A pril 26, 2008, 2 New Editions to Our Farm

Hey Everyone. Cold and windy here in Cooks Creek. We had a Spring storm this week. Snow and freezin rain. Made for interesting driving and generally hard to get around, even on foot.

Two new Holstein bull calves are now a part of our farm. We brought them home yesterday from the dairy farm where my oldest daughter works. We are going to raise them for meat. Holsteins are not great meat cows. Their main purpose is dairy. It is for this reason bull calves sell cheap. Right up my alley. I like cheap. We can raise them and learn as we go. The only way to really learn is do it. I can read a hundred books but when I get to actually get experience and exposure then I can understand and build my confidence. Well, they have been here 24 hours and they are still alive, so, so far so good. My daughter is the teacher here. She is teachin her old dad a few tricks. One of her duties at the dairy is looking after the calves so I have a big advantage than just goin at this deal blind. When we got them home last night one of the first duties was to make them into steers. My daughter brought home a device that puts an o-ring deal around their testicles. The idea being it cuts the flow of blood to the testicles and they dry up and become non-functional. We did one calf but the others testicles had not fallen yet so we will wait until they drop to get him done. Cows smell a whole lot worse than horses. My daughter stinks. I guess I better qualify that by sayin she stinks when she comes home from work. I can sure see why now. She is working with dozens of calves for 10 to 12 hours a day. We only have 2 and I can already smell the cows on my jacket. She says "don't worry dad, after awhile ya don't really even notice it" Maybe you don't but everyone else does. Well, I wanted to be a farmer so in for a penny in for a pound. Learnin from my daughter gives me a certain sense of pride. Not sure why. Watchin her around those calves and dealin with them makes me kind of proud. She has a way with animals. God has givin her a gift. It is her calling. I can see it sure as anything. Everyone has a calling and hers is animals. What is real sad is when God gives ya a gift and it is wasted. I think it is our duty to use the gifts God gives us. May even be a sin not to do so. It is easy to tell what your gift is. It will be something you enjoy doing. It doesn't feel like work. Ya would do it even if ya didn't get paid. Ya do it because ya enjoy, no, maybe even love it. Because of this you will excel at it. You will be good at it. You will be great at it.

Well, I just wanted to tell ya about our new cows. I will leave it at that and talk to ya all real soon.

April 12, 2008

Hey everyone. This will be a short post just to let ya know I'm still kickin. It is Saturday, late evening and I just came in from the shop got cleaned up and thought I would do a short post before I hit the hay. Finally got my hoist set up and working in the shop. Finished the electrical hookup this evening and all that is left is to straighten up the insulation in the attic I messed up while running the service from the panel to the hoist. We still have some snow layin around. I went out back to an old building. I have some stuff stored in there. I had a couple of rolls of wire out there so I went to get them. I actually was wading through snow up to my knees in the bush still. Suppose to get into the high 60s by Monday so that will knock the snow down some for sure. Wife is in the kitchen cookin soup for tomorrows church. It is our turn to supply soup for lunch. Man she fusses over that. Throw a case of can soup in a pot and take it to church. Done deal. I guess that is why the men don't bring soup. Actually that is not completely true. One of the fellas brought soup last week and it was good. Guess that is why the Mrs. is fussin so. Can't let a man show her up. My youngest daughter is out babysittin tonight, oldest daughter is in bed cause she has to work tomorrow mornin at 5:30. Son worked with me in the shop all day so he is tuckered and in bed too. Just me and the wife up. That don't happen too often. Got some old time country music playin on the squack box. Going to be orderin some chicks and turkeys pretty soon. Probably get them around middle of May. Maybe first week if weather looks like it is goin to be warm. We must be doin something right. People are phoning and ordering chickens and turkeys already. I sure hope we have a better year than last year. I never worked so hard at anything and got so little return. But I guess that is farmin. Well ya know I think I will call it a night and say so long. Got to get up early tomorrow, do some chores before church then off to church. Talk to ya all real soon.