Smokin’!

Steve is the best grilled I know. He is the best smoker I know. And not cigarette smoking.  He has been busy smoking meats for our vacation.  Our house has smelled wonderful for 2 full days. Today, the outside smells wonderful. Have I ever said I love this man? We freeze the meats and pack them to go! Load ‘em when we leave. Very little eating out because we like our own cooking.  It smells sooo good here!

Here is a funny. Dad’s (Jake’s) truck started and left - without the all important Jake miester! He was bawling! I sent this to Steve and he promptly came back for ‘the kid’. If that truck starts, that boy is supposed to be in it!  🤣

Nothing new sewing, but cutting this one out now.

That is all today!

 

Embroidery and Grandcats

Been playing with my embroidery machine and lovin’ the results.  I hope in the next few months to do a lot more embroidering on shirts and such.  No matter how much I thought I didn’t need this machine, I thank God my hubby insisted on the upgrade.  I enjoy every moment I spend sewing and embroidering.

 

I went to Punkin’s new (2 month old) apartment a few days ago to drop something off.  I got to see my 3-legged grand kitty, Munchie.  Isn’t he adorable?  Munchie had a bad fungal infection in his leg that could not be cured.  He drug his leg and though the vets did everything they could to save it, they had to amputate it.  Raelee sure is getting a taste of adulting - and she is rocking it!  She loves where she lives, she loves living alone, she loves working (3 jobs) and she loves her $5 plus two grand $,$$$ cat.  We are super proud of this young lady.  Not many 18 year olds are doing as well as she is.  ❤️

 

Exciting Day for Punkin!

After one year of faithfully rebuilding this Honda 550 four, Raelee and papa brought it down off of the stand!

And off on a run they went!  Works and sounds perfect!

Tomorrow they take it for a long ride; papa on the Harley and Raelee on her Honda.  

Update coming soon.

 Yesterday was my infusion. I had an infusion headache yesterday and today, and this afternoon I realized I just generally feel crappy.  We (Primary Immunocompromised) call it infusion flu.  It is not truly a contagious flu, we just feel like a truck ran us over after our infusion.  Today, that is me.  Tomorrow will hopefully be a good day.  Usually it takes a couple days to get past the infusion.  Honestly, I get about 2+ good weeks out of an infusion.  The week before, I am dragging butt, the week after I have the migraine and infusion flu.  Those two weeks I cherish though.

Here is my smile today.  MissBehavin’ has taken over Chelsea’s spot in the sewing room - only this girl gets in lots of trouble!  

Night all… resting ‘til I feel better.

Day 11 Covid-tine

Today’s Oklahoma update:

Again we stayed out most of yesterday cutting trees that bumped the fence and running hot wire.  I was so tired by 3pm that I had to call it a day.  He stayed out to finish another 25 yards or so, and then we had to go get out sweet Chelsea.

The Dr said the giant tumor they removed was not a fatty tumor as they thought it was.  They didn’t elaborate, but sent it off to the lab.  We will see...  The news was disheartening.  She is confused, anxious and does not like her new neck armor at all.  Poor baby.

Cy

The up side to today; spring has sprung!!  My favorite season of the year. A week ago it was all dead grease and bare trees.  Today, I was able to walk and enjoy the beautiful flowers God sent!  I always feel like it is a new beginning. 

I have always loved flowers.  I am particularly partial to flowers that have a scent.  In Louisiana my son loved the smell of my night blooming Jasmine.  I miss it.  Maybe I need to get one every year for here.  The deep freezes would kill them.

Anyhoo, gotta get back out there.  Fences don’t mend themselves.

Here I go!  Looking pretty old and goofy hair fluffs - 

but darned glad to be alive!

Lovin’ farm life and 40 acres of personal space.  Ours!

