Stockman's Contest

V's 4-H stockman's team had their first contest today.  She has only been to 2 practices so technically, this was counting more as a practice than a contest.

I think they had feed and equipment identification, hay judging and had to place a class of sheep.
I'm not sure what else.  Sometimes it is a little difficult to extract information from V during these teenage years.  Somewhat expectantly, no one on the team placed in anything.  We are looking for better results the end of March for their next contest after a month of practice.

Old and New

This was our old horned Hereford bull.  We sold him last year.  He traced back to the Herefords John Wayne had.

Here is our new polled Hereford bull.  He just arrived on Friday.
He came from a farm in Abingdon.

Sunday Snow

We were greeted Sunday morning with another light snow.  Our driveway was a winter wonderland on the way to church.

Feeding at J's dad's farm was a little blustery.
Here is a different view of the goats for "scooter".

I don't think any of them are mooning you this time.

Horse Judging

V and E competed in the B&B Horse Judging Contest Saturday along with about 200 other 4-H and FFAer's. 

They judged 10 classes; 5 halter and 5 performance.
There was a very cute class of Norwegian Fjords.
V competed as a Senior this year so she had to give 3 sets of reasons.  Unfortunately, V didn't place in anything.  E received 6th in performance. She only dropped 5 points out of 250 in performance and had an overall score of 475 out of 500 (that is if she didn't miss mark any cards). So it was a very high scoring contest for her not to have made the top 10.

Winter

Ann's pictures of Hawaii made me think of her friend that grew up there then visited Virginia during the Winter.   She had a hard time trying to imagine what things would look like in the spring.  I know there are changes in tropical regions, but they cannot compare to the seasons here.  How would you know what color leaves this tree would have or if it had flowers, fruit, or nuts?

After 20 degree weather and 40 mph winds, we are getting a little spring fever.

Goats

I haven't talked about the goats for awhile.  They are starting to get big.  They should start kidding next month.

On a bad note, they spent the night in the bottom a few nights ago instead of near the house and a coyote killed one of the nannies.  So we are back to rounding them up in the evenings to be near the house.  We may have a trapper come, but that means Emma has to stay tied.  What can you do?

Basketball Champions

E's team won their playoff game tonight.  The score was 22-10.  It ended up that they played the other team from their school for the championship.

(It didn't go in.)
Basketball season is finally over.  I think J is very glad of this.  V's J.V. season started the first of November.  It's been a long 4 months.

Track starts in 2 weeks.  Plus horse judging, stockman's contest,  steer showing, then horse shows.  Never a dull moment.

Play Offs

E's little league team is having their play-offs now.  They won today so they will be in the finals on Monday.  E's strong point seems to be defense.

The team won the trophy for the regular season champions.

Hereford Heifer

The calf born 2 days ago is doing great.  She is very spunky and pretty.  I love her pink nose and pink ears.

The cow on the right calved a few hours after I took this picture.  It was dark when J went out to check her and found the calf.  So this little heifer will have a playmate now.

Cards

I've borrowed an idea from my friend at thelittleredhen.typepad.com.

I have made some cards using old books from goodwill.

I think they turned out pretty cute.

New Calf

One of the Hereford cows calved this afternoon.  It was nice that she waited for today when it was in the 60's instead of last week's single digits.  Our calving seasons doesn't start until mid march, but she was already bred when we bought her.

It always seems that there are some curious cows whenever there is a new calf.  This one was a heifer.

MaggieMoo's

V and E talked us into going the new ice cream parlor in B'burg today.

V and E had been before and knew exactly what they wanted.  J however had a lot of thinking to do.
So many flavors,
so many toppings,
but you can never go wrong with chocolate.
J of course had to mention that he could have bought 2 gallons of ice cream at the store for the same price.

E's Pics

E got a camera for Christmas and has been busy taking pictures.

She has done a lot of self portraits.  She just got braces friday, tops only for now.

She had to go with J to feed the cattle at the other farm during the last snow.  It doesn't look like she made it out of the truck however.
Here she seems to be experimenting with the grey scale.

Birthday

I got a real birthday cake this year.  V made the cake while I was at work.  Then E put all the candles she could find on it.  I said I would not blow them out until they sang Happy Birthday.

E finally did some sort of soft chant that might have included happy birthday, so I did blow out the candles.
But you can see they did burn down rather low first.  And no, the smoke detector did not go off.

More Snow

More snow and cold weather has set in.  School has been out Tuesday and Wednesday and they have already called it off for tomorrow.

The main roads are clear but there is a salt shortage in town so the back streets have been snow covered.
I think we have lost most of Easter break and school may not get out until after June 11th.

Ducks

There are some wild ducks we see every time we go to J's dad's farm.  There are 2 black, 2 white, 2 mallards and several geese.