A new month

So March was not a good month for us here and I was not sorry to see it go. April on the other hand has started out much better and I have all intentions of it finishing that way!

The cows are still having their calves and it looks to be a good crop this year. We have gotten a few snow storms and one good thunderstorm the other afternoon.

We have added a puppy to our house, a blue heeler, which my two cats are not happy about. But they will learn to live with it.

This last weekend we were able to finally get the ground tilled up in the front yard and some grass seed planted. Also got my flower bed made and ready to go when the flowers come to our local stores. Now just trying to decide what type of flowers to put in there!

Have the garden all planned out, trying a new spot for me, but one that the family has used in the past with good success. Spending some time this week getting the fence fixed back up and till the ground up with the tractor. Then come May 1st the seeds go in the ground! I am determined to get this garden thing figured out here. I would be doing good if I could just keep the rabbits and squirrels out and let the plants get up and going.

I have also started on a new business opportunity and I'm enjoying that very much. I'm able to still stay at home, go to school and work my sewing business while helping to bring in some extra money, which on a ranch is always needed!

I have even managed to find some time to cook lately. It seems this past winter I was hardly in the kitchen at all and I have missed cooking and sharing recipes with everyone. So start looking for some great summer recipes to share with your family around the backyard and the grill.

Guest Post with Fairchild Farmgirl

I was recently asked by fellow blogger and ag mom to write a funny tale of something that happened to me as a ranch wife and about how crazy our lives can be sometimes. The story that ended up being the one is of when I broke my finger bottle feeding a calf. Yes that is right I broke a bone feeding a calf a bottle! You can read that story by visiting Farichild Farmgirl's blog.

That is not the only time that life has gotten crazy around here. Here are a few more examples:

Life on a ranch can be crazy busy at time and just plain crazy at others. I have learned this the hard way over the last 5 years that I have been a rancher’s wife. I did not grow up on a ranch; my dad was in the military. Sure it was in Texas so I was around horses and cows and always dreamed of being a rancher’s wife. The reality however is very different from the dream, but better.

So how crazy does it get? Well when I was still working in town at the local high school the hubby called one late spring afternoon to tell me to get home, there was a wild fire moving to the bottom end of the ranch that had all of our cattle in the pasture. I’m still not sure if I told anyone why I was running out of the office in the middle of the day! I’m pretty sure I hollered, something about fire, cattle, the hubby and I have to go! Good thing about living in a small town, they are pretty forgiving on things like that.

Two years ago now, the girls and I were getting ready to head to town for a small concert at a local church when the hubby called and said to bring a bottle and towels to the pasture below the house. I knew then that we had a baby whose momma either didn’t make it or was not able to get up and we needed to take care of it until she was able. Well needless to say there went the concert, I had a calf living in my kitchen and living room for 2 weeks and then in the back yard for 3 months. That calf, Dot, is now a 2 year old heifer and will still follow me where ever I go and I can call her by name across a pasture and she will run to me!

Here is Dot just a few hours old in the kitchen

Now here she is at a year old. Still loves to be petted any chance she gets

 

As to the just plain crazy, well between me getting bucked off horses, breaking a finger bottle feeding a calf, getting chased by pigs, wild dogs, broken water lines, cows breaking down fences the night before branding and the morning of shipping, things can and will get a little crazy on a ranch. But if it didn’t then it wouldn’t be fun. 

The funny part is a I was writing this the other day the phone rang and it was the hubby. He and our oldest were riding the pasture and moving the cows to water when he found a calf we had been looking for since the momma had died a few days before. I was just finishing up so I could go to town, run some errands and make my lunch appointment for my business. So the little one and I loaded up in the truck and off to the pasture we went to bring the baby back to the house. Got the baby home, in the pen and all set up, cleaned up and off to town we went. You just never know what your day will bring on a ranch.