Branding Post

Okay, here it is.  The Branding Post.

After saddling the horses and waiting for everyone to arrive on the 13th, we rode out to gather the calves.  It was a perfect day to brand (the best ever, I think).  It was cool enough that morning, everyone was wearing a heavy jacket or coat and gloves.  I'm so thankful it wasn't windy, though.  We would have felt like freezing if that was the case. 

The gather was short, but a lot of fun.  

The branding started after sorting, and my horse and I got to help with the sorting.  It was still cool, but people began shedding their layers as they began working.

There were so many helpers that we opened an additional pen and began branding two bunches of calves, making us finish quite soon.

When the last calf was finished, everyone had a calf sack war, then mounted their horses and pushed the cattle back to the pasture.  We headed to the house once we got a group picture and had a delicious dinner.  Lasagna, potato salad, lettuce salad, bread, vegetables, pies, ice cream!  It was yummy.   

There's really not that much to talk about since I've already explained the branding experience in previous posts, so I'll let you enjoy some pictures of the day. 

**All pictures were taken by Callie Sain.  She does such a great job!  So glad she came down and took pictures for us...and let me use them on the blog. 

If you want to see more of her pictures:

https://www.facebook.com/CallieSainPhotography

A big thank you sent to her.**



  

Random!

Well, after someone messaged me about wanting to buy one of my billy goats, I looked to see what they were selling.  It turned out they were selling two piglets and the idea popped into my mind. 

Why not trade my goat for those two pigs!

The pig price was just fifty odd dollars from the goat price, so after talking it over with the buyers, I got the pigs and a little cash, while the goat buyers got a really nice goat and a smaller gas bill for their drive to our place. 

 

So...meet Minnie and Pearl!  My two darling piglets.  They're just too cute!

 

Pearl is behind Minnie.

 And, this is kind of random, I know, but see that Almond Joy candy wrapper below?  If you look closely, I found a really cool name on it.  If you don't get it:  Peter, Paul and Mary is the answer.  I just simply wrote & Mary on it, under Peter Paul.  I thought it was quite tricky and bright on my side.

 

Okay.  Moving on...

 

It's beginning to feel a lot like...fall.  It's lovely and so refreshing.

 

This week we are branding our calves.  We're looking forward to a house full of cowboys and cowgirls when we're finished working the cattle and come in for dinner.  Be watching for a post about that.  I'm sure there will be at least one thing to write about. 

 

Thanks for reading.  : )



Birds

 

Look who came to see us this afternoon!  Mr. (or Mrs.) Roadrunner is back.  I saw it the other day and announced it to the family, but today I got pictures. 

 

Years ago, we had a roadrunner who would come to the house quite often and hang out.  When we were getting our a new roof put on, that roadrunner would come around and clean up the old cigarettes the men working on the roof would leave.  It was quite a sight to see.  Imagine--a roadrunner sitting on the window sill (like in the picture above) chewing on a cigarette.  

 

Needless to say, that roadrunner left a while back, and until this month, we haven't had any around the house. 

 

The other day while I was outside looking at my pigeons, and my chickens started cackling in such a way I knew something wasn't normal.  

 

Now, Let me explain: chickens (or at least my chickens) will alert each other if there is a low flying bird in the sky, such as a hawk, a couple of fighting sparrows, etc.  When they sight a possibility of danger, they look to the sky and watch for anything they should hide from.  Anyway...

 

I looked to the sky and quickly saw a large bird shadow.  When I followed it and found the bird, I was surprised to see a Blue Heron!  I've seen a bunch before in the pastures and other places, but never right in front of our house.  I watched it land in our elm tree, and then fly off, I thought it was never to be seen again. 

But I was wrong.  A couple of days after, it showed up again, this time landing to the side of our house where I got to look at it for a second. 

 

This past month, Beatrice, my hen, hatched two chicks.  Yay!  As did my other hen, Paprika, though they all died.  But Paprika began sitting again and now has three darling chicks.  Yay, again!  Likewise, my pigeons are doing better at keeping their squabs alive.  I don't even know how many of them we've lost this year, but thankfully, we have some more little pigeons who are doing fine. 

 

Among my many pigeons and chickens and doves (oh my...) we have a bunch of wild birds that are great to listen to and watch, and I for one am really glad God made them.  Just being the bird lover that I am--I decided to do a post about my favorite animals.  Hope you enjoyed.  : )

 

Beatrice's chicks

 

Monday Post

 



Hello again.  I've been really busy and blogging has not been on my mind...well, okay, it's been on my mind, but I haven't gotten to it until now.

My hen, Beatrice (in above picture) finally hatched two chicks after sitting on two batches of eggs.  The first time she didn't have any fertilized eggs, thus didn't receive any babies.  She has proven to be determined and kept sitting.  However, she didn't lay her own eggs, and since she was sitting on old, rotting eggs, I took some of my other hens' eggs and gave them to Beatrice.  I was hoping she would have some hatch, for she deserved some little ones.  Thankfully, they did come and she's the happiest hen on the ranch.
  

 
Then Mom's cat had two kittens, and a lovey pair they are!  The mamma cat is Juniory and the dad, or who we think is/was the dad, the stray T. Cat. (You can see both parents in my blog post titled, "A Pretty May Evening.")  I wouldn't be surprised if we keep both kittens even though we don't want too many cats on the ranch. 

Dad took us three kids to work on a fence a couple weeks ago, and I had my camera along to get some pictures.  So here are a few of them.  

 

 

Thank you, Dad, for taking this picture.
(L to R) Big J., Little J., and myself.

