Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

We had a great Christmas. Ellen made out like a bandit, as usual. She was funny this year. For some reason she didn't champ at the bit to open her presents; she'd just ask me which ones were hers, then she'd look at them and then leave them alone. Christmas morning, Gary came straight into the house from the barn with us. He told her we were going to open our present. Ellen held up her hands and said: (and I quote verbatim) "But wait, we need to eat breakfast first." So we delayed the gift opening for an hour; per a 3 year old's wishes. Go figure! So far the gifts she plays with the most are a little toy cell phone from my mother and the little pup-type tent that Gary got for her. We have it set up in her bedroom. We had Christmas dinner here, as usual. I got out my pickled okra and let everyone try it. They all liked it. Gary said when I first told him I was going to make some pickled okra this past summer, he thought I was wasting my time and supp...

Today we got our annual yeast rolls from the School of Metaphysics. The guy made me laugh to myself when he noted; "You have your stove outside in a building without walls. Why?" Apparently he'd never heard of an outdoor wood furnace. I never had either 'til I came here. I told him we heated the house with it, that there are pipes underground. Ellen is excited about Christmas, but she really isn't clamoring to open her presents yet. She asks which ones are hers every day, then she just walks away, apparently reassured that they are there waiting for her. I hope she continues like that every Christmas, but I won't hold my breath. On Sunday night we went to the church Christmas program. The kids did a great job as usual. Afterwards the kids gave out the presents they'd gotten each other. (Having exchanged names a couple of weeks ago.) Ellen got a little box of toys from her Sunday School teacher and a cute FurReal baby chipanzee from her cousin W...

Also known as AAA. This is what I ought to have named this blog. Anyway. Today I drove the dozer again. Had to tow some sort of something that hubby was working on from down by the sawmill up to front area. The last time I did this one of hubby's friends was astounded at my obliging attitude about doing such things. His atonishment kind of puzzles me; but then again his wife isn't as adventurous as I seem to be. So, because of such surprise reactions, here is a blog on having an adventure, helping hubby and how such things can be so fun and easy. Like I posted before, driving this dozer IS easy. Here is a horrible picture of me at the helm: Here is the view from the driver's seat: Here are the main controls: This inverted "V" concept is rather simple, but can be confusing. To go forward you pull the knob down to the right; the further down you pull the faster forward you go. To stop you just return the knob to the top of the "V." To go backw...

December's almost here. Yikes! I have to get some Christmas cards going. I have neglected this blog terribly, BUT I did my 30 day National Blog Posting deal over on my other blog. So, I will now try to get back to you. Random events in the past week or so. Last week I learned how to drive the big bulldozer! Piece of cake. It' just a little toggle dealy that you push up and down to make it go back or forward. Well, it's more than that, but for now, just take my word for it. The weird thing is that you use foot pedals to steer it. I have yet to learn how to operate the bucket, but first things first. Hubby wanted me to know how to drive it so I can tow OTHER pieces of heavy equipment around here, when/if needed. Last week we were eating supper and I looked up and there across the back yard strolled a little heifer. So we had to high-tail it out there and chase her back where she belonged. Our renter and his buddies got 5 -FIVE- deer this firearm season, all out in...

Where is that invisible line you cross when you look at a pile of leaves you've just raked and tell yourself things like; "It's too windy to burn these today and I don't feel like mowing them. I'll just leave them here, even though they are going to get old and gross and maybe attract snakes," instead of throwing yourself into them with careless abandon? When does the joy of life leave you and fuddy-duddy practicality set in? And why did I ever let it happen? It must have crept up on me while I was busy trying to be an adult instead of enjoying my childhood for as long as it lasted, even if it had lasted until I was 80 or 90. The next pile of leaves we rake up I am going to throw myself in them as well and have a real romp with my daughter. Who cares who might drive by and see.

Here's a shot of Ellen and Matilda. Ellen's shirt would not stay up on her shoulder, nor would Ellen herself look at or smile at the camera. Matilda wouldn't look at me either, so here you have an; "it is what it is" photo. Matilda is almost camoflaged in the leaves in the background. * Ellen loves to go walking in the woods and pretend to go camping. I am pretty sure she learned this from Barney. * We have a new lady on our mail route. Not just different, but new. New as in completely green to the job. Last Friday she delivered our mail at 8:55 PM. Yes, right as we were going to bed. Hubby had to get his boots on and go get the mail in his PJs. The next night it came at about 7 PM, I believe. I feel sorry for the lady, she's really sweet. But I hope she can pick up the pace a little bit. * Firearm season is in full swing. Our renter and 2 of his buddies got 3 deer out behind the rental house. They were in 7th heaven; 2 does and a buck. I waver...