Cow Troubles

Yesterday morning, Steve and I were headed out for our walk.  We realized the cows were all in an uproar, mooing like crazy and whatever it was, was serious.  We headed over to the pasture, and on the far west area of the pond was a cow in distress surrounded by all of the other cattle and vultures surrounding the main attraction; a cow with what appeared to be afterbirth on her backside.  The new calf appeared to be laying by her side, but she was not tending to it.  She would walk a couple steps and lay down.  We changed into our muck boots and headed out.  

Upon arrival at the cow, we found she had a prolapsed uterus, not afterbirth.  We called our vet, who had recently opened a shop south of us in Wagoner.  He couldn’t get to us for several hours.  We called his sister vet north of us and thankfully Clint could come right out.

Jake babysat.  He licked the calf and made sure the vultures were staying away from momma and her new baby.

The momma was miserable and the vet was 30 minutes away.  She would walk a bit and drop.  Steve came over with the tractor with cattle panels to contain her, but momma went in the pond.  When Clint got here, he got a rope around her neck and Steve pulled her out with the tractor.

Clint put on a shoulder length glove and shoved her uterus back in, put gauze on ether side, stitched through the gauze and her, tied a knot and said, “That’ll do it!  You can cut the stitch out in 2 weeks!”  That all took a total of 10 minutes - including pulling her out of the pond!

But look at the size of her baby!!!  

This will be a fun 2 weeks...

This morning, everyone seems to be fine; she is sore, but the BIG baby boy is nursing and hopping around the pond.  Wendy is trying to settle him down and corral him near mom, but he is having none of it - he is running and hopping from here to there, runs to mom, gets a bit more fuel and runs some more!

Life on a farm; living and learning.  :-)

Cattle Domino Time!

This is Windy - yes it is spelled right.  She was born on a windy day in Oklahoma, so her previous owners named her Windy.  She is the sweetest donkey ever - and she watches over her cattle and nudges us for treats.   We often see her running like a maniac in the pasture, rounding her herd up to show them who is boss.  Windy is definitely boss out there.

We have found piles of crushed bones and tufts of fur from what 'once was'.  We can't even tell WHAT it once was - but it is gone now.  We presume from the fur tuft colors it is likely coyotes, but since it has been reduced to nearly dust, we aren't sure.  What we ARE sure of is that she protects her herd and we haven't lost a cow or calf yet.

This is the time of year we depend on Windy.  She is very careful with her newborn cattle.  From the moment they drop from mom, she sniffs, circles, gets to know them and valiantly protects.  She is as good of a watch dog as you can get.  

Only better.

Our momas are all getting ready to have babies!  This year we will have 5 new babies!  That is what farming is all about - spring time babies; calves, chickens and goats (Steph).  We sure do have fun seeing them born and getting to know and name each of them.  

These girls are getting HUGE!  

A couple of the younger calves (here a steer) like "Chuck" here are just hanging out... waiting to be next years supper... we love them until we take them to market. 

Here is Daisy who is just taking lessons from the older girls; she is just a year old - too young to calve, but next year she will be one of the girls calving...

This is Ashley, another year old heifer, so she not calving yet.  Ashley was named (by request) after one of my girl scouts!  Ashley begged me to name a calf after her.  

So here is our little wild-ish child!

Here is Elsie (first time mom-to-be) and Chuck again.  They are buddies:

Here is one of our original cattle; Hazel, due to have her 3rd calf with us:

And this is Maddie; 3rd time calver with us and more than ready... lol... 

but she is always eating!

I believe this is Sadie, but I can't see her ear tag.  She is a first time calver though if it is:

Why do we name our cattle?  Because we don't want to call them a number!  We would rather a name - if he says "Sadie is calving", I know who exactly who Sadie is, but if he says "5 is calving", I would have to whittle through WHO is calving... lol...

And we won't share pictures of T-Bone and Porter... they are at the butcher.  Our first ever fresh, home grown beef.  Did it hurt us?  Of course!  But that was always their destination.  To know exactly what food was treated with that we put in our mouth.  Ours were treated with good wholesome food, lots of laughs, respect, and pets (yes, pats on the heads) and lots and lots of love - and they never saw a stockyard.  Ever.  

