Christmas at work, Christmas at home

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas at work. Yesterday the Christmas trees went up and names were drawn for the Secret Santa gift giving. I did not participate since I will not be in the office next week nor Monday and Tuesday of the following week. The reveal of Secret Santa’s happens at a luncheon on Wednesday the 13^th. That will be my first day back in the office since the 4^th of December. I did mention to the young ladies in my group that I generally would not participate because I am not comfortable buying gifts, no matter how trivial, for a woman I work with. And since the chances of drawing a man for my assignment was a low probability, I would rather sit out this game.

Besides, there is a well-known fact that one lady in the office will go completely overboard with the Secret Santa and whomever she draws will be flooded with little gifts throughout the days of the event. Everyone else is unremarkable by comparison. Of course, everyone hopes to be drawn by her, but only one will be. By Tuesday next week, it will be very obvious which name she drew. I already know who the lucky person is. Since I am not participating, I have been made keeper of the list – in case anyone forgets whose name they drew.

Meanwhile, back at the farm, Mama and Victoria bought a couple of the Christmas lightshow things that I will need to set up to shine against the house. I hope they are not disappointed how it turns out but from my perspective, it is far better that stringing lights. I told Mama I would try to get that set up this weekend, but we first had to rake up and get rid of all the leaves that have accumulated around the house. That is a half-day project all by itself. Mama wants to leave selected piles of leaves in certain places because Sam loves to bury himself in those piles when the nights are really cold. I am not sure how that will work out because a pile in one area will not necessarily be confined to that area – depending on the force and direction of the wind. But we can give it a try.

I am hoping Mama and Victoria can work on the leaves while I work on the well house in the barn lot. Regardless, we will get done what we can get done and all the rest will wait until another time. I am getting pinched for time with the well house because several of the nights lately have left frost on the windshield. It will not be long before we are dealing with significant freezing. I am far enough along that I feel comfortable I can have the building finished before it does get cold enough to cause me problems. Lord willing. With darkness coming so early in the evening, I have limited time to work on projects that are remote from the house. Somehow these things always manage to work out.

This is the first year in a good while that I am looking forward to Christmas.

Rabbits, welding, sort of, Max

The minute I got home yesterday Mama told me I had a mess to clean up. Our female rabbit had one baby. I do not know if it was larger than normal, but it seemed to be a very large and underdeveloped. She had it outside of the nesting box we had set in the cage for her. It was kind of a mess to deal with having dried and stuck to the cage. I am not sure what happened, but it was a disappointing outcome on our first attempt at breeding rabbits. Mama and I had discussed getting rid of the rabbits and now I think we are settled on that. We tried. Rabbits are not for us right now.

Once I was free of honey-do’s I moved onto other things. With limited daylight, I chose to get the welder and generator set up to do the welding on the fence I had moved behind the shop. It took some time to get everything set up. but I did manage to get the fencing welded into the new position. I am not a good welder, but I can get by doing non-critical work. The company I work for recently hired a man whose past work history was almost exclusively in welding. I will look the welds over when I have more time and more day light. If I determine that I need some professional oversight, I will ask him to help get things done properly. Otherwise, I will let it stand. In the fading light of evening I mixed up some cement and filled the hole the post was sitting in to complete the chore. The next step is to weld the gate to the post and finish stringing the fence across that end. One side of the enclosure is done. Two sides have pipe fencing to which we will attach some field wire like I did in the paddock we have for our myotonic goats. Within a couple weeks I should have the area ready for our pigmy crossbreed goats to move into.

I was up against the clock because Mama and I had set aside the evening to go to Sam’s. There was nothing urgent we needed to get but the list was inclusive enough to warrant the trip. Of course, we not only got the items on our list, but we managed to find several other items we discovered a need for. We rarely get out of Sam’s for under $100 – last night was no exception. I have to admit, the front of the store smelled wonderful with all the Christmas trees set out for purchase. Mama is holding off on buying ours until the window gets installed properly. The second attempt to make the correction to the initial incorrect installation will happen on the 14^th. Mama has been very displeased with the company that installed these windows. But, she has been extremely pleased with the windows themselves.

