Worms

We were so grateful to hear the rain on the roof last night. We need it so badly. This morning when I went for my walk, I noticed that the driveway was covered with night crawlers. I ran back into the house and coaxed Ben and Jonny out of bed, telling them to get buckets of dirt and to come pick up worms for fishing. So by 7:30 a.m. they had their beds made, teeth brushed, and were dressed and out on the driveway picking up worms. :) Now if I had told them we were starting math at that time I probably wouldn't have gotten that good of a response, but it's easy to obey when it's something fun to do! :)

Now we need to go fishing! :)

Shearing Party

Every year around this time we have our sheep sheared, before lambing season begins. To our surprise we had some sheep that had their lambs while they still had all their wool, not ideal. It makes it harder for the lambs to nurse, and sometimes they suck on the wool, which can give them "wool balls".

This year we had a little sheep shearing party. My mom and sister were here, as well as some others who were able to come at the last minute. For as many years as we have seen it done, it is still so interesting to watch.

Our sheep shearer is amazingly fast and is very good at what he does. He is also full of interesting facts, and just fun to talk to. With all the knowledge he has on sheep, we try to get him to predict the due dates of our ewes, even thought we do have a rough idea of when they are due. Most of the time he is pretty accurate.

People always ask us what we do with all the wool. Well, many times we have just sold it back to the shearer, but there have been years where we did some fun things with the wool. We had a wool mattress pad cover made for our bed and two pillows. Another time we had the wool cleaned , carded, and rolled into batts. I have made pillows and quilts with that wool, and plan to make quilts for my children some day, as I still have a lot of it left.

I have to say that I really enjoy having sheep. As a child, growing up in the city, I hated animals. I was afraid of everything that moved! To this day, I am still afraid of dogs. My dog is the only dog I am not afraid of, and to my own surprise, I actually really love him. :) But sheep are never vicious and mean like a dog can be. They are dumb and can drive you crazy with their skittish behavior, but they are easy to be around, especially for children. They also taste great! :) It's probably hard for you to believe that I can say that about an animal that I like, but when you raise an animal for the purpose of food, and you take good care of it, giving it a good life, it's not hard to butcher it and eat it. :) It's all part of farm life. :)

Baby Lambs! by, Emily

Last Friday, me and Aunt Nadine, who was staying with us, went out and milked together at around nine o'clock. (We milked late) After putting Belle back into the pen, I quickly shone my flashlight out into the sheep yard.... not expecting anything, but I did for some reason. The beams fell onto a white blob of something small laying out there with a ewe! I immediately started hollering to Aunty, and overcoming my fear of our gigantic and mean ram, I hopped over the fence, ran right past him, and in a few bounds was in the yard with Nettie, a first time mom, and twin lambs! Aunty was right behind me, and she took one of the lambs, while I took the other. We brought them back, but Nettie, being a pretty skittish ewe, and being it's her first time, was too scared to follow us, so I pulled and Aunty pushed, and we got her into a lambing pen. At this point I raced up to the house, dashed in, and hollered "LAMBS!" and was back out in the barn in the shake of a lambs tail! :)

The lambs, who turned out to both be girls, were really chilled, although they were both dried off well. But after some help nursing, they were doing great. The larger one had an adorable black spot on her leg.... so cute! She weighed barely six pounds, while her little sister (and I mean LITTLE sister!) was four and a half pounds!!!!!!!! The smallest lamb we have ever had! And she is small! We named the one with the black spot on her leg Nay-Nay, because she's the one that Aunty carried in, and Aunty's nick-name is Nay-Nay! :) (Aunty also has black hair, which goes well with the lambs black spot :)) Then we figured we'd better name the other one after Mom (being Aunty's sister) ... so we named it, instead of Mindy, Nindy.... so it's Nay-Nay and Nindy..... and the Mom is Nettie! :) They are doing GREAT now! They love to run around the pen, jumping around and doing all sorts of hilarious antics! :)

