Post Number 73

I was rereading some of my old blog posts and saw that I posted whatever I wanted, thought was interesting, or anything.  I realized I'm not doing that any more.  Part of that's fine with me.  I thought some of the old posts weren't written very well, but then again I was younger.  But at the same time, I was telling more about ranch life. 

Well, I'm doing a post now, for no real reason other than I haven't done one for a while and yesterday was pretty eventful.  So, here goes post number 73.

 

 As you can see in the pictures, I painted yet another cow skull.  Big J.'s birthday was on the 6th and I hadn't gotten him anything.  He had picked up this skull months ago, but it was sitting outside, turning pink somehow, and I saw an opportunity.  With his permission, I bleached it to get rid of the pink, then painted it.  I did all this yesterday and gave him his 14th birthday present...a little late, but it was worth it.    

 
Below are the other two cow skulls I painted this summer.  The yellow flower one was my first one and the personalized one was second. 

 

 

A week and a half ago we had an adventure with Big J.'s dog, Lightning (a.k.a. Buggy).  She tumbled out of our pickup and broke her hind leg.  As it turned out, if anyone wanted a broken bone in a dog, this would be the bone.  So, we got her to a vet, she got surgery, and is now living a kennel.  Here is a picture of her leg.   

 

I now have a pet boarding business.  It's starting slow, I knew it would, but I'm ready to board critters.  I'm really looking forward to business picking up.

 

 

The weather's getting right chilly out here.  The last few days have been cloudy, drizzly, and cold, but we still went to a football game last night.  A near town was playing the #1 team in the state and as it turned out we lost...but played an excellent game!  We were ahead for a while, and lost 26 to 28.  After we got home--shivering and numb--we lit our furnace. 

 

I guess colder weather is here. 

 

All for now!  : )  

The Wait is Over

Well, after a couple of years (yes...literally 2 years this month) of waiting, we now have a brand new floor in our house!  It looks wonderful, trust me.

So, if you read my post (A Night to Remember) back in Oct. of '12, you can see that we started taking out the kitchen and bathroom floor.  That was a very happy day, for I thought we were starting the process of getting a new floor.  And it did get the ball rolling.

A while back in this year, Dad and Mom started looking for flooring a little harder and finally decided on some kinds while I was gone to my grandparents' house.  Makes you wonder if I make things take longer...I'm joking...I think.  Anyway, with the flooring picked out, it was just the installing away from being done.  And October 3rd of this year was that day.

The floor men came out, after having made a bunch of other trips for measuring and looking it over.  They got right to work and began pulling up the old carpet.

Fact: the carpet was the original carpet from when this house was built in 1978, so just imagine how dirty it got.  Sorry, no pictures of the dirt piles they swept up.  It was nasty.

After the carpet was pulled off the concrete floor, they finished scraping and began laying the glue.  We decided to make the living room into two rooms so to speak, so the new floor--which looks like wood planks; however, it's made of vinyl--only lays in front of our fireplace.  It looks impressive.

Since we had pulled up the kitchen floor in '12 they just put down the glue and laid the rock-looking vinyl.  That floor looked a little too busy, but we couldn't change now.  We also put our brand (what we mark our cattle with to show ownership) in the kitchen floor.

They left for the day and came back the next morning.  The rest of the carpet came out of the living room and "library."  They laid new carpet (brownish; it changes with different lights) in the living room and library.  Thankfully, the carpet mellowed out the busyness of the kitchen floor.

I must say, we couldn't have had better floor laying men.  Those two guys were funny, though they spoke Spanish so we couldn't understand any jokes, they were gentle with our belongings, and seemed to know what they were doing. 

Now, we have a very homey house and just sitting here looking at the new couches and floor, with the orange glow from the lamps, makes it all feel wonderful.  Our living room could go in a magazine--really!  : )    
      

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.  : )