From The Kitchen Window

When Sadie and I were having another tea party Tuesday, I looked out the window and saw this…

A beautiful red tailed hawk was sitting on a yard fence post.

I see it in the driveway almost daily, but this was the first time I caught it this close to the house. 

Then this morning when I looked out there was the most spectacular sunrise. 

The sky was amazing.

Lastly, one more glance out of the window to check the sunrise and I had to grab the binoculars to make sure this wasn’t a coyote.  No coyote, just a big red fox.

 

Weather Move

Joe had planned to move the bred heifers from some rented land 20 minutes away, back to the house Friday. But some unexpected weather brought in some snow which thwarted his plans. Next plan was to move them Monday. But another weather system was on its way. If we didn’t get them out then Joe was going to have to start feeding them there.  That would be an undesirable situation. 

So this morning we headed over to bring them home.  Joe had been feeding them a little grain for a few days to get them use to coming in the lot. He didn’t have any trouble today. I hid in the truck and when he was done he came and got me. 

Next was moving some panels to make a loading area. 

Joe has this part down pat. The heifers were also pretty tame and there wasn’t too much yelling to get them on the trailer. 

Back at the house we just stopped in the road to let them out

and then herded them through the gate. 

They headed on around the hill while we went back for a second load. We finished just in time. It wasn’t long after we got back that it snowed another 3-4 inches. 

 

A Fancy Day

Today Sadie wanted to do a craft.  So we went upstairs to see what caught our eye.  At first she wanted to make a Christmas ornament.  But when I said Valentines Day was next she decided on a heart.  She picked  out the color felt and I cut out the heart.  Then she thought the ribbon of sequins would be pretty.  I showed her how to do it and with some help we got that sewn on.

 Then she wanted more sequins on the inside.  She already knew how to do that from a Christmas tree we had done before.  

I still had to help but she has a lot of patience for a just turned 4 year old.

I think it turned out spectacular.  

When it was snack time Sadie said we should have a real tea party.  There is a book series she likes called Fancy Nancy.  So I tried to make it fancy.  We had pretty glass plates, fancy glasses and I even played fancy music, Greatest Hits of the 1720’s.

It was a special and fancy day.

New Game

Allie has gone back to day care but Sadie is out of school until Monday so I was going to keep her this afternoon.  But then Sadie wanted to spend the night, yay!  It was pretty cold outside so I invented a new indoor game.

Bad Balloon or Ballon Minton.  Sadie preferred bad balloon.  Hence, there was a lot of ballon spanking. 

I thought it was really good for hand eye coordination.  We managed to not even break anything.

And Joe even got involved. 

Sadie is always concerned about Kit Kat’s happiness.  She is definitely an animal lover.

For supper she wanted a salad and pizza.  But after eating a large salad she said she was too full for the pizza.  We watched a couple of episodes of The Unicorn Academy, took a bath and read a few more chapters of Charlotte’s Web before bedtime.  Now I need to figure out what to do tomorrow. 

 

New Year, Same Job

We celebrated the New Year by weaning the calves at our farm up the road.  

Mike was wonderful to come help.  I pretty much just documented the process and was there as backup.

But Joe and Mike had everything under control.  Mike sorted out the cows and Joe shot the dewormer on them as they went though the gate.

Then the cows were turned out and counted.  Joe said we had the right number.

Then the calves were loaded up and brought back to the house.  My one “job” was to keep the calves from trying to go between the gate and trailer.  It didn’t take much, just putting my stick there.  Since Mike was doing such a good job replacing me, I stayed at the house after the first load and let Joe and Mike finish up the next two loads.   

 

Splitting Up

Since the guard dogs stay with the goats and the goats go pretty much anywhere they want on the farm, it is always a surprise where they will be in the evening at feeding time.

Today the goats were split up.  And of course, the dogs were not with the group right in front of the house.   They were with the group 1/2 a mile away and over the hill.

But look at those faces.

They are worth the hike.

I took a panorama shot, you might have to do some zooming in.  The group in front of the house is to the left, and the group with the dogs is to the right.  At least it was a nice evening for a walk.  And on another note, 

Happy New Year.

 

A New 4 Year Old

We had Sadie’s birthday party a couple of days early because a lot of the family was still here after  Christmas. But different illnesses cut back some on the guest list anyway.

Sadie 

and Allie had a great time decorating the cookies Emily had made with leftover cake icing.

When Sadie came in she said that the decorations were perfect for a birthday party. 

She really liked the extra attention.

Emily did a wonderful job on the cake and icing.

Sadie got several very fun toys, a Spirograph Jr. from uncle M, which is a vast improvement over the Spirograph we had as children, a camera from aunt A that takes pictures and prints them out on thermal paper for immediate viewing, a Coco Mellon version of Chutes and Ladders from aunt C that I am looking forward to playing with her, and a Barbie Dream House from me and Pop Pop.  I am trying not to spoil her but I just cannot  help it.  

Then today, I was going to keep Allie while Virginia and Mike had a special real birthday with Sadie.  A couple of hours later, they brought Sadie over because she was afraid Allie was having a more special day here than she was.  I had not planned anything to do so on short notice we took a trip 2 miles down the road to Dollar General.  Virginia orders groceries on line and has them delivered to the house, so Sadie had not been to the store very often.  She pushed the kid play cart and we went up and down all of the 

aisles looking at everything.  She wanted to get Christmas presents for next year.  But she could not even wait a day.  She got Allie a Christmas headband and ornaments. She wanted a plastic party crown but I told her we could make a better one at home.  Then I let her get a mermaid Barbie that she can play with in the pool of her Dream House.

At first she was pretty skeptical about me making a crown better than the store crown.  But she soon changed her mind, wanted to help, then play dress up with it.  I am sure with a little planning I could make a better one.  As soon as Pop Pop came in and said he needed to feed the calves and dogs, Sadie wanted to go with him.Then we ended up the day with a viewing of  the 2018 version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  I hope we made her day special.