Not By the Hair of My Chinny-Chin-Chin

Chester tried to roost outside the kitchen window Thursday night while we were eating supper. If you look, you will see him looking in.  What you may not know is that this window is fondly called "Cat T.V."  It's where the birdfeeder is.  Wow!  What a catch.

This morning we let Grace sleep in.  Laura and I let Bubby, the cow, in for corn.  We had to work to keep the sheep from following him and to avoid his bouncing hooves as he likes to dance and play.

We also had one egg hatch over night.  I'm excited to see how many more we'll have.

Unfortunately, Hoover found part of a rotten egg to roll in.  EWWW!

Laura and Hoover,

More to follow...

Chester the Rooster

"That's ONE messed-up chicken!"  the Big Guy declares each time he comes in through the back door.

Chester, the rooster, arrived at our house Sunday afternoon.  To keep a long story long, he was hatched from one of our eggs in a kindergarten room last spring.  As an alternative to slaying-by-cat, one of our neighbors adopted him.  He has spent the last 5 months in a chicken-sized kennel, sleeping indoors.  Petted, preened, and primped.  Until now.

Now Chester has moved to the farm.  Next spring his owner hopes to have a chicken coop and perhaps even a Henny-Penny chicken to keep him company.  Apparently Chester doesn't know he's a chicken.  A dog?  Perhaps.  A person?  More likely.  He runs to greet us then puffs out his feathers and struts around us in a circle as if he's going to attack.  We really don't know how to greet him.  He avoids the other chickens.  He sleeps in the tree--or under the porch--maybe even in the doghouse.  He sampled pasture life with the cow and sheep, but that wasn't much to his liking.  This could be an interesting saga.

Stay tuned for future updates on Chester the Chicken.

Passing and Moving On

It was a difficult day at Pine Ridge Farm yesterday.  Pretty, our faithful farm dog, was hit trying to cross the road.  I won't go into great detail.

We waited until everyone was home from school to tell the children.  In this new age of technology, I couldn't even share my grief on Facebook for fear someone would tell the children before they got home!

In planning the week, I saw an opening for last night and planned a time-intensive meal--meatloaf, homemade mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli, and fudge pudding cake--not taking into account a funeral.

So, as the potatoes boiled and the meatloaf baked, we made our way to the barn for one last goodbye.

Her leg was hurt, so the Big Guy covered it with a barn towel, but otherwise she was just our Pretty--quiet and serene.  Grief is an interesting thing.  There is a longing, a fascination, but there is also an avoidance and desire to get away.

As we left, the Big Guy loaded the pallet with the tractor and took her to the back pasture for a proper burial alongside her brother.  Unfortunately, he left the gate open.  I had just drained the potatoes when Laura came in to tell me Bubby (Grace's calf) had escaped the pasture.  I jumped into my flip flops and ran out to corral the big stinker only to find him contentedly munching on nearby grass.  The Big Guy shooed him back in the gate....

and life goes on...

To Market, To Market

Rachael and Grace with a load of lambs for market.

"What do you do with your lambs?"

Since we had baby lambs in January we took them to market in May (market lambs should weigh 50-70 pounds).  We usually load them in the back of the truck and set a wooden guard around its perimeter.  But this year Matthew reinforced the wooden guard with discarded choral performance shells and loaded it on a trailer we use to move lawn mowers and our ATV.

(You might notice our smokehouse (on the left) and outhouse (seats 4 at a time) in the background.)

All six of us piled into the pickup truck and drove 45 minutes to the sale barn (where they sell sheep every Wednesday).

Once there the Big Guy backed up to the unloading dock.  We all "helped" unload the 16 lambs and herd them down the alley.

A family-building experience wouldn't be complete without a stop at the A&W on the way home.  Mission complete.

What's New?

Life changed pace at our house in March.  Mom/Wife/The All-for-One,  took a long-term subbing position at the local high school (until the end of the school year).  Needless to say, life on Pine Ridge Farm did not slow down.  In the time since we last documented Iowa farm life, this is what has happened:

We bought 15 chicks from the farm store.  7 of them survived Julian, the mighty feline hunter.

The Big Guy and Matthew spent an evening wrestling with the rototiller.  They removed the head and manually compressed the frozen exhaust valve.  After an initial start, it failed to perform.  Other than the hardy rhubarb, mint, and flagged tulips, the garden has reverted to its original state of sin.

