The Milk Cow

We got a milk cow.  She is fabulous.  She is a beautiful Holstein.  She doesn’t have a name yet but I am working around the clock to come up with the perfect name that fits her just right.  I have never milked a cow before but in the 9 days we have owned her I am getting plenty of lessons.  We got her so we can use her milk to feed the baby calves.  So far it has worked well.  The babies have taken a hard hit.  We brought one in that brought some kind of sickness and it spread to the others.  They seem to be over the sickness but are now dealing with the weather change.  It was 100 degrees last week and the week before and now this week it hasn’t even reached 70 degrees.  The temperature changes are very hard for these babies to handle since they are so fragile.  Hopefully they all pull through this.  We have been getting lots of extra milk and so the dogs have been benefiting greatly.  They each get a bowl of fresh milk every morning and every evening.  Their condition is rapidly improving, even though it wasn’t poor in the first place.  We are also going to be drinking some of it.  Michael has tried it but I have not yet.  Michael grew up with his family owning a milk cow so he is used to this process and also drinking fresh milk.  He says it has a very different taste.  I can’t wait to try it!  I also plan to make a go at cheese making.  I am going to start with mozzarella.  There are so many great adventures ahead!

                Yesterday I did our first lettuce harvest.  I was so nervous I would pick it all (it’s leaf lettuce) but when I got done I couldn’t even tell I had picked any!  I made a balsamic vinaigrette from scratch and added pomegranate crasins and walnuts to the salad.  It was delicious!  I had never made my own salad dressing before but I loved it!  My recipe was:

                ½ cup balsamic vinegar

                ½ cup extra virgin olive oil

                A spoonful of canned chopped garlic

                2 Teaspoons white sugar

                Some Salt

                Some Fresh Ground black peppers

I put it in a jar, sealed it tight, shook it like crazy and drizzled it over the salad.  I love it paired with the crasins and walnuts.  I can’t wait to eat more for lunch today!  I paired the salad with fresh grilled asparagus (prob. The last harvest of the year), rice pilaf and grilled chicken that I marinated in Italian salad dressing.  It was a light supper but oh so filling!

Enjoy some pictures of our new milk cow!

Three of the babies milking with Honcho the dog watching very close.

Look at that stud working those udders like a champ!

A Lesson Learned

Although posts have been limited activity on the funny farm has remained elevated.  Yesterday I learned a good lesson.  I was trying to clean up my house because with all the activity lately it has not gotten hardly any attention.  I had been gone over the weekend and had left Yellow Cat at my house to fend for herself and mouse around.  Since she has been feeling better she has really started mousing so I didn’t want to interrupt her hunting schedule by taking her somewhere while I was fone.  Anyway, in my cleaning process I cleaned out the litter box and was excited that it wasn’t very dirty or smelly!  I really hate that job!  Anyway, basking in light litter glory I continued to clean. When I got to the fireplace I noticed an odd smell.  I started to look around for it and realized there was an ashy white powder on the floor and on the hearth.  I thought this was sort of weird.  The more I studied I realized that this was truly coming from the fireplace.  I haven’t had a fire in there since January or February so there should have been no reason to have any ash activity.  Boy was I wrong!  After further investigation I found that Yellow Cat really made herself feel at home and decided that the fireplace, with all that lovely soft ash, would make a great litter box.  HOW GROSS!  I hadn’t been in a rush to clean out the ashes in there because…. Well, there was no reason to at that point!  So, I had planned for a good hearted attempt yesterday to clean the house and I ended up having to totally clean out the fire place due to Yellow Cat’s confusion.  How is it that all these weird things happen to me?  Why can’t I just get a normal pet that does normal pet things!??!  Anyway, I suppose I learned my lesson, always clean out the fireplace after your last fire of the year!

Bottle Calves

I am happy to report that all the babies are doing well so far and we have acquired another one.  This time it is a solid black bull calf.  He seems to the be the strongest eater we have had yet and he needed the least amount of help nursing from the bottle.  The heifers we really had to help get them started nursing by getting the nipple in their mouth and then squeeze on their mouths to get the suction started.  We had to do that for about a day and a half on Blackie and 3 or 4 days with Red.  So far, bull calf has needed no help at all!  Below is a picture of Blackie meeting Ace.

