Frustratedearthmother's Journaling Journey

[frustratedearthmother]

Two more babies today! And, Oh My Goodness they are cute, cute, cute! I think one more might go tonight or tomorrow - then another one about a week or so later - then no more until August. I hope little Cocoa will get busy and deliver before bedtime...

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I'm sitting at work trying not to go to sleep. I stayed home from work yesterday because it was baby day. I'd been up several times during the night before checking on the girls. Lil Bit kidded at about 2:30 yesterday afternoon with two of the prettiest babies I've ever had on the place. Cocoa kidded about 11p last night and had one of the biggest and ugliest babies I've ever seen. No wonder she waited until after dark, lol! Soooo, I didn't get to bed until after midnight last night. That's two nights in a row of interrupted sleep and I don't do very well with that. Ugh.

Cocoa is a first generation Kinder and I bred her back to a pygmy buck thinking it would be a good cross for her first kidding. And, I don't have a Kinder buck yet, so a Pygmy buck was the only choice. That baby was so big when I finally got it out that I would have sworn it was a buck...but nope...big ol' girl. The only trouble she had delivering was that she really needed an episiotomy! The baby was presented correctly, just too big for the opening... ouch. Anyway, I just kept working at the skin and finally got it to stretch enough to get that baby outta there. Thankfully, no tearing - just a little swollen this morning.

The plus side of staying home yesterday (besides 3 new babies) was that I got to spend practically all day in the garden. I've been mulching and weeding and getting all kinds of chores done. AND - I picked green beans! I roasted 'em and we had them with dinner last night along with some home grown baked chicken. Yummy! Looks like I'll be picking squash in a few days too - sooo excited that the garden is actually giving back - finally.

I need to get these new mama's de-wormed. I've already got Spooky taken care of, but need to get the two that kidded last night. For awhile, I even thought I was gonna have to give Lil Bit a shot of oxytocin. She kidded at 2:30 and it was getting close to 5pm and she hadn't passed her afterbirth - so I ran to the vets office to get some "just in case". Of course, by the time I got home she'd passed it... Oh well, I needed it anyway. I usually keep some on hand but what I had expired over two years ago. Ehhh, it was time to get some fresh stuff.

Looking forward to a full nights sleep tonight. Red isn't due for more than a week, so hopefully I'll get plenty of time to catch up.

 

[Denim Deb]

Hopefully, she doesn't decide that she needs to go early since everyone else has already had their kids.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Sssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Don't give her any ideas! I neeeeed some sleep!

 

[Denim Deb]

Me too. I'm going to bed. Good night.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I worked today. It was the end of the school year 'fun day' for the students who earned it. Sadly, only 11 of our 63 students had all a's and b's. But, we took them to the Main Event and they had a blast.

I've still got one more doe due this month. Her bag is bigger every day and I hope she holds out until the weekend. I think my daughter and grandbabies will be visiting this weekend. The grandbabies want to witness a birth and I hope it works out for them. We had to explain to them that Chocolate Chip choked to death last week and, bless 'em, they took it hard. She was the first goat they tried to milk and they loooved her laid back attitude. But, at least now they have new babies to bond with.

I've started milking the girls just a little bit to ease the stress on their bags. So far, they all seem to be producing more than their babies can handle, so I'm helping them out a bit and it is serving to get them all more accustomed to the milk stand. It's a win-win, so far.

Need to butcher more roos- especially since I've got 60+ eggs incubating right now... what was I thinking?

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Happy Mothers Day!

I've been in the garden since 6:30am. It was nice and cool out there and the ground was just right for pulling weeds since we've gotten good rain for a couple days. It's just nice today - low 80's and a little breeze.

I'm picking stuff from the garden! I've picked squash a couple times now and the green beans are really coming on too. The bush beans, that is. Still waiting for my pole beans to start up. I pulled the last of the peas and am gonna let 'em dry a couple days and pluck the last of the pods off for seed next year. I've also got one more head of cabbage from my fall/spring garden that I'm gonna pull this afternoon. Not sure if I'll make another batch of mason jar sauerkraut or just put it in a big ol pot of soup.

On the down side - I've planted corn twice now in one spot. This moring I finally see the second planting is starting to pop through. I want to plant another variety of corn in the area that I pulled the peas out of. I really hope the corn will do good in that spot. Peas are supposed to be good for the soil, so I'm gonna give it a try.

The babies are all doing well. The mama's are all over-producing milk and I'm milking each one of em a little bit every day. It's helping them get used to the milk stand and the whole procedure. Cocoa (the half nubian/pygmy) has the most beeautiful udder....but she has tinier teats than the other pygmy I milked. She has a bag like a Nubian with teats like a Pygmy... gee whiz! She's patient and extremely well-behaved on the stand and it's a darn good thing, cuz it takes forever to get her milked down because of those itty bitty teats...

Back to work for me... I've got about 8 bags of feed that need to go to the barn and the darn things won't carry themselves....

 

[pinkfox]

youve been a busy momma! happy mothersday! and congrats on the babies!!!

 

[Denim Deb]

If you ever find out a way to get those feed bags to unload themselves, let me know! That's the kind of feed I want to buy.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Thanks, Pink! And Deb - them darn bags will NOT cooperate. And it's so muddy it was a real PIA to put 'em in the cart, cuz the cart just sank in the mud and was harder than heck to pull...

Having popcorn for dinner tonight. That's all I want right now - BUT - I've got leg of goat marinating in wine, garlic and rosemary for tomorrow's dinner. I'll pop it into the crockpot before I leave in the morning and hope, hope, hope it's delicious when I get home. It's from the goat we 'did' a couple weeks ago. The first batch of stew was delish, so I expect this to be wonderful as well.

Headed for the hot tub to work out all these aches and pains that keep popping up... getting old is the pits!