March Was CRAZY Busy Part 1

I'm not kidding when I say we were so busy that I had no time to blog. Sometimes I had time to take pictures, sometimes I'd get a post started, but most of the time I was so busy with living life to sit down and even relax or breathe deep. Sometimes it was a good busy sometimes it was a nightmare of fevers and crying and anxiety. Anyway, I'll catch you all up this week. I don't think I have ever skipped an entire month since I began blogging!

One of the awesome things that happened was my brother was home on leave and brought his family to the farm! Bonus, my aunt traveled from Texas to meet the new babies and see my brother and she came too!

Uncle T.  and Baby Zap.

Lil'Bug's tea Part-tay.....

My aunt Deedle, my inspiration and idol. She too moved to a farm in her mid thirties with no experience and made a go at it. She is strong willed and unafraid to try new things. Currently, she owns and operates a B&B in Galveston, TX. It's pink, no less.

Aunt Deedle with Baby Zap.

Even Chad got a turn holding Z., but he had to wait. ;)

Yum yum yum, thumbs.

Seriously, EVERYONE wanted a turn holding Zap. 

It was a good visit. :) I hope there are many more.

Blueberry Girls Paints Horses

Maple Lane

Unfortunately, we may have tapped too late. At least we'll be ready for next year!!!!

1st Park Day of 2011!

Blueberry Girl loves the swings!

I love park day. I love that we can keep the relationships we have formed over the years, five years now, in the Des Moines homeschooling community even though we have moved an hour away. I love that it happens right after Lil'Bug's art class. I love that this park is so perfect, easily accessible, nice bathrooms, variety of play opportunities and sand (I hate mulched playgrounds; I'll take sandy pants and socks over splinters any day), and I love the freedom.

Baby Zap had never sat in the sunshine outside before. He wasn't sure what to think.

I notice that sometimes they play on the equipment, but so many more times they play in the trees and run around the grassy field.  There is room to play. If someone they are not getting along with is there, there is room to move along and play something else. There is also a variety of cultures that meet. The casual exposure creates questions and learning about how each family lives, without the pretense of show and tell.

Playing.

We keep going and it has not been easy. We almost quit after a teenage bully, also a homeschooler, started targeting 6 year old girls....but we worked through that and in a way that left Lil'Bug and her friends feeling empowered and infused with a dose of empathy and kindness. It also demonstrated to Lil'Bug my trust in her, which happens in little noticed little ways everyday but when tested in a big way held up.

More playing.

It is nice to also have moral support for how we live. Homeschooling is a lifestyle and not many people outside the homeschooling circles actually get that. I have for the last 6 years so surrounded myself with people who do get it, that I forget how alien, misunderstood, misrepresented our lifestyle choice can be and what expectations are placed on us as such. Lately, that pressure has been exponential and having a safe place where people get us is really a quiet relief.

The view from the camera falling, luckily the only thing that seems broken is the UV lens.

Only one other family made it to this first, glorious park day of the year. It was unexpectedly 70 degrees, not windy, sunshine, and not terribly muddy. It's Iowa, it may not be that perfect again until May! Ha. A perfect day for Baby Zap to have his first park day, and for the girls to run off some winter blahs. At 4 pm they didn't want to load up and that's when the camera was "moved" out of the car and onto the parking. All is well though. I think.

Farm Work Day: Status of the Flock

Marshmallow. Not pregnant or not far enough along to see in ultrasound. Was exposed to ram for a very short time in the last 6 weeks, so we will recheck in a month, maybe two. She was injured in the dog attack in late December/early January but has recovered really well.

Male llama, intact. Not yet named. In my mind I call the two of them, Brothers Dmitri and Ivan.

Flurry - a cinnamon (phaeomelanin) coloured unregistered Icelandic ewe with a poor bite (her teeth don't match up to her upper palate) but she had a lamb with no mouth problems. She is 3-4 years old. We call her Cinnamon. She is pregnant. Was injured in the round up today, cut her lip, but she should be fine.

Bianca - a white unregistered full Icelandic ewe, probably about 4-5 years old. Thought this one was MB, but her name is now Wether-NOT. Lily thought that was silly so we'll call her Lady Bianca. She IS with lamb.

Buttercup Not pregnant. Healed from dog attack. Her injury didn't even bring her into the house. Was exposed to the ram only briefly - we didn't want her to lamb this year since she had so much trouble with her *5* lambs last year.