We ran out of room for farm equipment over the winter, and had the resources to add on to our existing shop.

Our friends, Brad & Jess, had hoped to find a new home for their St. Bernard, Missy.  She is a wonderful dog and we enjoyed having her at our house for a week or two until she started eating chicken-sicles.  She returned to Brad & Jess and is awaiting a poulty-free home.

The praying mantis kit Laura received at Christmas is alive with a myriad of fascinating, carnivorous creatures.  We are learning to set live traps for ants and fruit flies.  Whooping with glee at each success, it's a relief to look over one's shoulder in embarrassment and realize there is no one there.

The Big Guy planted a number of fruit trees in what is now the "new orchard."  He bought 12 trees:  peach, apple, cherry, pear, plum.  He is hoping to supply the girls with fruit for their summer pie stand--even if it takes a year or two.

The shop construction is finished on the outside.  The Big Guy completed the electrical work, but there is still dirt work and floor work to do.  Due to our photographer's full schedule, we were not able to document spring planting, which the Lord blessed marvelously.  The corn and bean are tucked in and growing well.

Finally, this is what greeted me when I got home from school today.  It's a functional piece of equipment that combines Matthew's love for ag mechanics, music, and his genetic predisposition to pilfer other people's junk.  More on that next time....

Signs of Spring

Yesterday the Big Guy and Laura saw the first of the robins.  It must be spring.
Last week it was warm enough to clean the chicken coop for the first time since winter it.  It must be spring.

You're right--it doesn't necessarily look like spring, but it was 40 degrees outside!  The snow was melting and, as it turns out, it was a perfect day for cleaning the inside of the chicken coop.

Hoover was most helpful as I opened the trap door and laid out the tarp.  As I got into the project, I found that the mess itself was frozen enough to pick up and throw out the door easily.  Most of the chickens made their way outside.  There were a few, however, who chose chaos in familiar surroundings over having wet, cold "feet."

I hauled the full tarp out to the pasture, and couldn't pass up taking a picture to show you.  Off to the left is a 1900's baler that happened to be in the way when a Linden tree grew up through it.  The pile on the ground to the right is the load from the chicken coop that will provide great legume fertilizer for the sheep's grass. 

I had thrown down hay from the hay mow in the barn when the school bus arrived with Grace, Rachael, and Laura.  Grace came to give me hand, and the chore was quickly finished.  Hurray!  Spring is nearly here!

Snowpant Surgery

"Mom, I still have that snack bar in the bottom of my snowpants."

 

Two months after our ski trip to Colorado when Auntie J. gave us homemade energy bars, Ryan's was still in the bottom of her snow pants.  It had disappeared through a hole in her pocket, survived snow, ice, melt, the clothes washer, dryer, and multiple trips to and from school.  UGH!

I'll spare you the Big Guy's insightful comment at the time of the extraction, but it had something to do with procedures in the barn.  The peanuts and raisins escaped unscathed.  I can testify that rice Krispies and corn flakes are quite hardy--they have staying power and come highly recommended.

President's Day Celebration

After a Valentine's get-away over the weekend, the Big Guy was determined to be a productive member of society--even if it was Presiden'ts Day.  He was also anxious to work off some of the festive fat he picked up in our Valentine celebrations at Biaggi's Friday night. The temperature was moderate (in the 20's this morning!) so the kids all went out to play in the snow.

Matthew and his friend, Jake, tunneled into a big snow drift the Big Guy had pushed to one side of the driveway.  It was a king-of-the-mountain drift with smaller children sledding on top and bigger children digging underneath.  Peace was short-lived.  Of course, when tBG and I came by later to unload firewood it was as deserted as a coyote den in hunting season.

TBG cut down 9-10 trees that morning. We benefit from the wealth of trees previous owners planted in the 1970's.  To the west of our house is a deep windbreak.  TBG says, "The good thing about wood is that it warms you up a few times before you light the fire."

It was later that night, after chores and supper, that the crew (David & kids) went out to the barn to take care of Bubby's horns (Falcon, the calf--affectionately known as "Bubby.")

That's about the extent of the holiday festivities--hope your President's Day was as relaxing and enjoyable as ours!

Success!

