If A Tree Falls

Joe went to clean out the cattle guard yesterday. It was full of leaves, gravel and dirt from the winter. But since it has been so dry, it was like concrete. That is until our 4 inches of rain. That softened it up enough to work with. 

Joe had gone down in the truck. I came a little later with the 4 wheeler.  You may be wondering what all of this has to do with trees.  Well, Joe took the 4 wheeler back to check the cows and I went out with the truck to turn around and come back. 

That is when I found this dead oak tree blocking the driveway.  So I had to back back up the driveway, find Joe and tell him he now needed to get the chainsaw. 

It was steep and dangerous. 

But Joe has a lot of experience with fallen trees. 

At least there wasn’t a fence to fix afterwards. 
 

Calm Before The Storm

Snowmageddon 2026 is being predicted for this weekend. 

As you can tell from the map, we don’t know a whole lot yet.  

But we could use a little moisture. The dry weather has been great for Joe to be able to get around the farm with the tractor feeding. But it hasn’t been so good to keep the water troughs full.   This one is in the horse field. The 10 cows from the cattle drive earlier are now here. They will have to be moved tomorrow so hopefully the trough will fill up some before the arctic blast freezes everything solid. 

On my way down the driveway going to work this morning I had to stop and take a picture of the beautiful sunrise. It looks like the calm before the storm  

I also have an update on my shades. I think they look nice from the outside.  But I needed them last month when we had a crew putting a new roof on the house. 

I will have to brag on the double sided tape I got to attach the fabric to the metal rod.   It actually came from Dollar General (I had a $3 off $15 that was good all month not just on Saturday). There were rave reviews. So far it is working great.   I would highly recommend it if you need strong double sided tape. 

 

25 Days Of Christmas, Day 22

The time has been flying by.  But I finally managed to find one before Christmas.  

A pony saddle that is.  I have been looking on Craig's list and Facebook market place for one but nothing has been showing up.  Then I checked on-line tack stores.  But I don't like buying something like that without seeing it.  Then I thought to ask a girl I know that gives lessons if she had a pony saddle she would part with.  And she did!  She thought it was a 10 in seat, but when I measured it, it was 12 inches.  I think it will fit Clyde and if the stirrups are too long I still have those that go over the horn.  So, hopefully it will work out.   After we had dressed Clyde up a couple of days ago, Allie said he needed a Christmas saddle.  I hope they like it.  

And just because the sky was so beautiful this evening...

 

25 Days Of Christmas, Day 13

I have a two parter today. First, the Christmassy part. 

I don’t think I showed  Emily’s finished Barbie tree after she let Sadie and Allie help decorate it. 

Emily had to do a little rearranging to make sure they were in order of most liked to least. The ones with more actual fabric usually rank higher. But hair style and facial expression also plays a part.  

Now for the non Christmassy part. Today we had to work the calves that were weaned 1 1/2 months ago. 

It was 22 degrees and very frosty. 

Since the cattle are use to Joe feeding them every day, he worked on getting them up and I took pictures and worked on not spooking them. 

We both were very successful at our jobs.  (I absolutely love this picture)

Plus, Mike came to help.  We sorted out some of the smaller ones and the heifers to keep for replacements.  Then we gave 3 shots each to 100 head.  They should be ready to head out to the feedlot in a couple of more weeks.  Joe will be excited to turn the feeding over to Circle 5.  

 

25 Days Of Christmas, Day 9

The little bit of snow that we got on Friday was mostly gone on Saturday.  I took the opportunity to work some more on my outdoor decorations. 

I had been eyeing this little grove of white pines along the driveway.   It looked like they needed some thinning. 

My big pots were looking pretty bare.  

But not anymore, instant trees.  

Since I didn't replace the fence in the border garden I thought I would add some height to it too.  

Now I have a temporary forest.  

And I added one to the arrangement at the side door.  

I finished it off with a few shatterproof ornaments.  

And I added some bows to the potted trees.  Everything looked great until...

Monday, when we got 4-5 inches of heavy, wet snow.  

I help Joe shovel out the feed troughs and forgot about the farrier coming.  I had not caught Otoelene and she was up on the steep hill in front of the house.  She apparently did not like me slipping, falling and flailing my arms around trying not to slide down the hill.  It was the first time that I can remember that she was difficult to catch.  The farrier said he had canceled all of his other appointments so he didn't mind the little extra wait.  

After I turned her back out I checked on Clyde and Hugo.  I have turned them together now and they are getting along fine.  You may notice that Clyde's tail is still braided.  I probably need to take that out sometime.  

Even though the snow was cold, wet and slick, it was still pretty.  

 

More Goats Gone

Friday before heading to the beach, we rounded up the goats. 

Most had actually been staying down in a hollow, hopefully eating weeds and rose bushes.  

When we got them into the holding field for the night they made a bee line to start eating pigweed.  

Saturday morning's sunrise was gorgeous.  

We got an early start getting the goats to the barn.  

Then the sorting began.  This sorting involved the larger wethers from last year, cull nannies and yearling nannies we didn't like.  We tagged 47 to send.  I had also sorted out two smaller doelings.    The person that bought the two semi bottle goats a couple of week ago said her neighbors had fallen in love with them and wanted two females to begin homesteading with.  Joe headed out with the trailer load, the other buyer took their two, and I went to the beach.  That night Joe said when he got to the market they only counted 46 head.  I insisted that I had used 47 tags.  The next day Joe said he found the 47th one back out with the rest of the herd.  Somewhere between tagging and loading she had escaped.  Goats can be tricking that way.  
 

Three Things

The weather was nice today so I decided to go for a ride on Hugo. 

Nice ride, not perfect but not dangerous either.  With my sporadic riding I cannot expect perfection so not dangerous is the next best thing. 

Walking through the field the other evening, I thought the foxtails looked like caterpillars. 

We are discovering that Allie likes to be a bit of a clown. She loves to make us laugh. But it makes getting a good picture challenging.  They had fun when I took them to Gigi’s house Friday. 

 

Catch Up

Our internet has been out for the last 3 days, and before that we were really busy.  Busy with what? You might ask.  

Sadie and Allie came over Saturday morning and stayed until Sunday evening.  The weather was very nice so we were able to do a lot of outdoor activities. 

We took them down to the creek to play.  I thought they might just wade around some and maybe look for pretty rocks.  

But they decided playing in the mud was much more fun.

When we got back to the house, I made them take a bucket bath before allowing them back in the house.

We did have some indoor time too.  Of course we had to make a craft. 

Then back outside to feed the animals.

Sadie remembered Lucy.  And it looks like Lucy remembered Sadie too.  She has grown a bit since Joe brought her home in a sack last year.  You can check that out HERE.  But she is a good deal behind her contemporaries that just left for the feedlot in Nebraska last week. 

Sunday after church we went on a hike.  Sadie wanted to show Allie the tiny house.

It looked like a Little House On the Prairie moment.

We still don’t have a key which was a disappointment to Sadie.  I told her she would just have to imagine what it would look like to be in a wooden box.

 A fun time was had by all.