Welcome to Our Home Dear Ones!

Sisko wrestling her sister Sophie


Patch and Princess

We Found Them! - Two Goats and a Big Puppy!

Last night I went to bed with a heavy heart and was weary to the bone. It felt like I had so many prayers out to Heaven that I myself couldn't even keep them straight. I went to bed with the hope of a ray of light to catch on to in the morning to keep me going.

Well, I think Father may have blessed me with a few rays of light. And I need to share them before the weight of life clouds them out.

It's not new news that we have been pondering what our hopes and goals are for our own little homestead. And if you read my last post you read about my desire to raise goats. Well, We've found our first Doelings.  I feel a tiny bit like a mother who's been waiting and trying to adopt for months and I've just got the call asking if I can be ready for them in TWO DAYS!!... The answer: YES!
 

Sorry the puppies picture won't copy here. Just think of a yellow lab pup but fluffier hair. :)

There is a common understanding among goat owners that when you put your heart in to looking for your own herd of goats you will look at hundreds of goats and when you find "YOUR" goat, you just Know. It is so true for me! It sounds strange. But it's true!

Goats can be expensive. If you want to sell your baby goats for anything other then brush clearing or meat you need to be sure that the blood line is healthy and preferably Purebred; and  Registered is even better. The breeds of goats that we've decided on range from $400 for a Registered goat to $175 for a Purebred non-papered.

You also have to decide whether you want a baby goat or an adult goat. And then decide if you want a bottle fed goat or a mother fed goat. And of course, if you want a Male or Female. We were considering either babies or adults. But they had to have been bottle babies. We learned with our borrowed goats, Billy and Skit, that we much preferred the bottle babies! They respond to humans far easier then mother fed goats. We also knew that we want Females. The Males really do smell terrible!! We will find a handsome stud for our girls when the time comes for them to be mommies. :)

So, with all of those things to consider, you can imagine why it is hard to pass up "your" goat when you find them. I swore I wouldn't get goats for the winter!  I truly meant that when I said it. But something kept us looking. And then a predator started snatching up our hens one after another when we weren't around (just this past week.) So we started seriously considering getting our Livestock Guardian Dog (LGD). But if you get a LGD puppy who you want to protect your goats some day you have to have goats when you get the puppy. Any animal (or human) that the puppy is around before they turn 12 weeks old they will consider their flock or their herd. The ones they will protect and care for. LGD's are an amazing breed of dogs.  They are also a small investment. They range from $250 to $100. But almost any other dog breed will be a nightmare on a farm for one reason or another.

SOOO, When I woke up this morning and I got on craigslist for the thousandth time and found two beautiful Purebred Nubian Doelings: Currently bottle feeding, de-horned, first shots, they come with a gallon of their moms milk AND their next vial of vaccine shot,  for only $125, I just Knew!! ...  And THEN, we found an adorable LGD puppy ready to go this weekend for only $100. Again, we just Knew!

I felt so good about everything as we squared everyone's pick up dates and times. It felt so right... And then the day moved on and life happened and doubt and worry crept in. It's so hard sometimes to make these big decisions. There is never enough money, we all understand that these days. If you don't, be grateful tonight. But for us, every penny counts! So I had to sit down tonight and ask myself what the financial benefit is of this investment. To remind myself of the plan.

The plan is to raise the doelings and the puppy (who is also female) until they are breeding age. Which is around 9 months old for the goats and around two years for the dog. Once they are breeding age we will sell their babies as well as gradually establish our ideal goat herd and breed the different types of goats we're looking for. Goats usually have 2-4 babies at a time. LGD dogs can have 10-14 pups in a litter. So they will eventually pay for themselves and more. In the meantime, I am planning on working with the goats to see if they are Cart Friendly goats. If not, we'll retain one or two of the baby boy goats, neuter them, and then train them to pull carts and wagons. After the female goats give birth we can also milk them and sell their milk. But I don't see me doing that. But you never know.

This has turned out to be a VERY long post! I obviously really needed to think this through. :)  But forgive me because I still need to think a few things through: :)

So the investment eventually pays off. And the feed for the goats isn't really an issue. Nor for one dog. I think the major concern (besides the initial investment ending up around Christmas shopping season) is setting up and choosing boundaries for the animals. This is where the fact that we're getting babies will come in handy for the winter season. Two baby goats and the puppy won't need as much space as they'll require in the Spring and Summer when they're bigger. My hope is to gather enough fencing to set up a perimeter around our back yard and the small barn/coop there. This will keep them close enough that the kids and I can feed them easily and care for their living space and the dogs messes. The key will be to find/buy the fencing,  and the major task will be finding the time and help to run the fencing.

