Saturday Tidbits

I know I am posting early today, but have a lot to post about.

First thing is... this little girl went back to see Dr. Tom this morning, with a very worried mama.

If you look closely, you will see she was "leaking" serum from under her incision.  She also had a runny nose, and she and I have not had a whole night's sleep this week, indeed, we have been up four times a night.  The verdict was that she had popped a stitch on the incision, and also that she had developed a sinus infection from her molars falling out during the dental.  She is on two penicillin medicines now, and had a shot at the doctor's today, with instructions to call him Monday. She has eaten and drank today very well, and has no temperature, so maybe we will get some sleep tonight.

I have a couple of observations about Blogger... I know that you all know that it is getting ready to make some changes... that our blogs, whichever style we choose, will look much glitzier.  We also loose the capacity to follow, or have followers.  How, then, without making everything you look at a favorite on your computer, will you follow?  Does anyone know?  I do like some of the new templates, I saw one today on a blog that I had never seen, but it is hard to tell if you can still date entries, either.  I am beginning to see blogs with no dates, and I find it very confusing.

Another one I have noticed is that after two months or so of seeing the dreaded "You are not allowed to comment on this blog, sign in under a different name".... I have not seen it now in a month.  What was up with that?  Was it something Blogger was trying out?   Interesting.

Keith knew that I had been very down this week with worry about Hannah, and worry about a family member who is very ill.  So last night, he asked if I wanted to go for a ride for a while today.  We love to get into the truck and just drive around the county, or over to the next county and look at farms and get ideas.  So today, after I had gone to take Hannah and come back, and he made an emergency trip to get his glasses fixed, we got into the truck and took off.  We went west, towards Jefferson County.

Our favorite restaurant in McLouth has closed again, so we drove on to Oskaloosa, and had a great lunch at Rosie's Cafe.  Keith got something unusual with his dinner:

He asked for ranch dressing with his salad.  We are both as deaf as posts, and could not hear the answer the girl gave him... but he said "Yes" with a nod.  His chicken-fried steak came first... and then the salad.  He stuck his spoon in the bowl to put the dressing on.... and then took a bite.  IT WAS GRAVY!!!  We both had a good laugh, and then he spooned some french dressing on top of it and ate half of it.  We have never seen gravy served with salad before!  His chicken fried steak was very good, so all was well that ended well.

This is a panorama picture of what happened when I went out at 10 AM to treat the birds to some bread.  Notice how everyone suddenly came to the fence to meet me?

In the little henhouse, we have about six hens who NEVER come outside.  We have never figured out why this is, but it is.  Here is Fleura, who comes out onto the porch and sometimes onto the ramp, but no longer goes down to the pen.

Isn't she pretty?

She is one of our home-breds, a part silkie-probably cochin cross.

Here are the llamas this morning, with Tony playing King of the Castle on the dirt mound that was removed from the garden last summer.  We had it dumped by the snake tree (where the old cistern is).  The original house on this property sat just beyond the fence line behind the llamas, and the little barn you see is Troy and Kathy's.  If you look closely, you will see a pipe coming out of the tree where Inca and Aztec are standing, on the other side of the tree from them.  This tree has been struck by lightening hard twice since we have been here.  The cistern is just below it... we have filled it in with cement blocks and other debris (and a lot of cat litter).  The snakes winter down there. 

As I type this, Lilly is out in the yard mouthing (not really eating) the carcass of Little Red, one of the cochin roosters from last spring.  We thought the hawk had gotten him.  He either flew over (a cochin???) the fence, or got out somehow and got too close to the yard fence OR the hawk dropped him in the yard.  That was all she wrote.  It looks like he has been buried quite a while.

RIP Little Red

Darn Lil!

Remember the black mare from three weeks ago, the day that Jill and I drove all over the county?  We went by her home today, and I asked Keith to slow down.  There she was!

She is just about impossible to photograph... but here is why she was in the SAME section of her pasture....

Her buddy is right across the road, and they were standing there staring at each other.  Horses are such herd animals, and I feel so sorry for the ones who are alone.  This guy and his sheep friends were gazing across the road.  Some kids were playing in the pasture, I should have asked about the black mare.

Since we were almost to Jarbalo at this point we decided to go on home, and liberate the little dogs for a while.  Keith has laid down to take a nap, and I am blogging and reading blogs.  I'll make a list of some new ones I have found, to let you all know about them.  We also talked about our garden for this year, and noted that many farm families have already plowed their garden plots to get ready for the new year.

Muffy and Bitsy, the Naughty Girls, this morning.

We were able to donate six dozen beautiful eggs this morning to our food kitchen... Thanks Girls!