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wintertime and the living is breezy

a wise sweater-chop supervises

goose ballet

strider!

annie warms up inside

junior is ready for rabbit season

tito flirts with camera

herschel fully recovered from rehab

a rare shot of camera-shy eunice

beat the heat with comic relief.

choppy learns his ABC's (always be closing)

a glimpse at the elusive jerry cat

oh brother!

del ray's orbit gum commercial

raspberry dream

LOL!

you gotta walk down that road...

time does fly...

the last few weeks on the farm have brought extreme heat and drought. our pig pond dried up. buckets of water have been carried. hoses set up. and lots of watermelons, cucumbers and corn-on-the-cob have been dispensed to quench our 2 adult and 8 piglets intense thirst.

luckily rain arrived on thursday and friday. replenishing the pond. and hopefully reviving our fields which have turned a november-golden-brown. not good for our exclusively pasture raised livestock. there is more rain in forecast all week. this should give the grass a second life and by next week the fields should be green once more. at least, that is my plan. but nature is hard to harness.

droseph, however, has not been affected by drought. he is growing like a weed. and finds the free-choice food available via the "chow hound" to be quite delightful.

baby ducks are hatching daily. however, one muscovy mom has a hard time raising her kids and tends to lose them out in the field. provenance farm DFS (duck family services) has had to intervene on occasion and place babies in a temporary brooding area until they are older. it doesn't seem to stop her from laying more eggs as seen below.

last but not least... a tito update. our little orphaned pygora goat is doing great. his horns are crazy long. and he does now, in fact, have a beard. seems like only yesterday he was curled up on my lap with a ninny bottle. time does fly when you live on a farm.

results in.... survey says... more tests.

first off, let me share the good news. echo and bloodwork are fabulous. always knew i had a good heart. :-)

CT doesn't show any new activity. but the spots are still there. so i'm being referred to a pulmonary specialist. i'm sure lots of fun tests and adventures lie around that corner.

meanwhile, i'm still having trouble breathing. and having chest pain. and still on limited activity orders from my surgery last month. which is making me stir crazy and frustrated and i'm sure driving my husband nuts. BUT, i've only more week until surgical follow-up and then i should be able to go back to my cherished yoga and farming. i'm really hoping that the introduction of aerobic exercise will help my breathing. right now, i can hardly get through singing a song without getting winded. which is el sucko!

but spring is here at last. little marton has moved outside. tonight will be his first night to sleep in the barn (instead of in our house). hope he does ok. he seems quite healthy and strong but he's not out of the woods yet. so wish him luck!

and now for that embarrassing tito video i promised....



sorry about the shaky camera and the lens cap. i was being attacked by a hungry and shameless seven month old pygora goat!

baby goats are great distractions...

rewind back to january when i went to oncologist for follow-up, had chest CT, then PET scan and found out i had a ruptured left implant and new spots on my right lung. then, being told that i had to wait until end of april for another PET scan to see if spots had grown. jump to february when i had implant replacement surgery where all went well. new implant in place and looks fabulous. then finally, skip to march where i started getting really sick, low-grade fever, shortness of breath, chest pain, racing heart. some i'm sure are stress. some are from a cold i picked up along the way. but some of these symptoms, honestly, just plain scare me. so i saw my oncologist last week. she ordered another chest CT, an EKG, and some blood work. blood work came back perfect. but the CT & EKG results weren't in before this weekend started. remember, i HATE waiting. especially for potentially devastating or hopefully B9 results.

so what is a poor girl in stitches, recovering from surgery, who is freaking out and hyperventilating frequently supposed to do to pass the time? how bout be entertained by some ridiculously cute baby goats.

the weather this week has been warm enough for little marton to start spending his days outside with the flock. tito, the other loner and former bottle-baby, has been showing marton around. introducing him to all his friends, especially the chickens and ducks. the transition was going rather smoothly until..... tito got wind of marton's milk bottle. uh oh! who would think that a 7 month old goat who has been weaned for at least 4 months would still want a ninny bottle? and who would think said goat would actually try and steal a poor 3 week old little newborn goat's milk from said little newborn. well, actually... i did. i pretty much knew this would happen. and it was so freaking cute i had to take a picture. there is also a video i will post as soon as i have downloaded it off my camera and reformatted for the web. so look out for that in near future.

yes, baby goats are a wonderful distraction.

tito greeting marton

marton meeting armel jr.