Friday night we also put Nancy, (who is the Grandma of Nay-Nay and Nindy) in a separate pen, because her udder was swelling up considerably, and she was absolutely GIGANTIC! I was sure she must have four babies! The next day I checked on her about every half-hour at least, because I was SURE she was laboring. That night around ten o'clock, me and Dad went out to check one her one last time before I went to bed. As I walked over to the pen, I saw that she was licking a LAMB!!! I yelled, "She's got a lamb!" Then raced up to the house to get everyone, coming back with Aunty on the back of my four wheeler. But we were about 30 seconds too late.... number two had arrived in a timely fashion! The first one was a girl, and the second one was a boy. After a LONG time of laboring, and what seemed to be a hard time, Nancy delivered another boy. She licked him off, and promptly began pushing AGAIN! This one was obviously breech, and Nancy did not push it all the way out, so when she stood up, Dad gently pulled it out. But SADLY it was not alive. The little guy was full term, but the birth of the third one really took a long time, and it was breech, so it probably had a pinched umbilical cord. We were wondering what to name them, and I suggested names of gems or something of the like, since Nancy's middle name is Pearl. So, we came up with some different, but cute names. The girl is Amethyst, the first boy is Topaz (we had to get pretty creative for the boys!) and the last one is Emerald.:)

Nancy had mastitis last year, though, and only has half an udder to feed three hungry lambs. After a couple days of observation we realized that they were obviously really hungry and not getting enough, so I got out a bottle and warmed up some goats milk. Going out to the barn I started with Amethyst. To my amazement, she latched right on and drank half the bottle!!! (About two cups). Her brother, Topaz, drank almost as much as she did, but Emerald did not drink much. He was a lot weaker than the rest of them and had scours. But after careful feeding and care, he's doing great now, like the rest of them, and I'm enjoying bottling them all. :)

Milly is due today, and is looking really big, so I'm sure ya'll will be hearing about that soon. Oh, and by the way, the kittens are doing great and there is four girls and one boy!!! (The boy is one of the orange ones.) :)

YAHOOO!!!!!!!! We've got KITTENS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! By, Emily ;)

Lately I have been keeping a close eye on Lady, my cat, as she is pregnant and has been getting really big. This morning when I went out to milk, she didn't eat her breakfast of kefir, raw eggs, and oatmeal I brought her, as well as her fresh, warm goats milk. Instead she ignored me (normally she follows me around, wanting to be petted) and went under the feeder in one of the birthing pens. My mind must have been pretty groggy (I had just gotten up, and was really sleepy!) because I didn't think much of it. Later today, around noon, I went out to check on her not expecting anything, but I've been checking on her on a regular basis lately. I made my rounds through the barn... looked under all the feeders, on top of the haystack, etc., and couldn't find anything. At the last feeder, the one she had gone under earlier, I got down on my hands and knees and peeked under. This feeder is completely surrounded by hard packed bedding, except for a little cat sized hole going under it. I called Lady's name and meowed for her a couple times. No answer, and no movement. But for some strange reason, I thought I'd go get a flashlight and double check. So I did. Shining the flashlight underneath, I saw her, and SHE WAS LICKING SOMETHING ORANGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I quickly started to paw away the bedding, but then decided I'd better change first, and zoomed up to the house on the four wheeler, getting on my overalls. Then I used the pitchfork and cleared away all the bedding from around it..... 1...2....3...4....5...6.... SIX KITTENS!!! I was overjoyed! Let's see here.... one gray kitten with a tiny orange spot on it's head, three light orange ones, one of them with a white ring around it's neck, two calicos!!!!! (Lady is tortie) I was THRILLED to pieces! Sadly though, the littlest one, which was orange, was really weak and was not nursing. He just didn't seem to have any energy and was really cold. I wrapped him up in a towl, fed him through a dropper, and had him next to the heater, but he did not make it. :( But I am still sooo grateful for the other five, who are doing GREAT! Lady is doing great too and sure loves all those little kitten! It's so cute to see her take her paws and tuck them all into her carefully, to lick them, and to lay there, all relaxed and purring. She just loves it! Kittens nursing really relaxes her! Sooooooo, I'll be looking for cute kitten names.... boy or girl, as I'm sure there is some of both (I haven't "checked" them yet) and of course, I'll also be looking for good homes for them all.... if any one would like to reserve one now, leave a comment. I'm sure they'll go fast! ......meow, meow, meow!
P.S. Mom told me to make this post short and not to do too much detail.... hmmm.... I'm not sure how well I did on that one! :/

Sugarin' Time

There are many things to love about spring on the farm, but the two most enjoyable events (for me) would have to be seeing all the baby animals be born and making boxelder syrup. I love the smell of the wood stove out on the back patio and the reason for getting out in the cool spring air - collecting sap!



