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Thursday, March 17, 2016

Shearing Day

  I have been waiting for this day for over a year now.  I knew when I bought my first three sheep last spring that shearing would be a challenge.  Not many people in the Deep South have wool sheep.  I have noticed that it is mostly hair sheep that are raised here.



I found a guy that travels around the country shearing.  He is also from North Carolina, not far from my home town.  It figures I would have to move to Alabama to find a shearer from North Carolina.   I had to be referred and luckily the lady i bought the sheep from also used him, so she referred me.  I got on the list and now I had to wait until he had time to come down south.


                                              



I happened to be the first private farm on his list and he showed up last Friday afternoon.  I didn't know what to expect but we had the sheep penned and waiting for him.  He moved in his large piece of equipment that ran his clippers and set down to shaving the sheep.  One by one he grabbed them and sat them on their bottoms.  The sheep never panicked and actually sat very still while he set to his work.  

I was impressed as I watched him roll the sheep around the floor while taking off their winter coats.  It was fascinating to watch.  I only have six sheep so it only took about 45 minutes and he was done.  Luckily, I was able to worm them before he turned them loose so I got to kill two birds with one stone.  It made that nasty job much easier.


Now I have a pile of wool in my barn that I am not sure what I am going to do with.  I am currently looking for someone who might be able to make it into yarn for me.  I love to knit and it would be really nice to be able to make something from the wool grown right here on my own farm.  We will see.

Saturday, March 12, 2016

New Life and Losses

I haven't written for awhile, actually it has been about a month, because I didn't know how to begin.  I have been very busy with the farm now that spring is finally coming around and haven't had the time to write.
It is kidding and lambing season and the goats decided that February would be a good time to have babies.  Ivy went first and had a big beautiful boy full of moon spots.  She had one boy last season and kidded very easily, and I am thankful for that.  So many things can go wrong, but this time it was easy for her and me.


That same afternoon, Violet decided she wanted to go and she had triplets.  I was stunned because she didn't look that big.  I was sure it was twins, but triplets! And to top it off she had two that were polled.  Violets little boy was also polled.  I was ecstatic.  That meant I didn't have to disbud them which I hate doing.  Everyone settled in and were doing great.  Violet was handling the triplets with ease and things started to quite down.




Exactly one week later, Diva went into labor.  She is an old pro at kidding so I was really excited to see what she was going to give me.  I put her in the barn, thinking she was in early labor, only to come back a few minutes later to two babies on the ground.  One of them was stillborn, the other one was doing well.  I stayed with her and a few minutes later she had two more.  Another one was stillborn.  Diva still looked awfully big and I thought there might be another, but she was finished.  Four babies and only two survived.  I was heartbroken.  She ended up with a boy that looked exactly like the daddy and a little girl that looked exactly like her.  I was thrilled.  I left the barn that night very happy.  Little did I know that things would go very wrong very quickly.



The next day, I found one of my sheep away from the herd.  I was concerned and went to check it out.  She was having a hard time breathing and had a lot of mucous coming from her mouth and nose.  I got my husband to help carry her to the porch and I spent the rest of the day and night doing everything I could to help her.  I called a vet but couldn't find anyone to come help me; I was frantic and felt helpless. She passed away in the middle of the night.  I was devastated.


The next morning, I went to check on the goats.  I went into the barn and Diva was laying on her side.  She was dead.  I lost it at that moment.  What could have gone wrong?  She was fine when I checked on her before I went to bed.  Now I have two kids that have no mom.  I cried and cried.  I lost two of my animals in a matter of hours.  I was starting to question if this life was for me.


A few days later, one of the ewes went into labor and I had my first little lamb born on the farm .  It is a boy and he is so stinking cute.  That little life helped me with how low I was feeling.


I decided to let Diva's little girl go to a family that bought from me last year.  I was going to keep her, but after thinking about what direction I wanted the farm to go in, I let her go.  It was very hard for me to part with her.  She was all that I had left of Diva.  I loved Diva and I still miss her terribly.