This morning as I was up the road doing my graining of the stock up there, it began to rain on me. The sun was just coming up. I turned around and there to greet me was a double rainbow; just beautiful. There for all the area to see and enjoy; embodying a promise of God. This morning we had to go to a funeral. I had never met the lady. Her sister had been a neighbor of my husband's family for many years. As had her nephew and his wife, I believe. She'd lived not far from here, and hubby's mom had kept in contact with her and her sister and one of her other family members. This particular lady who'd passed, I'll call her Bessie, was 94 years and 4 days old. She'd lived in this community for a long time. I am not sure just how long, perhaps 15-20 years. Maybe more or less, I just don't know. I should have asked before blogging. Anyway. We went to the funeral. The visitation was from 9:30 AM to 10:30 AM, the funeral itself started at 10:30 AM. ...

OK. So I missed one day. It's a good thing I didn't get this blog entered into NaBlo. In the meantime, I just finished blogging on how to make brown sugar on my New2Me Recipes blog. Here are a few random topics I thought I'd discuss. 1) I had never heard of a "plumber's friend" until I came here. Back where I came from we called them "toilet plungers." 2) Yesterday in church a neighbor, well, 5 miles or so down the road, asked hubby if the deer slept on our doorsteps. Ha ha. It would seem as though they do. Most any time you might drive here you will see deer, either in the pasture/garden area to the west, or out here in front of the house. There are 2 does that are so tame they don't even bother to run until you get 100 yards from them, maybe even closer. 3)These Asian lady beetles are out in full force today. It's warm, 70s or so, and all the bugs, wasps, grasshoppers...etc, are out for a last hurrah before winter sets in. 4)If I...

Here, for lack of anything else pertinent, is a pic I took back in August. Sometimes we can get spectacular sunsets here. This shot doesn't do it justice. I am not the photographer that jel is (from My Place-link on the right). But I thought I'd share it anyway. It's my way of saying goodbye to warm weather. It was 26 degrees this morning when we got up at 3:45 AM. Probably will be cold tonight too. Oh, the photo up top was taken down in the creek bottoms a couple weeks ago, I believe. Cows are still grazing, so there was still a bit of grass. OK, enough random wanderings. Bye

A year ago Ellen was still peeing in her diaper...and pooping in it as well. A year ago Ellen was still sitting in her high chair to eat. A year ago Ellen was still sleeping in her crib. Now she is sleeping in a big bed. (Of course this means she can clamber out of it and get mom up 4 times per night now, I am praying this phase will soon pass.) Now she is completely potty trained. (Now if I could just convince her to wear panties. Not even Dora panties will she allow on her body.) Now she is eating at the table in a big chair. (She's so tall she's never needed a booster seat.) All of the above was pretty much her own idea; in fact it was 12:30 AM one night when she squalled in her crib and got me up. I went to her and she told me she didn't want to sleep in her crib any more, she wanted to get into the big bed. So, I picked her up, tucked her into it and, voila; that's where she's slept since.

OK. So I am not doing NaBlo with this blog, but I am trying to keep up with it. And I am already drawing a blank. It's only day 4... Oh, I know. Our voting place. This time they changed our polling place. It used to be in the Windyville Community Center; no wheelchair access, no A/C and no central heating; just a potbellied stove. Oh and no potty, unless you count the outhouse outside. Now it is in a local church in that town. However, this was worse in some ways. The driveway is a single lane, on an embankment/bridge type of deal. The parking lot...well, it just isn't , that's the easiest way to put it. Umm...inside they only used the lobby/entryway of the church. OK, there's about enough room for 3 people to stand comfortably, well, maybe that's an exaggeration, but still, it's SUPER small. Hubby spoke to at least one couple who tried 3 times to get in there, and just went home the first two times because it was so jam-packed. Surely they can fin...

OK. I am sitting here typing on the computer, on my new blog, that is. Suddenly I hear someone driving in, really slowly. I watch through a window. Some guy in a truck. He drives a big circle in front of the red garage. Then pulls up in the driveway behind the house. And HONKS! ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! Why do people do that? It's so Pavlovian. If you want to talk to someone, get your lazy butt out of the car and come to the door. For pete's sake! It just makes me MAD! I am not a dog to be whistled for! I just went and stood on the porch, made him turn off his truck to talk. OK. Rant over. Buh-Bye

Well, NaBloPoMo is now is full swing once again. I am participating, but with a different blog. New2Me Recipes I wanted to do this one too, but they will only let you enter one blog, I believe. So far above blog is pretty boring, but I am going to try get something fun and interesting on there in the next week or so. Maybe I will use the next year to really prepare for it by making more interesting recipes. ***** In the meantime; The little twin calf continues to do well. The only thing is that we'd like to dehorn her, but she doesn't have any hornbuds yet. Weird. Probably because she was a premie. The bull calf we pulled yesterday is an absolute monster. Even if he had been laid right the cow probably couldn't have pushed him out! Yikes! But he's a cutie. Too bad we have to get rid of him. Hubby continues to prepare for winter; bulldozing fencerows and stretching new electric wire. We have our hay supply in, so that's good. I am not looking forward to ...

