Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

I picked this up off the internet...enjoy! An Old Farmer's Advice: *Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong.* *Keep skunks and bankers at a distance.* *Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.* * A bumble bee is considerably faster than a John Deere tractor.* * Words that soak into your ears are whispered...not yelled.* * Meanness don't jes' happen overnight.* * Forgive your enemies. It messes up their heads.* * Do not corner something that you know is meaner than you.* * It don't take a very big person to carry a grudge.* * You cannot unsay a cruel word.* * Every path has a few puddles.* * When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.* * The best sermons are lived, not preached.* * Most of the stuff people worry about ain't never gonna happen anyway.* * Don't judge folks by their relatives.* * Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.* * Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll enjoy...

Hubby calls it a cigar. Actually it's a septic drainage pipe...though I don't know the technical term for it. Hubby has been working on two septic systems the past couple of months (wet weather delayed both projects) and is finally managing to finish the last one; a septic system for a church just down the road from us. Anyway. He chose to use this kind of drainage pipe for the systems. The black pipe at the center has holes in it to allow for water to leech out of it. The Styrofoam peanuts in the netting around it prevent dirt from filling in the holes and allow the water to escape. You can't see it in the picture but there is a sheet of papery stuff on one side of the "cigar" that must be positioned on top when the pipe is laid in the ditch; this prevents dirt from filtering down through the "peanuts." If hubby had decided to use just a regular pipe he would have had to haul loads and loads of gravel to put all around the pipe before and after he laid ...

I thought it was time to share some more funny stories from folks who have had "adventures" on their homesteads. These are collected from the folks over at Homesteading Today. In this bunch I think the last one is the best. Enjoy. CK Never visit the goat pen with opened granola bars in your pocket. Trust me; goat-hoof-print shaped bruises on your forehead are very hard to explain away. Don't go into the chicken yard in bare feet. The smell of chicken manure doesn't wash off skin readily. Never let your kids tie their squirrel dog to a little red wagon at the top of a hill. You will laugh hysterically at the "Grinch dog" running frantically downhill from the wagon...until the wagon runs over the dog and tangles in the leash. The dog will not be happy, the kids will be freaked out, and you will pee your pants. Don't hold a pick-axe over your head because the cat ran into your target zone. The axe head is heavy and your once delicate little hands will cal...

For something to blog about I just thought I'd share a couple of things I've learned this past week: If a 2 year old should happen to find a stray glue stick for your hot glue gun and decide to use it to "paint" streaks on your glass patio door, don't panic. A little fingernail polish on a cotton ball will take it right off. If you should come home tired and distracted by a 2 year old after a particularly grueling weekly grocery shopping trip and by chance you should forget a bag behind the seat of the truck and it stays in there overnight...if the temp stays under 40 degrees all night have no fears about the tub of sour cream; just pour the extra liquid off of it and it will be just fine. Unless he should by chance read your blog your husband need not learn about it. hahahaha.....

Wear a pair of these to work one day. Or church! They'd go great with a mini-skirt! Now I ask you: WHO would not feel trendy in a pair of shoes like these? I NEED a pair to wear to church around here. But then again, I am afraid I'd disrupt the whole service, for once in his life the preacher wouldn't be able to talk. Either he'd laugh the whole hour, or he'd be so speechless with astonishment he'd forget his sermon. Hahahahahaha!!!!!!

Remember this cute picture of Ellen by the creek? This was taken the day before Easter. Here is what the creek turned in to after getting about 3 inches of rain in less than 3 hours: This is hubby's hay field and is two or three hundred yards from the actual creek bed. It was just wild. Ellen didn’t know what to think about it. She kept wanting to go to the creek. I kept having to tell her that this WAS the creek and we couldn’t get any closer. Hubby says he has seen it a bit higher than this once. He ended up spending most of the weekend putting up new fences, as the old ones were covered in logs and debris. The storm knocked our power out for over 7 hours I believe. It is rather a challenge to deal with a lack of electricity when you are so addicted to it. Plus try to explain to a two year old that she can’t watch Barney, Blue’s Clues OR Dora the Explorer, or listen to music, or turn on the lights or have the ceiling fan on either. It was a long day. Ha.

A good gardener knows not to push herself TOO terribly hard. A good gardener knows that it's OK to get a little behind on her gardening. Her pleasure and joy comes from watching both the plants AND the weeds grow...especially the grass. Her motto is: If you DO get a little behind on your gardening, just even it out by getting a little garden on your behind. *heh heh heh heh*

This actually happened a couple of weeks ago when we got a new calf. The calf was from a first calf heifer that was up in the bull pen. Usually when we see that they are close to calving we bring them back to the milking herd to get used to the process of being herded and to be able to keep a better eye on them. But it was so muddy that we decided to leave her there. We made a couple of trips a day checking on her. One morning I found her up there with her little heifer calf. We decided to do something different to get them. We took both 4-wheelers; one with the little calf cart, which I drove. We were going to load up the calf, lead the cow to the corral with the calf and then shut them up. Well. It was a good idea in theory, but it proved hair-raising in practice. You see, the bull does not like noisy, rattly things that invade his territory, they make him steaming mad. So he threw one wall-eyed fit. Hubby did a bit of discouraging with some bird-shot, which kept Mr. Bul...

Has it really been the 21st since I last blogged? *sigh* Times does fly, doesn't it? The past couple of days we had a bit of an annoyance; the computer quit on us. It does that occasionally. The little fans in the back turn, but nothing else happens and the monitor won't come on. The last time it did this we took the tower in and the dude said it was the monitor that was the problem, because when he plugged it in there the computer fired up. And, of course, when we brought it back home and hooked it up again, it worked. This time I tried it a couple of times. Then I unhooked everything, banged it a couple time and it began working again. Sister in law asked the computer guys where she works and they said it probably needs cleaned and the connections inside "reseated." So that's what we will do. So anyway. Things here are all pretty much copacetic. Except it has been really wet and we haven't been able to do much with the garden except watch the weeds g...