In my ongoing quest to become organized, (haha)I'm realizing one thing that helps is to have a place for everything and everything in its place. Dh took these cubbyhole/shelves down from an office he's remodeling at his job and I could see lots of organizational uses for them immediately. Tiger saw another good purpose. A new place to sleep. Click on each photo to see a larger version (plus you will be able to read the caption better).
It is hard to get organized when you don't spend much time at home. When I was a stay at home parent, I had lots of time to get things organized. Some things were organized. For example, I had a place to keep my new checks, but I have never established a place here. That is one of the things I love about my sewing machine because it has a cabinet upon which it sits and three drawers for organizing my sewing items.
So in the cubbyholes so far there are new checks, blank envelopes, stamps, and address labels. Finally a place for tape and the stapler. And backup CDs.
Back to cleaning the kitchen. I've always wiped down all the counters, cleaned the stovetop and drip pans, washed some dishes and wiped down the table. Now I need to get some laundry started, sweep and mop the kitchen floor, straighten the living room and vacuum. One day I hope to make a dent on the mess behind my desk. Ds2 would love me dearly if I would clean up this cluttered pile.
Oh. Naptime's over for a few minutes. How will Tiger get himself out of this dilemma?
He did it! Yay, Tiger! That was quite a feat for Tiger. I have suspected that he is visually impaired since he was very young because he is very clumsy and uncat-like.
Until next time.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
My New Cubbyholes
Saturday, June 02, 2007
Why I Quit Crocheting in 1987
Labels: crocheting, knitting, Memory Lane
I was 22 years old and pregnant with my first child. I'd made a few items, the first was a blanket. It was a bit larger than 
I'd anticipated since 1) I didn't use baby yarn 2) I didn't do a gauge swatch. I also used cheap acrylic yarn, which was the only thing I knew existed all those years ago. I used a pattern of squares interlocked with hearts. I used the blanket for both boys over the years, it was great for laying on the carpet when they were tiny infants and then laying them on their bellies. Little heads lifted up high, looking all around the room. I still have the blanket, it is 22 years old! It's in nearly perfect condition, (I guess acrylic lasts just fine!) with only one piece of yarn which has been snagged and needs repair.
After the blanket, I made a tiny pullover sweater in yellow and green stripes (I still have it, but don't know exactly where it's at for photographing). I moved on to a cream colored sachet and bonnet. I bought a big bag of tangled yarn at the local yarn store, which was nothing like today's Local Yarn Stores. It was more like a super selection of acrylic yarns. I think this particular shop was called The Yarn Barn.
It took a long time and much patience to untangle that huge bag of yarn but I finally got it wound into balls. I began the sachet, which was fancy and pretty. I completed it, and started on the bonnet. The bonnet was also fancy and frilly. It was a very complicated pattern so much so that I had to go to the LYS and ask the professionals for help. I was close to finishing the bonnet. I was working the frilly top part.
I carried my crocheting in a Kmart bag. They had these heavier duty bags back then and there was a carrying handle on it.
Dh was helping his mother and stepfather build onto their home. We arrived at their house and they were scurrying around in a hurry gathering up any bags of garbage, on their way to the dump which was closing in about fifteen minutes. I tagged along for the ride.
We got back to their house. I went to the entryway to retrieve my crocheting but couldn't find it... I looked around, getting a bit nervous. I asked my mother-in-law and she started to help me look for it. I asked my father-in-law and he asked if I was sure I brought it with me. I knew I had, and he then suggested I was on drugs and had been hallucinating. I was very taken aback by this as I was 8 months pregnant with a huge belly for heaven's sake. I don't drink or do drugs so I was quite insulted. I then spoke with my dh about my lost crocheting, and he suggested we take a trip to the dump to see if we could locate it. But you see, the dump closed right after we left. There was no way to get into it.
I was devastated. It was so upsetting that I stopped crocheting for years and years. I mean like decades!
Of course, having a new baby probably took up a fair amount of my time and I remember not reading anything but parenting books for the next 3 or 4 years. We were also quite poor and I didn't really have the money to spend on yarn. But if I had not lost that sachet (all those hours!) and bonnet, I probably would have found a way to buy a dollar or two worth of yarn every couple of months.