marton and the gang

tito stealing marton's ninny bottle (now that's just sad)

meet márton

meet márton... our first angora kid born 03/01/10. we named the little feller márton which is hungarian for warrior from mars. jason had to sub as "goat mid-wife" as i was in st louis staying with my mom. jason did a great job! unfortunately, márton's mommy, bianka, pulled an "842" and rejected the little bugger. bianka is a maiden. it was her first pregnancy. and she just didn't have a clue. after the birth, she got up and walked away to be with her other goat friends. jason, then confined her and her baby to a kidding pen for a while but no such luck. she just kept butting him away. and the little guy was in danger. the first 24 hours are so important. they need to get colostrom. so jason packed him up and brought him in the house and we have another bottle-baby on our hands. tito heard the news and is a bit jealous.

this time, however, i have the help of "other mother" little bit. who cleaned márton off after the birth. and has been pretending to nurse him ever since. i can't believe it. she's only one year old (and spayed) and is usually a crazy wild child. but all of a sudden she has taken on this massive responsibility with grace and composure. it's utterly bizarre. and so freakin' cute.

little bit cleaning off the "after-birth"

my first time holding him!

márton enjoying the comforts of home (like my favorite wingback reading chair!)

tito the conqueror!

baby goats tend to get pushed around when there is fresh hay involved. especially something tasty like alfalfa! tito found a way around this predicament. tired of being on the bottom, getting seeds and stems spilled onto his lovely coat. why not just go straight to the top? that's how he stays so fat! and clean!

yes, he is standing on top of a pig!

hay, it's what's for dinner (can i get a doggie bag, please?)!

it's officially winter. the ground is frozen which means time for hay. three round bales arrived over the weekend. which makes for some happy animals. the donkeys/horse/llama got one bale. the goats and sheep got another. and for some reason, the dogs claimed the third. who knew? hay, it's not just for breakfast anymore.

this just in... donkeys love hay!

the long and lean queen of the castle

"i got short legs, so this square bale's mine"

gratuitous pic of tito von peenerhaus

two for tito.

hay!

tito turned two months old! his little horns are growing. and he's been weaned down to two bottles a day. leaves and grass are replacing milk. he's been outside for a month now and is fitting right in with the rest of the herd. although, he still prefers the company of humans.

comin' at ya!

dried leaves are like 'tater chips.

sitting in a chair on the porch.

on a sad note, we lost of one the orphaned twins, russell this week. we knew this might be a possiblity. orphaned goats have a harder time. their immune systems can take a hit making it difficult to fight off even the least aggressive diseases. still, we are heartbroken. his sister, ramona is doing well. and we are hoping she will thrive and grow into a lovely pygora doe.

cracker goat strikes again

kids love kids (and llamas too).

we had a tiny visitor yesterday. delaney (jason's cousin ron's daughter) flew in all the way from sunny california to visit family (and more importantly, goats). she loves them. especially tito. but was very concerned about tito's negligent mommy (842).

welcoming committe member baby snakes greets ron and delaney

and offers kisses

while tito and his big sis little bit crash from all the excitement

life goes on.

life is a roller coaster. you coast, and coast. you feel a thrill when you turn a loop but then all of a sudden you throw up the funnel cake you downed earlier and wish you could just get off and take a nap.

that's how things are these days. the good days coast by. sometimes you don't even notice them. which is a shame. you don't realize that nothing is going wrong. you just keep sweeping the floor and feeding the dogs. and then you have bad days from hell. like yesterday. jason's dad was rushed to ER. seizures. possible side-effect from his stroke. might be able to control with medication. fortunately, might not impair his ability to heal and recover. never the less, still scary as shit.

we try to deal with these things. but the dogs still need to eat. and the floor is definitely in need of sweeping. possible bull-dozing.

luckily the coaster scenery is often pleasantly distracting. for example, tito von peenerhaus has learned (with the aid of porkchop's doggie steps) to access my reading chair. he hasn't learned to read yet. just nap. which is what i'd love to do someday.

tito and jerry blissfully sleeping

september, where did you go?

can't believe september is almost up. i have been seriously slacking on posts. tito along with my new part-time care-taker job seem to have thrown me for a blog-less and photo-less loop. sincere apologies.

tito is fine, by the way. he's currently visiting his cousins audrey, ramona, russell, and leon outside. his grazing instincts have kicked in (a la chewing on cords, paper bags, purses, shoe strings....). so, when at all possible, he gets to run free with the herd.

been stocking up for fall on yarn and crocheted items. new stuff up on etsy. i also take requests. perfect time to plan your christmas list.

mohair hat

mohair christmas pin