We had another lamb in the kitchen today.  I thought of you--and this blog--and wished I had a camera as I followed Hoover's prints through the dips and waves of new snow at 5:30 this morning.  The reflection of the waning moon on the fresh prints was beautiful and crisp.  I lack a photographer's expertise at capturing such a shot, so you'll be left to imagine it.

The twin torpedos hit me before I had both feet through the gate.  After feeding them, I made my way to one of Saturday's twins that we've been supplementing (the mama has mastitis).  In due diligence, I glanced at Sunday's set of triplets in the jug next door.  One of the babies was unnaturally stretched out under the heat lamp.  After finishing with the twin, I straddled the three and a half foot wooden partition and scooped up the sick baby.  Her head fell backward in an arc.  There was some life; she wasn't stiff yet.  Holding her close to my chest, I left with high steps over the jug door and quickly made my way back to the house through the wind and snow, juggling a baby and two empty bottles.

We tube fed the little one and set her on a heating pad in front of our kitchen space heater.

 

To aid in the heating process, the Big Guy used a blow dryer.

 

Before breakfast, she was tucked in with a heated rice pack weighing down either side of the heating pad.  As we ate lunch she was already up on her feet, trying to make her way around the kitchen only to find that ceramic tile is slippery when you're wearing hooves.  She splayed out like Bambi more than once.  Now she's back in the barn with her mama.  "That," tBG declared, "is the farthest from the edge we've ever brought a lamb....I wonder if she saw a bright light at the end of the tunnel?"  Success!

On a side note, Toby, the housecat, came around the corner of the kitchen just before noon and saw the standing lamb.  He went close enough to touch noses then turned, vomited, and rocketed out of the room.  Later this afternoon we found another stress-induced deposit in the dining room.  Toby's delicate disposition may keep him out of the barn, but it won't keep the barn from coming to Toby.

Stone Soup

I wish I could share the smell of simmering Stone Soup as it fills our kitchen today.  Stone Soup?  Here's our story and recipe:

Children develop a vegetable allergy once they leave toddlerhood.  Perhaps a few escape this common ailment, but I venture it is the parents who have overcome the obstacle, not the child.

The first time I made vegetable beef soup, Matthew and Grace were interested--until they saw the vegetables.  I needed to convince them this was a good thing--and the teacher files in my head started to click.  Ahh...yes!  Stone Soup!  In the children's folktale, a poor beggar slyly begs a hearty meal by promising to make soup from a stone.  Ingredients are added, one by one, to season the stone until ta-da!  Dinner is served.

So, in the age old tradition, I sent Matthew out to find a stone for supper.  He came in with a pebble.  "Too small.  We don't want to eat it; we just need it to make our soup tasty.  Get a BIG one." He went back outside and returned with a potato-sized, oddly-shaped gray rock.  We pulled the stool over to the sink so he could wash it, then moved the stool to the stove where he carefully dropped it in the pot.  To this day we enjoy stone soup.  Here's one of our all-time favorite recipes (original recipe by Helen McGill).

HEARTY BEEF VEGETABLE SOUP
1 lb. beef stew meat
1 c. chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. oregano leaves
1/2 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. thyme
1/4 tsp. sage
1 (1 lb.) can crushed tomatoes
1 c. chopped celery
1 c. cubed potatoes
1 c. sliced carrots
1 c. coarsely chopped cabbage
1 can condensed beef broth
2 beef bouillon cubes
4 c. water
1 large stone
1/3 c. uncooked rice or barley

Brown stew meat, onions, and garlic in a 6-quart dutch oven (or cook on low in a crockpot 2-3 hours).  Add remaining ingredients except the rice/barley.  Bring to a boil; reduce heat.  Cover and simmer 20 minutes (or cook an additional 3 hours in crockpot).  Add rice or barley.  Cook an additional 30 minutes (or hour in crockpot).  Remove the stone before serving.  Choose an accompaniment:  blueberry scones, biscuits, or pumpkin muffins.  Enjoy!

The Bruiser, Torpedos, and Ladies in Waiting

Bruiser was born Tuesday afternoon, fought through a night in the barn, and by Wednesday afternoon had learned to drink from a bottle. She was doing so well. The mistake must have been changing the dressing. It appeared to be doing more harm than good, so I left the wound open to dry. Even with renewed dressing and penicillin, Bruiser passed away yesterday afternoon (Thursday).    

