Ride 'em Cowgirl!

On Monday my friend Kristin, horsewoman extraordinaire, came over to give me a hand with Skipper. I had decided it was time for me to get on with the business of riding her again. I have handled her quite a lot in the past months and had been gradually gaining my confidence with her, so it was time to stop making excuses and go for it! I had asked Kristin sometime last week if she would come and give me a hand with it and she agreed to make some time for us. I'll have to admit, though, when she called, I starting having second thoughts! I think she might have used her whip on me if I'd have tried to back out of it! Seriously, though, just her coming over gave me that push I needed to finally get me to get on and ride.

Here is a little video of Kristin lunging Skipper...just to get her ready to be ridden.


After Kristin worked with Skipper on the ground, she rode her some...and then it was MY turn!


Kristin tried to get Skipper to pick up the pace a little.


It's going very well!


And let's try going in the other direction.


Skipper and I in action!

Happy Trails

Over this past weekend, I went on my first real trail ride. Well, it was mostly on the road, but it was still a long ride with a bunch of other people on horse back! I drove three and a half hours southeast of here to Versailles, MO. My Mom's cousin, Jay Yoder, lives there and I had been invited down for a visit. I arrived just before lunch on Friday. After having a glass of Susie's delicious mint tea, Jay and I went straight out to ride and rode for about an hour and a half on his property. He has a great trail system that meanders all over his beautiful 170 acre farm.
The next morning was the American Cancer Society's Ride For Life. All proceeds from the ride and other events relating to the ride went to benefit cancer research. Since my mom died three years ago from cancer, this cause is one I am very happy to contribute to. Especially if my contribution is from the back of a horse!
Here is the group preparing to take off on the ride. I am the one right about in the middle, in a ball cap, riding a brown gelding. Right next to me in a white shirt and sitting on a Palomino mare is my cousin, Jay.

The first half of the ride lasted about three hours. Then we stopped to water our horses in the creek and have some lunch. Jay and I decided three hours on a very hot day was enough for us and our horses, so we went home after that.

There was a BBQ that evening for all ride participants. After dinner there was a drawing for a saddle and also an auction. First, the names of all the riders went into a hat and they drew out one name. That person would win a brand new, hand made, leather head stall. I was the lucky winner of that prize! I wasn't even expecting that one! I had bought $20 dollars worth of raffle tickets for the saddle, so after the drawing for it (which I did NOT win), they continued to draw names for other prizes that had been donated. I ended up winning a pouch that clips on your belt when riding so you can carry all your important things, a brand new haltar and lead rope, a leather cell phone pouch, some gift certificates, and a tee shirt. I'd say, even though I didn't win the saddle, I still walked away with well over $20 worth of stuff! Here I am showing off my new head stall and haltar set. The haltar set is for a pony, but it fits my donkey and it is green (my favorite color). That is Jay behind me being a wise guy!

After all the drawings, there was an auction where people had donated lots of nice stuff for the cause. I ended up getting a very nice, new saddle pad for $25. I also met the lady who owned a local saddle shop just outside of town. In chatting with her, I learned she had an Australian stock saddle (which I have been looking for) and it was at a price I could afford, so I also came home with a saddle for Skipper. Here she is showing it off.

My cousin Steve (Jay's son) was kind enough to act as my personal photographer. He also took this video of me riding around on my horse. Well, the horse (Deuce) is actually Steve's horse. Since Steve was not riding, he was free for me to ride. He is a very nice Missouri Foxtrotter and he did great for me. I can't wait to go again next year.

Surprise In The Hen House

Our hens have been really busy this spring, providing us with lots of yummy eggs. We have one little white banty hen, however, who is very broody. She is always laying on somebody else's eggs. One day Greg found her laying on a Guinea egg, so he decided to leave it there for her to lay on. He gathered a half a dozen more Guinea eggs over the next few days and put them all under the banty. He wanted to see if she would actually hatch them out.

This morning he went to gather eggs and found one of the other hens laying in the box insted of the little banty, and lo and behold she had a little Guinea chick under her! He could see a broken egg shell in the box. He came and got me so I could come and see and I grabbed my camera so I could take some pictures. While I was snapping shots, Greg saw a dead chick laying on the ground. And then we saw another one. He lifted up the hen and we didn't see any in the box, but we saw the broken shells of four of the eggs. I then saw a chick on the ground. I picked that one up, and then we saw another. We figured she must have had them under her wings and they dropped out when Greg picked her up. She jumped right back up in the box, and we brought the two live chicks in and set up a box for them in the kitchen.