I began crocheting again in 2003 when a friend of mine crocheted a very beautiful sweater for her daughter-in-law -- who promptly hung the sweater in the closet and never even tried it on! I began to long to feel the yarn between my fingers and soon I started crocheting again. I started out by making a huge blanket for ds2. I had never managed to complete an item as big as this before. I made a few more items, but by 2004 the knitting bug was beginning to gnaw at me. A bunch of my online friends were knitting up a storm.
I had tried to learn to knit every once in awhile, but I couldn't get my hand to hold the yarn properly so I didn't think I could ever learn to knit. After all, when you've been crocheting for almost FORTY years, holding the yarn a specific way... difficult to get the fingers to cooperate. But then I discovered CONTINENTAL knitting. One of my friends told me to try it, so I did. Soon I was knitting scarves and more scarves. All knit, knit, knit, knit, knit. I learned the knit stitch very well.
I crocheted another baby sweater for my sister who is 9 years younger than me, for her first baby. The type of yarn I used for that sweater prompted me to try knitting the next one, instead of crocheting.
I am getting better at knitting. I finally have learned how to tell where I am with this pattern. It uses the seed stitch.
I feel like I had a big day today. I didn't get much housework done. Doggone it. That means tomorrow will be full of housecleaning. I'm tired already.
[Correction to title made on June 9th. I had previously said I quit crocheting in 1986, but actually it was in 1987.]
Until next time.
Hooded Baby Sweater Update
Labels: crocheting, knitting, Memory Lane, stash
I've been jonesing for my daily dose of Crazy Aunt Purl -- she's at a book signing event in New York. So I've started reading her blog from the start. I'm up to April 14th, 2005. Anyhoo... it appears she names each item she knits. At least that's how she started out. She sure did a lot of knitting when she first got needledhooked. So I decided to name this item Hooded Baby Sweater.
I haven't had a chance to knit for at least two weeks - where does the time go? But today dh had to do some Home Depot shopping for his job. Sometimes I wander round the store with him. I always bring my knitting in case I find time to knit. Today I told him I'd like to find someplace to sit and knit. This particular HD has a couple of benches but they are right outside the sliding doors. So I sat there knitting, getting a cool whoosh of air every few seconds. Not often enough to stay cool consistently and I didn't even realize I was getting overheated. I get rather cranky when I'm overheated.
However, I did finish the front left side of the sweater! It took me awhile to figure out what I'd done last, but I finally did. Once I completed it, I cast on and started the first sleeve.
Dh was also looking for a stainless steel bowl to make into a sink for the mechanics at his job. They need a handwashing sink and he figures a SS bowl will work great, rather than having to go and buy a whole new sinkbowl. And he thinks stainless steel will work best since they will be able to scrub it clean with an SOS pad.
We stopped at the two thrift stores looking for one. Salvation Army had nothing of interest, so we went over to the other thrift store. Dh found a stainless steel cake pan lid that he thinks will work, for a mere two dollars. If I remember, and it works, I'll take pictures and show them here.
I also found some more yarn to add to my stash. I'm seriously considering making a kitty pi. Or maybe socks. This yarn is 85% Wool, 15% Acrylic. Patons' Totem. It says, "Patonised for maximum resistence to shrinkage and piling". Hmmm... guess no kitty pi for this batch of yarn. That little blurb probably means no felting? I'm quite strict with myself regarding knitting, as you might notice, I'm only allowed to have one project going at a time. I am overly prone to starting something and never finishing, so I could easily fall into the trap of having many projects on many needles... uh, it just occurred to me that I started crocheting a baby blanket some time ago, maybe a year or more and have never picked it up again. See that is what I want to avoid, so I'm only allowed to work on the Hooded Baby Sweater. But apparently it's okay to buy inexpensive wool yarn when I happen upon it.
So I'm still bothered by one small thing. The thrift store had another bag, a bigger bag, filled with lots of small balls of acrylic yarn; however, within the bag, there were at least 3 to 4 more balls of this yarn. The bigger bag was $4.00. I should have asked, but figured they wouldn't go for my getting the other wool out of the bag.
The knitting needles are size 8 and size 10 1/2. The shelf said crochet hooks $0.50 each and knitting needles $0.50. But when I got to the register to pay, the lady said they were a quarter each. So two new sizes of knitting needles for $1.00. Whoo! Luckily I don't mind working with aluminum needles.
