Sunday Stills....Potluck

Ed said to go for it...so here are a few from the archives...remember summer? Nah, me neither....

For more Sunday Stills.....

Best Laid Plans

A LOT going on today, so we went out to milk early, and get that out of the way. Of course, when we got to the barn, Camry was giving every indication of imminent calving.

Of course.

Not much to do but observe in the early stages so we observed while we worked. About half an hour into chores a foot popped out. 

An upside down foot. If you have any experience with calvings you know this is not good. This baby was breech. Of course as soon as that foot made its appearance Camry stood up. Although sometimes we have been forced to deliver calves while the mama is standing up, it sure isn't the choice way to do it.

Breech deliveries are critical. Once the umbilical cord is broken by delivery the calf reflexively breaths. If its head is still inside the cow....well, it isn't good...

Eventually just as we were getting ready to feed out the hay, the old girl lay back down and got down to serious pushing. More good news......not......the calf seemed to be upside down itself. This is nearly impossible to deal with and have a good outcome.

However, a quick examination proved that the legs were just crossed funny. A little leverage and the boss got them right.

Next we pulled. Quick. A lot quicker than would be the case with a normal birth.

We got lucky. The huge bull calf was born alive. Then mama proceeded to bite off his umbilical cord too close to his belly, so he was bleeding like crazy.

Fortunately, we have umbilical tape so we tied it off. (Baling twine will do in a pinch, but the tape is lots better) Now if she doesn't bite the string off. And if she doesn't prolapse after that crazy birth....

For Jonna, Cathy, Linda

And all of you winter-weary good folks out there. The geraniums are already showing signs of damping off. Darned things anyhow; they are so hard to grow.

However, these hardy little herbs are confident that spring and summer will get here and give them room to grow and in the meantime they are thriving in the mini-greenhouse in the living room.

They give me hope.

It Was Supposed to Rain

Dogwood down by the driveway

But instead we woke up to the ground covered with snow and the air spitting sleet and ice balls and just plain nasty. And dark. Very dark. There is a hissing and rattling at the windows that does not bode well for the day.

This time last year, there were buds on the grapes

I have a literal mind, and live very much in the moment. Thus in summer when the grass is green and the trees weighted down with leaves, winter barely looms on my horizon......despite the fact that we have many, many months of it.

Sadly, the same goes for spring. I am not too good with the theoretical aspect of its pending arrival. And mostly feel very strongly that it is going to be winter forever.

Yesterday was so nice. Today, well, not so much. This time last year the woodcock was peenting. Wonder if we will hear him soon.

And Facebook's new policy of dunning anyone who links to anything for money before sharing their content has not only cut down by at least a third on the hits that come here. It has also found me leaving the site and doing housework instead. So maybe it's a good thing. 

That is all. Have a good one.

Heartfelt Thanks

Mom is being released from rehab today and coming home. Her ankle is still in a cast, but the brothers and grandkids got a special chair ready for her and dad has been doing a herculean job getting the house all set.

I just wanted to thank you all for your kind thoughts and prayers. I truly believe that they make a difference. A very big one.

So, thanks.

And So, the Carolina Wren is Calling

If this mourning dove was a border collie they would have called him sticky
just didn't want to move

And the poor dog fell through the ice on a driveway puddle this morning with a resounding crash. Seems the water underneath had drained away and left a void, into which she smashed quite gloriously. She was not hurt, but she was not happy.

No peepers in the spring pond for a while yet, I guess
But what made that big chunk of ice?

Took a walk up in the old horse pasture yesterday to clear my mind and to investigate a bundle of twigs up in a tree, to which the crows have been showing a great deal of interest.

I can see this mess of twigs from the big windows...

Is it their nest a-building, or someone else's that they are raiding?

Nothing was revealed about this mystery in the course of my little walk, but I stood a while where my old horse is buried, checked out the still frozen pond, looked for buds on the shrubs and bushes (nope, not yet) and thought about changes and challenges.

Came to no conclusions of any moment and had a lot harder time getting back than getting out there. Under the long grass were thousands of little chunks of polished ice. And where there wasn't long grass there was still deep snow.

Guess I will forego any further strolling until it all melts and leaves us.

That is all..thanks....

60+ should not attempt to walk down this without YakTrax. Just sayin'

As Requested

There Will be a Summer...but not yet

Like a cat claw lifting the edge of a window blind, the sun peeks through.

Just one sharp little toe nail's worth of morning.

Short, quick, flash of glow, then gone behind cloud and horizon.

Cold and gloomy owl light, passing for dawn today.

And the wind is thin and hungry whiny, whistling round the edge like a band saw shaving hearts for greeting cards.

Or the devil calling in his due.

Maybe I should go back to bed.

Or feed the chickens for Becky. Yeah, I could do that.

Sunday Stills....the Color Brown

For more Sunday Stills.....

Brown samaras on a box elder tree

Little brown bird (song sparrow)

Brown beverage

Brown bottle

Becky's pretty brown hair

..

Mobbed

Click to enlarge

Walking the dog, camera in hand. Saw this hawk and was taking a pic when these crows dived in to mob it. I think it is a red tailed, but it was half way across the valley so.....

Twenty-Four

Today our boy is 24, a man really, but always a boy to his mama. I'm sure both my middle-aged brothers are boys to my mama, and that is as it should be.

Once again he is far away on his special day, working construction out of state. We miss him. Miss Daisy misses him. But we go on because that is the way it is.

I can't begin to tell you the fun I have had with him, back when he had time to hustle me out on impromptu nature trips, hitting the vlies and swamps and woods in the Blue Bomber, birding and photographing the wonders of nature.