On the way home we were scheduled to pick up Max. Mama was wrestling with very conflicting emotions concerning bringing Max home. She was worried about how the bigger dogs would handle her. She was worried about the training issues we would have. She was worried about taking Max from his initial family. On and on. When we got to the house to get Max, Cheyenne’s mommy helped get everything ready and we were give toys, feeding dishes, treats, shampoo, beef flavored toothpaste, doggie treats and a bag of food that will last for months. Cheyenne was happy to see the dog go but it was easy to see that the mommy was not as thrilled. Cheyenne told Mama that when her daddy comes home and finds Max gone he will go to the bathroom and cry. You can imagine how Mama reacted to that. When we finally headed home, Max sat on Mama’s lap and whimpered the whole time. Mama felt like she was traumatizing the pup by taking him away from everything he was used to. Introducing him to the other dogs was uneventful – as expected. Housing him for the night was easy since Victoria had bought a crate for Kira to be confined in as a punishment for her getting on the furniture in our absence. We just repurposed it for Max.

This morning, since I was the first one up, I went to the crate to let him out and he growled at me – only slightly. I let him be for a few minutes to allow him to remember where he was and tried again to let him out. He would not come. I finally left the crate door open and went about my business. It was full ten minutes before he came to me and I was able to lead him outside so he could do his business. He is fascinated with the sliding glass door and easily went outside. I had to walk into the yard to get him off the patio. He was doing fine until a rooster crowed and he ran back into the sunroom. I had to re-crate him before I left since neither Mama nor Victoria was up.

It will take a few days to get him in a new routine, but he seems very intelligent and willing.

FBI, well house, Max

We had our next to last test in FBI last night. Mama and Victoria elected not to take the test last night because neither of them felt they were ready. Having taken the test, I think both of them made the right choice. I believe this was the most difficult test I have taken in our three years of FBI. Mama and Victoria still have to take the test, but they have until Sunday afternoon to get it done. The only consolation for me is that I got the four points awarded to those who take the test with the class. On the next test, two weeks from now, I will not get that break. I will be in Houston to teach a class – if it all works out with the client. On the last test, which all of us took outside of class, Mama outscored both me and Victoria. She made a 96. Victoria and I made a 95 and a 94 respectively.

Saturday last week I was able to finally get started on the well house in the barn lot. I struggled to see a solution to building little structure while working remotely with only battery powered hand tools. It is slow going to do things that way. What I decided to do was to prefab the walls and haul them over on our utility trailer. In doing so, I got to use all the power tools at the shop to make the needed cuts to the lumber and I got to use the nail gun to assemble the walls. I started early, took a break to go bus calling and restarted after lunch. By dark I had three wills in place on the slab and the rafters up connecting everything. I ran short on two by fours to build the front wall, but I would have run out of time to get it in place had I assembled it. The front wall will require a lot more effort to place because I have to move the breaker box and the well control box (now attached to a pallet standing beside the slab) to put it in place. It will be a one-day project all by itself. I changed the design of the well house to both simplify the construction and to save on materials. It was not a big change, but I think it will make the well house look like it was planned versus being just thrown together. I would like the buildings on the farm to look like they were thought through in placement, function and design. It is not necessary, but it makes me feel better about how the farm looks.

Our Chinese friends have asked us to take their little Toy Poodle. They call him Max. He is white, overly friendly and extremely animated. Cheyenne does not like dogs of any kind and Max will jump at her to get her attention – not endearing to a frightened little girl. Alex, her daddy, loves the little dog but for the sake of his daughter he is looking to find it a new home. Mama and I have agreed to take the pup on a provisional basis. Since Max would be the only male dog on the farm besides Sam we are not sure how that will work out. I am not crazy about the idea of training another puppy, but I believe they have him about half the way through the house breaking part of his training. I trust Victoria to get the behavior training completed as Mama works on the potty issues left to correct, but we are not sure if we can make it work. Mama is not thrilled about having a white dog – something about the eyes and the fact that they always look like they are crying.

Mama has been looking for a little dog since we lost Rosie. I have not encouraged the search. If we take and keep Max, we will not only have to train him to our standards, we will have to retrain him on those things he has done to adapt to the first family he lived with. Fortunately, he will not cost us anything and we can give him back if he does not work out with the five big dogs we now house.

Another fun little farm project.

Thanksgiving, the twins, the test

Mama and I went to Brittany and Andrew’s for Thanksgiving. Victoria was not feeling well and did not want to take the chance on giving the twins a taste of what she was suffering from. It is impossible not to snuggle and kiss on them while you are feeding or holding them. She stayed home and had Thanksgiving with Grandma, Grandpa and Norman. I took Wednesday off, so Mama and I could leave earlier than we had originally planned, and we ended up getting to Wichita by about 4 pm. We could have left much earlier but Mama had to go on a Lu La Roe binge before we left.