The smaller bag of yarn that I got was $3.00. 9 complete balls. Each ball weighs 50 grams and is 370 yards long. Seven of the balls are cream colored, well, more like white with bits of light brown. The other balls are white with bits of light blue. Two of the balls are complete, and the other one weighs 25 grams, so 2 1/2 balls of the blue yarn. You can click on the image at left for a closeup of the yarn. I don't think it's beautiful, but I think it would make some nice socks.
If I remember next week to go by that thrift store and they still have that bag of yarn, I am going to buy it, open it up, take out the wool and donate the rest of the yarn back to them. Maybe right after I pay for the yarn, right at the counter. I think those balls are worth even $1 each.
They had a lot of knitting needles, but the two pairs I found were the only matching ones. The others didn't match, some were dented and one was bent.
For years and years I didn't crochet or knit. I don't think I've told the story here. Hold on. I have to run out and throw hay and collect the eggs. Dh is cooking dinner, ds2 is making chocolate chip coconut cookies (and I wonder why I'm so fat?) so I pulled chore duty. Back soon with my story. No wait, I'll just make it a post of its own.
Until next time.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Sleep Mask
Kind of looks like a bikini top, eh? It's not, it's a sleep mask I made for myself. See, dh loves to sleep with the television on. Sometimes he'll mute the thing, but the light still flickers. I used to have a remote control on my side of the bed but someone removed the batteries and I've never gotten it set up again to turn the television off. So usually I have to get up, walk around the bed and turn the thing off. I bought the material several weeks ago, and over the weekend I finally had the opportunity to spend some time with my wonderful sewing machine (which I have never blogged about, but hope to someday soon). I found a pattern on the Internet, but I modified it and made it bigger and wider. I bought one foot worth of this cute kitty material, and one foot of dark blue flannel, which is the inside panel. I measured the material for the strap, but forgot to include more material so that it would bunch slightly, so the elastic could be stretched. But it fits my head perfectly.
I had a chance to try it a couple nights in a row. It works pretty good to keep out the flickering lights!
Until next time.
Monday, May 28, 2007
Memorial Day 2007
Wal-mart has flag material in the $1/yard area. We bought 10 flags for $10. I needed to hem the cut side, and kept putting it off, anticipating having to haul out the iron to press a tiny hem, instead of trying to sew it as I went along. When I finally got the nerve up to work on one of the flags I decided to see if my sewing machine had anything special for hemming. Wow. Yes. It has a foot included especially for hemming. It sewed the tiniest hem. Very cool.
It was a peaceful weekend. I had a chance to catch up on a few things. It was much easier getting things done in three days, than trying to cram everything into one day. We had grilled cheeseburgers and hot dogs for dinner, courtesy of ds2. And we only have three days to work this week. Nice.
Until next time.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Where's the Beef?
Labels: LJ, Ranch, Self-Sufficiency
550 pounds of it currently resides in our two upright freezers.
We took our remaining two steer in a couple of weeks ago. We borrowed a friend's horse trailer and took them ourselves. It was really stressful getting them into the trailer, and a long drive to the processor's. I finally got some shots of LJ licking the steer's nose. I talked about the day a bit on this post.
Please dear family members who contributed money toward this venture... claim your "share" as soon as possible. ;-)
Typically the hanging weight of a whole beef is 600 pounds.
Our steer were on the small side, weighing in at 400 and 404 pounds each.
Here's what we have:
11 Arm Roasts 34 pounds
25 Chuck Roasts 60 pounds
6 Filet Mignons 2 pounds
Hamburger 145 pounds
6 New York Strip Steak 3 pounds
12 Porterhouse Steaks 8 pounds
30 Rib Steaks 18 pounds
16 Rib Steaks 2" 17 pounds
24 Round Steaks 48 pounds
4 Rump Roasts 14 pounds
Short Ribs 26 pounds
32 Sirloin Steaks 40 pounds
6 Sirloin Tip Roasts 15 pounds
Skirt Steak (for making Carne Asade) 3 pounds
24 T-Bone Steaks 13 pounds
2 Tongues 5 pounds
Dog Bones 52 pounds
Misc Box containing liver, stew meat, soup meat 53 pounds
Until next time.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Happy 44th Birthday!