It all started off as usual. Except when I went up the road at 6:30 AM to feed the heifers and dry cows I found one dry cow going into labor. We usually give them a while before we go back and check on them. If she had been a first-calf heifer we'd likely have brought her back to the barn ASAP. So I went back and finished chores. Then at about 8:30 AM, when everything was winding down, a guy comes by and needs hubby to help with his well pump. He'd been out of water for TWO WEEKS trying to fix it himself. To make a long story short, hubby had to go up there and pull the pump again and fix the wires on it. This took until nearly noon. Meanwhile, I took mother-in-law and Ellen to town. MIL had a doc appointment. When we came back I checked on the cow. Uh-oh. NO calf! Hubby came home, ate, then we took Ellen to her grandma's and took both 4-wheelers up the road for a cow round-up. We got her back with no problems. However, when hubby went in to the trailer to do ...

Did you ever play this game? A week or so ago I went into a thrift store here and found this. This is an original box and game; it smells like it's been stored for 30or 40 years. But it's only missing ONE little cherry. I remember playing Hi-Ho Cherry-O waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back when I was a young'un. It was one of my favorites. The whole object of the game is to be the first to pick all 10 cherries off of your tree and into your bucket. It only requires that a child be able to count to 4. No problem for Ellen, she often wins. She just LOVES it! I foresee many games of Hi-Ho Cherry-O in the future.

Last Wednesday we had a set of twin heifers born. One didn't make it. We brought the live one back here and I got some colostrum in her; she was really tiny and wasn't able to stand. Hubby looked at his records and found that they were a month early. I didn't post anything about it because I was afraid she wouldn't make it. The above was a shot of her and Ellen on the second day; Thursday. On Fri and Saturday she went downhill, so much so that I pretty much gave up on her as well. But happily enough she came around, started guzzling her milk and standing up on her own. On Sunday night I put her in her own little calf house. She's pretty perky now. I got pictures of her today, but don't have time now to upload and post them. As you can tell by the above pic, Ellen was enthused about her. She kept giving her sticks and trying to get her to fetch, like a puppy. Now that the calf's in her own house, Ellen has lost her enthusiasm, it's just anoth...

As is her wont, Ellen nearly made me pass out from trying not to laugh at her today. I was making a cake...a German chocolate cake. She looked into the bowl of cake mix, eggs, oil and water and asked the above question. When I told hubby later he laughed and told her they were in Germany. I got a bit more creative. At the time I told her they were in the cake mix powder somewhere. hahaha... After all if there are fruit and nuts in a fruit and nut chocolate bar, and there's milk in a milk chocolate bar, why can't there be Germans in a German chocolate cake? *sigh* All right. I know, it's on the same level as; there's no baby in a bottle of baby oil. But it's lots more fun to think like that than to be practical.

Here, after I dunno how long it has been, several weeks, is the picture of the new bulldozer. At least pretend that you are impressed. A machine is a machine to me, though I am coming to appreciate the finer points of what is quality and what isn't. Though that might be applied more towards trailer shopping than dozer shopping. Notice this nice trailer that Mr. Dozer is resting upon. It is nice. The other ones we looked at were not. Below find a picture that I was going to post elsewhere, but did not want to wait. Ellen was helping me make this pie. As you can tell by her face, she enjoyed "cleaning" the spoon off after we were through putting down the chocolate layer on this strawberry pie. She also thoroughly enjoyed using Mr Chef brush to glaze the berries. Do not bother asking for the recipe for this pie just yet. It will be featured in my new blog for next month. I will let you know then. 'Kay? Thanks for your patience! In other news. Today I made...

Here is something I have often wanted to capture on film over the past few years. Finally I actually had my camera in my pocket and managed to snap this a shot a few days ago. When it is so hot during the summer months we often put our bottle calves in the bigger pen with the weaners (ummm...those are the calves who've been weaned off of the bottle). But in this enclosure there are no bottle holders for them, so you (meaning *I*) have to hold the bottles. Feeding one at a time is a joke because it'd take forever and you'd have to beat the others off with a stick. So your best bet is to feed them all at once; then it's over with. However this requires a special talent. Three calves, three bottles, two hands and one camera=dairy sleight of hand. In a still shot like this it would seem easy, but actually these little buggers are in constant motion; pulling on the bottle or "punching" at it with their noses, so you are constantly trying to juggle them to kee...

This is my favorite time of year. I love fall weather, I love fall colors. I was married in the fall. Hunters are going to start getting rid of the pesky deer around here. (I sincerely hope!) Leaves in the creek means 'tis the season for: Hot chocolate Spiced apple cider Apples Nippy weather Nuts Mums Thanksgiving hunting season cool weather clothes I get to wear fall colors again Ummm...let's see, what else? In a couple of years it will mean school time for Ellen. That's hard to believe.