One of the chicks seemed a little bit older than the other one (by a few minutes or so, maybe). We weren't sure the one would make it. It seemed quite a bit more unsteady than the other one.

But, after several hours, it seems to be doing fine.

We keep checking to see if the other eggs are going to hatch out. We want to be sure and catch them before any more chicks end up dead on the floor of the hen house. I know chickens will kill ducklings, but I never heard if they would kill Guinea chicks. I have heard of people hatching Guinea eggs under regular hens, though, and letting them raise the chicks in order to get them to be more tame. So, we don't know what caused the death of the other two chicks.

Around the Farm

Now that spring has come to Cavalli Run, we have been doing some things around the farm. It still needs so much work, and we still have yet to collect all the equipment we will need to do a lot of that work. Progress is being made, however, and I know we will get to where we want to be eventually.
We were not able to put a garden in last year, but we are doing a small one this year. We don't have a tiller yet, but we're not gonna let that stop us! Last year, after we got our sheep and they had cleared out an over-grown paddock for us, we discovered several old and new tractor tires hiding under all that brush. We thought they would be great for raised beds, so our garden this year is a raised-bed, tractor tire garden! You can see the cattle-panel grape arbor in the background, and I already have lettuce and radishes coming up in my "salad-garden" tractor tire.


One tire holds pepper plants and the tomato plants each get their own small tire (we have found lots of those around the place, too).

We are getting eggs galore these days. It's just about time to start having some roasted chicken! We can't keep up with all the production, but several people have reaped the benefit our excess! With a little modification, Greg has found that his old desert uniforms work as farm shirts! I almost didn't see those eggs!

We have found many innovative ways of utilizing the various treasures we have found around the place. These old real estate signs that were left behind by a previous owner made a good lamb "baby gate" to keep little lambs out of the ram's stall at night!

Greg had some extra field fencing that he used to finish the corral area behind the barn. No more orange snow-fencing to keep the sheep where they are supposed to be! Yay! While it has come in handy many times,I detest that orange stuf.

I had a run-in with a ram this year! He didn't actually butt me, he sort-of side-swiped me. Next time he wants to be on the other side of where I am, I will try harder to get out of his way! Ouch!

Greg found this big snapping turtle making his way across one of the sheep paddocks. He had already rescued one, and lifted the fence for her so she could make her way to the pond in the horse pasture.

This big guy was quite a bit larger, though, and not near the fence, so Greg had to get the snow shovel and pick him up in order to move him out of the sheep's area.

He was huge, but he looked nothing like a sheep!

What A Week

We have really run the gammut of experience for our first lambing season. A set of triplets, an extra large single, a set of twins whose momma sat on the second twin while giving birth (I have been told by several long-time shepherds that they have never seen this before), and a dead lamb from another set of twins (no apparent reason). And it just keeps coming!
Our week started with a visit from the shearer. This was a different shearer from the one we used in the fall. We got an Amishman form Jamesport, which is only an hour away. He only charges two dollars per sheep, but we had to provide part of his transportation. I did not have him shear my three still-pregnant ewes. He was very gentle with my sheep, but I have decided I want to try and pluck, clip or shear them myself from now on.
That evening we had guests arrive by motorcycle from near Memphis.


On Wednesday afternoon our yearling ewe, Cookie, was laying on the ground by the fence under the cedar trees. I saw that she had two feet hanging out of her. She was contracting strongly but nothing was happening. I sent Lynn (my friend who was visiting) to get Greg. We got Cookie out from under the trees and into the barn and then started pulling the lamb. It took quite some time. The lamb was very large (9.8 lb), and Cookie is so small. It was wedged in very tightly. Unfortunately, by the time we got the lamb out, his little heart was barely beating. He never moved and he died within minutes. It was very sad. He was a very pretty little mouflan, just like his momma. After I got myself collected, I got out my lambing book and read up on the situation once again. I wanted to see if we had done all we could, and what we should do differently next time. The only thing we could have done differently was pull harder and get him out faster. I really don't know if that would have been possible as he was in so tight. But, I guess we will never know. Poor little Cookie, she walks around like she is looking for something, but she doesn't know what that something is (she was not interested in the lamb when we put him by her).