He and I have built miles of fence together...well, he built the fence, and I supplied company, camera, and carrying of tools.

He has taken me hunting...I have always hunted, but hunting with him is a special experience, because he is so observant, and thus finds signs that I would walk right past. That skill has put food in our freezer for many a year

As I say, we miss him, but it is good to know that he is out in the world doing well for himself. Guess that is how it's supposed to be, with the raising of kids. You do your best and hope they do too.

Anyhow, Happy Birthday, Alan, hope you have a wonderful day.....love you....

Cleaning Pens

I'll bet Scotty is dreaming of summer just like we are.

Perhaps not the most fun job in the world, but it is nice for the girls to have clean, dry beds. Of course they would rather not cooperate by staying where we put them. Booth's daughter thought it would be fun to nearly run over me several times, sometimes bringing the rest of the bunch along with her.

All done now though, and they are enjoying their tidy digs and gobbling hay like it was their job...oh wait....

Happy First Day of Spring

One end of the bowling green

I used to wish we could flood the bowling green in winter so the kids could skate. They loved to do so and spent hours down in town on the public rink. It seemed such a shame to have this perfect depression in the ground, just begging to be filled with water and frozen, where they could have had a serious amount of fun.

Part of the other end

However, we pay for our water out here and it isn't cheap. So it never happened.

Fast forward to the ridiculous winter of excess, 2013, 2014. Kids are grown and all gone but Beck and she is way past too busy to skate.

Now the silly thing is full of lovely ice just begging for speeding blades.

Oh, well.

Harbinging his little heart out.

And why a bowling green you might ask? The boss's dad built it as a young man, using horse and scoop blade, for former owners of the place. It is really a nice sort of place, despite the complete and utter absence of bowlers.




And last night the kids brought the therapy baby down and let me hold her, sleeping sweetly, on my lap for several hours. She is a cuddler, content to snuggle in whatever arms are warm and handy. Thanks guys.

Visiting her great grand aunt from who she takes her second name

 Have a wonderful first day of spring! 

Listen

Can you hear that? Yesterday a robin was tentatively clearing his throat with just a handful of translucent water notes. This morning he is in full song, the first robin song of the year.

And that wild whistle from the locust tree? The Carolina wrens are still with us.

Birds all around, testing phrases from the songs they will soon be singing, light up the morning all the brighter. 

How not to love a golden dawn, laced with early bird song, and edged by glowing contrails? Guess morning is my time of day, and spring, however belated, my time of year.

We've got storms coming in I guess and plenty more of winter. But I heard the first red-winged blackbird yesterday, a true harbinger of better.

Look who's nesting in the snag right behind the barn.
Hope the wind doesn't take his condo down, because I sure can't wait to see his family,

A Symbiotic Relationship

I get to laugh, no matter how bad things get. Every day. No matter how little there is to laugh about.

 Every time I put my wool socks on. Every time I throw my old sneakers on to go outside for whatever reason. And sometimes just at random.

Daisy gets to roll around between my feet, doing her best to slow me down on my trip to the barn, rooting around in said socks, grunting and groaning and stealing lots of pets and ear and tail tugs. It takes me a lo-o-o-ong time to get my socks on. 

And Daisy gets to bark at me, "Hurry up! Hurry up! Woo, woo, woo!"

And to clatter around the floor, bundle of bolting, silly-joy-joy, happy, happy, happy, at the mere possibility of going outside where there be bunnies.

 I get a little 12-pound toaster muffin snuggled tightly between my bare feet in the kitchen as I type.....don't move, mama, you might step on the little one.

And Daisy gets to share the big, thick sleeping bag I drape over my chair to keep me warm and give me a place for those bare feet. She has her own bed, but it doesn't have pre-heated feet in it so.......

You see....symbiosis at its finest.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

A foggy full moon

Lots of Irish in our background....Great Grandpa McGivern came from the Emerald Isle himself....but no green to be seen just yet.

Varmints, though, we surely seem to have those. The kids both saw a big grey fox in the yard, in Becky's case in broad daylight, Saturday. 

Then Saturday night, Alan came back from taking his fiance home and sat in his car, just outside the back door,  for a few minutes. He heard something right behind the car, and turned his rear lights on to reveal six coyotes right there in the driveway behind the house. I mean right where we walk, right under the kitchen window over the sink.

Yow! Becky and I had been hearing them nights, and they did sound close, but surely not that close.

I don't know if I've mentioned it here, but over the past few weeks I have several times thought something was following me to the barn at night. Before the time change we were still going over after dark and I heard little rustles in the dead, dried weeds, and little crackles in the snow.

I tried to convince myself that it was the wild grey tom cat or maybe bunnies, but it prickled the hair at the back of my neck and disturbed me enough to mention it to the family. It just didn't sound like a bunny at all. They tend to quick bursts not sneaky slinking. And the cat is terrified of me.

Now I wonder if maybe I had reason to be nervous. Sure am glad the days are getting longer.

However, corned beef and cabbage are on the menu for tonight.

And a little bit o' green

Plus a link here to a story about what our Irish ancestors put on the menu, back before the potato was imported from Peru. It explains a lot about our occupation.....

Sunday Stills...the Letter L

Lots of Ls this week.......

Leather...
Magnum's old bridle. Nobody uses it any more, but he looked through it for many miles

Lacing

Lines

  

Liquid, 
a couple of pails of Scotty's milk being saved for the babies

For more Sunday Stills.....

Longing.....
Athena wishes all that milk would come to her!

And what would life be without......
Love!