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Monday, July 28, 2008
The great escape, part troisWell, she did it again. A week ago, I was taking the boys to daycare and as we passed
the barn, Nate piped up, "Look, Mommy, the baby horsie is out!" Uh oh, I thought, and considered stopping the car
to have a look, but time is of the essence when getting children to daycare, so I continued on. Came back after dropping them
off to find that the baby horsie was indeed out. But no sooner had I parked the car and run inside to wake Mark, but the little
girl went into the barn, where I quickly cornered her and ushered her back into the pen. Her mama apparently has grown used
to her baby girl going walkabout because Mist didn't even blink throughout the whole proceeding. Not an anxious whinny
to be heard,either.
9:13 pm edt
Sunday, July 20, 2008
The great escape, part deuxNever let it be said that Holy Moly's horses are lacking in ingenuity. I'm not
sure how she accomplished it, but Melissa was the latest of our equine birds to fly the coop. I was sitting here quietly writing
and filing emails early this morning when I heard high pitched whinnies accompanied by whickering from Mist. The whinnies
sounded strangely close by, so I got up and looked out the window in time to see a brown shape making a beeline from my rose
garden over to the round pen outside Mist's stall. Mist herself was running back and forth and whickering anxiously. So
I threw on my shoes, woke Mark, grabbed the camera and went outside. Got some nice pics of our now two-month-old filly while
Mark coaxed her back to the pen. (If you want to see the photos, I posted some on the foals page.)
9:19 am edt
Friday, July 4, 2008
And another thing...Just as I was finishing up that last post, I heard from Sandra. Bessie is pregnant!
Even though we only were able to breed her the last two days of her heat, it was enough. The ultrasound showed very clearly
that she's in foal. Woo hoo!
3:34 pm edt
Life on the farmMark has been ill the past two days, so I've had to take over as chief caretaker
of the animals. Not an inconsiderable task, with 3 cats, 3 dogs, 7 horses, 12 chickens, 14 pheasants, and 2 pigs (did I ever
mention the pigs? Probably not, since they're strictly for pork chops. But they're two sows, Holly and Molly, and
they have a little sty under the trees out behind the septic field. Nuff said.)
Anyway, now that I've taken on the farm chores these past couple of days, I've discovered why Mark
drops so much weight in summer. Farm chores involve putting the dogs out in the yard for the morning; feeding the cats; dropping
five bales of hay and a bale of wood shavings down from the loft; filling MIst's hay bags (which are WAY too high for
a short person to reach easily, so that's a bit of a logistical challenge as well as a physical one) and water buckets
both inside and out in the pen; hauling grain and hay to the paddocks for the four horses summering outdoors; cleaning Mist's
stall and hauling the muck to the manure pile; hauling slops to the pigs; feeding the pheasants and checking their water;
collecting eggs and feeding/watering the chickens; hauling the hose out to fill the water troughs in the paddocks... do you
see the repetition of the gerund "hauling"? It's quite a workout. And that's not to mention the continual
cutting of lumber for the wood furnace we haven't installed yet (at the rate oil prices are rising, the new furnace will
pay for itself in about 2 years!) If I did all the things he does daily, I'd be skinny and muscular, too. Start at 8 o'clock,
finish at around 10:30--that's more of a workout than I get at the gym, no question.
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