HELP!!!BLOGGER ISSUES

I need help.  I'm trying to get rid of a few blogs that I follow.  It used to be so easy. Now I don't have a clue, I can't find the follow button, to unfollow. Kwim?

Help!
Lisa

Balancing Rock

Well for my birthday I wanted to go on a hike.  I've always wanted to go to Balancing Rock. It's really an amazing natural wonder.

Dave wasn't very into it, but I convinced him.  He's not a very outdoorsy person.  I love going for walks.  Well I didn't realize it was a hike...not a walk!  A 2.4 km trail ONE WAY to be exact and then 235 steps going down, down, down. But it was fun.

We even got to go on a ferry to get there.

Looking nice and fresh at the beginning.

Starting the trek down the steps

Almost there!!!!

Ta Dah!!! Balancing Rock.

I got a man there to take a family photo. Can you tell it was a bit windy?

J. is a good photographer.

Have a Blessed Day!
Lisa

A camping we will go!!!

Well since I'm on vacation we decided to go camping at a real campground for the weekend. It's not far from our house so we can go back and forth to milk the goats and take care of the animals.

We went Friday night  and all was going well till J. crashed with his bike!  According to eye witness accounts he went flying over the handle bars and rolled several times.  One of the kids came running to get us. Thank goodness he was wearing a motorcycle helmet and not a bicycle helmet or he'd have a concussion also.

He banged up his leg bad.  We had a paramedic camping two lots from us so he came over and bandaged him up.

EMS to the rescue

After a few days still not looking nice.

When things had finally calmed down, J. sat by the fire.  Don't you think a spark landed on his toe! Needless to say he went to bed.

The chef making breakfast

On Saturday, things were going relatively well. We went home to clean J.'s leg properly.  Dave said, "I wonder if they still make that spray bandage?" The reasoning behind it was he'd still be able to go swimming. So off to the pharmacy we go.  They still make it.

We go back to the camp lot.  Dave leaves to give the dogs a walk and I'm left to spray that stuff on J.  So he's sitting on the picnic table when he says, "Is this going to hurt." 

I'm like, "I don't know. I've never used this stuff."  (I should have looked at the ingredients that said....alcohol!)

So anyway, he's sitting on the picnic table holding his bad knee and I spray the stuff. Wellllllll....he's not a drama queen or anything.  His good knee goes flying into his forehead almost knocking him out! (Potential concussion number 2)

I'm a bad mother....I started to laugh.  Well I'm sorry but it was so funny!  

He gives me this look and I think oops! Then he starts to laugh.  Phew!

That night Dave got tie outs for the dogs and he needed pliers and wrenches for the bolts and what nots. 

Right before going to bed, Dave tells J., "Put your helmet and the pliers in the car for now." 

So J. put the pliers and the wrenches AND his 5 lb jack knife in his helmet and then puts the helmet in the car.  

Can you see where this is going....

The next morning J.  says, "I'm going for a bike ride!" Takes his helmet out of the car and puts it on his head. Concussion number THREE!

The pliers and wrenches and his 5 lb jack knife come tumbling on his head!  

He didn't cry or even get angry.  He just looked at us (We were really trying hard not to laugh again) and just burst out laughing.  

We're supposed to go camping again next weekend only we've hired the goat sitter so we're going further.  We are also going horseback riding. J. has never been.  

We might have to sell the mansion on wheels after next weekend. Since J. seems to be so accident prone around it.  

To be continued......

Sun, floppy hat, and Martha Stewart magazine.  Life is good.

 Have a Blessed Day!

Lisa

Emilie loving camping.

Simonne tolerating camping.

I'm this close........

to selling everything!  We got nice hay, 142 bales of it.  But we've noticed that it's looking funny.  It's gone from pale green to silver and full of dust.  Everyone is telling us that it's full of mold.  But it doesn't smell moldy and it's not all like that.  So I have no idea what to do.  When you open it up dust just poofs out of it.  But again, it doesn't smell musty or moldy.  What would you guys do?  Have any of you farmers seen this before?

Now for the chickens.  They have mites!! We've burnt the inside of their pen and dusted with insecticide dust from top to bottom and we've also dusted the chickens.  I thought they were all gone and then yesterday J. went in the coop and came out covered.  It was creepy.  Bugs don't scare me but things like this freak me out!  So this means more money that we don't have to spend on the chickens.  The new pullets are in the goat barn now and they're clean.  They're in cramped quarters but they're clean, so they're going to have to stay there for a while yet.  I'm not going to move them yet.