While the twins were still asleep we went with Brittany to Sam’s to pick up a fresh turkey for dinner the next day. Of course, we did not get out of Sam’s with just a turkey. By the time we got back home it was time to get the twins up. They have an hour or so of play time when they get up from their late afternoon nap. Brittany does not normally hold them during that time but rather lets them squirm and coo on their mats with the mobiles just out of reach. But since Mama and I were there they got held during some of that time. Mama could not keep her hands off the babies and since she had one I could not let the other suffer neglect. It was not long before we were feeding Zoe and Sophia, reading them their bedtime books and singing their bedtime songs. They have grown so much. Nothing unexpected, but always slightly shocking.

Late that evening, Mama, Brittany and I went to a specialty coffee and cookie shop to pick up a cheesecake that Brittany had had a friend make for us. It was Pumpkin Spice Cheesecake – and it was amazingly good. Brittany had made a Chocolate Pecan Pie, but I could not eat it. Mama and I got in on every feeding we could on Thanksgiving Day – between prepping and cooking. I took the rotisserie with us so we could use it for the turkey and Brittany made a potion to inject into the turkey. I had assumed it would take about three hours or slightly longer for the turkey to get done but it was done in about two and a half hours. We had delayed the mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, cornbread stuffing with green chilis and regular stuffing to have them done about the time the turkey was going to be done. We had to hurry just a little to get everything to the table together. But we did it – while Mama and Andrew took care of the twins. We ate about 3 pm; that coordinated the meal with the afternoon down time for the girls. It was a fun meal.

In-between all the cooking and feeding activities we got everybody dressed for Christmas pictures. I don’t remember if the dresses the twins wore were the ones Mama had bought or if they were something Brittany already had on hand, but the girls were dolled up for the photo shoot and cooperated well throughout. I did not get a lot of pictures on my phone because I was taking the photos of the twins with their parents, but I did get a couple shots of the babies and the team trying to stage the perfect shot.

Sadly, we only got two evenings of participating in the normal routine Brittany has for the twins. We headed home late Friday morning after Mama and I did a little – actually very little - shopping. The drive home took a bit longer than normal because we shopped our way home. So much so that I got a call from Happy State Bank Fraud Detection Team to make sure the purchases made across Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas were valid charges to our card.

I had only one complaint for the holiday. In the normal process of feeding the babies we had to take time to burp them about half way through each bottle. We raised them onto a shoulder, thumped them on the back and encouraged them to get the burp out. Mama and Brittany would lavish praise on each of them each time they gave a good hearty burp. So, I had to ask. What do in not get such praise every time I burp? Why am I scolded with an “Excuuse youuu?” Honestly, my burps do not smell any worse than theirs.

We have a test in FBI tonight. Our next to last. Mama may not be there to take it. She was sick last night and felt only a little better this morning. Part of the reason for heading home on Friday was to give us and Brittany – who also has some schoolwork due – time to study. Well, know how that worked out for us this evening.

To travel or not to travel, sickness, shopping

If it holds, I got a reprieve on some travel. I was scheduled to attend a three-day conference in Houston next week but due to workload and advancing priorities at work I have been taken off that roster. It would have been a very informative conference to attend but I am needed elsewhere. I am not horribly disappointed. It will give me an extra week of evenings to work on the farm projects. A week of not sleeping in a hotel bed. A week of not eating out - struggling to find things that I can actually eat. A week of evenings home with Mama. Not a bad deal. It is not a slam dunk yet, I still need to find out if the Marketing Manager, who originally scheduled me for the conference, is okay with substituting another employee for me, but I am fairly confident that I am in the clear.

Tomorrow we will head to Brittany’s. At least, Mama and I will. I am not sure if Victoria will feel up to traveling. She is having another bout of coughing with headaches and some minor bowel issues. I was a little concerned about myself last night. I always have an upset stomach after we go to our FBI class. It does not seem to matter what I eat or drink. The results are always the same. Last night was no exception but last night the stomach discomfort felt more like a stomach bug than a simple upset stomach. I tried sleeping in the recliner. I tried sleeping in the bed. I finally fell asleep on the couch. I do not feel much relief this morning, so I will have to be careful today and honestly monitor my condition. The last thing we need to do is take any sickness to the twins. I would hate to miss going since sickness kept us from visiting them two weeks ago. It has been a rough couple months for me, Mama and Victoria, but we are not alone it that.

Mama and I swapped vehicles this morning so she could have the truck. She is taking one of our rabbits to the vet. We had one rabbit who got ear mites. It was a bad infection/infestation. I eventually dispatched her because we could not get her well and we wanted to spare the other rabbits from the same infestation. We may have waited too long. In order to find out, we are taking our lone female – who is due to have babies this coming weekend – and have the vet check her out to see what, if anything, we need to do. It is always better to know than to guess. I don’t imagine that it will be an expensive visit, but I will find out soon. We are talking about selling the bucks and keeping only the pregnant doe. It would be better to know that the rabbits are healthy before we offer them for sale. We are not rabbit people, but we would like to see some babies be born. They might make good Christmas presents.