Then, the very next day, Sage delivered a set of twins. When I got out there, she had a lamb on the ground, and soon after, presented a set of legs. A few seconds later there was the very tip of a nose out. But then nothing happened for over 30 minutes. I got out my lambing book once again, and then went into action. I broke the membranes around the nose, stuck my finger in the lambs mouth. Nothing! So, I pinched the nose between the nostrils, stuck my finger in his mouth again, and, suddenly he sprang to life and popped right on out!
We watched for awhile, until he was up on his feet. While watching, we noticed that Momma would not let them nurse. They tried and tried but she would not let them near her back end. We got them to the barn and into a stall so they could be alone to bond. But, after a couple of hours, there had still been no nursing. I got out a dog collar and leash and prepared to tie Sage up. I couldn't catch her, of course, so I made a lasso of the leash and got it around her horns. She fought that like crazy, so I got it off of her, then got it around her neck. I was then able to hold her still enough to get the collar on her, then tie her to a post with the leash. After that she calmed down quite a bit. I petted her a bit, and when I had her calm and not trying to get away from me, I tried milking a bit of colostrum out. No, I have never milked a sheep before. But, when I tried it, the milk squirted all over my leg! So I went and got a quart jar and milked her into that. Lynn and I bottle fed the colostrum to the babies and then left them alone so they could bond and so I could try and get a few hours of sleep.
I got to bed at 11:15, and was wide awake at 2:45! Out to the barn I went to check on everybody. Wonderfully, the ram's belly was nice and round. But not so for the ewe. So, back to the house I went to mix up some lamb formula (milk replacer). She guzzled it right down. I went out two hours later and gave her some more.
I decided to try to get her to nurse from Sage (I really did not want a bottle baby), so I tied Momma up again. But, try as I might, I could not get that baby to latch. I left them alone again to see if they could bond some more. I came back later, and her tummy wasn't empty, so I was sure she must have nursed at least a little bit from Sage. (Oh, I had had to file her teeth a bit, because thay were very sharp). I kept checking throughout the afternoon, and, every time I checked, she seemed to have something in her tummy. She was never as full as her brother, but not empty, either. In my experience with multiples so far, this is often the case...one will always be a little on the low side of the other. She was active, not lethargic, so I decided to take the "wait and see" and "let nature take it's course" for a little bit.
In the evening, when we got the sheep up to the barn for the night, she seemed a bit on the empty side again. I told Greg I couldn't go to sleep thinking she was hungry, so I fixed her a bottle and headed to the barn. For some reason, I grabbed my file on the way out. Something told me I should check her teeth again. Maybe Momma was letting her latch on, but if she still had a sharp tooth in there, she wasn't letting her nurse long enough to get full. She guzzled her bottle, and then I checked her teeth. Sure enough, I felt another sharp little ridge. I filed it down, and then we left the barn to head for bed.
When we arrived in the barn early in the morning, we found she had got into the ram's stall and was crying for her momma. Poor little thing, she was bleeting weakly as if she was just tuckered out. She was up and walking around, though, and was happy to see us! It had been suggested to me that we weigh her to see if she had lost weight since birth, and sure enough, she'd lost about a lb. So, resigning myself to the idea that I had a bottle baby on my hands, I was off to fix a bottle. But Greg said, "Why don't we try one more time to get her to latch on to Sage before you get a bottle?" I thought it was worth a shot, so I got the collar and leash, lassoed Sage again and got her tied to the gate. Greg held her leg up and I held the lamb up to the teet. At first nothing happened. But then I reached up and expressed a little milk. I held the lamb up again, she sniffed at it, she grabbed ahold of it and went to town! She let loose a couple of times, and then couldn't find it again, so I helped her out, and she'd suckle again. After she had a nice full belly, we let Sage's leg down. The lamb let loose, but then she found the teet on her own and kept going. Sage was being very calm and letting her nurse. No kicking, no trampling, no moving away! I was so overjoyed I cried!