                I had a funny moment last Friday as I was talking to my dear friend Meghan as I was headed over to feed the bottle calves.  We finished a great conversation and I said I had to run because the babies were crying for supper.  She laughed and said, “Wow how our lives have changed!  I am leaving from supper at a bar in Boston and you are going to feed cattle!”  I have reflected on this a lot since then.  It makes me laugh every time I think of it.  It also makes me think of how many different paths there are in life.  I never thought this would be the life I would live but I love every second of it.  I always thought I would be right along there with Meghan and my other friends that I grew up with being young socialites in the city and someday settling down in the suburbs to raise my 2.5 children in my white picket fenced yard.  When I was little I told my mom I wanted a job where I could wear “click-clack” shoes when I grew up and my dreams have come true.  My cowboy boots go click-clack every time I wear them.  Although this is not the same click-clack we imagined (I thought it would be high heels) I wouldn’t change it for the world.

                On that note, I am off to feed calves, chickens, dogs, horses, the cat and the fiancé.  Have a great Tuesday!

Living on the Funny Farm

There has been so much activity lately that I can’t even think straight let alone make myself write for the blog so I apologize for the huge gap in news.  To start off I have some sad news that our dog Gabby has disappeared.  She has been my family’s dog for years and when my parents moved overseas she came to live with me.  Sadly, I think some predator or something may have gotten her.  We have had a lot of fox sightings recently and also coyotes roam the area frequently.  On the bright side my life has been filled with many other animal adventures and distractions.  Tulip, Michael’s bulldog has been getting chewed alive by Buster, the Boston Terrier pup.  He plays plenty hard and she doesn’t care but she was looking really tough so she made the move from Michael’s house and the pecan orchard over to my house for some R&R.  The barn cat, Yellow Cat, also got into a scuffle with an unknown creature and has been in poor shape for weeks.  We finally brought it to my house to recuperate and it has gotten so much better.  It also helped taking it to the vet for some more formal TLC.  Hopefully before long she can move back out to the orchard.

This past weekend my chickens arrived.  There are two groups, some larger than the others.  The oldest were born on or around March 29 and the other group was born on or around April 12.  They are so cute!  There are also SO many of them!  With being so small they have to be taken care of and watched pretty close so the solution for that was they have moved into my house.  They live in different sized large Rubbermaid containers in one of my spare bedrooms.  Let me tell you, they are fun but make racket all night!  Their chirps are cute and the babies sleep a lot but the bigger ones do not!  The bigger lot will move outside to the chicken house this weekend.  It is time for them to go!  With a bulldog, an injured cat and 25+ chickens my house is getting a little crazy. 

To add to the madness I have also gotten 2 bottle calves.  One is about 4 days old now and the other was just born yesterday.  These calves are very hard to care for and their chance of survival is sadly not very good.  However, I am doing my best to keep them going!  They get bottle fed twice a day with milk replacer and a colostrum supplement.  They are about the cutest things ever.  I am not naming them until they are at least a week old because I want to be realistic  about the situation.  They are doing so well though!  The older one is especially looking great.  She is a big heifer calf that eats like an elephant (If you would let her) and is already drinking water out of a bucket.  She even comes when I call her.  The younger one was born a little premature and is defiantly going to have a bigger hill to climb.  I just got her yesterday afternoon but so far she took a bottle last night and had one again this morning.  As long as she keeps eating like that things should stay positive!  It also helps that Michael is experienced in all of this.  On day 2 with the older calf she got sick.  The stress of the move and everything gave her a cough and a runny nose.  Michael was able to treat her twice though and the next day she was 100 times better.  We were a little more proactive on the younger and treated her right when she got to the house so hopefully we stay ahead of her and her very likely poor health. 

All of this combined with a visit from my mom, wedding planning, a full time job, church activities, a garden the size of Rhode Island and 4 horses to care for I am pretty darn pooped out.  Thank goodness tomorrow is Saturday!  We have an LWML (Lutheran Women’s Missionary League) rally so that will be a fun morning of fellowship and Bible study!  After that it is back to work with more garden planting and finalizing the chicken coop for move in!   It seems as though my life is quickly transforming into a funny farm/future petting zoo and I love it! 

