So my neighbor K came over to milk this morning and kicked me out of the barn! She told me she wanted no distractions. Still took her half an hour to milk Aliana. Oh well, this is her 3rd try I think. She did much better this morning and got a lot more milk out of her. I still had to finish her off but she really did much better. She keeps stopping and I think that is the problem. She just needs to stay put and keep her hands on her udder while she is milking and Aliana will stop tap dancing on the stand. The first 15-20 minutes she is great but after that she just wants off the dang stand already.
Busy day planned today. We have story time at the library and then we are going across the street to the YMCA to the pool for a couple hours and then to the post office and feed store to get more smoker fuel for this weekend. Then we have a birthday party this evening for crazy cake lady's son at PUMP IT UP, an inflatable warehouse thing where the kids get to jump on all the bouncy stuff for hours.
Today is also my mother's birthday but sadly she has to go to the funeral home tonight. One of the parishoners at church passed away. His wife died last year and he hasn't been the same since. He was last seen on Thursday and didn't show up to a cookout on Saturday or church on Sunday and when a friend went to go check on him he looked in the window and saw him lying on the floor. He was already gone. I told my mother that he was much happier now that he was with B, his wife. It hit my dad pretty hard cause they just had a special prayer for him Wednesday at the deacon's meeting. Don't know the cause of death yet, not that it really matters now, he's much better off.
The heat is supposed to be over 100 again today so I'm leaving the dogs inside the house while we are gone. I also had another chocolate indian runner in the pen when I woke up this morning. Brahma Mama immediately bristled up and I saw another little head poking out from under her. I gave her some more food and fresh water and she still has 2 eggs in there. They feel really light, like they have babies in them, not like they are full of goo and they smell fine so I'm gonna give them another couple days. Probably give them until this weekend to see if they do anything. They are probably the older eggs, I pulled them from a week's worth of eggs so they should hatch any day and if they don't I may put them under my runner hen to see if that helps speed things up cause she should start hatching her eggs in another week or so.
I had a friend call me yesterday and wanted me to take another friends entire flock but I wasn't allowed to eat any of them, even though 4 of said flock were meat chickens. Seriously people. There were 4 red sex links, a RIR, and a leghorn and 4 meat chickens. Why would you get meat chickens if you weren't gonna eat em? She wanted $75 and the promise that I wouldn't eat them. I passed.
Oh, and my husband came in the mail the other day!!! He is booked to speak in an outdoor sportsman's show in the middle of August and they sent out the flier for the show and his picture/bio is on the back of the flier! The only thing is that they had a typo and said he was speaking at 3 AM on Saturday I told him that he needed to call his buddy that put the show together and tell him they were gonna have to pay him extra to speak so early!
Well, gonna go get things ready for the library and pool....everybody stay cool today!
Neighbor came over for milking lessons again and kicked me out of my own dang milk barn. She did pretty well, she got around 10 oz of out her and I usually get 12-14 in the mornings and 14-16oz in the evenings so she did pretty well. I finished milking her out for her (her hands were cramping up) but she did very well. Only problem is that she is giving her waaaaaayyyy too much food and treats to keep her still. Gonna spoil her and then she gets all cranky when I milk in the evenings.
I'm feeling better about being gone though. Talked to my mom yesterday again for her birthday and she said that our friend that passed from church probably died Saturday sometime cause he went fishing that morning but failed to show up at a party that night. They said that from the preliminary autopsy tests they think he may have had an aneurism (sp?)
The birthday party last night was interesting. The bouncy things were pretty fun for the kids but I got 2 skinned knees from racing my 4 yr old down the bouncy slide. I rolled over part way down and now it looks like I have rug burn on both knees Unfortunately, I couldn't eat the dinner they provided...cake and pizza. So after the party we went down the street to the mexican place and got me two enchiladas for dinner.
Today I am going to the chiropractor!!!! It is my initial visit so x-rays and all that jazz but I am hoping he does something to my back and neck. I seriously think all the years of being pregnant and carrying children on one hip and farm chores have got me all out of whack. My lower back and neck have been in constant pain for the last month and I'm just over it.
My kids and I went to the pool yesterday for a few hours and I have opened a whole new can of worms. We have a tube slide there and you have to pass the swim test before you can go on it. Well, my 6 yr old decided he wanted to try and he passed. My DD passed hers last week but couldn't get up the courage to go down the slide, she would go up the ladder but wouldn't go down the slide Once my son went down it my daughter decided she had to do it too. She only went once but it was all my son did for the next 3 hours. I bet he went down that slide 50 times.
Today I am going to look at some homeschooling resources and review the sols again to prepare for the upcoming school year. I'm trying to get a schedule down in my head that will work for us and give us a bit more structure to our day. I'll also use it to help my kids learn to tell time a bit better. Gonna be another hot one today so we are trying to do some crafty stuff today and stay inside. I also took the last 2 eggs out of brahma mama's nest and put them under my runner hen. Brahma mama is just too busy with the 4 babies to sit on them but then again, in these temps they would probably be too hot if she sat on them all the time. I still think they are viable so we'll see what happens in the new nest. I am gonna work on a temporary pen for Brahma and the babies so they can get out of the small pen during the day and be safe from the hawks, I'll probably use my Clampett pen setup that I used last year for my chicks during the day. Two sawhorses, a big piece of hardwire cloth and a piece of lattice on top. It ain't pretty but it sure is functional
Lori, throw a bunch of rocks in the goats feed dish, so she has to work hard and long to get to the food. That should solve the overeating/feeding issue.
Really? I've been putting a handful of hay on top of everything and she has to dig for everything but I never thought about rocks....hmmmmm I may have to try that. Gonna freak out my neighbor though, I can picture it now "you want me to feed her WHAT?"
We used fist sized rocks for the horses when that was a problem. We also would feed good quality hay first and then some grain after they weren't quite so hungry.