I freed Sage from the gate, and she continued to let the lamb nurse. Then, when she was finished, Sage slowly started heading out to the pasture, watching and waiting for her little lambs, who followed right behind their momma.
We have decided to name the milk-chocolaty ram "Skor", like the candy bar. He has just a touch of frosting on him. I'm not sure, but I think this makes him a solid moorit (brown) with flashing. Or else he is a spotted moorit.

We are calling the ewe lamb "Marshmellow" because she looks like a toasted marshmellow! And she is so sweet! I believe she is a moflan like her beautiful momma.

Here's the little siblings lying in the grass.

Little Mr. Skor is to be the ram for our third breeding group. So, that gives us three un-related rams, all three a different color. I couldn't be more pleased.
One more ewe (Ursula, who is Cookie's momma) left to lamb. She is getting to be quite a blimp, so it has to be soon.

Lambs, Lambs, and More Lambs

Yesterday, Cocoa had a set of twin, black, ram lambs. At about 3 in the afternoon, Greg came in and said she was in the side paddock and it looked like she was in labor. So, I went running out. She was standing and then layed down by the tree. Solomon, the ram, was bothering her a little bit, so I headed out to chase him away from her. As I was going through the barn, Greg called out that she was on her feet and the lamb had fallen out. I got out to the paddock in time to see Solomon chasing her around, so I hustled him out of the paddock and shut the gate. Meanwhile, Cocoa headed back to her lamb. It looked like she had another one coming out, but then she sat down against the fence, so we thought it must have just been the afterbirth we had seen. She proceeded to lick and clean her baby, but she wouldn't stand up to let him nurse, and he was sure looking for the milk bar! So, I went and got her some molasses water with electrolytes, and when I got up close to her with it, I saw a little lamb nose sticking out from under her rump. Just as I got over to her, she got up to get the water, and I saw the lamb just laying there, still in his sack. I thought it was dead, but it moved its head ever so slightly, so I gave it a little nudge and rubbed him a bit. Then he really started to move and Cocoa came running over and started licking him. He really struggled for a long time to get up. It was so hard not to get in there and help him out, but I resisted. I try to take a very hands-off approach and have read before that if creatures aren't left to struggle to do what they are intended to do, they will be weak and may not thrive, so I stayed away and left him to figure it out. He finally did make it to his feet, and today he is just as alert and active as his big brother. Cocoa is a two-year-old, first time mother. She is not quite as attentive as the older, more experienced ewes, but all bellies have been full at every belly check! Here I am keeping an eye on the situation! This is Cocoa and her boys today. We've named them Hershey and Nestle because their momma is Cocoa! Here is a picture of Daisy and her single ewe lamb, Whoppers. Whoppers was a big girl at birth, weighing over ten lbs. She was born two weeks ago, just two days after the triplets were born. This is Daisy and Whoppers today. You can see how much she's grown already. Zuma's triplets have really grown, too. Compared to the new babies, they are quite roly-poly! We named them, collectively, The Three Musketeers! The ewe is Porthos and the two rams are Athos and Aramis. This morning when Greg went out to let the sheep out of the barn, he discovered that Shula had a white lamb with her. She was huge and I couldn't believe she only had a single, which wasn't all that big. I looked around and saw a black lamb, laying dead on the ground by the wall. Both were ram lambs. It was very sad, but, thankfully, the white one was healthy and doing well. This little guy has a lot riding on his shoulders. Since he was not sired by our Solomon, he is to be the ram for our next breeding group. His name is Zero, after the white candy bar. I call him "Zero my Hero"! And here's a little video of little Mr. Zero doing his little lamb job!

Starting Out With A Bang!

Yesterday we came home from attending church and picking up a few supplies and found that Zuma (named by our granddaughter, Sophia) had given us our first lambs on Cavalli Run. At first Greg saw one lamb, so he came to get me in the house where I was putting stuff away. We headed out to the pasture and, as we got closer, we saw a lamb standing next to her by the hay bale. The closer we got, the more lambs we saw. When we finally reached a spot where we could see on the other side of her, we saw that she had triplets! Three little black lambs!


She still had her afterbirth attatched so we decided to go away and leave her to bond with her babies. We saw that they were all nursing, so we just wanted to give them some time. I brought out a bucket of water with molasses and some eloctrolytes for momma, and she just guzzled it! While she was drinking, I bent down and got a look under the lambs and saw that she had two little ram lambs and one ewe lamb.