Mama’s shopping trip yesterday was a success. At least, in her eyes. From my point of view, I made out okay. She did call me twice to see if she could purchase things that were not on her list, but as we talked through each bobble that caught her eye, we came to the conclusion that it would be better to pass on the additional purchase for the time being.

That may not be the case as we barrel towards Black Friday, but it worked out yesterday.

Goat chatter, behind the shop, help, the pups

Friday evening, Mama and I went to Bowie to get the truck. I took some time to talk with Roger to get the low down on the repairs while Mama headed to Rick’s to talk goats. He has a slew of baby goats and it was fun to watch their antics as we talked over how to advertise, market and price the ones we are wanting to sell. I believe we settled on a description, a price to ask and a place to post the advertisement. After this weekend – Thanksgiving weekend – we will start the process and see if we have success. Stopping at Tractor Supply and Walmart put us back home well after dark, but with Saturday being a pretty free day, we did not need to hurry.

Saturday was very windy. The winds started out of the East and shifted westerly by noon. 

Later in the day they came out of the North and the temperature dropped drastically. I did not venture to far from the house because it was a very bad day for me as far as my colon was concerned. I have been keeping a food journal so I can cross reference what I eat with how my colon reacts. So far, I have not been able to see a direct correlation between food intake and the severity of the pain. Traveling does not help diet wise, but I make the best of the situation. Anyway, between bouts of cramps and time in the bathroom, I worked on the back of the shop.

The pipe fencing on the east side of the shop- formerly a carport - was not set in a way that made sense for the shop. Some of the fencing needs to be moved to make it practical for the back of the shop especially. Nate and I already took up one of the two pieces of fence that needed to be moved in back of the shop. Saturday, I cut and moved the other. To get to it I had to clean up all the stuff I had set against it when I thought we were going to get the shop blacktopped. Once exposed, I started cutting the pipe with my Sawzall. I had to wait at one point for Mama and Victoria to get back from their shopping trip in town because I had used up all the metal cutting blades I had available and they were bringing me some new blades. With the new blades I quickly got the section cut loose. I had already dug out the post and beaten off the concrete poured around it so the single post on that section came out of the ground easily.

While waiting on Mama, I dug the hole for the post at the new location. That is difficult in this ground. On each new post hole, I dig as far as possible and then fill the hole with water. When the water soaks in, I dig some more. I was fortunate with this hole because the water soaked in within a couple of hours – during which time I delivered feed to the barn, picked up some pipe, a pipe gate, some fencing for the new enclosure and swapped out the hay forks for the bucket. I was happy to be able to set to fence in place (180 degrees from the original position), level and square it and have it ready to weld by dark. Looking back on how long that one seven-foot section of fence took me to move, I dreaded tackling the forty-foot section in front of the shop. Fortuantely for me, Chester stopped by Sunday evening to look at that project and see if he and Chuck will tackle it for me. I will find out this week if they can do the work, when they can do it and how much it will cost me.

Victoria already has one of the five pups sold. She got a deposit Friday. Scheduled pickup for the week of Christmas. Let’s hope they all sell that quickly.

Truck repairs, rats, travel challenges, limited shopping

Funny things happen at the farm every time I am away. Monday night everything seemed to be fairly normal. Mama was home for the day because she was still not feeling well. She got the call from Roger about our truck. The repairs are not excessive but for a diesel the parts are always expensive. A filter and sensor inside the valve cover, a sensor on the exhaust and the labor to make the repairs totals about $500. I have no problem with the price. The truck is paid for so making a payment for repairs that is less than the monthly payments some of my friends are making on their new trucks seems like a very good deal. The repairs are just in time according to Roger. I can live with that also. According to what he told Mama, the truck should be ready this afternoon.

Tuesday, she was advised to stay home for an additional day because she had not been twenty-four hours without fever. Tuesday night, during the evening feeding, is when Mama and Victoria found a large rat trapped in a closed barrel where we normally store feed. How the rat had gotten into the barrel – the lid was closed and weighted down – and how long it had been in the barrel is unknown. By the time I got home Wednesday night and put the starving rodent out of his misery he had been without food or water for at least three days. He looked pretty pitiful but got no sympathy other than to quickly dispatch him. Mama and Victoria were hesitant to touch the barrel even thought there was no possible way for the rat to get to them. In their defense, the barrel did stink badly from the rat being confined for whatever time he had been there.