I really don't know what to do.  Do I get rid of the chickens?  I've been told that once you've got mites you can't get rid of them unless you leave your coop empty for 3 years.  I didn't believe them, but I'm starting to now. I'm just sick of all this stuff.

I'm on vacation now so I guess I know what I'll be doing with the rest of it. Bugger.

Have a Blessed Day
Lisa

Febe

I've been neglectful of my blogging duties and I have so many things to say so I'm going to have to do a couple of posts in the next few days.

This post is very hard to write.

It's been a long time coming. Febe's CAE has finally taken it's toll and I couldn't stand watching her suffer anymore.

We've had the farrier come and do her hooves for a year now. She would come and trim them in a way that would take the pressure off her knees.  But even though we would keep them trimmed in between visits, we noticed in the last month or so that the outer part of the hoof was growing at an alarming rate.  It was also growing so hard that we couldn't trim, cut or even use the rasp to get it back. 

Almost overnight it grew an inch and curled under. She was walking on her knees. She couldn't even stand up long enough for me to milk her.  That's bad since with the milking machine it only takes 3 minutes.

Our farrier told us that she's found that goats with CAE seem to have this problem and it can't be stopped.

So I told Dave to take her and get her put down.

That night, Maggie, her daughter, took over Febe's stall.  She cried and cried, so Dave put Febe's collar in the pen and she calmed down.  So I went to visit Maggie and I cried and cried.  But nothing could calm me down.  I kept thinking if there was anything else I could have done. I know in my head I did everything possible, but my heart kept searching.

Welcome to farming.

We have kept Febe's hide and we will be making a drum out of her.  So her feisty spirit will live on. 

 Already  Maggie has taken over her mother's place in the herd even though she's not the biggest goat. Maggie might not look like her mom but she's got her attitude.  I like that.

Our last day together.

Have a Blessed Day

Lisa

AND THE WINNER IS........

First I want to apologize for not posting sooner.  You know....life happens.


But without further ado....

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the winner is......................
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Carolyn Renee!!!!!!!Please email me your mailing address so I can get those in the mail tomorrow!

I had a ball doing this.  I'm going to have to find something else for people to guess.  I want to thank all that sent in a guess or became followers and put links to my blog.

For those of you who didn't know what it was, it was a dried up goat testicle. Ya, I know I'm kinda gross. But hey, that's farming life!

Have a Blessed Day
Lisa

Giveaway!!!

I've had alot of response to my giveaway....it's almost done.  If you haven't entered yet, now is the time!!!

Get details here.

Giveaway!!!!

Ok, this is my first Giveaway!

To get one chance I need you to email me and let me know what this is.........

Don't post it below because I don't want to giveaway the answer. So instead Email me at

springpeeperfarm@eastlink.ca

Put  in the subject line what you think it is.

To get another ballot if you're not a follower, become one.  Just let me know that you're a new follower in the comments section.

To get a third ballot, link this post on your blog.  Again let me know in the comments.

You've got till July 14th at 9pm A.S.T.

The winner will receive 3 wonderful, luxurious, handmade by moi and my man...

hold on to your hats!!!! 

Goat's milk soaps!!!

Who would have thunk it.?! Soap, whoa.

So anyway I'm just curious to see who knows what this is.

I know what it is. It's the first time I've ever found one.

Good Luck Everyone!!!And make sure you check back on the eve of July 14th!

Have a Blessed Evening

Lisa

Spring Peeper Gets a Special Visit

One thing I just LOVE about having a farm is when people come to visit.  We love getting company.  But sometimes in life you get a really special person to visit.

A friend of mine, Ginger, has a son with metachromatic leukodystrophy.

(say that 5 times fast)

She asked me if they could come and visit the farm. I said no problem. We'd love to have you guys!

Garrett was diagnosed with metachromatic leukodystrophy when he was 5 years old. He'll be 15 this Sunday. He was in a wheelchair within 6 months and had a feeding tube within 9 months and could no longer speak after 11 months.  At 15 years old he only weighs 40 lbs.

This is a brutal illness. It's robbed Garrett of his childhood and has created more stress in a family that anyone could ever imagine.

His family is amazing, but his mother Ginger, is the one to be admired.  She has done so much for her son. She takes care of him 24/7.  She doesn't get much respite from healthcare.  I don't think she's even ever considered putting him in an institution.