Cream Puff - white ewe, Poppy's daughter of last year, sired by Blizzard (before he was wethered) so she is 50% Icelandic and then has the Rambouillet/Suffok/Dorset mix genes. Her ears have tan coloured tips. She would probably throw coloured lambs, is not pregnant.

2nd male llama.

Mary. Leg injury from dog attack. Not pregnant.......because she's a he? Just checked the records and it seems that the white lamb that came with Marshmallow is actually a ram/wether lamb not a ewe. Which means the lamb we lost last week, Wilbur, that we thought was a wether, was actually a ewe? Think we'll change his name to MerryWether. Odd thing is, the vet didn't notice he is a she is a he?

(born 3/29/08) Poppy -Peeking up behind the whether in the front of the picture. A great mother - Rambouillet/Suffolk/Dorset mix ewe, Poppy is pregnant.

Blizzard - a white unregistered full Icelandic wether, well tempered, probably also about 4-5 years old.

Ferdinand - a black Shetland wether who is a real love-bug. He is second only to Poppy in affection and kid friendly interaction.

Dolly. Has been exposed for 6 weeks. Not far enough along to detect if she is pregnant. Would be due in November. Dark brown and white female, registered, mother of Stormy. Not extremely approachable but tolerates shearing.

 There is also another wether, a white icelanic, but I didn't get pictures of him. There is one more ewe who is pregnant too. Again, I missed getting her picture and do not have name confirmation on her. We really, really need Claire to come for a visit and help us get these names straight! :) 

Farm Work Day: Bellies

Mostly this series of posts is to log pictures for our own records. I'll do a long one with each sheep's status later today, we have 4 ewes with lamb in my field notes, we verified the identity of the wether that the coyote killed in December, and we know that Buttercup and Marshmallow are not with lamb (which is intentional).

Farm Work Day: Lovely Childhood

I somehow captured this smile while documenting the vet in the pasture. Blueberry Girl ran up beside me and said, "Here I is! Smile!" I love, love, love the moments of sheer windblown happiness on the farm. 

Blizzard 2011 Feburary First

So this month, I got to sit and read everyone enjoying the snow days with a heavy heart. Sure, we were at times curled up with a roaring fire in the wood stove, venison roast slow cooking, and homemade cherry sodas and hot cocoa....but the rest of the time Chad was outside doing regular chores in 40mph gusting (-60 windchills) winds, ice dagger snow, below zero temps and even colder wind chills.

So here are my neglected blizzard/winter updates.

Pipes freezing. Last year I couldn't leave the house if it was in the teens or below because the water had to be run every hour to keep pipes from freezing. This year Chad insulated the pipes going upstairs, set a timer on the basement faucet to run the water automatically every so many hours, and changed some stuff around. We've had outside temperatures in the NEGATIVE twenties and teens and been ok. Only a few times did the upstairs and laundry room cold water pipes freeze and once the wind froze the hot water heater (a tankless). Just once. Mostly I can leave the house without worrying about it, but with the baby it is not likely that I will leave the house when it is that cold anyway. You know?

Keeping the wood stove going is easy during the day. At night Chad gets up every 3 hours and tends it. The way he does it burns more wood than the way I manage it during the day, but that's mostly so he can sleep. We grossly underestimated the amount of wood needed, but even since purchasing the wood, we have saved money in heating PLUS we are actually comfortable and can heat the downstairs to 70 degrees. Last year it was a good day if we could keep it at 60 and the girls and I spent a lot of time upstairs where the furnace actually worked, which was ok since I had to constantly do laundry to keep water going through the pipes so they wouldn't freeze. This winter I have only needed to do laundry once a week. :)

Our chickens stop laying in the winter. We don't give them supplemental light. I know its not efficient and our customers really want our eggs, but I like the idea of giving the ladies a seasonal break. They have started laying again now that the days are getting longer. They fared the cold well, we also don't have supplemental heat in their coop, but we use deep bedding. They do get heated water though.

When the blizzard and dangerous cold hit our farm we still had two sheep in the "med shed".  Basically Chad rigged up a livestock trailer with deep bedding for them to be close to the house. Paddington was still healing from the amazingly gory and horrific wound from the dog attack. He was doing well and was about to be renamed Rasputin since we'd seen him come back from the brink of death so many times. Suddenly he was comatose and two days later he died at the vet's. We also lost our ram, who was perfectly healthy. We had post mortem done on both and showed that they were eating well and had few parasites and good muscle tone and healthy organs.  The official cause of death was "severe cold". The idea has been put out that maybe our hay quality did not match up with our mineral supplements. So we are crash course learning about soil/grass deficiencies and sheep nutrition. We had a couple ewes start showing signs of lethargy like the ram did and so we were proactive and gave them vitamin shots. So far, so good. Lucky for us that we planned our lambing to be late Spring and we have lots of time to figure this out. Our next batch of hay will be tested and we can match the supplements with its deficiencies for a more exact nutrition. Good can come of bad.....