The other lambs are doing well.  Matthew was sent on a mission to feed two of the quads. "How will I know which ones?" he asked. 

"Just put the bottles down where they can reach and call. They'll come," the Big Guy answered.

When Matthew came back in the house he was pleased and a little surprised. "They were just like torpedos, Dad! All I did was call and they came as fast as they could! You really have to hold on to those bottles." So now our little bottle babies are fondly called the Twin Torpedos.

And these...are the ladies in waiting.   So goes life on the farm.

Kitchen Lamb

There's a lamb in the house this morning. I don't know if she's going to make it, but she's one of the toughest fighters we've ever seen.

I'll try to keep this short. She was born and left to the side yesterday afternoon. When I found her, she was so cold, I couldn't pry her mouth open to intubate her. The tube had to be slipped in the side of her mouth and maneuvered into place. We put the heat lamp dangerously close and, an hour and a half later, she was on her feet. Every time she tried to nurse, she was bumped aside. When she lay on the ground for too long, her mother pawed viciously, trying to get her up. Bruiser kept trying to nurse, but was an absolute underdog: tiny, frail, fighting, but failing.

Here's Ryan's rendition of the evening (Bruiser and one sibling were delivered early in the afternoon. Eight-year-old Ryan picks up the story around 4:45 p.m.):

"Well, it all started when Elva and her friend came to our house to see the baby lambs. They were checking them out and right when they were about to leave, I saw Bruiser's mama was going to have more babies. The first one was a goner. My mom swung it around, and shaked it, and almost did CPR. And then she said, 'I'll check if she has another one.' And, she did. She had one more. Mom had just put iodine on the little, little baby (Bruiser) and it crawled on the new baby and that was the most colorful lamb--yellow, blue, purple, red, just like a rainbow. And of course, then Elva and her friend went home.

Mom said, 'We'll check on them after supper.' So we did. And that little lamb was very, very, very cold. Dad tried just rubbing on her and blood came out her side. We decided to try a few things--like stitches and glue--because there was a cut. Nothing worked. So went to go to bed. In the morning, we thought it would be dead.  We hoped it wouldn't, but we thought it would.

But, in the morning, Mom went out, found the baby, and it was standing there by the bucket, alive.  She brang it in. And now it's lying down, resting, in a box, with a blanket over it.  The end."

More to come....

Natural Gas Explosion

One of the staples of the farm kitchen is the pressure cooker. We bought one early on for canning green beans and tomato products from our garden. Gardening was a wonderfully fun experience for the children when they were little--for about fifteen minutes the day we planted, thirty minutes in the middle of summer under the shaded cool of overgrown bean poles, and perhaps a whole five minutes in late summer when we snapped mature beans.  

 

Children running to the garden for clues in the treasure hunt.



 

Party in the garden.

In the years since, I have grown to love our pressure cooker for those don't-have-time-to-wait moments.  At least once I have realized everyone is expecting "Grammy's Stew" for supper--with roast beef, cooked carrots and potatoes--but the roast is still in the freezer at 2 p.m. No problem.  Defrost the roast in the microwave.  Crank up the pressure cooker once for the meat. Cool and open.  Add veggies. Crank it up once again. Voila!  Dinner is served.

Our dinner plans changed yesterday and with snow on the way, chili and cinnamon rolls seemed the perfect  choice. Unfortunately, the only beans I had were dry. Pressure cooker! After getting kids out the door for school and starting laundry, I whipped out the instruction manual. 

They needed to boil and soak. After that I covered them with extra water, locked on the lid, and set the 15-pound weight on the nozzle. As per the instructions, I turned the stove to medium heat and worked nearby until the weight started rocking. From that point it would take 30 minutes. I could combine the ingredients in the crock pot to mingle until suppertime--at 11:00 a.m. I was way ahead of schedule!

I was reaching for a can of tomatoes from the wall cupboard when the room filled with a horrendous hissing followed by a piercing "pop." When I turned toward the stove, liquid beans spewed upward in a geyser, spattering the ceiling, the walls, the counters, and floor. There was nothing I could do!! I looked for cover, wondering if the pot would explode or if the lid would separate from the pot and soar across the kitchen. The only shelter would take me closer to the hissing pot. There was nowhere to hide, so I stood my ground. Screaming--first from alarm, then horror. Beans dripped from the ceiling, cupboards and overhead fan. Grace, who was home sick for the day, came running upstairs to see what was wrong.

