A Monday

As far as Mondays go, this one was about like it. Rob woke up to a phone call that is dad had fallen and gone to the hospital. He's back to his place now, just a little bruised in ego and body. 

The heat was unbearable throughout the day. I even managed to walk through a dirt devil today. Not intentionally, it just blew up on me and swirled me around a bit. It feels like those blower dryers in gas stations. Hot and muggy and you feel dirtier afterwards. 

But the day did get extremely better. Since we were so hot, we managed to set off the sprinklers in the sky for a spontaneous and extremely quick shower. I saw a rainbow, so I know more rain will be coming soon and getting us out of this drought. That's my hope at least. 

I also managed to get all the furry animals in their stalls all by myself tonight! Kenzie has been giving us some issues, so Rob is leash training her around the animals to get her more acquainted with them. Late tomorrow night, the new cows should be coming. With the heat, my transporter and I decided overnight travel is best for them. I can't wait to meet them and welcome them home!

Always Be Learning

Rob and I are going about this new phase of our lives with a lot of plans to carry out. Last year, we accomplished purchasing thirty acres of land with an electrical pole, a pole barn, and a water well. That was the easy part. 

Stages two and three, which were supposed to be done concurrently, were to establish the barn with animals and build the barndo. Barn is done, the last two animals for awhile come by Tuesday, but the barndo hasn't even broken ground yet. It's frustrating and we're doing all we can to get going on it. 

Stage four we began today. This is an unusual sidestep, but one which should aide us greatly. We're both getting our real estate licenses. Why? Simple explanation is to be able to find and purchase more land in the future. Successful farms grow and we plan to be successful. 

It's about being prepared in many ways for whatever gets thrown our way. I'll share more down the line, in the meantime, enjoy one of our reds testing her own wings. 

Weekly Wrap Up

I apologize for not writing the blog last night. The heat has been zapping us of energy and this weekend's forecast is hotter and dryer. Like that's even possible!

Anyhow, we've had a good week overall on the farm. All the animals are finding playtimes in the mornings and evenings when it's slightly cooler. Patches likes to stand over watch on all the goats as they like to lay in the aviary. Fancy likes to patrol the outer perimeters before taking dust baths. Fiona moves only enough to get the maximum amount of air from the fan in the barn. They all love their pettings except for the three newest goats. Those three will get there. 

We're still waiting on the bid for the barndo. In the meantime, this afternoon we're having our cement guy come out to layout the plan for the foundation for our pavilion. This weekend, we'll be installing misters on the perimeter of the barn and once the pavilion is done, we'll be putting misters there as well. Anything to survive this heat!

Reggie protects from the window inside the RV. Even there sometimes gets too hot for him!

Take Your Time

This learning the stalls routine is going to be challenging it appears. It takes Fancy three treats to coax her into the stall. It takes Patches five along with guiding her. Fiona though, wow she wanted nothing to do with it tonight. Treats didn't work, coaxing didn't work, guiding definitely didn't work, but we finally got her in there. How? Well read on. 

There is a stack of old doors in her stall that I sat on and just waited her out. I waited, I sang to her in a Scottish lilt. I waited, I showed her I still had a treat for her. I waited, I acted like there was something so amazingly interesting next to me. I waited and waited some more. It took thirty minutes, but she finally came in and went straight for her food. I think she'll be very happy when her new friends come. I can only imagine she's a little lonely in that big stall as to herself. 

Each day will get easier. The great news is that our dogs are completely over the chickens now. Two got fully out of the pen and our pups just looked at us, saw that we had seen them, and then went off exploring. We're all learning!

Party Fowl

I will admit, turns out the big nest of eggs we found turned out to be guinea eggs! Our next door neighbor's birds decided our yard was perfect for their laying. Not too worry, we returned the four dozen eggs to our neighbor and she can incubate them if she chooses. We're too busy with quail right now anyway. 

All our animals are beginning to enjoy their new stalls. Fiona especially likes having her own space to eat. I do think we need to put more fans in there though. This summer has been brutal with the heat!

Tomorrow, I'm on the hunt to find a suitable feeding trough for my goats. It has to sit tall enough where it won't be in their way, but low enough for little Caramel to get some food! She's just so tiny and adorable!

The two new bovine come in early next week and then we'll be all set for awhile. Truly, I told Rob that at least! 🙂

We sometimes let Reggie drive haha

Independence Day!

We knew our chicks were set to start laying either last week or today, imagine our surprise when we walked the back of the barn today and found the mother lode! We only go around the back of the barn maybe once a week at most, we thought the chicks always stayed in the barn during the day, but apparently they had their own outhouse. We'll be doing the float test on the four dozen we collected to make sure some didn't spoil, but I feel most are ok. What a great surprise! Am independence from the grocery store on eggs!

We also got our new stalls put in so the donkeys and Fiona will have their own sleeping quarters at night. They don't know what to make of them yet, but soon enough they're going to love their individual space. Fiona especially, now we can feed her more and not worry about the donkeys stealing her food!

To celebrate today, we cut up watermelon for all the animals. Guess who was the first to take a nibble? Yep, Patches. That girl won't miss any tidbit of food. Have a great celebration tonight, we'll be hunkered down with the animals keeping them safe from the boom booms. 

Only One

A busy weekend at the farm! First, we drove two hours away to pick up the smallest and most adorable dwarf Nigerian goat you've ever seen. Seriously, she's a dwarf of a dwarf! While I was there rounding her up, I spied a couple of silver does. Before I knew it, I not only picked up the one I had purchased, but bought two more! Meet Caramel, Sugar and Spice. All three of them have already gotten along and learned the routine of bedtime!

Once we returned home with our newest loves, we had our farrier come out to tend to some of our girls. Fiona is still too skittish to get her hooves trimmed, but I'll continue working on her. Patches and Fancy didn't like it, but they got theirs done. You'd think he was killing Scotchie, Cocoa, Sundae and Cookie Doe, but they all have trimmed hooves now. Let's hope this gets easier with them as all their cries really got to me. 

Today, all the animals settled in for yet another scorcher. Patches and Fancy took to their job well and protected the three littles as they found the chicken coop to their liking. I swear, if you want to entertain any animal except chickens, build an Aviary!