Sundays and Moms

My own dear mother has been gone for four years already, and I miss her like it was yesterday.  The last two years of her life, she was very child-like, and often called me "Mother", in fact, rarely did she call me Mary Ann.

How she would have loved to come out here and sit on our porch and watch the birds feeding, and see the chickens, and laugh at the llamas.  I know someday I'll be with her again, but for now, I'm sending her happy prayers winging their way skyward for Mother's Day.

It was mild and cloudy/sunny today, and I had a nice long visit from the grands and their mom and dad,

Paiton, Jaxton, Madison and Jacob.  I didn't think to take any pictures while they were here, but we had fun looking at and holding the new baby chicks, and seeing the other chickens, and chasing the turkeys.  After the chaos in the pasture, we came in and had cookies and milk.

A little later, I went out to do the chores.  I worked so hard Friday and Saturday, and then went down into the pasture with our little yard cart hooked to the tractor, and raked two big loads of hay to put on the new compost pile.  Then I called it a day and did chores, and came in and read for a while.

For me, a perfect day.

Here are two little farm dogs that helped:

These two little girls have become very good friends.  Abby can't keep up with their younger legs.

This is a remarkable picture, because it features five of the boys from the big henyard in it.  Rambo (Baby Rambo) on the left, the last son of our Buff Orp rooster Rambo...and King of the Big Henyard.... and George, the partridge cochin in the feed bowl... Boots, the Mille Fleur rooster, and Speedy, the Brassy Back Old English Rooster.  That's Jackson having a siesta in the background.  Jackson likes to lay down where he can see me when I am doing chores and take a little snooze, I notice now that he does this daily.

Here were Turkettes Annabelle and Clarabelle taking a dust bath while I sat for a while.  You can see from Anabelle's underside that they still have not grown back any feathers.  Their feathers, you see, were complete rubbed off on their chests and undersides when I got them from their previous owner.  They were in a pen with a lot of chickens, and the pen had literally a sink-mud-hole in it, and the two girls, for the three days I went there to get birds, were in that mudhole every time I went, pacing back and forth. They are slowly coming back to complete health, and I hope their feathers will re-grow to cover the bare spots.  They are lovely turkey girls, and very calm, unlike Helen, our first Turkette.

And to close the week out, a totally gratuitous picture of Splash, my favorite of the new hens.

I hope everyone had a happy Mother's Day 2012!