Ellen has it all figured out. A few weeks ago she and her aunt were playing a game in which Auntie put a penny under a puzzle piece and Ellen turned all of the pieces over until she found the penny. At which point she'd shriek and carry on like she'd found the motherload of gold. When it was time to leave Ellen took the penny; Auntie told her she could put it in her piggy bank. Last weekend this happened again. Ellen took great joy in putting the pennies in her piggy bank. One day here at home she also found a nickle on the counter, one I'd rescued from the washing machine. Voila! Ellen trotted to her room to put it in her piggy bank. She was excited. She kept asking for more "pennies" to put in her bank. I found her a couple that had been lying around for a bit. You know how they tend to collect. She was mighty pleased. Then this morning as I was fixing her breakfast I heard her talking about pennies. I went into the bedroom and found this scene: Why ...

Hubby put the dozer in the shed, so I can't really get a good picture of him, yet. But here is the trailer that will carry him around. It's called a "lowboy." I asked why that particular moniker. The answer is that this is lower than a regular semi trailer. OK. I will take hubby's word for it. To me a trailer is a trailer...some are longer, some are different colors, some have sides. But...well...you know. In any case, it is our newest acquisition. What other news can I share? Hubby said that one juicy piece of news that we have cannot be shared with anyone. Therefore I am disappointed because I had a great idea of how to share it. Oh, well. (No, it does NOT have anything to do with babies) We have a new heifer to milk. But the calf was dead. I have a new cold. Today Ellen got to reading a toy catalog and, of course, wanted everything in it. I finally told her; "Ellen we don't have the money." Ellen knew better. She went to my purse, got o...

Yes, we have a new "family" member here on the dairy. Note the quotation marks. He's a pretty big dude, but will come in handy here. We still have fallen trees from the ice storm 3 years ago that need to be cleared up. Forgive me for not having a picture of him to post yet. However, above you can see a shot of his service manual. Inside this service manual, at the very back, is his operation manual. Do not confuse the two, as I would have. The operation manual is only maybe 1/2 inch thick. The rest of the monster manual is all about servicing him. This manual pictured above did NOT come with him. Take a guess how much this would cost if you bought it from the manufacturer. Come on...just pull a figure out of the air. I didn't come very close to it when hubby had me guess. I made what I thought was a preposterous guess and gasped when I was way under. Here's a hint. Hubby went online and found a place that dealt in used machines and manuals. He paid ...

(*ahem...we begin this post with a sincere apology for the month long absence...the month of August was too hot and dry for blogging, all my words turned to dust before my fingers could type them out. Thank you for your continued patience...) Really I need to bring my camera with me in the mornings when I go up the road to feed and check on the stock. Last week there was a doe and her twins out feeding by the road. Today...well, today was another story. It began yesterday actually. Since it has been so dry hubby has had to put out hay for the bull and heifer group up the road. Yesterday morning they had finished their hay, and for some reason their hay ring was up on its side a ways away from where it had been around the hay bale. Hubby went up there and put out another bale (these are the big round bales, by the way...maybe 4'x5'.). Then this morning I go up there and notice that not only is the hay ring no longer around what's left of the bale of hay, but it is abou...

A couple more sayings for you: "His shirt-tail doesn't hit his butt, 'til he finds someone to tell his tale to." This one has to do with a gossip. Obviously this dates from way back since nowadays when someone gets juicy news all they have to do is whip out their cell phone, ticky-tack a few buttons and have all their contacts informed. "Its a poor dog who can't find his way back home." This one hubby quoted at me today after I told him what had happened. We had a couple of dudes fly out here to conduct some business with hubby. They landed in Springfield at about 11:30 AM and then had to fly back out at about 5PM. They were through talking at about 2:35 PM. Hubby left. At 3:00 PM, one of them knocks on the door: "Hi, um...I am having trouble getting my GPS to give me directions back to the airport. When I enter the airport address it just gives me this weird message." "Ah," I say. "Yes, the terminal out there is new, I do...

Here is one picture that I was astounded to be able to take. There at the zoo in Eureka they have a petting area...I think they actually call it "The Barnyard." Mostly all they have are goats and sheep. You walk in there and they have brushes to groom the animals. Ellen walked in there like she owned the place, took a brush that another kid handed her, and went to brushing the goats. The shot I got of her brushing them doesn't show her face, but she was happy to pose for this one. (Oh, they do have alpaca and a llama, but they were penned up. My nephew said he the alpaca spit on him once...I avoided them. haha) What is a trip to the coast if you don't go to the beach; even if it is cool, windy and cloudy? We went to the little town of Trinidad, where the beach is much more accessible. Clam Beach near McK, requires quite a hike to get down the water. Ellen was a bit intimidated by the waves and surf, but she got her feet wet a couple of times and watched me b...