My birthday was yesterday, but we got our beef back and after ds2 and I went through the 15 boxes worth of beef, inventorying it all we were too burned out to think of making an elaborate dinner. We decided to wait until today to do my birthday dinner.
I had filet mignon, a baked potato with butter and sour cream, fresh steamed corn on the cob, salad, sauteed mushrooms and onions. For dessert we had a German Chocolate cake which ds2 made and dh made me a peach pie. Hubby and I went peach picking yesterday after we picked up the beef. On the way home we went past the local peach farm. They lost 80% of their crop due to the severe frost we had last winter, but they had some peaches available for U-Pick. $2.00 pound. They were very juicy, but not very sweet.
I've never bought filet mignon from the store, but when we got our last beef we ordered t-bones and porterhouse steaks and I found out if you do that, then you don't get filet mignon and new york strip steaks. So we had one beef done one way t-bones and porterhouses and the other one filet mignon and new york strip. I also found out that filet mignon is that tender piece on the t-bone and porterhouse steak. I probably won't ask for filet mignon again. It is delicious, but so little of it. No wonder it's so expensive.
Until next time.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
It's a Good Day to Clean
Labels: Body Acceptance, books, goats, knitting, work
I'm thinking weekly posts are going to be my best hope at this point in time. I'm trying out the "working 15 minutes, taking a 15 minute break" FlyLady idea today. I think that's her suggestion. I figure I can get four hours of housework done if I stay at it all day long. (Hah, that worked for about 1 hour and now I've been here since.)
So I'll be here on and off for the next couple hours or so. Depending on how much I end up fonting about. Pretty cool on the new Blogger feature - auto-saving drafts. NEAT.
My keyboard and mouse arrived. The mouse is awesome, now to learn how to use all the buttons all over it. The keyboard's spacebar isalittle funky... as you can see I am having some spacebar issues. I hope I'll get used to it.
On the baby sweater front... well, it's looking like I might be giving it to someone else's baby. Maybe. I've become a bit annoyed with the previous recipient baby's parent who didn't even know I was knitting a baby sweater, so will never even know what the baby almost had. I was confused about the front and blogged about it here. I think I solved the problem. I'm pretty sure I was backwards on my sides. I will try to remember in the future to use patterns which show the layout of the pieces. This pattern doesn't, so I have no idea how the individual pieces are supposed to look. But this is what I have for now. I think the piece on the left is the right side. The piece on the right side is the first side I did and I had to take out several rows to be redone correctly.
Because this part of the pattern takes so much thinking effort, I decided to start my sock gauge. I hear a lot of grumbling about making the gauge, but then I read a blog somewhere - did I already link to it in a previous post? I see that I haven't. Anyway, I decided to embrace gauge swatch-making and use it as a tool, which is what they say it is anyway. That said, I discovered why I couldn't get my gauge without using needles 3 sizes smaller with this knit baby sweater. It's because I knit freakishly loose. So I decided to tighten up my knitting on the sock gauge. I left this image extra big so you can click on it and maybe see what I'm taking about. The bottom few rows are very loose and stretchy. But as I continued on perfecting my technique my knitting became tighter and more uniform. Later in the day I worked on the baby sweater again and was still able to achieve the loose knitting effect which is important if I ever want to finish the baby sweater.
I like this article about gauging.
Rethinking Thin arrived. I've had a chance to read a bit of it, and frankly am astonished at how long people have been dieting, and learned that like fashion, diets resurface their way through the generations.
Yesterday dh had another side job. It's actually a continuation of side jobs for an elderly woman. We neglected to call to let her know our estimated time of arrival so naturally she was a bit annoyed at us. It was getting late in the day so we had almost decided to wait until next weekend to finish the job, but then we decided we just wanted to get it done. We refinished her back gate, and replaced the door frame (the decorative part) around one of her side doors. We stained the back gate and painted the door frame. It took longer than expected - four hours both of us working steadily. These jobs always do. I told dh yesterday to start doubling the time he's estimating for jobs. If the person doesn't like the cost, then they won't hire us for the job. That's fine.
