Why girls make terrible farmers...

I grew up on a farm. I live in town right now, but I am a country girl. Addie has inherited this gene. She is very much a country girl. My best friend is a serious country girl (picture her, Addie and I loading up 6 300 lb pigs by ourselves into a trailer to take to fair)... She raises pigs... We have spent much time in the barn when the sows are delivering...

Two weeks ago I get a text message at 10 pm... "sneak out and meet me in the barn"... so I did (don't worry- Noah was here with the sleeping littles). What we found were 15 newborn piglets. The average was about 3-4 lbs. The runt... 8 oz. She had to keep him in a container in order to not be smashed by the others... Kerri stayed up with him all night in the barn... holding him up to the mommy to nurse until 3 am when he was just too weak. She took him to the house and began syringe feeding him every 30 min through the night and into the next day. Then we took over...

He stayed by the fire... Addie fed him religiously but you could tell he was going downhill fast. We knew he was dying... even told the littles that he was dying... but we couldn't let him die in the cold barn. He died cuddled up to Addie.

This is why girls make terrible farmers... we farm with our hearts. A man would have wacked it on the head when it was born and slept through the night and not syringe fed a dying piglet every 30 min for 42 hours... Girls make terrible farmers... His name was "Nugget".

bunnies

Noah took these pictures of his rabbits and their new home at Grammy's farm. At the base of the white bird house is their new little home. The bunnies are so happy and Noah was so sad to see them in a cage every day, so now they get to be outside and exploring.

just an ordinary day...

It is all fun and games in the pig pen until you give 1 kid the hose!!! What do you get? 5 wet kids and a big mud puddle for the pigs to play in. I refuse to think about what percentage is mud and what percentage is pig poo- but my dr assures me this is what keeps kids healthy. A good dose of old fashioned dirt.
Now, what I didnt get on camera... Molly carrying around a fluffy yellow chicken like a little bag on her arm, screaming at her siblings to not dare get her chicken wet. Bis and Yordi wrestling for the hose, coming crazy close to the hot fence (meanwhile, Bis not believing us that it is indeed hot). And my girly girl (not) Addie. Dressed in a WHITE strapless tank top diving into a pile of dry pig mud, throwing her brothers out of the way to capture and grab armfulls of runaway chickens before her pigs eat them. Then, informing me that was so NOT mud! :) And Bis running as fast as he can around the storage unit, screaming ADDIE YOUR PIG- GET YOUR PIG at the top of his lungs. 2 seconds later the pig rounds the storage unit in hot pursuit of Bis, kicking up his heals and laughing...

mothers day

The 5 littles- 3 age 5 and 2 age 4... TROUBLE!!!!!
Funny, these are the only pictures I have from Mothers day... so cool though, we had beautiful weather and my sister's family and our family all met at mom and dad's house. We barbecued and all the cousins got to play. We took a long walk in the mint field and the kids rode the 4 wheeler. The highlight was playing in the pond- hunting for tadpoles!!!
The big kids were there too... ages 14, 12, 11, 10. Addie is the only girl but gives the boys a run for their money!!

another relaxing evening...

Tonight we had pig weigh-ins for county fair. This means county fair is just 60 days away. How can that possibly be???? This is a different year for us, a trial year... we are keeping the pigs at our house which allows the kids more chores and more time with their pigs. Normally we borrow a trailer from a friend, but this year Tom got all crafty and built us a trailer. Usually weigh ins take most of an evening... lots of hard work, several big bodies to push, pull, roll, screaming, skittish pigs up into a trailer. This year... the pigs loaded themselves. We literally couldn't get off the ramp quick enough for them to wriggle up into the trailer (the bucket of rotting food I saved for this very occasion certainly helped). Of course it had to be raining, but this is Oregon after all... We get to the fairgrounds and wait our turn to weigh the pigs. We back in the trailer and usually the 2 big boys they have to help with the animals take 1 look at Addie and then start wrestling her pigs from the trailer for her. This year they handed her a pig board. She climbed up in the trailer and wrangled both her and Noah's pigs onto the scales. Poor thing was so tired... she climbed back into the car and Molly started screaming about not wanting to sit next to "pig poop"!!!! I think we are in good shape though... weights are 115 lbs, 120 lbs, 133 lbs, and 154 lbs. We have 60 days to get to minimum of 230 lbs. Now if we could just teach them some manners, personal space, and respect we might just make it!!!

In all my FREE time...

So, between all of the bonbons and the soap operas... THIS is what I find myself doing in all of my FREE time!! :) We (namely me and Addie) are bottle feeding the baby kittens... we are very fortunate that they are almost ready to be weaned. Meanwhile, I sneak around and make sure I don't talk in that corner of the kitchen, lest they hear my voice and start SCREAMING for their bottle... fun times...

Tonight is "pig" night... we are geared up and ready to go... my friend called early this am to see if we were going to stand the excitement until tonight... good times and lots of laundry. Oh and did I mention that it is raining??? Stay tuned... hopefully pictures, video, and an explanation...