Also on Tuesday, the company that installed our windows came to replace the one window that had been improperly installed. It is the only window in the house that has grids in it; other than the sidelights for the picture window – and those are correct. Mama was thrilled to have the repair scheduled before Thanksgiving so we can get her a tree and get it set up in position in front of that window. However, the window they brought to replace the incorrect one was ¼’ too large to fit. Mama was very unhappy – and very vocal about it to the service technicians. There was nothing they could do except endure Mama’s aggravation and shamefacedly head back to their office about an hour away, leaving the originally installed incorrect window in place at our house. When they will be back is still up in the air, but it better be very soon. Mama is going to want her tree up soon.

I stopped by the school on my way through town to give Mama a kiss. She was less than fifteen minutes from getting off, but she had to run some errands before going home. I think Bro Zack gets a kick out of me and Mama and our tenderness toward each other – our open expressions of love toward each other. Maybe a little of the romance will rub off on him and his wife. The stiffness and restraint imposed on them at the Christian college where they met – not necessarily a bad thing – has followed them into their marriage; also, not a bad thing, but it sure makes me and Mama seem excessive by comparison. Again, not a bad thing.

As of last night, Mama is still feeling less than 100%. She is desperate to recover so she can enjoy the trip we are planning to take next week to visit with Brittany and Andrew and the twins for Thanksgiving. Mama has more angst about now feeling well enough to go shopping for Black Friday than she does about the overall visit. She and I have talked about spending limits for the nationally acclaimed sales event – they will be very low limits for this year. That is not necessarily a bad thing. I asked that this Christmas we concentrate on family and not on presents. For that reason, we will focus on getting gifts for the grandchildren and only incidentally for our grown children or each other.

We had one Christmas when we first moved to West Virginia when we literally had nothing to give each other or the children. We scraped together as much money as we could for a proper Christmas dinner and enjoyed the very cold day preparing the meal and then eating it together. It was one of the bests Christmas’s we have shared over the years.

It is time to try that again.

Recovering, bred goats, cattle report, goats bred, littering

Mama was sick all weekend. Saturday was the apex of the symptoms and she spent almost the entire day in bed. Sunday was better for her but not by much. For me, Sunday was bad. I woke up with horrible pains in my colon and they increased through the very early morning. Neither of us made it to church. By about 8 pm Sunday night I was feeling some relief and Mama’s fever was breaking. She will stay home today. I will drive to Lake Jackson, TX to teach what may be my last class for the year.

Saturday, I was not feeling too badly but I was noticing more intestinal pain than throughout the previous week. I took care of the early feeding and spent the remainder of the morning putting the linoleum in the birthing center. I got the flooring repairs done Friday evening, so it was only a matter of cutting the linoleum and fitting it to the floor where Victoria was going to put Kobe for the birthing. I warmed up the enclosure to help make the linoleum more pliable, but it was not necessary since what Victoria bought was the foam backed kind that is not as stiff as the industrial grade. It all went in well enough and as requested, I made sure it went up the the walls a few inches – at least, on three sides.

I worked on the back of the shop for a couple hours before I hooked the Sequoia to the trailer and headed to Bowie to get our bred goats. Fortunately for me, Rick’s son was available to help me load the goats. It was somewhat easier to get them into the cages on the trailer than it would have been to get them into the cages in the back of the truck – which is still in the shop – but it was still a struggle to pull the resistant animals up onto the trailer and into the cages. At the farm end of the journey, Victoria was available to help me get them out of the cages, off the trailer and into the enclosure. They were, despite all the struggle of getting them there, happy to be home.

Also on Saturday, Wayne called to tell Mama that he had finally identified the calf that goes with Daisy. He had taken all the calves to be tagged and when he let them back out at his lease, he watched the little heifer go straight to Daisy and nurse. He recommended keeping her on the lease another month to make sure she has the opportunity to get bred. His thought was that the calf is only about six weeks old and Daisy may not have come into heat since its birth. The extra month will give her that time. Mama and I were thankful for his generosity. With the small herd we have it is vital to capture every opportunity to have our heifers bred.

While we were out feeding yesterday evening I watch Solomon breed one of the little nanny’s we got from Bro. Daniel. The oldest nanny, and the only one with a name, Sugar, started rubbing her head against the neck and head of the young Billy in their amorous ritual leading to the female coming into heat. As Mama and I hoped, all of the goats should be bred by Thanksgiving. By Christmas or New Years, I will have a new enclosure set up for them. Mama wants to keep the two breeds separate for now.