The lady knows we work four days each week and made a point to comment on how she only has two days each week to get things done and can't sit around waiting for us to arrive. Well, her roommate also drives but doesn't work at all. I say she should do the errands and running around during the week. Whatever. It's not we slept in until 10am and finally decided to get going. I was up by 4:30am, out milking by 5am and we were finally leaving just about 7am. It was a non-stop day. We finally arrived home at 8pm. Ds2 had a wonderful dinner ready for us. Butter fried chicken breast (no batter coating), a lovely tossed salad, eggplant and zucchini and fried rice. It tasted so good. I got overheated while working in the sun and at one point had to sit down and kick off my shoes and socks. I was just too hot. The lady had some friends over, a man and woman and their young daughter, for swimming. They're splashing and yelling (Marco - POLO - Marco - POLO) and we're burning up from the heat.
No one has any time anymore. Today ds2 said the weekend never even started and it's already over.
I was late for milking this morning. The girls were yelling at me. I started milking around 7:10am. Very late indeed. I noticed Ms. Z was still in heat (I questioned whether she was yesterday but wasn't quite sure) and have been toying with the thought of some off season breeding - especially since I'm noticing my girls coming into heat this late in the year. Usually they stop showing signs of cycling by end of March. So I decided to take her over to visit Elvis once I was done milking. I have been worried about his fertility since I stupidly didn't pay attention to the important things when choosing a buck. Things like positioning of the equipment... when humans have fertility issues, men are advised to switch from jockey shorts to boxers for maximum fertility since having the scrotum snuggled near to the body keeps the sperm warm. God designed the sperm to be cooler, thus the hanging design. Elvis' ahem seems to be very near to his body.
Today I moved our other buck, a Nigerian Dwarf -- who is excessively sexy (iow, constantly peeing on his own head) and always ragingly in the mood (and quite frankly he seems more like a dirty old man pervert the way he's always leering and snorting and sticking out his tongue at the girls, lol) -- into the hallway which separates the does from the bucks, while Elvis and Ms. Z had a chance to get to know one another. Ms. Z immediately reared up and popped Elvis one on the head, so I had to hold her to stop her from doing that. One of my goat mentors says there is nothing worse than a young buckling being bashed by a doe to make him less likely to perform his job successfully. Finally he covered her and was done in a fraction of millisecond.
I debated leaving her with him for the day, to make sure she was bred but ended up taking her back home. Next I took out one of our doelings who is 14 months old. She has always been on the wild side and I've been worried about her ability as a milker. I've heard some horror stories of people trying to milk wild does. So I've been catching her once each weekend, removing her from the yard, putting her on the milking stand, locking her in and giving her some grain. She's taming down nicely.
I am working with Elvis each weekend (should work with him more, but just don't have the time) training him to walk with me when I hold him by the collar. I need to be able to take him to visit the does and take him back home. Bucks grow to be very big and it's important that they learn to take commands. Once he weighs 250 pounds, it's too late to teach him to walk calmly. By that time he'll be charging and racing to get where we're going and that would be a disaster. I'd never get him back home. So I took Elvis from his pen to walk him for a while. Last week was the first time I went into his pen. While he didn't run from me too much, he did run. But this week he came right over to me. He knows good things happen when he comes with me. Namely he gets grain. But best of all, he'll learn walking peacefully with me will allow him a visit with one of his wives. I did take him over to visit again with Ms. Z. She stood for him this time, that's a good sign that she's at optimum fertility.
If she produces kids in October, his fertility will become less of a question. I will probably breed a couple other does if they come into heat in the next couple of weeks. We have never bred off season before. Usually we wait until September or thereafter to breed. That is the normal season for breeding Nubians. Also, for people who show, it puts their does at the peak of their lactation so they have these huge udders when being shown at the fair. But since we don't show our goats, that isn't a priority for us.
Sweet dreams, kitty.
Until next time.
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
My Birthday
Labels: Bargain Hunting, books, Herd Queen Productions, stash
My birthday is the 25th.
My sister and I have talked about how we tend to start buying a few things here and there for ourselves a few weeks prior to and after our birthdays. See, we try to not buy every little thing we desire on a whim, but around our birthdays it's a great excuse to just get what we want. That doesn't mean I go out and buy $1000 stereo systems or a new computer. I'm talking fairly inexpensive things.
