done by 10 o'clock, which is sad because that's my normal blogging time... so posts are kind of sporadic right now. My eyes are trying to close on me, so I better head to bed... g'nite!

Day 123

Well! I kind of fell off the blogging wagon over the last week. I got deathly sick in Spokane, made it through the wedding and the drive home and now we've had a rocky start to this week. Hopefully I'm back to blog land and I have a few posts to catch up on... here's today.

1. Jacob waiting for me to go feed the calves. 
2. The healthy calf
3. What else - Feed Mill, the vet (Sick cow should hopefully be okay...), catching up on being gone

Day 108

1. The calves chilling out...
2. An amazing almond, ginger, peach muffin from a coffee shop (one awesome place!)
3. Drinking my "fancy" hot chocolate during bible study at the coffee shop
4. Walking by the Murray's old home (near the coffee shop)
5. Kitty in the window!
6. What else- Mostly bible study, the Ayers over for dinner and to feed the calves

Day 103

1. Feeding the calves twice a day. 
2. Doing homeschooling in style
3. Mom's shoes and socks perfectly match the clinic's floor.
4. What else - Mom's Discogram  :(   & CTscan 

Day 102

1. Bottle feeding Moe (on the left) and Curly (on the right) at 8am this morning
2. Moe waiting for Jacob to feed him
3. Finally got new contacts! Yay. I can see my eyes again. :)
4. Hanging out with Kate in Canby. We've just finished our chocolates from Ladybug Chocolates.
5. Putting up fencing in the orchard for a few of the sheep. 
6. What else - getting treated to lunch at Kate's house, moving the rest of the sheep to new pasture & feeding minerals, visiting with our neighbor Nancy this evening who came over to see and feed the calves.

Day 101

1. Buying dairy calves (so excited! Me, that is. Andy didn't know I was taking the photo.. )
2.  Now he knows I'm taking the photo. ;)
3. Beautiful Camilias
4. Dad and Jacob feeding Curly this evening. Dad told me explicitly that he wasn't going to feed them, just watch, and then of course the second, he enters the pen and sees how cute they are he says "Hand me a bottle"... He's awesome like that.
5. What else - Mostly just steer related stuff. Wasn't expecting to be able to take them home right away, so Andy and I bought a tarp and took them home in the back of the van! Then I drove around gathering what we needed (milk replacer, another bottle and two nipples, feed). I'm thrilled to have cows again!