He needs frequent suctioning and constant re-positioning. 

What breaks my heart is that Garrett understands everything.  I cannot even begin to imagine what he's going through.  

Just close yours eyes for a minute and imagine not being able to move, to eat, to swallow, to speak, to make your needs understood, to be at the mercy of everyone around you. You can't even toss and turn at night.  You're trapped. You're trapped in a body that has betrayed you.

No I cannot imagine.

But this is what this kid is going through everyday.

We can only thank our Lord that he has a wonderful family that loves him and would do anything for him. 

I'm not going to go through the problems Ginger has with healthcare and getting help physically, mentally and financially. Because that would probably take a book, not just a short post.

I just wanted to bring awareness to this illness and to Garrett.

Happy Birthday Garrett! You've come a long way baby.

Garrett petting Denise our new kid

Ginger helping Garrett hold a chick

Ginger making donkey sounds to get Garrett to smile.

Going for a donkey ride...kind of

Have a Blessed Evening

Lisa

Canada Day weekend!

It's been a busy weekend.  I can't believe I survived it!

First of all Stockings was 5 days overdue. Of course. Why can't these goats kid on their due date.  The problem was that we were bringing Tomas to the airport in Halifax so he could go home. 

The lady I had to milk had never seen a goat born or delivered or anything. So I gave her a head's up on what to expect.  Denise was a good sport about it and had my cell number on her cell speed dial. 

I was still at work when I got the call.  J. and Tomas had stumbled upon Stockings and her newborn doeling, but since she was supposed to have twins, they thought that the long thing hanging on her behind was a dead kid.  Dave wasn't at home at the time.  He was gone to drop off the dogs at my mom's.  So I called him in a panic to high tail it home! He was closer than I was. 

To make a long story short.  That wasn't a dead kid stuck. It was just the afterbirth.  But the problem was that by this time we needed to leave and we still only had one kid and Stockings wouldn't let the doeling suckle.  Not a great scenario.  So I got on the horn and called our pastor. He's got goats and used to work on a dairy farm. So not much fizzes him.  He said he'd come and check on her. I also called our other goats friends and they would come and check on her also and try to get her to nurse.

In the mean time I called Denise and told her what was going on and that we had to leave. I was not happy leaving.  I wanted to stay home, but Dave insisted that I go with them.  

So between the three of them they got the doeling to nurse and the second one was never born.  I don't know if the vet made a mistake in the ultrasound (I hoping for this one), or she aborted it awhile ago, (which is very unlikely) or it's still in her (Gosh! I hope not!) but she's not showing signs of infection. I honestly didn't think that she had twins in her in the first place since she was so small.

So Denise kept calling me all evening to keep me informed and up to date on everything. She did a great job. She even asked me if she should go check on her around midnight.  I told her to go to bed!   

So guess what we called the doeling.....

Please meet Denise!

So we slept overnight in Halifax because Tomas' flight was at 5am.  He had to be there 2 hours ahead of time so that meant we had to get up at 2am.  I never sleep well in hotels so I got a total of an hour's sleep that night before I had to get up.  We left Tomas and headed home at around 4am.  It's a 3 hour drive home. We took turns driving or else we'd fall asleep. Plus Dave cannot drive for long periods now with his arm/shoulder the way it is.  We stopped in to see his dad and do a bit a grocery shopping so we got home at 9am.  We were zonked!!  We were supposed to go camping for the first time that night at a friend's campsite.  We did go, but we needed to nap first. We only got there around 6pm. 

Ya think he's zonked!???

A little while ago we bought a cute second hand camper.  So this was our trial run.  We even brought the dogs with us.  But we had to go home and milk the goat still. So that was a small pain in the butt. But all in all it turned out pretty good and we will be camping again.  Our friend said that we could camp there for July. But we didn't want to overstay our welcome, so we brought it home. We'll go again another weekend.

The Mansion on wheels.

J. enjoying early morning fishing from their verandah.

These people's camp is bigger than most people's houses. It's beautiful.  I didn't want to post photos to respect their privacy so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Simonne sunbathing on the lakeside and Emilie trying to find something to eat as usual.

So we came home on Monday all tired and dirty, but we had fun.  It was a wonderful family weekend, the first of many more to come now that I'm done with the farmer's market.  

One bad thing when I got home was that I checked on my spinach and it had already bolted.  I never got a chance to enjoy it!  The carrots didn't even germinate. I'm so not impressed!

Have a Blessed Evening

Lisa