Although I tend to buy things for myself prior to my birthday, I would really prefer that those gifting me would wait *until* my birthday. But oh well. I'm not really complaining, but it's up to me to buy myself something for my birthday. Maybe my family will cook a special meal on my birthday. Friday the 25th of May.
So far my family had a surprise party for me, my mother gave me my card and $40 on the 3rd... with which I bought myself two shirts and maybe a baseball cap. I have been wanting to buy some of my Cafe Press shirts just to see how they look in real life and so I bought one of The Herd Queen and the other of LJ when he was a tiny little puppy wearing a sweater I'd crocheted for him. I also bought a baseball cap which I am planning to give to dh and ds2 and I picked out a shirt for dh that we thought he'd like.
I'm anxiously awaiting the arrival of those shirts. I really hope my shirts look good, the image, I mean.
I also bought myself a ironing board cover. A really nice one. It was regularly $11.99, but was on sale for $10.39. The scanner rang me up at $11.99, so I took it back to customer service. At this particular store, if the item is under $5, they give it to you free. If it's over $5, they give you $5 off the sale price. I told the lady it was marked down to $10.39 but I guess she heard me say $10.49. I wasn't going to quibble over a dime. Then another $5.00 off on that. I found the one I bought from my local store from Target online. You can see it here: Ultra Ironing Cover and Pad Set - Tranquil Leaves. It has this neat silicone pad where you can lay the iron down onto it *when it's hot* even. Neat. I haven't used it yet, but I did get it onto my ironing board.
I bought myself a book yesterday, having read an article shared with me by a friend on one of my non-dieting email lists. The article is here: Genes Take Charge, and Diets Fall by the Wayside by Gina Kolata and is actually an excerpt from Ms. Kolata's book Rethinking Thin: The New Science of Weight Loss — and the Myths and Realities of Dieting which I purchased from buy.com for $10.15, saving $10.00 by using the new Google Checkout.
I almost purchased this yesterday and may yet purchase it today: CERVINIA CALZETTERIA SOCK & FINGERING YARN.NEW.PRINT.. The link won't work forever, since it's an eBay auction. But here is a picture of the yarn:
I snagged the image from Smiley yarn. The color I like is Naples 904, which is the reddish colored yarn. Smiley's is selling this yarn for $2.50 per skein. Minimum order $40 though... and $12.95 shipping for however much yarn you order. I'm not sure I'm prepared to spend $52.95 on yarn today. ROTFLOL. I thought I'd get a better deal than on eBay and I guess I would get a better deal because if I ordered 16 skeins of yarn at $2.50 the shipping comes to only $0.80 per skein. But still! $50 is a lot of money to spend on yarn at one whack when I don't have much time for knitting to begin with *AND* furthermore I already have quite a stash.
And I do have some pink yarn asking me to please make socks with it.
Last but not least, ds2 ordered me a new keyboard and mouse. He researched both items some time ago and he does a great job researching to find good quality items. I can't wait for these to arrive: Logitech MX518 Gaming Grade Optical Mouse and Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 M17-1844.
He ordered them for me from Amazon, where I had a $25 gift certificate so my total cost there was $35.00.
Now I must get to work.
Until next time.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Happy Mother's Day 2007
Labels: goats
I already posted last week about my combination Mother's Day/birthday surprise, so there isn't much to say about today. Ds2 did make cheese enchiladas, one of my favorite meals.
I attempted to take it easy today, but I still tidied up ds1's room, completed one of my side jobs which takes about an hour (most months), scooped two litter boxes, washed 2 loads of dishes, washed several milk jars, wiped the kitchen counters, cut dh's hair, swept the kitchen floor, mopped up a sticky mess that someone threw a towel onto but didn't clean up (am really and truly learning the wisdom of "A Stitch In Time Saves Nine", gathered, cleaned and refrigerated the eggs, milked and processed the milk, washed three loads of clothes, which are all sitting waiting for me to fold and put them away.
I think I'm going to stop whining saying that I'm busy, because that seems to be my lot in life, at least for now. I hope someday I can go back to working 3 days a week and stop all the extra weekend jobs. But in the meantime, I know God will continue to give me the strength to make it through.