Gardening Season

Gardening season is inching closer and closer and things are really starting to pull together in my neck of the woods.  This past weekend Michael and I installed irrigation for our garden.  We may have gotten a bit ambitious on this garden but I am really looking forward to it.  Our garden measures 300’x25’.  Yes, I know, that is a 7,500 square foot garden.  Yes, I know that we will be able to feed a small nation shall it be successful.  But why not!?! We have the space, time and energy (right now that is).  We will be providing a good amount of food for our wedding reception so it will come in handy.  Half of the garden will go towards my favorite food on Earth – corn.  Anyone who knows me knows I can consume corn like it is about to disappear off the face of the earth.  The other 3,750 square feet will go towards traditional garden items likes tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, peppers (many different kinds), carrots, peas, lettuce, eggplant and about a million more seed packs that are sitting on my dining room table.  We have started some seeds inside and they are looking great.  Really spreading their “wings” in the grow container we have them in.  I will also be putting in some flowers because a little color and beauty never hurt anyone!  I am not 100% sure on planting in this region but from what most people say it sounds like we can really take action after Easter.  It seems to be the “safe time” to get things in the ground. 

                Last night I made an eggplant and beef pie that was pretty tasty.  We bought the eggplant so we could eat it and also extract some of the seeds for planting.  We also did the same with some interesting looking tomatoes from the grocery store.  (I am not a tomato eater so I just encouraged them because of their weirdness.)  I had never had eggplant in this form and I loved it.  The texture was just right and it worked well with the beef and spices.  I just had one issue and it was that I shorted it on the sauce it needed because I ran out of supplies.  Overall, it was a good, filling eat. 

                Enjoy the pictures below of my recent happenings!

 Ace - The Newest Addition to the Family - Out for a ride on Sunday.  Poor guy was scared of the camera and ready to jump - hence the spread/crooked front legs.

Standing towards the end of the garden.  Can you see to the other end?

After a long day of running and chasing birds Honcho needed to watch some T.V. to unwind.

Brittney Spears

Have I mentioned before that I have a horse named Brittney Spears?  Well, as embarrassed as I am to say it, I do.  I did not pick out this name and have tried to change it many times but I can’t seem to find one that sticks.  Many times when people ask how many horses I have they also ask what their names are.  I must admit I am sometimes embarrassed to having Brittney Spears so I make up another name.  This has got to stop though, she must have a name!  I think I may be fighting a losing battle though because the name Brittney Spears seems to be sticking really well.  I have owned her for over a year now and she lives at the feedlot.  The pen riders use her to ride the pens and check for sick cattle.  She also gets used when they are shipping cattle.  When I bought her I DID NOT need another horse but I felt bad for her.  She had a really poor shoeing job done on her feet and it made her unable to walk for months.  A really sad deal so I convinced the owner that I needed her because she could be my new English horse when she got better.  She is a tall lanky thoroughbred so I thought she would be perfect for jumping, etc.  That is all a great plan but after a year and a half she still hasn’t left the feedlot.  She does well and gets ridden enough to warrant her stay.  The winter has been a little tough on her so she doesn’t look as nice as she has in the past but hopefully this nice spring weather and getting ridden more will help that out.  This weekend is going to be a horse cleanup weekend.  It is supposed to be 80+ degrees out every day so it will be perfect to getting all of the clan looking better.  I can’t wait to spend some time out in the sun and beautiful weather!  Have a great weekend!

A BIG Day

Today is officially a BIG day.  I meet this afternoon to get something I have been wanting for years.  Today I meet with a custom book maker.  Michael and I will make a 2 hour trek to the “big city” where I will have my foot fitted  and measured for a pair of cowboy boots for the wedding.  I am so excited I can barely hold myself together.  The place I am going to has been making boots for 4 generations and has even made boots for famous cowboy, Gene Autry.  I have a pretty good idea of what I would like them to look like but also want to leave some of it up to the professionals.  I can’t wait until July 28^th – the wedding day – to wear them with my dress!  I’m sure there is lots of other news that I should be filling you in on since I haven’t written in so long but really, all I can think about is boots so you will have to wait to be caught up on the latest happenings! Have a great weekend!