 

It may not look bad, but I cleaned bean sludge for 3 and 1/2 hours. Beans coated our cell phone docking port and earpieces. The salt and pepper shakers no longer had any holes. Bean goo, once dried, creates its own cement force field, locking in freshness--and not so freshness. I thought the worst of it was over until I pulled the stove our from the wall. There is no picture. There was shame.  My behind-the-stove-sin was covered in at least a quart of bean soup.

Over and over, I was thankful for God's protective hand.  I didn't want to think about what could have happened.... but thought this picture summed it up:
 

Another farm experience lived, survived, laughed at, shared.  Yes, we had chili and cinnamon rolls for supper--and on my way to the store to buy canned beans I looked in the rear view mirror and caught a glimpse of  crusted beans on my eyebrow!  Oh, crumb.  On days like today, it's good to know Jesus.

Night Shift

No, there aren't pictures. That's because it's dark. I just came in from the 3:00 a.m. lambing shift. The Big Guy went out around 11:00 to feed the bottle babies. I woke shortly before 3.  Unable to sleep, I turned off  my 5:00 a.m. alarm and climbed out of bed.

Yes, I said  bottle "babies." After watching one of the ewes paw and pace all day, she dropped triplets in a back alley this afternoon. They couldn't have been there more than 45 minutes, but by the time I found them they were cold, wet, and somewhat trampled. Once again there was a great cacophony--minus that of lambs. They were too traumatized to bleat. The Big Guy and 15-year-old Grace came into the barn just in time to help sort things out and get the right ewe in the jug.

The Big Guy promised to take the younger girls to piano while I took Matthew to the orthodontist, so Grace and I talked through intubating. We had just prepared the milk when the Big Guy returned. Matthew and I took off for his appointment.

As of my most recent visit to the barn, the youngest and smallest of the new triplets is the only one doing well. The one we assume is the firstborn still isn't standing (12 hours later). He will not last long. The other is clearly a bottle baby at this point. And the quads? They're hale and healthy--for the moment.

Jublilation

I went to the barn this morning to check on our 11 ewes who are due to begin lambing--and found a beautiful set of quadruplets.  They were in a corner surrounded by three very busy mamas.  No pictures of the rodeo, but it did take some finagling to get the calf locked up and the right mama in a jug (small pen) with all four of her babies.

Surrogate Mama Number One was motivated by some aggressive ear-twisting to get out of the pen.  Surrogate Mama Number Two left on her own.  Needless to say, there was much mayhem.  When a ewe lambs, she instinctively turns in circles, looking for her prodigy and, once it's standing, nudges it to her udder.  Now that all the mamas heard the high-pitched bleating of the babies, they responded with deep-throated calls and turned in circles, running into each other.  One of the mamas who "lost" her babies was calling and pawing at the closed gate.

To warm the little ones up, I grabbed a heat lamp out from under the window cupboard (a 2x12" board that lifts on hinges across its top edge), climbed up onto the sides of the jug, and hung the lamp from a 16-penny nail in the wooden ceiling beam.  The cord didn't reach the outlet.  I would need an extension cord.  Before leaving for the cord, I fed and watered the mama hoping to distract her long enough for the babies to eat.

When we have triplets or quadruplets, we give them a boost by tube-feeding them pre-mixed colostrum.  Knowing a belly of warm milk would give them the shivers, I ran to the machine shop to get the necessary extension cord, shuffled back over the icy gravel to the barn, went through 2 sets of doors, a gate, and up on the sides of the jug, kissing cobwebs, to plug in the lamp.

I mixed the colostrum in the house, returned to the barn, checked the mama's udder to make sure she had milk (ewes have a wax plug at the end of each tit that has to be released before milk can pass).  Then I tube fed three of the babies, trimming and treating their fresh umbilical cords.  The other little one was contentedly nursing, so I let him be.

After Laura woke up we went to barn together.

 

By now everyone was settled down--except Grace's calf, Falcon.  He was so excited that he kept rubbing up against us, head-butting and pushing. 

After a sound pat on his side, he would run and jump in mad circles around the barn.  He was still running and jumping even as we left.  Who knew birthdays could be so exciting?