This busy weekend started on Thursday evening... when we drove 40 miles after work to a friend's house to borrow her horse trailer so we could take our steer in to the processor the next morning. Then it was 70 miles home. Up early the next morning to get the steer loaded and get on our way since triple digits were being predicted by 10am. Indeed, it was quite warm by that time. We brought LJ with us and he did NOT enjoy the heat at all. We took the horse trailer back to my friend's, and stopped by my boss' home (she lives just a few miles from my friend) for half an hour to visit for a bit as she likes dh quite a bit and hasn't been able to see him in awhile (since he's been working - he used to volunteer at my job).
That took most of Friday and by 2pm we were just finally on our way home and beat. I had emailed with a local goat person inquiring about the bucks she was taking to the auction on Saturday. Purebred Nubians. She was asking $150, and offered me two for $200. Dh and I were going for it, partly with the mindset of "rescuing" the poor boys being taking to the livestock auction. Ds2 was the crystal clear voice of reason, logically asking why we need TWO bucks when we don't even breed every year and we aren't supposed to be keeping any of the babies anyway... so instead of getting two, we got one.
I went by her house and spent about three hours looking at goats, talking about goats and goat people we know and used to know, and wished we'd have never known... finally I got back home, later than I'd ever anticipated, milked, ate dinner and got into bed.
On Saturday, dh and I went to the grocery store and did all the shopping at one store and were done by 9:30am. Stopped by the goat person's home to pick up our new yearling buck. We won't even need him for breeding until September, but he was going to the auction and a very good price at only $150. Brought home the groceries, then we had to head back over to the butcher's because we wanted the heads and the hides, and the tongues. I promised my boss the last tongue, but I didn't know I was supposed to pick it up within a day or two of being butchered, so we lost out on that first one. Those darned tongues are worth $15 EACH. The heads are worth $25! And the hides! Dh was keen on having the hides. We finally got there to pick everything up and they didn't even put the hides or heads into plastic bags. LUCKILY I had a plastic tablecloth in the back (which was there to protect the carpeting from the new yearling buck) that they plopped the sopping wet, bloody hides onto.
Dh spotted 2 five gallon buckets on the way and we stopped to stuff the hides into those.
Pretty creepy those heads with the EYEBALLS still in place. Ugh.
Finally we got home and I didn't get into bed until 10pm last night. And now it's almost 8pm. I am sooooo tired. I wanted so badly to lie down and nap today, but I had coffee and caffeinated herb tea to stay awake so I could get those few things done that I needed to do. Oh yes, one more thing I took care of. I finally got November, December, January, February, March and April's milking records onto the spreadsheet!!
Tally for last year's milk:
Miss L. Lactated for 321 days, produced 857 pounds of milk (~107 gallons), daily average 2.67 pounds. She kidded in April, giving birth to one buckling. He was allowed nurse until he was 3 months old and then we weaned him.
Miss D. We had her for 320 days, she produced 827 pounds of milk (~103 gallons), daily average 2.58 pounds. We bought her end of January, she aborted a few weeks prior.
Miss M. She lactated for 194 days, produced 376 pounds of milk (~47 gallons), daily average 1.94. Miss M. gave birth to two kids in May, was allowed to nurse her buckling for three months, he was weaned. Her doeling was allowed to nurse for 6 months and was weaned.
Miss Z. She lactated for 259 days, produced 568 pounds of milk (~71 gallons), daily average 2.19. Miss Z. gave birth to two buckling kids in April. They were allowed to nurse for three months and were weaned.
Miss D, the herd queen. She lactated for 245 days, produced 217 pounds of milk (~27 gallons), daily average .88. She has always been a low producer. She kidded in March, one doeling. She managed to produce enough to raise her doeling, who was allowed to nurse for 6 months and was weaned.
Yearly statistics: 2847 pounds of milk (~355 gallons). Bear in mind four of these does raised her kids herself. Most people pull the kids, milk the does and then bottle feed the kids. You then obviously get a more accurate picture of how much milk each doe is giving. For the first two weeks, the doe is allowed to nurse her baby around the clock. Once the kids are two weeks old, we begin separating the kids from the does overnight. We then milk the does first thing in the morning and allow the does and kids to be together for the entire day. It works out pretty good.
