Friday, February 20, 2009

Babies are Here So Let the Milking Begin!











Good Morning:



The line of children waiting for thier turn on the rope swing - The tractor ride - Danyel and Ali feeding our first kids - The tour hanging out in the field with the goats and dogs.
The air is crisp out at 4:30am and I hear in the distance coyotes howling and in the close distance my Anatolian's warning them to stay away. My house is quiet at 6am. I wonder if I should break the silence and turn on the radio or just enjoy......ENJOY! We have had a busy few days to say the least. Tue was catch up day and prepare day for our big tour coming on Wed. Getting the parlor in order, all the dishes washed and put away in the Processing Plant, the grounds picked up of any of Maggie's garbage digging, buckets and the grain area in order and most important the hallway to the bathroom clean of anything and the bathroom clean up too. It is no small feet to get our property ready for about 40 children. We didn't have any babies born and that was alright. We don't have enough babies to let the children coming feed babies or for that matter milk a goat. We are in the very beginnings of our kidding season. We all were in bed early as Wed. it would be an early work call. Well David came in about 2 am and woke me up telling me that three goats were in labor at the same time in the barn. I sure didn't want to get up, but up I did. I grabbed towels and soap in case. I have to say those mom's did good. I only helped one doe and it was just a slight pull to finish the job. We had six new babies on the ground by 3:30am. I was back in bed pretty fast and back to sleep even faster.




We were up Wed. morning about 7:00 to finish anything up that might need done. We got the goats all settled - babies fed, goats fed and watered, and three goats milked. All is ready for the tour. People showed up at 9:15am. This mom was early so she could feed her baby before the tour and before everyone got here. Most of the others showed up at 10am. There were alot of children milling around. The estimate was 39 children and 15 adults. The first thing they checked out were the chickens that were wandering around the farm... then the cats. We decided to divide the group in half. David would give hayrides down into the goat field and then the children could pet the goats and run around. While I took the other group on the farm tour. This worked out great. We first took everyone up to the top where the babies are with their mom's and Danyel and Ali got into the pens and held up the babies for all to pet and hold. None of the mom goats seemed to mind all the attention. Then David got the tractor ready and loaded his group onto the flat bed trailer lined with hay bales. I would say he was gone for about 45 min. Then we traded groups. Both groups got to try samples of our cheeses we make (minus the two that we are completely sold out of). The next thing that happened was a long line behind the rope swing. The second big hit, I think, was that rope hung in the old fir tree. It was so nice to see children waiting their turn for that rope. This kept the children occupied while mom's got the lunches out. Then they slowly left the swing for some good food. They all started leaving about 1pm - except one or two families and they got the treat of the day..... a doe had twins while they were here. We were a little worried about the size of the group - if we could handle this big of a group. Well, it went off without a hitch and I think everyone got their fill of kids and farm.


We want to Thank the FHEA Academy for letting us entertain you and teach you about our dairy. We enjoyed all of you.
We had one more doe deliver on Wed. making the total of 5 does and 9 babies born. So then Thur. comes and we decided that since David had gone to market on Monday this week that he should not go on Thur. So David stayed home. Though he worked - getting the table for the new vacuum sealer machine - which took him all day to find. We did our catch up homeschool - Danyel felt better so she went to Biology and we still had three doe's have babies. Our baby count is now up to 26. Its just a little crazy feeding all these babies - but the routine will start kicking in and then it won't really be so taxing on our brains. We have seven mom's being milked right now. David went to prayer meeting at church at 6:30 and the girls and I went back to finishing our homeschool work. By 8:00pm we were done and David was home by 9pm. Since the girls are both sick they went to bed at 9pm.
I was up this morning at 4:30 packaging up cheese for David to take to market. Its going to be a great day today. One more side note, David's application for a railroad job has been accepted and so now we wait to see if he is one chosen to go through the interview process. This could be a real blessing for our family. We wouldn't do as many farmers markets this year, as there is only one me.
We are heading out to do chores and feed some hungry babies.
Have a great day.
We are all in Gods Hands -- what a blessing to know that as TRUTH.


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