As it got closer to evening, we wanted to bring them all up to the barn. We tried luring her with some sweet feed, but she wanted to stick pretty close to that bale. So, we ended up picking up the lambs and carrying them back to the barn. Zuma followed right on my heels. We weighed them and checked them over. They weighed in at 6.6 lbs, 6 lbs even, and the little girl weighed 5.8 lbs. Good weights for triplets!
This morning we went out and tagged their ears first thing. The first one went well, the second one was harder for some reason. I couldn't get the tagger to squeeze together completely, so I switched it to the other ear and got it in there. By then my hands were shaking because I felt so bad! The last one was a little tough, too, but I got it in. Here's a little video where you can see their new jewelry!


I checked bellies tonight and everyone had a full tummy. I have been told that sometimes with triplets one of them may not get enough milk. So far, they seem to be doing just fine, but we will keep our eyes on them.
It has been a very exciting couple of days. I wonder who will be next?

First Anniversary

Today is the first anniversary of moving to our farm. This was much like the day we moved in a year ago...overcast and chilly. It was wetter last year, but not quite as cold, I don't think. We woke up this morning to find a dusting of snow on the ground. I am really hoping that was the end of it for this year. It has been a very cold winter for us in this old farm house with little insulation and only one heat source (a propane heater on the living room wall). Next year we plan to put wood heat in, even if we aren't able to do any other remodeling or building.
Aside from being a cold winter, it has been a year of many ups and downs. We have had to do a lot of clean up, a lot of un-packing of several years' worth of things that have been in storage, things that came from my mom's house after she died three years ago, plus things we brought back from Germany, and a lot of getting to know our farm and the various animals we have aquired since moving in: 3 dogs, 1 horse, 1 donkey, 30 fowl (laying hens, banties, and a half dozen Guineas), 7 ewes (would have been 8 but we lost one), a ram, and several barn cats.


We have known some loss this first year. One of our original ewes (Zinnia) strangled herself in the fence, one of our banty hens went missing, and several cats have died or disappeared (mostly kittens whose mommas dragged them off to hide them).
We had over-grown pastures we couldn't see, let alone hike, because the man who was supposed to cut the hay didn't get it done in a timely manner. We had a miserably hot summer and no central air. We had wool we couldn't spin, a horse I couldn't ride (because I lost my confidence after she threw me shortly after I got her), a sheep-guarding donkey who didn't like the sheep, and dogs who shed like crazy and make a huge mess in my house!





We've had more house issues than we've ever had in any house we've lived in: rolling floors, rotting floors, roaches, flies, Asian beetles, frogs, and mice. We didn't even have this many critters in our house in Africa! Okay, we did have roaches, AND we had lizards...but not the rest. Oh, and ants...we have had some ants here, and we did have ants way worse in Africa.
But, there have also been an awful lot of highs. I love hiking these hills. Nothing makes me happier than being out on my land (except maybe working with my horse and having her respond to me the way I want her to). I have discovered that I am capable of much more than I would have given myself credit for. I have learned so many new things. I know how to drench sheep now! I know how to work with wool now. I am learning how to work with my horse and getting my confidence back. I am learning how to take care of sheep, horses, donkeys and laying hens. I learned how to use the willow from the ponds to make baskets. I am working on training my dogs. I made a saddle pad with my own two hands. I have my own, farm-fresh eggs coming out my ears. Our farm has a plethora of wild berries and fruit, which we were able to put up to enjoy all winter long. Three of our four children were able to spend some time on the farm with us, along with their families. We have had visits from several friends we hadn't seen in years. And, how could I forget? I got some really great boots!!!
Even with all the lows, and a few days where I seriously wondered if we made the right decision when we decided to follow my dreams, I feel overwhelmingly blessed to be living this life. I am planning to live here for the rest of my life. I told my husband I wasn't moving again until Jesus came to get me, and I'm pretty sure he's not gonna make me pack! But, even if I didn't have to pack, I have no desire to ever move from this place. The future promises to be very bright, and many exciting events are on the horizon.
We should be having our first baby lambs any time now. I am hoping to be riding Skipper again by the end of April. I was working with her some yesterday and she remembered all of her lessons from last fall...even responded to them better than she did then. We are getting our fences set up in order to be able to do proper pasture rotation with the sheep this year. I hope to have my hand-craft business up and running by this fall. We are getting ready to put our first garden in (here). Spring is showing itself. We have so much to look forward to. Year number two has all the potential to be very exciting and full of even more new adventures.
I'm looking forward to sharing this next year with all of you. Thank you for reading my blog over the past year, and especially for commenting on my posts. I have enjoyed getting to know many of you and having you along for the ride.

