The Birthday Parties

Maisie got two birthday parties yesterday! We tried to do her party at 2:00 thinking that might be the warmest part of the day.  Turns out this is more of a Happy Hour crowd and that party sort of flopped.  Not to fear, Reg "baked" another cake and we had a birthday party re-do around 4:30 and a good time was had by all.  

The first party wasn't a complete bust.  Maisie enjoyed eating some birthday cake, but most of her friends didn't realize it was party time so they were heading out to graze the front field and she wanted to go with them.  If you are the birthday girl (or pretty much any time), you get to make the rules.

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A post shared by Sara Dunham (@thecrazysheeplady)

I had technical difficulties with the live and recorded video with the first party, so I didn't even try to use my phone for the second party...and that may have been the best gift of the day.  I dusted off the Big Girl Camera and took actual pictures just like in the olden times.  

Love her little pink nose.  That's Andy in the front.

I love sweet Baba on the right, politely waiting her turn.

Walking out into the middle of this crowd carrying a box of "cake" is not for the faint of heart.   I always forget how big Murphy (at Reg's left elbow) is.  Jared, in front of her, is not small.  Muffin, in the background, is not small either, but she's doesn't like to get bounced around in the mosh pit so I snuck her a cookie later.

Reg shared with everyone, but made sure the birthday girl got the biggest share ;-).

Baaxter loves Auntie Reg.  Liddy's just there for the "cake" ;-).

Now that was a party!

Happy Birthday, silly Maisie :-)

It's A Party!

Our Hug a Sheep Day farm party will be a virtual party this year.  As long as I can get the tech stuff figured out, I think it's actually going to be pretty fun :-).  The sheep's schedule is grazing and socializing in the early morning, napping for the rest of the morning, a cookie party at 11:00, more napping, another cookie party at 2:00 and then hiding while Maisie has to gets to dress up in a Halloween costume at 3:00.

For the rest of us, there will also be a fleece "show and sell" at 1:00.  We still have several Punkin's Patch fleeces needing a good home before winter and I picked up the Rocky and Jared bred fleeces from Tring Farm the other day and there are some really pretty ones that would like to be adopted as well.  I thought it might be fun to set them all out on the porch and take a little peek :-).

Against even my own best judgement, we are going to dress Maisie in her costume live at 3:00.  We aren't going to do a test run ahead of time...mostly because I haven't even made it yet.  There is no telling what will happen, but I'm sure it will be hilarious, no matter which Maisie shows up this year.  We are probably tempting fate on this one.  I hope I don't need to add a trip to the ER to the schedule :-o.

Everything will be happening live on Instagram.  I think I'll be able to share a link to Facebook after each "event" is over, but if you want to watch it live, you'll have to use Instagram.  I'm hoping I can post them all over here as well, but I've got to get that all figured out.  

I'm estimating each event will last 10-30 minutes. Feel free to join in at any time and come and go as you please :-).

 

"Y'all Come!"

Summer is always trying. This summer seems to be trying extra hard.  

The latest trouble, skipping over several things, was a stray dog coming on the farm Saturday.  He made a run at the horses in the morning.  I chased him away.  He appeared back in the evening and came in on the sheep.  We tried to catch him that time, but he got spooked by some fireworks and bolted away.

Without a good guardian like Hank, we are going to have to take extra measures to try to keep our sheep safe until a time when we can find a new dog.  And finding a new dog may be nearly impossible because of a situation with the new house built right on our front field fence line.  I set up a camp.

The first thing we did was lock the sheep up in the secure paddocks near the barn.  A dog or coyote could still get in if they really worked at it, but hopefully it would be too much trouble or at least slow them down enough to give me a chance to intervene.  We put the tent on a clean(ish) patch of level gravel.

Big Moose was immediately involved so we moved the tent back  to straddle the short fence and took two jug panels and built a wall around the front half.

He is so silly.  I just love this sheep :-).

From there it deteriorated, because you can either laugh or cry, and Biscuit is ready to welcome everyone to the Equinox Farm vacation B&B.  The sunsets over the barn roof are stunning!

You can have an up close and probably personal encounter with Maisie.  What a face, eh?  (Click to biggify)

You can watch the full moon rise and travel over the farm.  Definitely a highlight!

A slightly better picture, but not much.  The moon was so big and so bright.  A cell phone just can't capture it.  I never needed a flashlight and as it reached it's peak height over my tent, maybe 2:00, it was so bright that every time I woke up and looked across the barn lot, I could see everyone and everything.  So much better than fireworks.  