Sugaring is definitely a family event. It starts out by the taps getting pounded in the trees and the buckets getting hung up. Mike and the boys usually handle this job, although Emily enjoys it as well.

Then once the sap starts flowing, it needs to be collected and dumped into the barrel. Brandon does a lot of the collecting with some help from the rest of us.






Mike and the boys maintain their incredible hulk-look by chopping firewood every day during syruping season. :)


Keeping the sap cookin' is an intense job that Mike does well. He manages the fire, making sure the syrup doesn't stop boiling, boil over, or get too low.....usually 24/7! And when Mike is gone during the day, I manage the fire.




Once it's time to pour off the syrup and finish it inside, Mike gets busy with his hydrometer, measuring the sugar content and telling me when to get my jars ready for canning. Mike and I work together canning the syrup.




Of course the most enjoyable part about making syrup is eating it! That is a job we all do well! :)



In order to have a good run, the weather must cooperate. Having cold nights (below freezing) and warm days (in the 40's or low 50's), makes for the best run. Last year we collected about 500 gallons of sap and ended up with about 12 gallons of syrup. This year the weather has not been cooperating as much. It's been too warm. So far we have gotten about 5 gallons of syrup. Hopefully we will get a few more days of cool weather. Next week it is supposed to be in the 70's, so the run will likely be over soon. :( Life on the farm is never predictable. :)

Grandma's Birthday! by, Emily

Last weekend we celebrated Grandma Berry's Birthday. We were planning to have a tea with her at noon, so while Mom picked Grandma up and ran some errands, I got everything ready. I baked a cake, made bagels, etc., while Jonny faithfully washed the dishes. :) At noon Mom and Grandma arrived home and we sat down for tea. The first course was fresh bagels with homemade herb cream cheese on top and an apple and walnut salad, as well as some mango tea. Next we had canned nectarines and pineapples topped with whip cream and cinnamon, chocolate cookies, and some little candies. Yum! Later that afternoon the whole family left to go to "Zellas", a restaurant in Hutchinson with delicious food. After dinner we came back, packed up some things, and me, Mom, Aunt Nadine, and Grandma all left to go to the Pillar Inn B&B. It was so much fun! The big house is beautifully decorated, and we stayed in the luxurious Grand Suite. After settling in, all four of us put on our suits and sat, or should I say squeezed into the the whirl pool for around an hour or so. :) Then we ate the chocolate cake, played a game of cards, and talked...and talked......and talked some more! :) Then around two o'clock we went to bed. The next morning we had a delicious breakfast, then left and shopped for a while. Grandma stayed the weekend with us. It was so much fun! Grandma is a wonderful Grandma and we are all so grateful for her. Happy Birthday! We love you!

P.S. (from Mindy)

When Grandma comes out to the farm she is always working, partly because there is always work to do, and also because Grandma likes to stay busy. :) But this time we took her out and pamper her, which was really fun! After having her here for four days Brandon said, "You know Mom, Grandma is one of those people that a person just never gets tired of having around. She could be here all the time and I wouldn't mind a bit." :)

Starting Seeds

We have been in the process of planting seeds since the end of February. Most of the seeds have germinated and are growing, but there are some I am still waiting on. Rosemary, for example, can take 20-90 days just to germinate!

In an effort to extend our growing season and have more space for starting seeds, Mike built me a little "hot house". It's made out of six glass patio doors, four (on their sides) screwed together to make a square and two across the top. Last summer a friend who was working as a carpenter remodeling homes saved all the glass doors and windows that were replaced and supposed to be thrown away, and instead brought them to us. What a friend! :) So last fall we put some of the glass over straw bales to keep our greens growing....it worked great! In fact I noticed, when I was in the garden the other day, that some of those greens are growing again (the glass is still over them). :)

Yesterday the temperature outside was around 50 degrees, but in my hot house it was 80 degrees. I was temped to go sit in it! :) As it gets warmer, I'll have to open up one of the doors a bit. Now today, it's barely 30 degrees outside (that's Minnesota for ya!), so I put a little heater in there and am keeping the temp at about 70 degrees since I have seeds that I am trying to germinate.

Growing plants really is easy, it just requires a lot of babysitting! :)