Our dogs are outside dogs. Even in the cold. We tried to, and did, bring in Lucy when the winds were bad, but she hated it. Coming in to the super warm house isn't actually good for her. We had sure she had unfrozen water to drink and deep bedded shelter and she was fine and happy. I also fed her fatty meats. The high fat content helps her keep her body warm. Hobbit is old and comes inside gladly.

The kids love the snow and hated the sub zero weather because mean old mama kept them inside in the dangerous temperatures. They survived it by climbing the walls, jumping on everything and everyone, I let them trace out the foliage mural on their room wall, and when things got mean I made them do chores. Ha. Actually, the floors are quite clean as a result.

Some things I never thought I'd have to do as a farmer. This week I had to explain to the grocery clerk that yes, I was loading my groceries on to my two year and six year old's laps because the bags of chicken food were taking up the empty seats and floor space in my full size pick up....and they were there because the vet did the post mortem in the truck bed and the dead sheep were still back there (we were just driving home from that and it's not like I could unload them anyway....).....and the grocery clerk wasn't even phased. Farm life. You know? Also, in the last month I have learned a lot more about livestock vet science then I thought about previously.

So, that's how we have weathered this last round of weather. About 30 minutes prior to writing this post I was Googling Iowa Girls Basketball Tournament dates. Why? Because the last big blizzard of the season is always that week in March. Always. Then it snows again in April at least once randomly. So, this years tourney storm? First week in March. Looking that up was a turning point. I think I am officially, after living here for 16 years, an Iowan. Right?

Clementine Betrayal

So following the last post, I feel inclined to disclose the Clementine incident.

So, background....if I buy 1 bag of Clementines they all get eaten the first and second day. If I buy two bags of them, then they all get eat the first and second day. Now, I love Clementines, so I understand. So this last time I squirreled away about 10 for myself. I thought I would stealthily indulge on afternoon.....

and I was caught. The look was one of shock. Followed by silence. Then...

"Mom, what is that?"

me: "A Clementine."

"MOM HAS AN ORANGE!!!!!!!"

me: "Hey. Yes. I do."

"YOU SAID WE WERE OUT BECAUSE WE ATE THEM ALL!"

me: "Yes, you ate yours. These are mine."

"YOU LIED!"

me: "No?"

"WE ARE SUPPOSED TO SHARE THE FRUIT."

me: "Yes. And you didn't share with me. So I set these aside."

"BETRAYER!"

Silence.

More silence.

Ever since I have not gone alone into the kitchen. They are quick footed. When we replenished supply, the new pattern is that they get out 3 at a time, one for each of them and one for me, which is nice.

Snacks

Someone recently asked me what we do for snacks around here. We do snacks at will, as in the kids have full access to have them at any time they feel hungry, even 10 minutes right before dinner (though I discourage that by getting them busy helping me with dinner preparations.)

Why? I regulate my own hunger and eat at will. Most adults do, so in raising them to be adults I want to create healthy habits. If healthy snacks are available and they learn to regulate their own hunger, they form good habits. They also take pride in creating pretty presentations and preparing the food for each other. They know they can ask for help at any time too. I also encourage them to drink water, because sometimes thirst pretends it is hunger.

Dried fruit
popcorn (in lard or coconut oil)
crackers
cookies (rare)
frozen fruit
juice
yogurt (Greek)
beef jerky
nuts
peanut or sunflower seed butter sandwiches
hard boiled eggs
fresh fruit
carrots and celery
Popsicles
cheese
chips and salsa
eggrolls

In the summer, full access means they might eat 10 peaches each in a day. You know what? It's peaches, not soda pop, chips, and candy. In the winter, I keep a bucket of apples in the kitchen and they eat at those. Again, it's fruit not junk.

They recently realized that many breakfast foods are included in the snacks so they make their own breakfast too. Later they often ask for a second breakfast (the little Hobbits). Sometimes elevensies. ;)

For car trips, apples and crackers. Easy to pass out and eat and clean up. We will stop and get food while out too. Smoothies are a favourite.