Ellen and I got back from our 2 week trip to California on Tuesday. We had a great time visiting family and friends and seeing some sights. You can't go to N. California and not get a picture of some redwoods. So one day we visited Sequoia Park Zoo. I will post some of the zoo pics in a different entry, but for now here is a couple of impressive shots. There at the park, in a cluster of redwoods, they have a platform and two slides set up. Here is a shot of Ellen on the bottom of one of the slides: And here she is standing at the top of the stairs that you go up to get to the slides. This is on the opposite side from the slides, of course. Believe it or not, I actually convinced her to sit on my lap and go down one of these slides. She was not at all in to doing so alone. She isn't really adventurous and won't go on the swings at all.

Here's a great way to get rid of them. A lady was passing these out at the reunion on Saturday; a cute gift. The plants are just flower garden staples I believe, but don't ask me what they are, I am not up on that stuff. My MIL is, I think she said the light colored one is a Dusty Miller, or something dusty, I can't remember. At any rate I thought this would be a great idea for a yard sale, except use herbs you have grown from seed. I bet they sell pretty well along in spring.

OK, so this is just one picture. I don't have enough time to post any more at the moment. Ellen had a great time at Vacation Bible School. Mostly she loved painting during the crafts period; the above birdhouse was right up her alley. One of the guys in the church actually made enough birdhouses for all the kids to have one; so probably 50 or more. Thank you Mark! The preschool class went pretty well for me. Last year on any given day during VBS there were anywhere from 10-16 preschoolers. This year there were 6 who actually showed up every day and then 2 visitors on Thurs. The great thing about that is that there were at least 3-4 helpers in there with me the whole time, so we did great.

Here is a picture of about half of my onion crop. Most of the rest of it is still out in the garden, waiting until I get a chance to harvest it. I am going to chop many of these up and freeze them for later use in stir-fries or soups. It cuts down on prep time. I do not eat raw onions; they come back on me something awful. But hubby and Ellen love raw onions. Hubby likes them sliced up with cucumbers in salted vinegar water. I eat the cukes, but not the onions. Ellen eats the onions but not the cukes. She frequently has onion breath. ******** This week I am slaving away at VBS. I am teaching the preschool class. So far I have had 6 students in my class each day, though we originally started off with 7. One student decided to move up to the next class with his grandma; which was fine with me. He is one of those squirrelly kids you can't keep still anyway. I forgot to take pictures today, but I will try to remember tomorrow. Thankfully there have been plenty of helpers ...

This past March when the stores started putting their seeds on display I loaded up on them lest they not have them by the time the weather was agreeable enough for planting. I believe in March we were still having temps down into the 20s at night, and not much warmer during the day. Ellen does not know the finer points of gardening, all she knows is that on TV Rabbit from Pooh is forever planting his radish seeds. Therefore she was all on fire to plant some of the seeds when we got home. I didn't see the harm in letting her plant some of the cabbage seeds, they are my least favorite vegetable. (ugh...but this post isn't about my vegetable dislikes...I have griped enough on Facebook about that.) So I cleared a tiny spot in my little flower garden and let her plant away. Days, weeks passed. Much to my everlasting astonishment I noticed that her planting efforts had not been in vain; lo and behold, the cabbages had sprouted. So here is Ellen holding one of the fruits of her g...

These are pretty good; hubby likes them, and a couple of people have requested the recipe, so without further ado (except to add a note or two) here is the recipe: (Note #1: You can make these with whatever ground meat you wish, I presume, just season it a bit more.) (Note #2: I didn't have seasoned bread crumbs, so I used plain and sprinkled on some oregano and savory...it was really good.) Parmesan Pork Zucchini Boats Ingredients 4 Medium zucchini 1 lb. Bulk pork sausage 1 Small onion, chopped 1 Garlic clove, minced 2/3 cup Seasoned bread crumbs 1/2 cup Plus 2 tbsp. shredded Parmesan cheese, divided 1 Egg, beaten 1/4 tsp. Salt 1/2 cup Water Preparation Cut each zucchini in half lengthwise. Scoop out seeds and pulp, leaving a 1/4 inch shell; set aside. Chop pulp; set aside. In a large skillet, cook sausage and onion over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Add garlic and zucchini pulp; saute for 3-5 minutes or until tender. Remove from the heat. Stir in the bread crum...

In a previous post....a couple of years ago in fact, I grouched about our insurance carrier. Since then we have changed policies and things have gone along without incident. Until yesterday, that is. Yesterday at approx 3:30 PM, while I was trying to fry chicken, mash potatoes and stir the gravy all at the same time, the phone rang. The timing in and of itself is very annoying. The lady said she was from our insurance company and that we had not paid since April. Hmmm... I distinctly remember writing the checks. I told her so. She said she'd look into it and get back to us. When she called back hubby answered. She advised him there'd been a mistake. So hubby asks: "Oh, so our account is OK?" Lady: "Oh, I don't know, you are under a group policy, I only handle individual policies. You will have to call the people who do handle group policies." (Say what?) Hubby: "Do you have the number?" Lady rattles it off. Hubby: "So why don...