I thought of Hank off and on throughout the night.  He and I would often sit together on the hill and watch the farm on bright nights.  It was one of my very favorite things, even in the winter.  The last picture I took of him was him resting next to me under a bright full moon.  I wish I'd thought to camp out with him all night even just once.

The next morning I woke to the sound of Petunia's bell and turned over to see the sheep grazing in the arena.  They'd quietly tiptoed past me and let me sleep in.

Good morning!

I watched for the dog on Sunday and did not see him again.  That evening a neighbor found a promising post in the missing pets group on FB.  I contacted the owner to make sure it was indeed the same dog, now safely at home and back in his electric fenced yard.  It had been scared by fireworks.  Fingers crossed we never see him again.

Other than the gorgeous full moon and the fun of sleeping in the sheep yard (which was actually fun even with the bugs and hot weather), the best story from all of this was what Rocky and Jared did to try to protect their flock.  I told it on an IG video post last night.  You should be able to follow along.

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A story of how Rocky and Jared protected the flock last night and some more details about the stray dog and the camp out.

A post shared by Sara Dunham (@thecrazysheeplady) on Jul 5, 2020 at 4:57pm PDT

Shearing Shots

Another spring shearing is in the books and this may have been our best shearing yet.  The fleeces are a little messier than I'd like, but they aren't terrible.  The weather, with the excessive rain and several high wind events, has been extra challenging this winter.  

Bill, our shearer for the past...many years...has stopped shearing.  Without his big shearing trailer with it's ramps and chutes to rely on, both Tring Farm and Final Frontier Farm had to set up in-barn working systems to handle their big flocks.  

I watched how both set ups worked out and decided to set up a similar system over here.  Tring Farm kindly loaned us all the gates and panels we needed and helped design the areas and angles and it worked a treat.  

The sheep were all penned in the aisleway stall which funneled into a small catch pen which funneled into the chute which fed into a tiny catch pen where the sheep were then turned around and backed out onto the shearing board.

The fleeces might have been messier than I'd like, but the shearing itself went great.  Taylor Schwartz came over from Mayslick, Kentucky, and did an outstanding job with our, um, challenging interesting flock.  I've got more pictures to post tomorrow.

Cheeto

Big Moose marched into the holding pen...and then decided maybe he really didn't want to be the next sheep in the barber chair.

All those beautiful baby curls :'-(.

Even prettier on the inside.

Mini Moose watching.  I have a video to upload of Big Moose being sheared, but the internet is so slow tonight that I barely got these pictures loaded.  You can hear Mini Moose calling to him.  First hair cuts are probably a bit scary.

"They are."

Remember Mini Moose's dark gray stripe running down his shoulders as a lamb?  It's still there!  I'll try to remember to take a picture tomorrow.

Tabitha

Count Chocula

Big J aka Jared

Good old Salt.  I think I've taken a shearing day picture of her at Final Frontier Farm every year for the last...many years.  Seemed kind of funny to be taking a picture of her on our farm.  Seemed kind of funny to not be shearing with Bill, too, but that worked out as well.  

A Stupid Post With Some Good Pictures

I have been working on this post for over an hour and I just can't get it to flow.  I need to get back to work, so here is just the series of pictures from the other morning. 

This is Jared and Big Moose.  I'm wanting to tell the story about why Jared is grazing in the yard and how Big Moose idolizes him and followed him out there and how Big J reacts to that and how their two personalities and even appearances are so similar even though the chances of them being actually related are pretty slim and how...blah blah blah...

"We're out of time.  We'll try to do better the next time."  Tony Kornheiser, PTI

Our 15 Minutes Of [Snow]

We enjoyed it while it lasted :-).

Mini Moose and Chocula

Big J aka Jared

The little darlin' ;-).  And I think that's Mini Moose.

Big Moose.  He's just so fun to photograph.  What expression.  

Chocula, Tessa and Tabitha.  Chocula was picking hay of Tessa's back.  I'll have to up his pay :-).

Liddle

Petunia and Tessa

And a new puzzle!

Drizzly Day(s)

This group was the last to run in during the latest shower.  I always think it's interesting to see who pairs up with who.  The Jacobs always stay together and I love that old Clover Belly is welcomed into their "clique".  Rocky and Jared, Woody and the Mooses are mixed in this time.  The Adventure Sheep ain't scared of no rain...or much rain ;-).

Two new puzzles for everyone who's not as adventurous :-).

Good Morning!

Everyone's in their spot.  Rocky at the gate, waiting for breakfast, Jared standing at the ready, Maisie and Cheeto, relaxing in the warm sun.  Cheeto is watching me carefully to see if it's time to get up for breakfast, though.  The chickens are scratching around in the straw, but mostly happy for the sunshine.  Three cold mornings.  We are all happy here :-).