We have sold all of the kids from this season and I have also sold the lamb.  They will all go to their new homes as soon as they are weaned.  I am hoping to have more lambs sometime this spring.  I also purchased three new doelings to add to the one doeling that I am retaining.  I am hoping the rest of the season will be uneventful.  I love new life, it is full of promise.  

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

Sheep

 This past Saturday was a busy one around the farm.  Lots of things were being delivered to start new building projects and hay to get us through the rest of the winter.  We also had sheep come to the farm  to start our Babydoll herd.

     I fell in love with Babydoll sheep when I went to get my Nigerian goats almost two years ago.  I didn't get any at that time but I knew I wanted to try sheep on the farm.  Last year we added three sheep and I was hooked.
  

I didn't realize that I wanted to mainly do sheep until this fall.  I wasn't sure how I was going to accomplish this because Babydoll sheep are not very common and very expensive.  I put myself on a couple of waiting lists at different farms hoping to get lambs to grow my herd this spring.  I felt like I would have time to save up some money to buy two maybe three ewes in April or May.  

                       

Christmas came and went and I settled into planning for the new year, when I saw a post from the farm that I bought my ram from.  They were selling their entire herd of Babydoll sheep which consisted of three ewes and two Rams.  The timing couldn't have been more perfect as wer were expecting a settlement check from a car accident we had last year.  


I immediately sent a message to this farm and put a deposit down on the herd.  I was also informed that all three of the ewes were heavily pregnant and we hope to have healthy lambs on the ground in the middle of March.  I am hoping that my ewe is also pregnant even though I haven't seen signs of her being in heat this fall.  I am so excited at the thought of having lambs this spring.


Now that the deposit was put on them, my thoughts turned to where i was going to house and pasture them.  We have been slowly clearing land in order to make pastures for the animals that we already had but I was adding more animals to the mix and I knew I would need to make room without damaging what little pasture we had. 

Needless to say, the check from the settlement didn't come as quickly as had been promised so the clearing and the fencing didn't happen before the sheep needed to be delivered.  Saturday came and so did the sheep.  I was so excited and nervous to be dramatically increasing my herd all at once.


We also inherited a two year old Great Pyrenees female that had been with the sheep and I am hoping that she will be a LGD for them.  So far she only wants to be with us in the house instead of outside doing her job.  Time will tell if she will be the working dog that we were hoping for.  At least she gets along well with all of the other animals.


So now the next step to the farm begins.  We have started raising a small barn to house the goats and the sheep as they go into labor in the next few weeks.  It shouldn't take too long to complete and I am very glad we will have somewhere to house all the new babies that are due in the next month or so.  I have found a shearer to come to the farm next month to shed everyones winter coat in time for the Alabama heat.  I feel like I am getting more organized as I find my direction for the farm.   Time will tell if all this works as well as I hope it will.

Thursday, January 28, 2016

Big changes

Big changes are coming to the farm this weekend.  I had an opportunity to adopt a small herd of sheep from another homesteader and I jumped at the chance.  I never saw myself as a sheep farmer but after we rehomed the pigs I needed direction for this little piece of paradise I call home.



I always thought I wanted goats for the farm and I do love the four Nigerian Dwarfs that we have but I have fallen in love with the two Southdown Babydoll sheep that I add just about a year ago.  They are wool sheep that are compact in size and are very easy on fencing.   Their cute little faces greet me when I go to feed them everyday. 

I recently read a book called "Sylvia's Farm" which made me reconsider sheep on my farm.  I love how the author describes her farm and the animals she takes care of.  I felt an instant connection to her and her animals.  I would love to go visit upstate New York just to see her farm.



I can't wait for this weekend.  Now to create more fenced in pasture and housing.  We will have lambs this spring.  Three maybe four of the ewes are pregnant which is scary and exciting all at once.  I just hope the weather cooperates so we don't have babies while it is cold.