Hello friends. Here is what appears to be my weekly post, although I really would like to be one of those overachieving bloggers who posts every day of the week, somehow that just isn't working out for me at this time of year. Mostly it's because I am too busy in the garden. Plus other various dairy duties call my name. I found the recipe for the above pie over at the blog run by The Lumberjack's Wife -who's husband is really in sober fact an electrician. But never mind that; go over there and say "hello" to her. Her blog is much more entertaining than mine is. At any rate, the Chocolate-Lined Strawberry pie is awesome. And easy. Of course my pie is not as picturesque as the photo she had posted, but that's OK. It probably tastes as good. ******************** Today we discovered a heifer has disappeared...just hopped the fence. Gone. Kaput. Who knows? She was imminently due to calve. Hubby says that by now she's either dead or taking care of her calf. ...

OK. I only have 6 minutes to blog...where do I begin? Ummm Friday: we got a new calf from #87 who was VERY attached to calf. We brought cow and calf in. Put calf in pen. Sunday: #87 decided calf must be back where she gave birth to it, so broke down fence to get back there...almost a mile back up the road. Hubby took calf back up to her yesterday. Sunday: I found different cow, fondly called Tornado Head, with a stillborn calf. Cow will not leave site for 2 days, even though hubby drug dead calf away. Today. I went up to do feeding. Heifer #75 in labor, making no progress. Tornado Head still refuses to leave birth site, she's looking pretty rough. #87 has hidden calf. We bundle Ellen off to her Grandma's and go do some cow chasing. We get #75 back to farm here, hubby has to pull the calf. Nice heifer calf, but #75 refuses to have anything to do with it. (Meaning I have to clean all the yuck off of it, thaw colostrum to feed it...etc) Back we go up the road to the ...

Ellen's Missouri aunt made her a dress. She got the pattern from a co-worker, thought it was adorable, and made it for Ellen. It is so cute, but she had quite the time with it. For one thing...the MAIN thing...Ellen wasn't cooperative in the "let me measure you" department. So Auntie had to just make a guess at the size. The first time it was too little. The second time it was a tad too big, but I put it on Ellen while they were here so Auntie was able to measure it a bit better. So now it fits just right...for a few months anyway. The shoulder straps are unique in that they are just that; straps. You pull them through button holes in the top front and then knot so they can't be pulled back through. It made quite the sensation among the ladies at church yesterday.

gumption/gump's hen / 1 initiative, resourcefulness; 2 courage Her story isn't all that unusual, I suppose. There are thousands who go through it, for one reason or another, and they face it with the same determination and courage. But here in our corner of the world her story touched us all. Last June a lady at our church had to have the lower part of her left leg amputated below the knee. To a woman who is active and athletic this was devastating, as you might expect. But what was remarkable was that through the devastation, through the agony of loss and the pain of recovery...two things remained steady; faith and gumption. Faith that God had a purpose for her life, faith that He was still with her and would see her though. The courage and gumption to start over again, to make the best of what life had handed her and not complain about it. This was an inspiration to all of us. Last summer she said she wasn't going to be able to play at the church softball games...

Every once-in-awhile a day comes along that calls out for a walk in the woods. The weather is perfect; sunny, breezy, not too hot, not too cold...just perfect. Not to mention the cows were pastured in the upper fields. So I loaded Ellen up on the 4-wheeler and off we went down to the creek bottoms again. The creek was a little bit lower than on our last walk, so after we spent some time annoying the eensy-weensy schools of fish with our rock throwing, and chasing the little peeper frogs around I decided to go to ford the creek and check out the other side. We went all the way up to the top of the ridge behind us. When I type it out like this it all sounds fast, but keep in mind this is on some 100 acres of wooded land here, so the ride is rather bumpy in some of the pastures, and going through the wooded areas you have to dodge fallen branches (or limbs, rather...a branch in this part of the country is actually a body of water.) On this other ridge we find the old homestead. The or...

Blogger and I have some issues here. I have tried to blog but it keeps kicking me out. Argh! Anyway. There's not too much exciting going on to blog about, though I have a list of things I want to put down. (no time for all of it now.) But thanks to everyone who answered about the rag on the bush question. Now. How about the saying: "Too much sugar for a cent." Hubby and I have our own ideas of what this might mean. When I Googled it all I came up with was a book by that name. I wasn't of a mind to purchase it, so I am still clueless. Have fun.

Here's another saying to add to my list. Whenever Ellen is throwing one of her down-in-the-floor-kicking-and-screaming fits, hubby says; "She's really taking the rag off the bush." OK You tell me what that's supposed to mean. I guess it's just an old Ozarks saying that made sense a hundred years ago.