It's all fun and games

The weather here has been beyond gorgeous... we have been staying out way past bedtime... but like all things, the fun must come to an end. It's all fun and games until... someone gets a lap full of duck poop and mom fires a shot in and breaks the backboard!!

In negotiations...

This time the pig is seriously busted. This is the view of my day lillies and peonies from my bedroom window. The pig has made himself a nest... we are in negotiations... hot wire or a sentence to the barn and pasture with the 4H pigs. Addie chuckled at dinner when I told her she needed to disipline her pig. She asked how she could possibly discipline something so adorable. I am not finding him so cute right now. The bummer of the deal really though is that we were ham and beans for dinner. Someone brought up ham/pig and Molly put it all together... she burst out crying and wanted to know if she was eating Rusty (Noah's pig from last year). We told her that it was a good possibility. She was slightly less than pleased. She had a banana for dinner. She is NEVER eating pigs again. Too bad cause ham was the only meat I could get her to eat...

Too Funny

It is a beautiful sunny day out. Yordi was goofing around on the porch (in typical Yordi fashion). He ran and got some sticks so we could go fishing. He caught a shark and since he couldn't wrestle it to his fire to cook it up for me he decided he needed to just build the fire on top. Buzz was willing to play along... it involved a nap in the sun and being rubbed on the belly with sticks. Poor kids- they have no idea that playing with pigs isn't the *norm*

Should I be concerned???

I cant find the cat. Clementine... the outside semi-tame cat. The cat that followed the dogs into the house this morning. The cat that I thought might be cold and could come in for a quick warm up. 6 hours ago... the worst part? I just realized that I lost her... hmm... closets or toyboxes first first... That's what I get for trying to switch to decaf. I'm going back to regular before I lose a child...

Photos from the day

Well, the cassirating went well. Pretty cool in fact. We were the first ones up at Kerri's farm. The girls had not slept in the barn. We were greeting by Kerri's hubby who told us to head to the barn. Shortly afterward everyone got there. 23 babies- 11 boys- 3 mama sows. Kerri had already marked all boys with a large blue sharpie. She had to capture them and take them away from the wolverine mothers. Man they are protective things!!!!! As she handed them out to us, we then marked on them which mother they belonged to. All baby boys into the playpen. We decided that since the mommas were climbing the walls (literally) to rescue their screaming babies we would take them to the other barn. The whole process was pretty cool. The boys in the club did a great job of holding babies. None of the kids wanted to do the actual cutting (it was kinda scary) but they were all involved in helping out. Kerri's dad did a great job and let the kids do as much as they wanted. What amazed me was that there was NO blood. Really thought there would be. No, none!!! The kids did great, the babies did great, a couple of bags of souvenirs went home with dreams of a frying pan... none to our house. We get to pick out the babies in less than 4 weeks and Kerri is going have each kid vaccinate their own pig. Addie has fallen in love- one little gilt that runs over and nips her on the hand whenever she bends down.

Molly was a bit concerned when it was all over- looking around at all the people. She quietly asks if just animals have to do this or people too?

I told her just boy animals.

Well, why?

Cause they have boy parts.

Oh, so we aren't going to do this to Noah?

Oh heavens NO!

Whew! I still am glad I'm not a boy.

Fast forward to today... I explained that Dad will be picking up from school tomorrow. Noah has a dr appt. Molly is crying... I thought you said we weren't taking his boy parts!!!!!!!!!

Can you say scarred for life?????

big happenings today!!

There is big stuff going on around here today. Pictures will be coming later. I can hear Rebecca already... I know. But please understand- we live on a farm... in the country. This is just a part of life...

The conversation over the last couple of days goes something like this: (it started when the littles overheard me talking about getting a babysitter)...

Molly: Mom NO you cant leave us behind... I wanta "cassirate" pigs too!!! It's not fair. Addie says I'm old enough to scoop poop this year and if I'm old enough for that I can handle "cassirating" pigs too.

Yordi: I wanta do what Molly do too... I do pigs. They no smello so goood, but I like them piggies.

Mom: I don't know guys- there will be some blood, and baby pigs screaming for their mommies, and mommy pigs that are mad and want their babies... maybe you would be better off at home.

Molly: Good grief mom, you think we don't like blood or screaming? Yordi's nose bleeds all the time and that doesn't bother us. Besides my ears are plugged and I cant hear anything.

Yordi: I ready for screaming...

So yes, we will all be heading to some friends house to "cassirate" pigs. Addie has been there since yesterday "preparing" and if I know those girls there is a good chance they slept in the pig barn. What an awesome experience. These are the kids fair pigs for this year. They have been part of the entire process. We hauled the momma home from the fair (she was still a little pig)- the kids have seen the babies shortly after birth. Today, they get to be hands on. Addie has graduated Molly to "poop scooper" this year at the fair. Life is good. (if it could just warm up a bit... a 38* barn isn't fun for very long).

Pictures after the events of the day...