On a final note, Kobe started “littering” late Sunday afternoon; and, boy did she make a mess. The first pup took over four hours to come. Each of the successive pups took about two hours each. I was standing duty when the second pup was born. It is a fascinating process to witness. There is a total of five pups. I am not sure of the count of the sexes among the pups, but they are all beautifully marked – from nearly solid black to brindled white, grey and brown. Dam and pups are all doing well.

Victoria was well pleased.

Truck issues, all about the dogs, maybe goats too

We had to take the truck to our mechanic yesterday evening. As Mama drove it home it started to act like there was a problem with the fuel system. She called me to alert me of the issue and asked if she should go ahead and try to make it to Muenster and back. I said no. She called Brittany and let her know we would not be able to make it this weekend because of vehicle issues – primarily the cost associated with the repairs taking the money we needed for travel. When I got home we took the truck to Bowie, so Roger could look at it. I believe the main issue is a plugged fuel filter but there is also an alarm on the exhaust system that needs to be checked out. Since we were making the trip to Bowie, I had Mama take the Sequoia to Allen’s Texaco to have the oil changed – it is about a month overdue. She picked me up at Roger’s after she was done.

The truck did okay initially but I noticed that it struggled in the higher gears, so I put it in Tow/Haul Mode to keep it in the lower gear ranges of the transmission and it did fine all the way to the shop – no pulsing or surging. I kept it at about 65 mph for the trip. Like normal, Mama said she would follow me to Bowie, but after a few miles of driving under the speed limit she called and asked if it was okay for her to hurry on to Allen’s. In all fairness to her, it was crowding the time that they would be closing for the day. She has never been good at being in the following position on the road. When we have to take separate vehicles to the same destination, I always let her lead. It is the only condition in which she wants to be in the lead.

Once back home I spent the rest of the evening working in the birthing center. I ran the power cord to the building from the chicken coop so I could avoid taking power from the well house. Grandpa rigged the power to the building to be supplied by an extension cord. It was a clever move on his part. When we do not need the building to have operating lights and plugs, I simply remove the power cord. I was able to get the subfloor almost finished. I will complete it tonight since we are not going to Brittany’s. The linoleum will go in tomorrow. Hopefully that will be in time for Kobe to use for the pending delivery. That is the main focus of the home this weekend – and will continue to be so for the next ten weeks or so.

Since I was not enamored with the idea of trying another dog breed as an income generator, Mama thought through the idea thoroughly and came up with an alternative – goats. I can get on board with that. There are several advantages, not the least of which is that they will never be house guests. Since they are livestock, regardless of how attached we may get to them, they are never going to become family members in the way a dog does. Offspring from the goats we are breading will sell for very good prices and will net us more than a litter of pups from any dog we currently own. We are already set up to house between twenty and twenty-five goats in the current pasture and have begun fencing to set up a second pasture to house an additional fifteen or so.  We will have to borrow a Billy from Rick to breed our flocks but that is a very workable issue.

I will be heading to Lake Jackson, TX early Monday morning so we hope to have the truck back by then. It will be an inconvenience to Mama to be without a vehicle while I am gone, but she can hitch a ride with Bro. Zack and Ethan.

Life goes on.

Finally cooler, dogs, getting away

In an unusual turn of events weather wise, it was cold and rainy all day yesterday. We needed the rain and the cold was not untimely but the combination of the two made for a real winter-like day. Even though we did not accumulate much rain, it was a pleasant day in my view of things. It is supposed to remain chilly but not as cold over the next ten days which will present a little of a problem for Victoria and Kobe; who is due to deliver sometime this weekend. Fortunately, the birthing center is well insulated and can be easily heated to help the pups stay warm. I will spend the evening reinforcing the floor so we can lay linoleum on the floor so Victoria will have an easier time cleaning up the necessary mess generated by the growing pups.

Mama and Victoria are talking about buying a Bassett Hound. One of the families at the school has a breeding pair and their puppies sell out in the first week of being advertised each time they have a litter. The price asked for the pups is not cheap; hence the thought of purchasing a female for breeding purposes. I am opposing the idea for three reasons. One, we have five dogs already; at least two more than what we need. Two, purchasing a pup comes with all the requisite training that is never my favorite thing to deal with. Three, it will be at least sixteen months until we can even think about breeding the female. Four months until the pups are born and six weeks from that until they can be sold. More than a year to see any return if all goes well. And an unspoken requirement that I hesitate to bring up; when a puppy is brought home, you have made a fifteen to twenty-year commitment to care for a dog that will, at best, give us ten litters before Mama feels sorry for her and retires her. Right now, we are on the farm with a large house with a really big back yard. Where we will be in five or ten years may not accommodate dog ownership as easily as our present situation does; should we be required to move. My goal is to lower our canine population over the next several years, not increase it.

Every time we need to be away from the farm we have to make arrangements for someone to look after our ten goats, our four head of cattle, our forty chickens (in three separate locations), our three rabbits, and our five dogs – which require the most care since three of them have to be let out of and be brought back into the house at least twice daily. It is a lot to ask. We always manage to get someone to cover for us, so we have not had to cancel travel for lack of help, but it is still a lot to ask. Part of the joys of ownership. It is not a complaint. It is simply a part of living the life we are now living.

Speaking of the farm, Mama and I are having to double up on getting some of the needed chores done before we leave tomorrow. Some of the running will be done today and some will have to get done in a hurry before I get home tomorrow. Mama is taking a couple hours off each day - today and tomorrow – to get feed purchased and to get the needed gifts purchased for the celebration at Brittany’s. I am crowding several chores into a long night to get them done to meet Victoria’s needs for this weekend. Victoria will stay behind this weekend because of Kobe. Even she is rearranging her schedule to get more time off through Sunday in anticipation of the delivery. I am predicting 6 or more pups. Time will tell.

What happens over Thanksgiving in still up for discussion.

Weekend news, travel, Mama’s civic duty

The weekend seems an age ago now, but it was an eventful weekend for us; at least Saturday was. Since Mama and Victoria were both available to help, I repaired the cross brace for the support of a tarp on the kennel we use to cover the little chicken house where the roosters are now residing. I was fortunate enough to have the right size fencing rail to make the repair of the cross brace damaged by rain water that had accumulated in the tarp and stressed the rail to the point of breaking. Mama and Victoria helped me stretch the tarp I had bought at Harbor Freight over the kennel and clear out the insulation I had set in the kennel when we took it down from the ceiling of the coop. (If we do not hide the Styrofoam panels, the chickens peck at them, eating them like they are candy.) Now, for at least a couple weeks, the roosters will have the extra room to move about in the kennel versus being always confined to the small Tractor Supply Special coop. In a few weeks we will move the kennel to the birthing center to allow the pups room to roam outside of the building.

With that done, I worked on replacing a window on the east side of the coop. Weeks ago the glass had fallen out of the window frame and broken. I had intended several times to purchase new glass to put into the frame but had not taken the time to investigate the repair. When I found out the price of the replacement glass I balked. Instead I began looking around the farm for an intact window to put in place of the empty frame. It just so happened that I had a direct replacement which took fifteen minutes to install and clean. On this particular weekend, Mama insisted on cleaning the windows in the coop. If I am thinking correctly the window glass had not been cleaned for about thirty years. We got the windows several years ago from a stack my Dad had kept in a shop building in Chappell Hill. They had set unused in that stack for several decades and when I installed the windows in the coop a couple years ago, I did not take the time to clean them. Well. Now they are clean.

There were several other little things that got done. I rigged lights into the switch at the door of the shop, we picked the last of the elderberries and I cut down the frost-bitted bushes. I also cut down the six-foot-tall canna lily plants outside the back window of the living room; what a difference that made in our view of the back yard. More cleanup was done in certain areas that were – and still are – sorely in need of it. Victoria cleaned out the birthing center in expectation of puppies being born this coming weekend.

I traveled to San Antonia and spent Monday night there, taught a class Tuesday in Helotes, TX – just outside of San Antonio – and traveled home Tuesday afternoon after the class. Mama and I will be traveling to Brittany’s this weekend for 100-day (more-or-less) celebration for the twins. It will be another overnight trip because we have too much going on to stay through Saturday into Sunday. Monday, next week I will be traveling to Lake Jackson, TX to do class there on Tuesday – traveling home Wednesday, more than likely. If the class ends early, I will have to determine if it is worth making the six-hour drive home after the class or just relaxing at the hotel until the following morning.

 A week or so ago, Mama got a jury summons. It is probably the fourth one she has gotten since we returned to Texas. This one required her to call the number listed on the summons between 12 pm and 4 pm Friday afternoon. She agonized all day about making that call except between 12 pm and 4 pm. During that time, she completely forgot. She called in a panic Monday and was told she should report for duty at 1:30 pm the day of the trial. She was needed for a traffic violation that required a jury deliberation. With that in mind, Bro. Zack finagled the school trip they had to make on Tuesday to get her back to Decatur in time to report for civic service on a jury. The only problem: the trial was held on Monday at 1:30 pm. The court clerk got a chuckle out of Mama on that one, assured Mama that she was not in any trouble since there were plenty of alternates to serve.

Mama was embarrassed, but relieved.

