One Year.

One year ago yesterday, I married my favorite man in the whole wide world.  We had an amazing first year together.  Although it was rough at times, we learned so much about each other--and about ourselves!  I can honestly say that I love and respect him more each day that I know him.  

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He was a pretty cute kid, but unfortunately I didn't know him back then. ;)  Thankfully he hasn't really changed much...

I guess I was pretty cute, too...

We always find ways to entertain ourselves in situations where, for example, we are iced in with 14 other people for a whole week over Christmas break.

We've had lots of great adventures together--we even got to sit next to Ernest Hemingway on a boat tour in Key West!

And most importantly, it is very important to us to take care of our skin together.  Get rid of those blackeads! ;)

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Thank you, Davy, for a wonderful friendship and a wonderful first year!  You're a butthead, and I love you.

Thank you, Lord, for blessing us with the richness of our companionship.  May it always honor You.

Bessie

p.s.

My sister Jenny recording the guitar lick.  She is an amazing musician!

Jenny, Davis and I recorded a cover of Ingrid Michaelson's "They Way I Am" last night.  

Check it out here (just click on the correct song title)!

The Way I Am

Udder Changes

Ok, I apologize in advance to those of you who do not particularly enjoy viewing goat butts. ;)  Just concentrate more on the udder, which is the part that we are going to be discussing in this post. 

Irma is getting very close to having her baby.  I don't know exactly when she was bred (stupid Bessie!), so I don't have a definitely "due date", but you can tell when a doe is getting closer by physical signs, such as an udder that is getting increasingly bigger and tighter. 

Here are some pics of the progression of Irma's udder growth over the past month.  Enjoy!

January 27th: Itty bitty udder!

January 30th

February 3rd

February 5th

February 10th:  Nice and round, but not stretched or tight looking.  The udder still looks pretty hairy, even though I had recently shaved it. 

February 18th: Fast-forward eight days and we have a much tighter, less hairy-looking udder. 

February 19th: And a little bigger...

February 21st (today): Earlier today Irma's udder looked like it hadn't changed much.  However by this evening it was MUCH larger and tighter.  See how stretched it looks?  Kinda shiny?  Yep.  She has got to go soon!

Well, I hope that was interesting to at least some of you! ;)  I have been learning so much about goats lately, and things like this are just fascinating to me.  Call me crazy.

Have a lovely night!

Bessie

For those of you who like watching baby goats frolic...

Here is a new video of Hana from today.  She is so dang cute, I can hardly stand it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvzsnei3rds

Bessie

Doings Around the Farm

Went to the Bread Beckers today to stock up on grain and supplies, and bought some grains to experiment with in feeding my goats.  I have been thinking about feeding my own grain mixture and reading up a bit on it, and decided to just go for it.  I feed myself whole grains because the nutritional benefits are so amazing, so why not my animals too?

Using several different recipes I found online as a guideline, I mixed up a batch of grains to start slowly incorporating into my goat's daily feed.  I used hard red wheat, barley, oat groats, black oil sunflower seeds, and a bit of flax seed.  The goaties seemed to love it--gobbled it right down!

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In other news, I finally finished building my milking stanchion yesterday!  It turned out great.  Well, I suppose some could critique my building skills (which are not very much developed yet, I am sad to say), but I am proud of myself for doing as well as I did. ;)  I used the free instructions over at Fias Co Farm.  You can find them here.  If you do download these instructions, consider making a donation to Fias Co Farm as a "thank you" for all the great free goat keeping information they supply!

Here are some pictures of my finished project:

"Any food left in here?"

 Little Hana is doing great.  She is learning how to jump up on things now, and I keep looking out and catching her dancing around her pen, jumping up on the porch of the goat house, etc.  So cute!  

You can see Hana in the background--she was resting from all of her fun jumping around!

 She has such lovely markings over her eyes.  Buttercream has the same markings, but they are hard to see because they are dark cream on light cream. 

Irma is looking closer and closer.  Her little udder is tighter today, but her ligaments are still pretty hard.  I am HOPING she goes this week, because I am off of work and will be home to help out if need be.  Please Irma?

Her udder is lookin' good!

And lastly, Davis built a little deck out from the duplex house for the dogs and goats to play on.  Desmond really likes it. ;)

Have a great weekend!

Bessie

Hana--One Day Old.