Here are a couple pictures of our new buck. He's very pretty. He is tri-colored. Mostly rust brown like most of our herd, with black and white marking. He has the cutest white pompadour on top of his head. So cute, I'm thinking nicknaming him Elvis. He is not as people friendly as our last buck. I am definitely going to have to work with him to behave on lead. We watch our does to see when they are in heat, then bring the buck to visit them. I need my bucks to be obedient enough to lead calmly while I take them where they are going. Today I spent some time with this boy, giving him handfuls of grain when he cooperated with me and walked nicely alongside me. He tries to butt his head between my legs, squirms around and tries to get away from me. He has scurs which now I am thinking we will get to get some scur nippers as I think he could hurt us if he jerked his head just the right way when I'm holding his collar.
Happy Mother's Day!
Until next time.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Rest In Peace
Labels: goats
Our buck that was sick with urinary calculi back in April did okay for about a week and then he came up with another blockage. He grew worse and we knew he wasn't going to make it. So to perk him up a bit, we moved him in with his wives (2 current and 1 future) and children (1 buck and 3 does). We took him out of the pen every day for a ration of grain and goodies and treats. He loved crackers, carrots and apples. And he loved molasses coated corn, oats and barley.
He was four years, two months old. I heard his mother passed away earlier this year.
Rest in peace, Bambi.
Until next time.
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Surprise!
Labels: Wish List
Since it's so difficult to surprise me, my family went all out with a combination Mother's Day and birthday celebration yesterday.
Ds1 and I were off to see Spiderman 3. I don't know if it was the hassle prior to the movie, or sitting four rows back from the screen, but I didn't much care for it. I loved the first two Spiderman movies. I guess I'm hard to please.
So we got back home to find this, notice the coloring of the balloons to the right. The colors signify some of my gifts, NICE, guys, very clever touch (seriously!).
Dinner was ready to eat, and there was a chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting.
I commenced to opening my presents. First I opened my card, which was very sweet and funny from ds2.
My first gift was a Whitman's Sampler (chocolates) which ds2 asked to have immediately... the pink Disney shirt is a gift from my mother, btw.
My next present was Russell Stover Nut, Chewy and Crisp Centers, but I wasn't about to give these up, nuts and chews are my favorite! Even ds1 was begging for a handout on these!
My next gift was a lovely teapot with all the things I wanted in a teapot, and a beautiful cup with which to drink tea.
That was all the presents on the table, but then dh handed me a small gift wrapped box.
WOW, is that beautiful?
I was momentarily confused, as just this past week I bought myself two rings off eBay. The first one is an eternity ring and was $8.99. .925 Sterling Silver and Austrian crystals (copies of diamonds and emeralds).
The second one is diamond cut rhodium-plated. This ring is made of jeweler's brass, and was $4.99. $2.52 shipping on each ring.
Got ds2 good, too. Told him they cost, "Four ninety-nine and eight ninety-nine." He asked, "Dollars?" And was freaking out, thinking I'd charged $1400.00 on rings. Finally told him they were only $4.99 and $8.99. Pretty rings, fast and courteous communication from the seller, arriving by USPS a mere two days after I'd purchased them.
I'd looked at the emerald and diamond gold ring a couple of weeks ago at a local, family-owned jewelry store and really liked it... but felt it was too much money to spend on a ring... $300. The jeweler told us she was running a 25% sale for Mother's Day, so it ended up being $225.
The confusion came in because I thought dh had somehow found time to wrap the rings I just received in the mail that very day, and had had with me while at the movie. I didn't understand another little ring box.
Which brings me to my last gift, from ds2.
WOW. These are gorgeous earrings and at first I was freaking out, since they were so expensive. They were regularly $400!!! OUCH!!! But the jeweler put the cost down to $189 because dh and ds2 explained that they only had exactly $450 to spend.
It's really hard for dh to surprise me, since I manage the finances... I would know if large sums of money were missing, or I would see charges to credit/debit cards.
Since the guys bought these on Friday, they had to hurry and surprise me, or I would have known something was up. See they had me pull out $300 cash for hay... under the guise of getting 30 bales all at once. Then they realized that if I didn't see 30 bales of hay, I'd know something was up. So they decided to give me an early Mother's Day/birthday surprise.
Awesome. I feel loved.
Until next time.
