Good evening and welcome to our online world, we are happy you could join us here tonight. Today at least for me was a more normal day, getting up, watching the snow fall from the sky as I got my morning coffee. Thank goodness for coffee. Elijah slept a little late today , so we (Michael and I ) we only greeted by the dawn and one small baby bear crawling up between us on the bed, singing the alphabet song the whole way. We have 4 baby finches that also like to great us with the dawn, they hungry chirping demands of food upon their parents as the bears call out there’s as well…lol The bears had oat meal, I grabbed a sandwich on the way out to school. I left a little late, as I was really hoping they would cancel school, due to the bitter mind numbing cold, but they did not so off I went. I showed up at school four minutes late…oh well not bad all in all.
After school I went to the gym, did 3 miles on the bike and 200 pounds on the leg lifts( I get a grade for going, no really), than off to Wal-Mart for a few things, than to styles for some cheese for pizzas, was too tired to sit and grate five pounds of cheese tonight for our Wednesday pizza. Anyway came home to bears fighting and Michael trying to get stuff done. Dah’veed still cleaning dishes and such. Just glad to be home though. Took some time to do school work with the baby bears, Elisha is working on addition and Elijah is working on multiplication. Have to look over Rachael and Dah’veed work and set tomorrows work for them. Still have a few days of home work to catch up on and soap to make along with 12 mustard seed pendants and ship out eggs to eager people. Got an email today from someone who bought eggs six months ago and is just now asking where they are, well I shipped them of course and tracked them to her door, I will most likely refund her anyway, just to keep the peace. It is just not worth the stress and it has been a bad year for people doing strange things with eggs. So there you have it, the short of my day, so I will now go and wrap eggs, and get some school work done, play some more with the bears. Then get some rest…Thank goodness I will have my school money tomorrow and will be able to pay some bills and pay off the loan for the ban and make it truly mine. I get the loan portion of my school money on the 10 and it is the only way I could do this right now. I hope to have the scholarships by then as well. They dived this money into two parts and the first part you get after being in class for a month, so it is not easy for parents to go back to school the way it is set up. We manage, but it is due mostly to my thriftiness and the support of my older children and my husband, most moms are not so lucky and end up dying in a dead end job, just trying to make end meet. Because of the issue with my scholarships I will have to find a way to make back up that extra (not really) money. With the egg business slacking off, I have to find a better way. Yesterday I looked at some more Jacob sheep, though most were crossed with who knows what, the cost was full price. The man wanted 150 bucks each, four ewes and one ram, two or more of the ewes were breed, but by what? In the sheep part of our farm I am trying to get to where we have as close to full blood Jacobs as we can, this is very hard as there are not a ton of these guys around and when most people give up on raising them for whatever reason they end up in the auctions. Once this happens I almost do not want to touch them. I have to quarantine these animals for at least 6 months to be sure they are free from hidden disease and parasites; that is six months of feeding an animal I may never make a dime out of, not a good bet. I have been threw the breed sheep thing before as well, that was our first Jacob lamb, her name was sweetie, she was the most lovely Jacob ewe I have ever seen, I bought her for I think $375.00 freshly breed, we were told. The man even delivered her to us. I thought I was in heaven until my daughter a few weeks later ran up from the pasture and told me there was a baby out there. It was I think 19 days or so, we got her on April fools day and she gave birth on Easter and dies a few days later of complications. She left us a half Dorper/half Jacob ewe we named LOG (Lamb of G-d). She gave us several babies before her passing this summer. When I buy animals I try to buy from other small farmers. I like to see the animals in their farm setting, before I bring them home to mine. I check there eyes, I tough them all over, I check their feet and their mouths, you can never be too careful. If your seller does not want you to do these things, leave and say thank you, do not buy from them. If they show you a defect and try to tell you that most people have the problem and that is fine, walk away, they have figured you for a sucker. I knew a breeder who was line breeding and lying about it. She gave away all the bucks and does; most had watch is called in the goat world Parrot jaw. Parrot jaw is a heredity disorder that is most often seen in goats that are bred back to their parents, brothers or sisters and is seen most often in Nubian goats. Other than the things you see on the outside, on the side they are prone to heart problems and too many other things to list. No one should do these things, but they do, so this little free goat that you have fallen in love with, will cost you a bunch of money and in the end, if it lives will be of no value. Be smart about the animals you acquire, better to buy an old healthy goat and get a few breeds out of her or him, than to buy a young unhealthy animal that will not produce healthy young for you to love. Please feel free to email me at: raziel133@yahoo.com if you need help or have questions that I have not cover here, feel free to email me and I will be happy to help you. Like “Red Green says; where all in this together”.
News From The Doghouse and where the polar bears roam...
Very frozen this morning, the Boss woke me up after midnight to toss wood on the fire, and I got up again around 2-2:30, stayed up that time, made coffee on the percolator, ran hot water on the sinks, trying to prevent freeze up, tossed wood on again at 4:30 and went to sleep until 6:30, had a cup, ran the hot water, and went and tossed some more wood, cleaned out the ash, and checked the livestock.
Moo was in the barn last night, so got Dah’veed and we rolled out a big bale of hay, and I let her out today, and was she happy to run around, snorting and kicking when she got out in her pen, immediately head butted the bale of hay, I'll try and get a video of it sometime.
Dealt with the expected frozen waterers and stuff, had to stop a few times because my fingers were freezing, and had to fix some things too. I was happy the Boss left for school, because it’s important to her, yet didn't like her going because of the cold and wind chill, it was like 3F, and thankfully everything went well today. Played with the Bears a bit, and got them to take a nap, although the way they act you wouldn't think they got one. I guess they are getting cooped up. Elijah went outside with me for a little bit, check the wood on the fire and check the expecting mommy goats, then we ran back to the house froze from the wind. It was fun I guess. Our wood burner is in the basement, but you have to go outside to access it, it’s just the insane way this place was built.
Hope everyone is warm if you are in the storm aftermath.
From all of us here on the farm, we wish you are warm and happy night with your loved ones.
Here are a couple of good goat books to check out, yes we have them...lol
Great blog you have here. :)
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