Coffee

"Why do I have to be woken up so early? I was asleep!" Tads first complaint of the day as he lays in his bed trying to ignore me waking him.

"Baby, its after 9 am, its not early."

"Yes but I was awake until daddy made coffee!" We have a coffee pot/grinder in one so if you are awake, you can hear someone making it.

"You were awake all night long and heard daddy make coffee at 5:30 in the morning?"

"Well, I was at least awake and heard the coffee!"

"That doesnt negate the fact that it is now after 9 am and you slept last night from 9:30 pm, all the way to coffee 5:30 am then asleep again until after 9. Its now time to get up."

"Awww man..."

New barn again

This is the new little barn that I blogged and deleted because the pictures were not straight. Sorry about that loss of patience on my part.


Our friends helped us put the building up, they helped us take it down! This was a free shed on someone else property, she let us have it if we would take it down. We changed the roof pitch, Eric drew this up and he and Frank cut it, which took a lot of patience, throwing things, on their part!


Jeffrey and I held the roof while it was attached, and cut 2x4 pcs. He held mostly and I cut mostly.


Nail guns and cordless drills are the best invention since sliced bread.

See? Pneumatic tools... And child labor, who invented that? I praise them wholeheartedly.

"Lillith, I am going to head butt you in just a minute." Nona says, she is taking out her frustration on her battle buddies bc she was locked into the field.

Now with the supports the roof stays up on its own, however it needs a great deal more work at this point.

"Hey Tad, run up to shop and get the other battery for the dewalt set."

Running for the shop, he didnt even have to be told to hurry!

Here I am back and I didnt kill myself in the messy shop! Still running...

Taking a break on the new swing, which Tad made.

I am not killing him, I swear! I am just seein' if his head WILL pop off!

How are we gonna get this OSB up on this steep roof? Why isnt mama helping at all? I mean she is just standing around with the camera around her neck.

Aww look at that! Its nearly roofed. Well okay fine its not, it needs tar paper and shingles. Which is now has, and I will photo that as soon as there is enough sun for me to go out. Its horrible and gray and cold today, again, We have had one sunny day in 9 days. And today is another gray one so oh well. We are spring cleaning this wk, the yard and house. And building stalls, and, and, and... have a good wk all!

Sunrise

The sun does the sweetest things

Why, only this morning as I stood at my door

I saw through the night and the stars

the peeking of purple, then so much more.

The clouds lined up to be infused with color,

purples and oranges, most brightly those pink.

These rose and grew before my eyes.

Just as I felt so grateful for beauty,

There rose the sun, a fire in the sky

He rose ever so slowly then suddenly was there.

Now I wonder on such a cold morning,

Why would he rise,

If only for I?

-Jo

Conversations

Tad and Nathalie were sharing a grapefruit at the table, the sugar canister was between them with the lid open which is on a hinge. Tad leaned over to see what Nathalie had in her cup and ran his head into the sugar canister.

"Hey buddy, I wouldnt ever join a wrestling team."

"Why shouldnt he?" Nathalie inquires.

"Honey, he was just taken out by a sugar bowl, what do you think?"

"It was a very aggressive sugar dish mama." Reported Tad. Hmm I dont know about this...

BB

In my last post, I mentioned BB. He is a goat, that monster meant to eat the ears off of or at least taste them. BB stands for butcher boy, yes I know that is tasteless but I live in the country, on a little mini farm so there is that. We bought him from a friend who breeds boer goats. BB has a percentage of nubian, but is mostly boer. He is a meat goat and is two months old. We will fill a portion of our freezer with him, as well as with Lilliths kids (large brown nubian goat of ours). Just letting you all know who BB was.

In case anyone feels horror, really this isnt different than people who raise chickens for their freezers. Yes, we do that also. We are also buying a couple of cows to raise and have butchered. For an animal as large as a cow (aprox 1800 lbs at butcher time), we need someone else to do the job. For smaller meat animals, it makes more sense to do this ourselves. In attempting to homestead, we have to find ways to be self sufficient or we dont really have any point in this. If you still think I am terrible, I have a good friend who once named a goat Bob, for Kabob. So she at least, will be on my side in this...

My dawg

So I wrote a post on barn raising, and showed some nice photos. These photos were uploaded to photobucket and then I used the links to post them to my blog. Problem? It cut off the right of the photo. Now it could have been just my computer, but I was aggravated. I emailed my friend Amanda, who is quite good with computers and web pages. So, without giving her any time to respond I deleted the post in anger. She of course came on to help me, solved all of my blog problems in moments but my post is gone. Several people read it and found it amusing, but I cant really get it back. There you have it.

Onto other things, my dog is naughty. I have been training her to be less naughty, dont jump on people until they desire your death, dont kill chickens and dont tear up the goats ears. So during the day, Monster (dog) has to be on a chain, at night she sleeps in her kennel in goat barn. Today, it is raining. It was sprinkling this morning and I thought I should make her a little Monster hooch so she will have a place to be without going into her kennel. Photos following.

No mama seriously, take me off of this chain because look! I cannot run well see??? Help! I dont like my new house!


Oh allright you at least did a decent job on my house mama. Can I get off the chain please? See me smile?

Aww man mama, you dont love me. I have been so GOOD off the chain today! I chased only ONE chicken and only tried to eat BBs ears off once, okay fine twice but he was asking for it!

See? The chicken is not dead. Let me off this chain. I will be good while you are watching.

Okay so the dog said some other choice words, I wont share them here. I did make her new house in the South barn front room so was able to let her run free while I worked. She ran free this morning for 2 hrs while I did chores, cleaned up and played with her. She did very well, this is her first time not on a lead. She has been on a lead, in a kennel or separate barn room from the goats/chickens or on a chain for several months while I work with her. Today she did so well, I was proud but she did try two times to eat BBs ears up while I was busy. I know she is just playing but still.

I built the little dog house (monster hooch) out of scrap plyboard, 2x2 and 2x4 pieces leftover from our barn building. It needs a little trim, paint and something more on the roof and I think we will make a front so she has a doorway rather than an open front. She doesnt want to use it, instead she gets rained on. I think she is holding it against me that I put her back on a chain after she was so GOOD!

This last photo is just because, how many of you have wind like this? That was 3 days ago. Today, it literally blew me over. I actually fell sideways. It wasnt pretty...

Farm Photos