We don't do dessert except for holidays or special occasions. We have blood sugar issues and there tends to be less problems at night if we avoid the idea of dessert after dinner. It also eliminates the child urge to "save room" and not eat dinner. Ha!

Here's the thing. We ALWAYS have ice cream in the freezer. I love ice cream. There is no limit on that treat either. They girls still choose yogurt and fruit and cheese. They also don't feel pressured to "finish" what is on their plate, even dessert items. I wish I could get that kind of control for myself!

Also, I found that if I buy fruit snacks....that's what gets eaten. So I buy the healthy foods. I don't buy the junk if I can help it. I only go to the store every other week so when they run out of something, like clementines, they are gone until next time. At the end, snack time gets creative- that's a good thing!

Winter Fun

Green Things I Don't Do

I had an insightful conversation the other day with a friend. The topic was shame really, about not being or doing things "green". This got me thinking that if we wrap ourselves up in the shame of not doing, or do certain things because of what others may think of us, then that is not maintainable. The action will not stick. Nor should we be ashamed of our progress, if we are not quite green homemaker of the year. You know? I make a lot of food from scratch and do a lot of intentionally good for the earth kind of things, so I think sometimes that might intimidate others? But I am not perfect, not a special green mama. So here is my confessional....not perfect indeed!

I don't hang out my laundry. I don't even have a clothes line. If I did, it would be a pain to walk heavy baskets of wet clothes form my second floor laundry room all the way outside. Then there is road dust, bird poop, and all sorts of other factors that just don't appeal to me. For this reason I have opted not to push the issue with my dearest.

I don't enjoy doing dishes by hand. I wish that I did, but I don't. I love <3 love my dishwasher.

I buy the good light bulbs that produce decent light. I hate florescent lights. Not to mention the toxicity of those florescent bulbs once they are done and off to the landfill and our watershed. I won't even pretend that people bother to take them to their stores to be recycled. It just does not happen.

I want to be a responsible person, but the reality of being "green" does not always fit every one's life. Maybe those things will come to me (likely not the light bulbs though) and years from now I will be happily hanging up wet undies with my dishpan hands, just like years ago when I thought I had to microwave food to make it safe to eat and now I don't and will never own one. I'm just not there yet.

It is because of this constantly changing mindset that I have come to understand more and judge less. I am not a lesser person or care less for the earth just because I have decided to opt for an HE dryer so conveniently placed in the room next to where all the clothes get shed and next to the other rooms they get put away. I do a lot more than most people because I can and have opportunity to. I have animals I am raising to eat in open air, I have a body of water in my care, I have children I am raising to care about these things too, and I have access to a life that those children can continue, inherit the earth in real terms.

What does matter is the actual, thoughtful living. I know that I should recycle soda cans even though there is no easy way to do so out here on the farm. I know that hanging laundry is a helpful task, and that doing dishes by hand can save water and money, I choose not to but I know the pros and cons in making that decision. That is different than just ignoring it, being ignorant of it, or just doing what is normal and easy. The choice needs to be mine and mine intrinsically.

Christmas Week in Review part 3...Christmas Day

Going to church for the Christmas Eve services. All dressed up.

My Blueberry Girl's hair, all princessed up. It was what she picked out. Totally tangle free, that was OUR holiday blessing. :)

She was quite proud of how lovely she looked. Quite loud about it too.

Santa brought them each a formal princess gown. Happiest. Girls. Ever.

Sweet, sweet childhood.

Baby Zap was just happy to be cuddled.

I love best how they share and help each other. I tell them being a princess is more about how kind and generous and grace giving one is than it is about the taffeta and lace.....

Christmas Week in Review part 2...Our First Pasture Predation

We lost a ewe last week. We think it was to a coyote, but then a couple days later 4-5 sheep were injured all at once. The first 4 we found right away and brought them to the house, the 5th  the next day and we are not sure if it was one we missed or if the predator came back.

We learned a lot in that 24 hours.

1) Our first aid kit was insufficient.
2) It is better to keep all vetrenary supplies in one place not in various places.
3) Sheep are amazingly resilient if you can get them out of the initial shock.

and 4): Lil'Bug. Is. Amazing.

The night was a normal mundane night, I sent the girls to bed, tucked them in, and was nursing Baby Zap. Chad went out for chores.

Suddenly he is kicking open the back door and yelling for towels. In his arms, Paddington a brown wether, who was bleeding profusely from his neck.

Lil'Bug jumped out of bed, put on her jeans and boots and appeared in the kitchen, "What can I do mom?"