Deterrents, breeding program successes

I spent the majority of the evening getting the electric fence put up along the back fence. Bringing the power from the shop at least eliminated the drop we had been using at the walkthrough gate by the garage. It dies not eliminate the jump over I had to install at the walkthrough gate to the area the new goats are in. Mama will have to be careful not to touch the wire that is above that gate – and on either side of the gate. I used tee posts to get the wire up to about six feet in height but we both still need to be careful when the fence is energized. It does not discriminate what it stings – and it does sting. The last time I had the electric fence energized, Kobe was stung and would not go into the back yard any further than the grass near the house for several days. Hopefully, the charge on the fence is not life threatening to the chickens.

I also worked on the two live traps I could find and set both of them up for service. I put one in the goat barn on top of one of the rabbit cages – where I almost caught a rat by hand last weekend. Mama was terrified at the thought of that. The other, I set up in the coop behind the door on the Banty side. It was the one that held a chicken captive for two days the last time I put in service. Mama and I will have to keep an eye on that trap. I believe we have a third live trap, but I did not know where to locate it last night. It is crowding toward the time of year when I will need to start trapping and killing raccoons. We have seen an increase in the raccoon population over the past few months and sooner or later they will come looking at our chickens.

We got news yesterday that our goats are bred. I asked Mama to schedule a pickup for Thursday night since I will be leaving Monday and traveling home Wednesday. We might be able to go tomorrow but we have so many things that need to get done tomorrow that I am not sure we would have the time to squeeze that in also. We will see. When we do go we are going to buy some Banty hens from Nancy to expand our little flock. Normally, Mama ad I would no buy the chickens, but Rick and Nancy have done so much for us that we felt it was a good way to show some gratitude. Besides, we will get four or five little Bantys that are almost the same age as those we have raised. Integration may be a small issue, but we should be able to get past that in a couple weeks as the pecking order is established. It is disturbing to Mama to see all the little battles that happen as they determine flock rank, but it is unavoidable.

The next couple weeks will be fast and far-flung. Getting through them to Thanksgiving will be an endurance contest for both me and Mama. It’s all good – sort of.

Timid goats, Holidays, no bathrooms

Our newest goat additions are beginning to settle into the routine that Mama has for the farm. So far, they have not ventured very far from the pen where we originally deposited them, and they do not seem impressed by the feed we have been using on the farm for many months, but overall, they are starting to come around. We still have them with Solomon and will continue that until the end of this month. At that time, we should be able to put them with the other females in the proper goat lot. Solomon will go to a new home and at least one of the newer goats will go to that new home with him. By the time we get all of our females back on the farm we will have six nanny goats in that lot – providing we get to sell Kia and Yukie. Lilly and Dolly should come back to us bred. Whether the other goats are bred remains to be seen. We are waiting on them to go into heat right now. At that time, we will be able to determine if Solomon will be able to breed them. We have hope since he is certainly willing to do so.

We carved pumpkins at work yesterday. It has become an annual tradition – and a very competitive activity. It is amazing to see the creativity in the group as the final products were displayed. My team did not win but we were pleased with our effort. The rules are that you have 30 minutes for one member of the team to clean the pumpkin – but no carving can be done at that time. Once that time has expired, you are given one hour to complete the carved pumpkin. What was done by a couple of the teams in only one hour was very impressive. Ours was the one with the hands. Whataburger requested photographs of the one representing the burger so they could post it on their Facebook page.

As we speed toward Thanksgiving, I am both excited and apprehensive. With the compiled project lost, the looming specter of Black Friday and the rapid approach of Christmas, I feel wholly unprepared for the holidays – at least from the financial perspective. We will also need to get someone to watch over the farm for us during the Thanksgiving weekend we are at Brittany and Andrews. Having the animals to care for on a daily basis is inconvenient when it comes to scheduling time away during the Holidays. Mama and I talked about the need to be home on the extended holidays so we did not have to inconvenience anyone with the care of all our animals during their holiday festivities. But we are not there quite yet. If needed, I am willing to stay behind to manage the farm so Mama can see the grandbabies. I love our grandchildren, but it is far more needful for Mama to get that face to face time with them. Whether or not that would ever happen without me remains to be seen. In any case, traveling during Thanksgiving and Christmas is problematic.

We have no working bathrooms at the office this morning. I do not imagine we will be able to keep the office open through the day if we do not fond a solution since the average person needs to go to the bathroom at least every hour or so – depending on water/liquid intake. The septic tanks are full to overflowing and we are waiting on a pump truck to clear them out. I suggested that we get someone to look at the leech bed to see if it is working properly. I suspect it is not. What we will have to do through the morning is to go to anywhere available around the town to use the restroom.

I can work with that; but it will make for an interesting morning.