I Was a Goat Farmer

But the Lord took me from tending the flock and said to me,

"Go, prophesy to my people Israel."

Amos 7:15

I was a goat farmer when God called me. My days enjoyably consisted of tending my flock of critters and children, gardens and home, while I pursued what I thought was a deep walk with Christ: reading my Bible, attending church and prayer services, doing my duty in the nursery. Then God showed up with reality. Eternity appeared before us with a dose of acknowledgement that couldn't be ignored. The truths that God had been laying as a foundation in my life were now called upon to be lived out. He shook my world and called me to greater desires.

When the grace of God is poured out on a person there is no going back, only going deeper and closer to that Light. The world around you dulls in the presence of Jesus and the previously glittering distractions are no longer a lure. You have no choice but to want more. Not more of the world, but more of the moments when it is all about God's glory.

I don't know how to adequately describe the transformation. I don't know how to tell you what it feels like to be so close to Holiness where you are allowed to sense the very near presence of your Maker and still breathe. The day of Trent's death was a day of repentance. "I believe you now, God, help me overcome my unbelief." I thought I was living for Christ before that day. Now I only long to live for Him. To live with nothing here that I won't want to leave on the day that He calls me.

To live desperately needing God for everything is addictive and satisfying. But I don't have a need for God now in the same way that I did three years ago. I want to live where I need Him. I want my life to be poured out to walk like Jesus walked. I am excited to see how God plans to fulfill that longing in the days that I have left to live for Him alone.

"These are the words of Him who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars.

I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead.

Wake up!

Strengthen what remains and is about to die,

for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God.

Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard;

obey it, and repent.

But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief,

and you will not know at what time I will come to you."

Revelation 3:1-3

The Busy Season

We wake up tired these days and go to bed even more tired yet. The sun starts shining earlier, and sets later, and our bodies believe that they have to keep up with it. As long as that orbiting ball of fire is making its trek across the sky we assume that there must still be time to finish one more project.

The last of the seven bottle calves are close to being weaned. The vast difference between the couple months of their births making the red and white steer appear tiny in contrast to its more mature counterparts. The Black Angus are dwarfed under the Holsteins tall, lanky forms, their growth appearing outward rather than up.

There are still five does milking, with a total of thirteen goats in all. Too many bucks make up the lot of them, with one Craigslist reply away from reducing our herd. Soon it will be weaning time for the kids as well, which puts another item on the never ending list: more goat fencing.

Our young replacement pullets are thriving, and the new clutch of Silkie chicks are protected well under the wings of their possessive momma. One little black fluff ball doesn't realize it is a Light Brahma mix  that was adopted into the Bantam family when we snuck some extra eggs under the broody hen. Soon it will tower over its siblings.

The garden is growing weeds faster than edible plants it seems, and if we don't catch up on our daily barrage we may just have to give up. Using all manual labor, busy hands digging deep in the sandy soil to remove pesky roots, makes for buff muscles and nice farmers tans.

Several new fruit trees are growing well- four peach and another pear, plus some Saskatoon blueberries that the deer seem to have acquired a taste for which continue to remind me that tree fencing needs to be wrote on that list as well. We are attempting blueberries yet again, hoping for a freezer full of them one year. There may be at least a taste for everybody in a few days if we can keep the birds away from them.

Overall, it's been another season of missing. Intensely missing my son. Longing for eternity to begin.

Almost too tired to even grieve, the pain still refuses to end. Flashbacks enjoy popping into my weary brain lately, attacking when I have little resolve to fight them off. The balance of living before the accident and after is continuous. Life goes on. A mother's heart doesn't want to. Joy is rarely ever bereft of the longing. Laughter only hides the scar, still too fresh to ignore. Somehow living here, longing to be there. Finding purpose in one more calf bottle, pulling one more weed, storing up one more treasure, praying one more prayer for all these young souls that surround me, hoping for hope, waiting for what is not yet.

I continue to be reminded that the year of the Lord's favor will come. He will:

"Provide for those who grieve in Zion-

to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes,

the oil of gladness in the morning,

and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.

They will be called oaks of righteousness,

a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor."

Isaiah 61:3

1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 tells me to not grieve like those without hope, or even to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. I believe that Jesus died and rose again and also that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. The familiar words almost become rote in my tired state. I have repeated them so often that it becomes hard to make them exciting lately. I pray for God to wake me up to the gospel again, remembering those same words being uttered just before the accident.

Eternity.

I stop and ponder the word again. Eternity. Going insane wondering what Trent is doing there, wondering why mine is taking so long to begin. Wondering what to do in the meantime. Begging that my children would all be found there in Heaven together.

The Last of the Bunch

 

 Belle delivered twin bucks, the last of the bunch for this kidding season.
Oh my~ I do love those spots!