Q: How do you know when you've become a true hillbilly? A: When you bring a coon in a live trap to church. Here's the story: One of the guys at church...I will call him RR for convenience sake, is a rabid raccoon hunter. He has coon dogs and all the spotlights and gear and whatnot. Several months ago during coon season he went coon hunting over at the neighbor's place across the river but I don't think the dogs even found a coon to chase. Hubby told him that we have LOTS of coons, so over the course of the past few months RR has been over coon hunting several times. We do have PLENTY of them. However, apparently we breed pretty clever coons because he and his buddies have never been able to tree a coon on our place. They head straight to their den trees and that's the end of that. He has even come over the past couple of weeks in the off season. Now he loves to coon hunt and says he needs to train one of his dogs, but I think he is mostly bound and determined ...

Who's life have you toughed today? Ha ha. Have you ever read any of those church bulletin bloopers? Like: "Bless someone today, say hell to someone you don't know." Along those lines? Well, last Sunday our church bulletin advised: "Have a blessed day and tough somebody's life today as hopefully God has toughed yours." The author of the above line did not catch the blooper until she'd finished copying and folding them. She gave us all a laugh, and she is gracious enough to laugh along. (Obviously she meant to say "touch" instead.)

Lately I have been having trouble with this computer; it wouldn't let me post anything. Very annoying. Anyway. For Christmas hubby got Ellen one of those little art easels; a chalkboard on one side and a dry erase board on the other. Ellen takes notions from time to time to draw on either side. Currently she loves the dry erase side. We have noticed that her drawings are becoming more and more sophisticated, as it were. For instance, if you squint and hold your head just right you can see that this face behind her actually has a nose, eyebrows, a mustache and a beard. The addition of facial hair is kind of puzzling because no one she knows personally has any facial hair. But she must have picked it up in some of the shows that she watches. I don't know. I just thought it was funny that she put it in there. I have a bunch of other stuff to blog about but it'll have to wait.

Recently I got the following comment from a vet student from Australia, on a post I did on the blind calf we got back in 2007. This is the second comment from Australia that I have had regarding this issue. I thought I'd post this since a reader of this blog has a son in large animal veterinarian training. Perhaps he would find it interesting. This post from back in 2007 on the Blind Calf continues to draw comments. (Follow the link if you wish to read it.) Apparently folks Google when they get a blind calf in their herd and my post comes up. I just wish folks would report back in on what happened to their calf. This particular one I blogged about never prospered, was always vision impaired, and was susceptible to infections. We took her to the sale barn when she was about 18 months old. Anonymous said... Hi - I'm a last year vet student from Brisbane, Australia. I found this site when doing research on a blind 1 week old dairy Swiss brown calf. This calf was reported blind...

I figured it was time to change my picture up top there. I took this pic out in the west pasture a couple of weeks ago. The grass was just starting to get green but the trees hadn't leafed out yet. In point of fact, the trees STILL aren't leafed out yet. Spring has been slow to develop here this year. But I am hopeful that at least it won't freeze them all off like the past couple of years when we had a really early spring. There isn't too much dairy news to talk about at this time. Well, let's see what I can come up with. The two new bulls we got a few weeks ago have settled in pretty well. So far the one with the milking herd is fairly docile; just lays down in the corral and chews his cud. They don't get super mean until they are a bit older, so we shall see. We moved 27 of 30 open heifers from their winter pasture here by the barns. They are now in Windyville. The other 3 are still here and need to be moved ASAP. And that's about it folks, for...

If you want yet another fun blog to follow; check out this one: Blabbin' Grammy A Grandma from Tennessee who blogs about life "back then" and now. Stop by and say hello.

It's going to hit the 80s today. I planted more radishes and lettuce this morning. The first little crop of radishes are coming along great. My mother in law said she heard about radish sandwiches; butter two slices of bread, cover one slice of bread with sliced red radishes, top with other slice of bread, enjoy. Hmmmmm...I will feed one to hubby and see what he thinks. Last week or maybe it was the week before we were working on getting the garden beds ready to plant. We had meant to burn them off to get all the weeds off, but believe it or not it was never dry enough, or not windy enough, to do so. So hubby just ups with the tiller and tills them anyway. (Now there's tons of ground up chickweed regenerating itself, but no time for that story now.) The next day I get out there with rake and shovel and pitchfork and start cleaning out the sod. As I am working my way along I see this "thing" up ahead, like a little old dried up melon; it had a stem on it. I kept workin...

Oh, dear. Yet again I am tardy in getting back to my blog here. "sigh* Well, here's but one thing we have been up to. The weather has finally improved enough for long walks. So last week I loaded Ellen up on the 4-wheeler and we went down into the creek bottoms for a walk. It was a lovely evening for a walk, but mostly Ellen wanted to throw rocks into the creek. As usual, it was hard to resist skipping a few stones across the creek myself. One fun part of going to the creek for me is seeing evidence of who else has been there. Here, for my convenient picture-taking, a turkey and a 'coon left some tracks side by side. I tossed in an AA battery for size comparison. And what trip down to the creek bottoms could possibly be complete without a visit to the boneyard to remember the dearly departed? Yes, we recycle here on the dairy; ashes to ashes, dust to dust, cow to coyote...etc. And now...owing to lack of time to continue my photo walking tour, I must bid you farewel...