 

Thanks, Big J., for taking this picture.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for taking a look.  : )

Bat Watching and More

Have you ever sat in a chair and watched a million bats fly out of their cave for their supper of bugs?  Or look at Saturn and see its ring?  Or shop at all the antique stores on main street?  Have you ever explored a cave?  It's all amazing. 

Dad had been looking on the computer a while back and saw something about Selman Bat Watch in Oklahoma, and was interested, so put our family name in the drawing to get a chance to watch 1 million bats fly from a cave.  As it turned out, we were picked out and got to take a trip to watch some bats.

We went to Woodward, Okla., on the 25th, got a hotel room, and ate supper at Carl's Jr.  Next, we drove out to Alabaster Caverns State Park and hooked up with the right people so that everyone in charge knew that we had made it.  We were shown to a meeting place where all 75ish people were to be to get more information about the bats. 

The tour guide told us some interesting facts, asked and answered questions, and soon divided the big group into three little parts.  (Each group then had its own leader.)  The group names were Moths, Bats, and Owls.  As they said, "do you see the pattern?"  That's right--the moths are eaten by the bats and the bats are eaten by the owls.  Of course, my family and I were in the moths group...

Our guide (white shirt) in the Moth group.

 

 

 

One of the other two groups.

All the Moths climbed into a school bus and were the first to the nature trail.  Thus, we got to hike on the trail, hear the stories, and experience it all first.  We crossed a creek, looked at plants, and heard still more about bats.  We stood somewhat near the cave opening, but weren't allowed to get too close.  They said a human would soon die after entering the cave because of the ammonia. 

When we finished the walk, we got some water to drink and took a seat on our chairs to watch the bats.  The bats had been coming out around eight o'clock, however, on this night they waited until nine.  So as dusk was settling down, the bats began to come out.  They came out as a ribbon or river form and kept coming.  And kept coming.  Wow.  They didn't fade away.  For about thirty minutes the adults came out of their cave to eat bugs.  I mean we hadn't even see the pups yet!

 


This picture shows a lot of bats. See the stream of bats in the bottom right corner?

 

 


As it grew dark, the end of the million or so bats showed itself and the guides rounded up the Moths, Bats, and Owls, and we all headed back to the State Park.

Because of the time of year we were down there, there was a "star party" near by.  If you've never heard of them, it's a spot where a bunch of telescopes are set up (Nice telescopes) and anyone can look through them for free.  There are also really smart people near by who tell you all sorts of information about the stars you are looking at.

We saw Saturn!  It was amazing.  The people in charge showed us major constellations and other stars, including one star that looked blue and another that looked gold.

26th
We slept in as late as our bodies would permit and soon checked out of the hotel before 11 o'clock. 

I enjoy going antique/junk shopping and successfully got my family to take me to a shop on Old Main Street in Woodward.  It turned out to provide three stores of my liking and we went to each one.  

At the first store, I liked almost everything I set my eyes on.  Yes, that happens all the time, and sadly I usually leave the store empty handed.  But this time, I had money and a mind set to buy at least one thing.  I bought a knife, fork, and spoon, all of which don't match; the knife has a heavy pinkish handle, the fork is a common silver fork with a tiny flower carved in it at the end, and the spoon is a baby spoon, but it matches the knife, so you know what happened.  And I mean they were only a dollar...

At the next one, I didn't find anything I really wanted to have.  I looked through some books, but didn't find any good ones.

When we went to the last store, I fell in love with it right away.  It was once a hardware store and just the building itself was gorgeous.  It went on and on!  Each room had a wonderful feel to it.  50's on Five was playing great music over the speakers and the man who owned the store was super nice.  

I found all sorts of things, some out of my price range, some too big to take home, but I did find a cute apron and outfit for Ambrosia, my mannequin.  I bartered with the man and got the Pendleton suit for a very nice sum of money...and by the way, it looks perfect on Ambrosia.

I figured I ought to show you Ambrosia in her new outfit.

After the perfect morning of shopping, we drove back to Alabaster Caverns and with our tickets got a tour down in the cave.  That was fun.  Our tour guide was very interesting and fun, the people with us were all great and friendly, and it was so cool down there!  (I mean temperature cool.)  We walked from a 100 degrees sunny place to a 56 degrees dark cave.  It felt wonderful! 

Cave opening

 

The path in the cave was made from concrete but over time spots have been covered with clay dirt and that mixed with water turns into a sticky, slippery mess.  Thankfully there were rails to hang on to.  And everyone was expected to catch any falling person as if they were long time friends.  (No one fell that badly, however.)
 

 

We saw two salamanders in the cave and a few animal tracks.  A stream ran through the cave and added a really neat sound to the flip-flops on smacking mud.  In one spot at the cave the lights went out on purpose for one minute.  It was really dark but also really neat to know how it felt to be in the blackness.

 

Look closely and you can see the salamander.

The tour ended too soon and we were all thrown back into the 100 degrees, so to speak, but thankfully we didn't have to walk back to the camp grounds, instead they drove a van back for us.

 

 This picture above makes it look like it was a tight fit in the cave, but it was not.  The lowest spot was one of the original trails, a person just had to bend over, and people don't have to take that trail.  The over all spots were nice and big.
  

 

 

 

I know, this is a blurry picture, but I wanted to show the cave and the people.

 

The exit of the cave.

 

Our tour guide (in front).  She was great.

 After the cave, we began the drive back home.  One of the many things that was good about this trip, we didn't have to drive hours and hours to get home.  We only had to drive about two hours to reach home!  So nice.  

This trip was a blast!  I enjoyed every part of it.  : )
 

My family.
(L to R) Mom, Me, Little J. Big J. and Dad

Dad, Big J. (standing in back) and Little J.