Monday, January 18, 2016

A Day at Grammy's School

    I had been given a gift of being able to stay home with my children while they grew up.  I had also been given a gift of being able to homeschool them throughout their academic years.  I loved every minute of being with them and learning right along side of them.  They are now all in college or have graduated from college and I couldn't be more proud of them. 


                             
                                         
           
                                      

                                                

                                               
                                          

                                   



My oldest daughter and her husband are now having to face the immense decision of whether or not to put their own children in public school or to homeschool them.   The public schools in Alabama are not the greatest to say the least, but they both work and can not see how they could go to a one income household having four small boys. 


I offered to homeschool my grandchildren so that they could have the same opportunities that my children had.  It was a hard decision for me.  I just finished homeschooling six children and the thought of starting over is exciting yet daunting.  

I have learned a lot over the years and I can't wait to do things I wish I had done with my own children. There are a lot of new curriculums on the market and lots of different methods that I didn't know about when I was teaching my own children. 


So for now, I am doing preschool and we are having a ball.  I am using sensory bins and lots of manipulatives to encourage learning while playing.  I can't wait to see where this leads in the next few months.

Saturday, January 16, 2016

The bathroom



We have been living in the house for two years now and we still have a lot of work to do on the inside.  We took the opportunity of family coming to visit for Thanksgiving to get the bathroom remodeled.  We have been wanting to remodel it but we get so busy with keeping the animals happy that we never get around to making ourselves comfortable.


The last people to live in the house decided to paint the walls and shower surround with milk chocolate brown paint.  We are not sure why they did this except maybe to cover all the dirt and mildew instead of actually cleaning it.  The cabinet used for a sink was crooked and falling apart with a green laminated countertop.  There is a window in the bathroom but no ventilation fan so it stays damp most of the time.  The only part that we liked is the original cast iron tub that desperately needs to be refinished.  



We started by ripping down the plastic mobile home sheets that were being used as a tub surround.  They reminded me of what you would see in a trailer.  Under the sheets, we found ship lap which  we would have loved to keep but we needed something that was waterproof.  We decided to use wooden beadboard instead but we needed to make it waterproof as well.  
We rebuilt the frame around the window with a farm house frame and I hope to do this in the rest of the house as we tackle each room.  All we did was stack lumber to create a very unique window surround.



We did some searching on the Internet and found someone who had used marine paint to waterproof wood in a shower.  Now, marine paint is not something easily found and it turned out to be quite expensive for such a small space, so we decided to use appliance epoxy instead.  We had seen it used on another web site and it seemed to work well.  



Appliance epoxy comes in a spray can and the fumes are terrible, not to mention that the paint gets everywhere.  If we had been smarter, we would have sprayed the paint into a container outside and then painted it on with a paint brush in the bathroom, but evidently we are not that smart.  


The paint did go on and we had to wait several hours before we could put on another coat.  This gave us time to recover from all of the fumes.  We still need to put on a third coat at some point but it seems to be holding up very well.
We used reclaimed barn wood to frame out the front of the tub to add character to the small room.  We also used the same wood to line the wall over the sink before we put the mirror up.  We love the look of the wood and we are so glad to be reusing wood from a shed that is on the property before we pull it down.



We also replaced the toliet and decided to put in a pedestal sink to maximize room.  My husband also built a bookcase at the back of the tub to give us more storage space.  We don't have a linen closet so we needed somewhere to put all of the bathroom clutter. 
We have been shopping at a local antique shop and we found a cabinet that works well above the toliet for more storage.  All of my essential oils and homemade beauty products fit very well there.



All in all, we are very happy with the way the bathroom turned out.  We still need to refinish the tub but it is okay for now.  We painted the walls a very pale blue, which we don't like but we will repaint soon.  It is a small space but it ended up with a lot of character.
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