And Gabby thanks you, too!!!

From Sheep to Yarn, On a Shoestring

Our sheep were shorn in late October. I had visions of skirting fleeces all winter long. But, it got too cold to sit more than 3 feet from the only heat source in the whole house. Even at three feet, I am usually sporting two layers (or more) from neck to toe and sitting underneath a blanket or two, often wearing gloves or fingerless mittens (sometimes both) if I'm knitting or crocheting. Otherwise my hands are tucked under my thighs, under the blanket to keep warm!
Besides that issue (which I hope will be resolved by next winter), I lost motivation to get all the fleeces skirted as I have not been able to get a spinning wheel yet. I figured I had two options: #1-have 7 un-skirted fleeces sitting in pillowcases in the cedar chest upstairs, waiting for warmer days to be dealt with; or #2-suffer the cold, skirt and wash all the fleeces, and have them sitting in pillowcases in the cedar chest waiting to be carded and spun! I went with option #1!
I did manage to get three of the seven fleeces skirted before it got miserably cold. However, I got frustrated with having even 3 skirted fleeces just sitting there and nothing I could do with them. I kept trying to come up with some way I could get some of my wool spun. I even considered sending it off to a mill to have it all done for me...but I really wanted to process my first fleeces from the sheep to the yarn myself by hand. Besides, sending it to the mill would be very expensive.
I have been searching the internet most of the winter for ideas. I've been asking friends for ideas. I've been racking my brain for ideas. Then, one day, I got an idea! I had seen some fleece combs on the internet and thought they looked an awful lot like my dog combs! And I remembered I had a spindle I had bought years ago, but never really learned to use properly, and I was sure I still had it. It had to be packed away in a box from our last move. So, I decided I would first hunt down that spindle. I mean, what would be the point of washing and preparing a fleece if I no longer actually had the spindle? Then I would just have a skirted, washed and dried fleece sitting in a bag in the...you get the picture! Of course, it wasn't where I first thought it would be...but it WAS in the last place I looked!
Well, once I found the spindle, I had to do a little adjustment to it (it needed a hook), and then I washed up some fleece from Zinnia (the ewe I lost right after shearing to an attempted escape-gone-bad).

The fleece took forever to dry in this cold, but I took the time to watch some videos on You Tube about using a drop spindle. And, finally, I had some nice locks to comb. Here is a video of me combing some fleece.


Here's a bundle of combed fleece.



Here I am, using my newly-modified drop spindle. Okay, yes, Greg took three videos of me using it, but I was biting my tongue in every single one, so they didn't make it into my blog!


And here is my first product...a very nubbly "novelty" yarn.

It may not work well for socks, but I have big plans for this yarn!

Two New Ewes

Today Greg drove down to NW Arkansas to pick up two new, hopefully pregnant, ewes. It is always so exciting to get new additions to the farm.

Welcome to your new home, girls.

Checking out the new digs.

It didn't take long to find the sweet feed!


We have so many hopes and dreams for our homestead. Spring is just around the corner, now. Baby lambs will be coming. We're going to order some more laying hens and a couple of roosters, plus get an incubator so we can start hatching out chicks to sell. We'll be doing another shearing. Several friends are planning first-time visits. We've just talked to one of our neigbors and made arrangements for him to cut our hay for us this year. Plus he's agreed for Greg to help him with it, so Greg can learn how to do it, so we can someday do it for ourselves. And, I have my new training halter and my great new boots that are waiting to be broken in as soon as the ground dries up enough to let me get back out into the round pen with Skipper. I hope to be riding her again in no time! I'm also ready to start the next phase of training with the dogs.
There are a couple of other things in the wind, that, if they come to fruition, will just add to our many blessings and the hopes of a bright future here on Cavalli Run. I'm going to keep those close to the vest for now, though! If they come about, I will certainly be filling you all in on them as they happen!