She held a dishtowl to Paddington's neck wound while I searched for more towels and thought about what to do.

I emailed Lorraine at Hedgeapple Farms. I couldn't find her number anywhere. I thought and thought (quickly).....then I called Lois at Reicharts Dairy Air. She has goats, but in my mind goats and sheep are similar so I called. At 8pm. Lucky for me she was home. She walked me through what supplies I had on hand, dispensed advice, and as I repeated it out loud, Lil'Bug paid rapt attention.

Chad brought the other lambs in one by one, driving each one up from the pasture in the front seat of his car. He was really upset. These lambs were in the pasture with our llama and a full grown wether and should have been protected from coyotes and coyotes don't usually prey in the late afternoon.

As I explained to him that Lois had first aid supplies we needed, he decided to wait for the vet. Confused, I asked him why he thought waiting was a good idea? He didn't think driving 5 hours was a good use of time. Ah, I reminded him I was talking to Lois, not Lorraine. Lois lives 25 miles to the north of us (in farm terms, just up the road). So he decided to go after all.

I was exhausted, the baby strapped to my chest in his Moby wrap, which was getting sopped with pasture mud and blood.

Lil'Bug on the other hand, very much awake, hopped up and started mixing up some honey water. She had heard discussion about trying to get the sheep to drink and decided it would be her job to get them to drink the sweet water. The sheep would not lap it, so she asked for a bottle. Despite having a newborn, we do not have bottles. So I suggested the syringe that we use to squirt water in her ears. She gathered it up and started squirting the fluid into the lambs mouths, gently lifting their heads to her lap one by one.

Each lamb was bleeding and Lil'Bug was covered in blood. Not that she noticed or cared as she tended to them. Winston (lamb wether) and Mary (lamb ewe) were examined. Mary's foot was torn up, possibly broken. Winston had puncture wounds, possibly a neck sprain too. Marshmallow also had neck wounds.

I set the kitchen up so the sheep could not get to the other rooms and moved this and that to make them more comfortable. Chad came home and bandaged and cleaned and gave medicine and Lil and I went to bed.

In the morning, we woke up to Marshmallow (ewe) throwing open the box of hats and gloves by the back door and unloading the contents. We knew she was getting better is she was bored. Ha!

Lil resumed feeding them sweet water and I spent the day cleaning up sheep poo in my kitchen only to have it quickly replaced.

Chad spent the day at home, assessing the pasture, taking Paddington to the vet, and doing first aid on the wounded.

I felt pretty helpless,  Baby Zap limiting the amount of help I could be. Lil'Bug really shined though. She's only newly six and had more patience, calm, and clear thinking (more than most adults I know) in a crisis than I think anyone would expect of a child. Yet, here she was, self motivated and directed in a time of need. Not present in her was the girl with a short temper or the child who gets jealous of her sister's toys or of the baby's attention. Here was a responsible, caring, level headed girl doing what needed to be done.

Chad was deflated. Our confidence in sheparding was shaken and these little lambs were the victims of the horrible proof of our inexperience. In our minds it was not the ferral dog that was to blame, nor his teeth, but our own mistakes.

The result: we bought 2 additional llamas. We moved all the sheep together. We buffed up the fences. We bought a bigger...item that takes care of coyotes. We built up our first aid supplies. We learned. None of that makes our pasture predator proof, but maybe just a little less like a giant coyote dinner buffet?

As of the writing of this post, Marshmallow is back in the pasture and the other lambs are on the mend, soon to join the others. Paddington's neck wound is healing and he is finally eating and drinking on his own. Mary (ewe) and Winston are almost ready to go back out too.

And my kitchen floor is clean. CLEAN. It took quite a bit of effort, mind you. I am definitely designing a vet stall into the new kitchen design AND we really need to push up getting a barn. In the meantime, we have some ideas.

Christmas Week in Review part 1...Christmas Eve Day

Our tree, the girls and Chad picked it out, brought it home, and decorated it.  Lily thought it was funny that when they went to pick out the live tree, because someone forgot their coat, they just bought a pre-cut one?).

Early that day, Nala (Lily's kitten) made her way into the walls.

This is how she got in.

Just big enough for a hand to reach in and grab a cat head. She was pretty sick when we got her out, but she's on the mend.

This is what it looked like AFTER the cat was extracted. Wow. All the years of house construnction and deconstruction and demolition all culminated in THIS. And all of this was in the middle of cleaning for Christmas company. Seriously.