And we can live with that.

This is Chelsea trying to look bigger than Jake:

But she is not bigger:  We figure Jake is around 125 lbs and Chelsea is a whopping 45 lbs:

And so we wait... for coming soon... CALVES!

*Farm Girl/Guy Problems*

So we are all still trying to get to know our girls and they are us... in western Oklahoma, they had very little people contact, but here, you know me - I want to be up in their faces all the time.  I want to get to KNOW them - they are our critters!

I get dumb stares:

And MissyBadCat aka Missbehavin' is not sure what to think about that critter...  She always goes where I go - like the dog; one is my right side kick and the other is my left side kick.  Chelsea, the dog, just wants to round 'em up and corner them.  Missbehavin', on the other hand, wants to be under them, near them and around them.  (I think she is scoping out out the milk content)... but she is finally accepting them, and they are her.


We are learning all the ropes of cattle farming. One thing we learned is that if you buy 22 bales of hay and put it all out in the pasture, the four cows are gonna eat a little - from all 22 bales!  When that happens, picking a bale up with a tractor is not an easy task:

*farm guy problems*

And it doesn't tie off too easy either:
 

 

But eventually it all works out and you get it there.  Cows are not very patient critters - they stand (in the way) at the ring waiting for the new food:

 

Or stare you down to make it happen faster:

Another thing we have learned is that freezing temperatures freezes water troughs and ponds.  We finally got this one broken up and inserted a water heater to thaw it out.  The girls are now happy to have water drink, not ice cubes, to munch on:

 

If you will notice, that ice is about 2" thick!  BRRR!  At the time this picture was taken, the pond hadn't yet frozen over - so they did have water.  It is now frozen.  We have to be sure the heater is working several times a day.  *farm girl problems*


One of the things we found we are supposed to check every day is the girls butts.  Yes, you read that right, butts.  Apparently, right before they give birth, their backsides get soft and you can see the birth canal widening and getting ready to birth.  So, every day, twice a day, we try to peek at the girl's backsides.  Some days it is easier said than done.  I think they know... you know... like us women know... we DON'T WANT OUR BACKSIDES being examined.  I was lucky here - they were racing away from the trailer - they were not up to any more rides!

So now you know some of what our lives are like with the new cattle farming.  So many things have changed this last year and continue to change.

We never know where our lives are going to lead us.  Years ago, we used to know what to expect; you know, kids had school, scouts, band and such. These days, it is just Steve and I, the farm and the critters.  We think we know what to expect, but things just keep changin', life keeps happenin' and ...

The world keeps on twirlin'.

Busy, Busy, Busy!

I have been so busy!  Taking care of critters, fighting ticks... what a horrible chore!  I am determined I will persevere and win the battle with them.  I get so darned mad when I think of how long it must have taken our little doggy go have gotten that way.  She was horrible.  I have to vacuum 2 times a day, bathe her once a day, and I have put stuff on her neck.  Today I will dip her and see how that works for us.  I have never seen this many ticks in my life.  Such a sad shame.

I have been moving stuff from one place to another... we seem to do a lot of that.  We cannot just move it one time or two times, we have to move it four or five times!  UGH!  When we moved here, we moved stuff in, then we moved stuff to the shop, then we moved stuff from the shop to here there and everywhere.  Now some of the stuff was in the garage and I wanted my garage back so I moved it to the lean-to.  Once we get the shop finished, we will move it from the lean-to to the shop again.  Oy!

It is all exciting though - in no time, we will have a place for everything and everything in its place!  I have a little garden workshop area already set up in the lean-to area!  It has a work bench and everything!  Can you tell I am excited??  Pictures to come soon.  We have so much 'stuff' in the lean-to, it will take a bit of time to organize.  I have plans for it though  ;-)

And I am pooped.

We're FINISHED!

 After many long months of working on transforming the barn into a shop, we have done it!

Do you remember what we started with?

We started with a barn cat:

Who was in a barn:

We added concrete:

And walls: