Are we living our dreams?

[rhoda_bruce]

I know....I really need to buy a camera. My bad.
Well, I went on an excursion today to pick up 5 buff silkies in the next parish. I wasn't exactly how to get to that bayou and the young woman who was selling the chicks sent me directions thru mapquest. What a wild adventure. I went off in all kinds of side streets that I really didn't need to go thru, ended up passing up one of the streets, somehow....I don't really believe it was properly marked and eventually gave up and called a friend to ask Cajun style how to get to that bayou, using popular landmarks. Needless to say, the way I went, was not the way I came back. I came back like a boss.
Everyone in my family wants to see the new babies. You'd swear the stall I put them in, is a nursery. Athena, looks a bit trapped and wild. I found she looked engorged, so I milked her and got out almost a quart of colostrum. Tried to bottle feed it to the babies, but they didn't seem to get it. I only did it to relieve her. The colostrum is in the fridge. I'm thinking, if she really continues to look so caged up and wild, maybe I can milk her, keep the babies tucked safe in the stall and put her right back to work on weed control. I have discovered she doesn't care for molassas in her rations. I just thought the extra sweetness and calories would help, but she ignored it but gobbled up the plain rations I gave her.

 

[Denim Deb]

Map Quest directions can be a pain. I used to do pony rides, and would use Map Quest to figure out how to get to places. Once we had a ride that I knew how to get to the house, just wasn't sure how far down the road I needed to go. Map Quest wanted me to turn off of the road the house was on, go on a main road, then go waaaaay up, then take another street BACK to that road and come to the house from the opposite direction. I don't think it would give me directions the way I wanted.

Just recently, I was trying to figure out the best route from my brother's house to where I've been picking up the wood. I knew my brother's address, but not where I was going, so I found the house on Map Quest, then clicked to get directions to there. The directions they gave were to some place in Georgia! So then I tried doing it the other way, going from there to my brother's. Again they gave me directions to Georgia.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I heard the orchard was getting overgrown, by my sister. I thought it over, just a bit and asked DS if he wanted to go with me shopping for a big, ridding lawnmower, but he claimed he was tired. He suggest I just forget the orchard and sell it as soon as my father dies. Plenty of time to think about that. I guess so much family drama happened in the past few months that my kids are down on the woods and orchard.
Well, I went for a walk and it is getting really wild. I might as well give up on it. I already have too much to do as it is. According to my tax preparer, I came out $26 ahead on the orchard last year. Nice, huh?
My sister did me a huge disservice. She bought property, adjoining to mine in the woods and now tells me she has a 5 year plan (that part, I do not understand) and is figuring on having a street cut all the way to the back and subdividing it and putting it all up for sale. She is really good with figures and told me how many lots I could sell, just with the orchard and woods and how much I can get for each, etc....then started talking about some kind of bond that offers a high rate of interest.....but the whole time, I'm thinking that my sister is forcing me out. She didn't need to buy that property to begin with and now she wants to sell it to people who will put houses and trailers on it and drive their cars, trucks and off terrain vehicles all over it, while I just want to go for walks and pick wild herbs and forage for mushrooms after a fog and catch crawfish a few times a year. Whats the good of having lots of property in the woods, when it won't be the woods?
If she really does that, maybe I should sell out and start looking for a big piece of earth somewhere to replace all that I have lost. It won't happen tomorrow, but thats what filled my ears today.
My brother is at his camp, furthur up north. His son tells me he will be coming home with a chopping blade or something to fix the damage to my road. Thats nice. Hope he don't think I owe him a favor afterwards.
Well, I waited most of the day before putting my chickens out to forage. I found a nest of their eggs in some ragweed...just a few. I didn't let my ducks and geese loose because they end up at my neighbor's yard and the woman is a bit strange.....omg, she once had poop on her driveway. Apparently she has found duck eggs in her yard. How terrible. Good fences make good neighbors. When my sister was so hell bent on buying up all kinds of property, why didn't she buy that one? But I did put all my goats to work on weed control, including the one that had twins 2 days ago, because she was going stir crazy. She absolutely went nuts for the weeds. She did give me some trouble milking today....was kicking and bucking. Well, while she was away, eating brush, the babies just laid down, not moving, except to breath. I figure its a basic instinct...to keep absolutely still when Momma is away, so nothing can eat me. She was on weed control for about 3 hours and then I brought her back. By that time, she wanted her babies. Godson and I fixed them up with 2 pallets on the ground, with hay on top, just in case it started raining and the water rose an inch or two. I put the babies on top. I did notice one of the babies, seemed to want to climb to the highest point. That desire to climb starts pretty early. They really are too cute. I'm wondering on the possibility of them having separate sires. They certainly are not identical twins. The oldest seems to look like the mother's twin, who we assumed was the sire.....but the younger one is kinda gray. The only other possibility is a pigmy buck and he is a beige color. I know.....I will have to post some pics. But I believe its possible for a female dog to have pups for multiple dogs and I think I've even heard its possible for women to have a set of fraternal twins for 2 men, so stands to reason, it could be 2 sires. I hope not because this doe, will obviously give me much more milk than the last one I milked, but I'll have to figure a way around the fighting and kicking. I would want the doelings to both be for her twin because I know they'd both eventually be awesome producers. I guess time will give me some hints.

 

[Denim Deb]

Can't say I blame you for thinking about moving away. The only thing that keeps me going some days is having the woods next to me. They ever cut that down, I'd have to find a way to move. I've had several dreams where they're putting in a housing development, but so far, that hasn't happened.

On another forum I'm on, someone had posted about a sheep that was pregnant by 2 different rams and had the lambs a couple of weeks apart! So, I guess it it possible w/goats as well.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I really don't like Fridays much anymore. Too close to the weekend and my vanishing act. DD18 has to go to work today, which she usually doesn't. Fortunately DS is off, so he can watch DD 7 and 10while I pick up Daddy from the hospital.
The parish (my old employers) dug the ditch along my property, without letting me know and left with whatever mud 30 or so feet gave them. I called the supervisor and he told me a note was left on my door, but it wasn't. I went check on the trailer's door, on the adjoining lot and no note, so I reported the supervisor. He is such a trouble maker anyway. He had wanted to buy 10 French ducks from me, but I smell a trap, so he can get them elsewhere. I have a license to sell farm products anyway, so don't think he can do me anything. Hope he leaves DH alone. He is always threatning his subordanants with repremands. I don't know what happened to my old foreman, but he just vanished and the assistant became the foremen. Serious power trip.
I'm forgetting to write things on the calendar, that I really should, farm wise. I suppose Im pretty close to a hatch date. If I have enough hatchlings to add to the chicks and ducklings I already havein the brooder, then they should be safe because the older ones will be too overwhelmed with numbers to attack the new kids. Also, I haven't yet written the BD of the kids, but I best tend to it.
Things are starting to stack up. I might need flylady to go on a rampage, as well as do a few comparable things out of doors. Not sure how much longer I will be putting up with being a full-time employee. There is too much I can't manage because of my time away from home.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I put 15 fuzzy butts in the brooder, along with other baby birds I'm brooding....they were accepted. I'm sure I will have a few more hatchlings come out today to add to the mix.
Always trying to improve my flock and sell my ducklings, which is the cash crop of my project. I can't seem to hatch out enough ducklings to satisfy the locals, but I"m beginning to think I should seriously downsize.....pick a breed or two and get rid of everything else. I can't really leave town, unless I get a house/farm sitter....not that I ever really do, but still. I don't really need the size flock I have to take care of my family....obviously, I am taking care of the egg and meat needs of more than just me, but I'm the one with all the trouble.
Now I really do believe the country is heading for disaster, but not sure when or how it will affect us, but when it hits, I'm thinking a dozen birds would be easier to keep alive, than 7 dozen.
Maybe I will change my mind if my ideal fence gets constructed soon.
I promised myself that I would open my hives before April was over....best get to it. I'm afraid I might need some help. Not exactly sure who I will ask....but it won't be DH Whoever it is, gets lots of honey and maybe some other stuff. I have a few people in mind.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

It is a lot of work taking care of a bunch of critters - for sure. Good luck on working with your hives!

 

[rhoda_bruce]

My uncle, my dad's younger brother, played a joke on me. Today, I went out to tend to a few chores and eventually decided it was time to clean the pool. I was heading out onto a set of stairs I don't normally use and found a bag, laying flat on the upper deck. I opened it and found a bottle of Rainwater Madeira, in a brown paper bag, inside a plastic bag from a wine store in MD, named Mills. No one had signed it and the only clues were the bag and the cash register receipt, showing another bottle of a different beverage and the last 4 digits of a credit card.
He came clean after I exhausted all my primary suspects. Gotta figure how I"m getting back at him. Only thing I can think of is to save it for his funeral and drink it with my cousins. What a nut.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

DH left in October and its now May. He had started years ago, remodeling one of our 2 bathrooms and it ceised half way thru the operation, leaving me with just one BR that has a functioning toilet. Yeah....well, this is gross, if you silly, young, aren't a problem solver, never camped out or are not a nurse. Okay....I keep hearing that a very large % of the water we waste is for just that....waste. We only pee about 250cc's at a time and we flush at least 2,000 cc's down the toilet, which needs to go to our ceptic systems. The math just don't add up, huh??? Well, I"m not silly, easily grossed out, young or a non-nurse, so I confess: I have parked one of my bedside comodes in my bedroom. Having the amount of kids I have, I can't always wait my turn, politely, so I think its cool to have a back up plan.
Now that ought to be an interesting, honest, journal entry.

 

[Britesea]

What an excellent idea! I need a Guzunda too! We only have one bathroom, and after 30 years of marriage I think our systems have synchronized-- I'm always dancing outside the door, lol. Plus if all there is inside is urine, I can dilute it and use it as fertilizer.