And snuggled up in her cozy little house. :)

Here is a video of her from today.  I apologize in advance--don't know what's wrong with the vid, but it is a bit choppy for some reason. 

Hana is only nursing out of one side of Buttercream's udder, and will not hear of trying the other side no matter how much I try to bribe her.  I finally had to just milk out the other side myself, to relieve pressure for poor Buttercream.  It. Was. So. Cool.  I have always wanted to try milking, and it was so easy!  Just squirted right out!

I actually purchased all of my milking equipment several weeks ago.  I won't begin milking Buttercream until Hana is two weeks old.  After that I will milk her once a day, and let Hana nurse for the rest of the day.  

Hooray for farm life!  I love it so much.

Bessie

She's Heeeeeeere!

Today Buttercream gave birth to a beautiful little doeling!  We decided to name her Hana (Hah-nah), which is Korean for "First".  Thought it was fitting...:)

Hana is light brown with white moonspots and blue eyes.  She is gorgeous!  Her ears are very angora-like--long and floppy!  She is a little fluff ball.

Here are some pictures from the exciting day!

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Susanna comforted Buttercream, who had just started to push. 

The baby came out exactly right--two little hooves and a little head.  Once the head was out, she popped right out of there in a flash!  Buttercream did a great job.

This is Cael when he saw the baby for the first time.  Love his expression!

 John and Josh holding Hana...

She was up on her feet right away, very curious about this new place she was plunked out into.

I was so excited. :D

Isn't she beautiful?

So, it was an amazing day.  That is the first time I have really, hands-on experienced an animal birth, and it blew me away.  The wonder of a new life is simply breathtaking.

~Bessie

Update: not kids yet, and some other stuff of interest...

I married such a sweet guy.  Look what he made for me at school yesterday!

It's a goat!

The ocean is on the other side.

He is an education major, and made this in one of his classes (social studies and creative arts, I think?).  I'm not sure exactly what it is...some sort of wooden purse or letter holder? Anyway, I love it.  

He also found this CUTE pattern for me at a thrift store the other day...

I love him. :)

No kids yet!  I think Buttercream is crossing her legs because she knows how anxious I am for her to give birth.  She is determined to string this thing out until I am a mad-woman.  Then she will pop those babies out on Saturday when I have to be gone all day.  

Alas!

~Bessie

Why am I so bad at algebra?

I was encouraged--over the past few weeks I have actually bee doing pretty well with my algebra homework, usually making either  100 or in the 90's somewhere.  My overall score for the class was a 95.

Then I took my first test.

It was like a flashback to that first college algebra class I took--I just couldn't remember everything that I had learned so far.  I had even studied several hours before taking the test!  For some reason my brain simply refuses to hold onto that information.  I made a 70 on my test, which brought my overall score for the class down to 73%.  Ugh.

I just want to make a B this time.  That's all I ask.  Just a little B.

Good Music.

Anyone else LOVE James Taylor?

I've been listening to this record all day.  It has been a perfect compliment to my nice, quiet day at home. 

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"Well, there is a young cowboy he lives on the range
His horse and his cattle are his only companions
He works in the saddle and he sleeps in the canyons
Just waiting for Summer, his pastures to change..."

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Sigh!

Bessie

p.s. Still no baby goats...

The wait continues...but maybe not for long!

I am learning so much about pregnant goats.  Two weeks ago I thought I knew what to look for as signs for impending labor.  Now that I am actually seeing those signs, however, I feel silly for jumping the gun!

This is Buttercream three days ago.  See how her babies are still pretty high?

So Buttercream is really preparing to have her kids now.  Yesterday her belly dropped substantially, her ligaments that stretch from the tip of the spine to the pin bones on either side of her tail began to soften and get "mushy", and she spent the day doing a whole lot of stretching and yawning--trying to get those babies in position.  Today she looks much smaller around the middle--the babies have been positioned in the birthing canal.  I can't feel the babies anymore when I put my hand on her side.  She is still doing a whole lot of stretching, and I think she is having some contractions.  Her ligaments are now almost complete mush.

This is Buttercream yesterday.  Her belly had really dropped down.  Look how bony her hips appear!

Looking back at a couple weeks ago, I can see that I was checking things wrong, and thus miscalculated. Ah well!  Live and learn, right?

Maybe Buttercream will decide to have her babies today...whoopee!

I'll keep ya posted...

Bess