A couple of days ago hubby needed something for his dessert. I looked in one of my cake recipe books and found something new; a triple lemon cake. It required a box of lemon gelatin to be added to a lemon mix...then you are supposed to beat it for FOUR minutes. I thought that was excessive, but when trying something new I always follow as close as I can to the directions. When the required time was up I looked in the oven and couldn't believe my eyes; it had really puffed up, almost to the point of running out of the pan. I took it out. I set it on the counter to cool. Regretfully, I didn't take a photo at that time. After all, how bad could it be? Hubby took one look at it and said; "It's going to shrink." "Yes," I said. I didn't want to watch. I went back in an hour or so. This is what met my eyes: You can't really get a good idea of how ummm...short it is because of the perspective, but let's just say it's pretty flat, too....

Yesterday morning I was doing my regular graining of the young heifers when the strangest thing happened. These are the 6 month to year old girls, close to the same size as the heifers below. Their feed bunks are on a bit of a hill that falls steeply off down into the creek bottoms. It was just barely light out, maybe 6:45 AM or so, and I had just opened the gate and was shoving my way through the 10 of them when suddenly something happened behind me (dunno what it was) and they all startled and went charging off around me. One of the smaller ones got so excited she tried to jump a feed bunk, landed smack inside it and flopped around like a fish out of water before she leapt out and took off in the rear of the herd. It was kind of freaky because I was afraid I was going to get trampled. I had this brief and strange sensation that I was in that scene from Jurassic Park where the veggiesaurs were flocking around the professor and the two kids, and if I turned and looked down over the...

This week starts off with everyone in our household having a cold. Plus the temps have been in the 30s all weekend and we got some ice/sleet last night. Happy Spring! I think it was Thursday or Friday that hubby put out the last of the alfalfa. Usually by this time there is at least SOME grass for the cows to eat, but not this year. Our production is gradually going down and at just over a buck a gallon for milk it's not a pretty outlook. But on the bright side they are saying that the temps will be up to 60s by Tues perhaps. So maybe things will pick back up. **** Sometimes Ellen just cracks me up. She hates having to take a nap. She will protest to the last minute, with her eyes barely open; "I don't want to take a nap!" So I tell her she doesn't have to. She keeps protesting and I tell her to go get on the bed. Then she howls to lay on the so-FAH. (And you must pronounce it like that, the Spanish pronunciation; so-FAH.) So she'll lay down, go ...

I have a cold. This is the first cold I have had in close on 2 years. I honestly can't remember the last time I had one. I remember having one when I was still nursing Ellen, she must have been only 5 or 6 months old, or younger. And I think maybe I had one soon thereafter, but not much later. Since hubby quit driving the school bus we have hardly been sick at all. Something to keep in mind on the positive side to potentially homeschooling Ellen. This weekend we had visitors from Oklahoma. The son of one of hubby's friends who used to live in the area here. He and his girlfriend came by to chat a bit. I think he was showing her around his old stomping grounds. What a charming couple. He's in his early 20s and is on his way through veterinarian school, with the goal of becoming a large animal vet. This is a field that is sadly lacking...most of the money is with small animals, people's pets. If you happen to find a large animal vet in the area...good luck in...

make me so ready for spring to come. Today we went to Lebanon and got most of the seeds we will need for our garden. I need to get some cucumber seeds, but I'll get those in Buffalo. Ellen was determined to plant some seeds today. She watches Rabbit plant his radishes in his garden (on Pooh) so she wanted to plant something too. I opened the pack of cabbage seeds and gave her a few to "plant" in a hole in the flower bed. She was satisfied with that, although she got peeved when the leaves she'd covered them with blew away. We are supposed to get some rain tonight. I hope we don't get much. I am so tired of mud, and said mud is just now starting to dry up in the dry cow corral. Hubby has several graveling projects on hand; one involving grading of a driveway. He also has to re-do the heifer corral, reinforce it actually, in order to catch the bull. Mr Bull has been here 3 years now, so he needs to leave so we can get a youngster in here.

Yesterday I reported on Facebook that I'd found twin bulls in the dry cow field. It seemed to me that they both came from Fluffy, who appeared to have deflated like a balloon, though there WAS this other cow over there with them all. I took my camera this morning and here they all are...two cows and two bull calves...Fluffy is the cow in the background, with the white face. Weeeelll...later on hubby went up there today to get them and he begged to differ. For one thing they are both quite large. For another, he says that other cow appears to have had a calf, though she doesn't have much of an udder and wasn't due until April, which is why I assumed Fluffy had had both calves. So we don't really know whose is whose or what's up or who's on first...etc. But at any rate, they were both sired by the same bull, so they ARE brothers. While I was up there, the other cow got nervous and took off with BOTH of the calves: It is not uncommon for a cow to steal a cal...