It's no secret that life is a struggle right now. It seems like we are being knocked around in every direction we look. It's really hard. But if we take a minute to think back on the last 6 months, my best times have been when I had the goats and other little critters to care for with my own little ones at my side. It will NOT be easy in the winter. We haven't even hit the coldest times. But Leif and I have a feeling that the animals might be a blessing during the winter months. Something for the kids and I to care for together. And I admit, they are my project. They help me the most. But when all else fails, go for what has helped in the past, right? ... Right!  So, there we have it. It is what it is. I will allow myself to be excited and try hard not to let the hard things about it get me down. I will be surprised if there is not more good then bad in the results. I hope that's the case anyway.  And deep down, I hope my family members (my little family and extended) will be happy with the decision as well. ... I guess that's just the little girl in me.

Planning Ahead - Looking Ahead

I feel like writing tonight. The boys are playing computer and it's funny to listen to them talk to each other. Over the last year or so we've come up with names for each of the boys. nicknames that describe a bulk of their personalities. I often find myself smiling at how right on we are with these names. Jakob is "Radar", Caleb is "Navigator", and JJ was just named "Play by Play".

I'm actually pretty tired. So I'm not going to be very creative with this update. Let me just share some of the latest and greatest:

This winter I am making our Homestead plans for this Spring. We want to do more gardening this year. I'm looking forward to giant pumpkins.  We also look forward to starting a small goat herd. My hope and plan is to learn how to train some of the goats to pull wagons and carts.
Right now my choice for the Cart Goats are the Nubian and the Silky breed:
 

This takes Planning, Financing, and Time. Wish is luck!

On a different note:
We were able to meet with a Neuro psychologist this week for Caleb. He was a very nice doctor and I believe he will give us a lot of answers to questions we have for all of the boys.

I finally have an MRI scheduled for next week to get answers and follow up about the tumors that I have on my pituitary gland. I really hope we make progress with my health!! I have so many reasons for wanting strength and well being!!

Well, it's Bed Time!!! YIIPPEEE! :)

Goats - Gardening - and Chickens

On Friday we worked out in the yard all day. We got a lot accomplished, but I was EXHAUSTED! I think I got too much sun... Leif did a whole lot more then me and he didn't fall apart... Crazy! But this is all beside the point. We borrowed a couple goats while we were gardening. Our neighbor brought them over and they ate weeds and got tangled in their ropes all day long. It was actually kind of fun.

Our little family liked having them here. But I'm not sure everyone was so thrilled about the idea of getting our own. By the end of the day the "farm smell" was noticeable. I did a little research and the goat experts say that if you take care of the goats well enough that they shouldn't stink (unless they are males, then the ALWAYS stink) No male goats for us! We're pondering a couple of miniature goats... But we'll see.

Leif cleaned out the green house area that we're going to use. That was a lot of hard work! I planted seeds (not very hard.) And Leif trimmed a bunch of tree limbs to let the sun in. Unfortunately, he cut a limb that his dad had been nurturing through the years to use as a tree swing branch. We felt REALLY bad about that!!! Ahhh, the joys of sharing a yard...

Saturday morning was our Chicken Decision Day. We decided which breeds we wanted and then we placed our order. Can you believe that we will be getting our chicks in the mail! It's like the Stork Delivery Tale in real life!:) We ordered 6 hens and 2 roosters. So around April 21-22 we'll get a special delivery of chicks. We'll actually get around 29 chicks in all. Because we combined our order with Leif's brother's 21 chicks. YEP! 21! Here are some photos of our chickens. They are going to be fun!

Araucanas/Americanas: These chickens are known as the "Easter Egg Chickens" because they lay multi-colored eggs (blue and green colors.)We ordered 2 of these because they will be so fun!

Golden Laced Wyandottes:We ordered a hen and a rooster of this breed.







Crested Chicken: There are several types of Crested Chickens. We aren't sure which one we will get. We hope it's this color. We ordered a hen and rooster of this breed.


Red Star: This is our classic brown egg laying hen.







Partridge Cochin: This is our Mother Hen. She'll lay eggs. But we'll eventually let her raise chicks. She is the classic mother hen.


When the chicks arrive we will keep them inside for just over one month. Then they will move outside into the coop that we've made/are making for them. It will be a new experience for me. But I think it will be a good one!