 

The Reality of Home School

 

 

This picture is  the epitome of our home school days: if something better comes along, forget the books and live life. "One more week, one more week, one more week," I keep repeating to myself, and I will (Lord willing, if not that will be okay, too) be done teaching first grade math concepts and basic phonic sounds. Yippee! The race is on between all the kiddos to finish their bookwork for the year. Many subjects have already been crossed off the list and some of them are down to the last few lessons before a summer break- can't wait!

Esther





2012 Esther and her twins



Let us not become weary in doing good,

for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9

February 15, 2013. That was the date I had wrote on the calender for Esther's due date. Over two months ago. Every day she was under scrutiny. Signs, no signs? We checked pretty consistently: swelling, ligaments, udder, anything? Looking at her big belly and trying to imagine the thoughts of God as He was designing His new creation inside that caprine womb. Maybe a sign, nope, definitely no signs.

Then a few weeks ago, once we had finally given up hope on the February due date, the signs started. Maybe next week, we said. Then, maybe tomorrow. Don't leave home, don't schedule anything extra, don't live lest she deliver those kids without us. Then the tomorrows came, and the signs didn't change. The middle of the night checks waned, then the middle of the day checks, too. The early morning races to the barn soon became solo walks of enjoying the scenery. Halfheartedly now we check on her in the middle of chores. I'm sure some day she has to have those kids.

Two years after Trent's death, a date that I hadn't had wrote on the calendar, I find myself much at the same place as with Esther. The anticipation has waned. I keep telling myself that heaven will come one day. I'm sure Jesus really meant soon when He said He's coming back. The middle of the night and early morning worship services have dwindled to hiding under the covers until I absolutely have to get up and face another day. The arms haven't been raised as much and the prayers have become pathetic groans.

Weary? Yes. Like Anna and Simeon in the gospel account of Luke, I wait {un}patiently for the day that I will see my Savior. I wonder how many weary days they waited. I wonder what they did in the meantime. Then I wonder at the overwhelming joy that they must have felt when the promise was finally fulfilled.

One day we will make that trek down to the barn and, Lord willing, there they'll be – kids more beautiful and intricately formed than we could have ever imagined. We will forget the long months and weeks of waiting, and we would have gladly made those middle of the night trips all over again when we see momma with her babies.

As we stew in frustration over “when will Esther have those babies” a miracle is taking its time to form down in her stall. The pain and hard work will belong to Esther alone, the price that she has to bear for it to be possible that there is such beauty for us to behold. Like when Jesus delayed before going to Lazarus' tomb, His glory is often times seen more divinely when there's waiting involved.

A Doozey of a Kidding Year

 It's been a doozey of a kidding year so far, and we are only half way done. The vet's number will soon be on speed dial, and my yearly farm budget is already in the negative. It all started a few weeks ago when we received news of a positive CAE test on one of last years bucklings.  CAE has been a new experience for us, but obviously has been a part of the goat world for quite some time, and with many varying opinions on the handling of it. (FiasCo Farms has a great post about it here.) Since a majority of our goats are sold as breeding bucks, we made the hard decision to cull out two of the four does of that line, leaving two others who will be kept back with the hopes that we can successfully bottle feed their kids to prevent CAE and keep the line in our herd. The disease has essentially wiped out half of our milkers.

Next, after that crises had been dealt with, came our first delivery from Dixie, an older doe who would be retired after this years kidding. She delivered two beautiful, healthy kids, but had barely any milk. The little buck didn't make it past the second cold night. Then Asha delivered healthy twins, but again, the buck out of the set didn't know how to get back into his warming house and didn't make it through the first night. At about this point I felt like the worst farmer ever, and vowed to never have kids due again in February/March (forgetting all of the successful past years of raising babies).

Lucille's due date came and she started out perfectly. There were obvious early labor signs when I checked her before going to bed, so I brought her up to the old wood basement to deliver her babies in the warmth. She let me sleep a couple of hours each in between checks throughout the night, and even let me finish a cup of coffee before she got serious about pushing. Little feet soon appeared, although they were the back feet, but being they were in the proper position I wasn't concerned. Within two pushes I became very concerned when all of a sudden out came a monster of a baby, a second tiny baby buck plus her uterus all at the same time.

We hurried to make sure the babies were breathing and taken care of, took a big breath ourselves, and looked again to try to determine exactly what had come out and if it had gone back in yet. Nope. I headed upstairs and did a quick search on the internet for "prolapsed uterus" and verified my original thought. Yep, that's a prolapsed uterus. I called the local vet, only to find out that nobody was available and had to call the office further away. The nice vet at that office wouldn't be available for a couple of hours, but calmly proceeded to instruct me how to put it back in myself. Alrighty then. Good thing I had had my coffee already.

Following his instructions, I grabbed the extra bag of sugar from the cupboard and headed back down to the basement. As I was dowsing the uterus with sugar to reduce the extra moisture and trying to figure out how to pull the after birth off without breaking the buttons which could cause her to bleed to death, the girls were in the background vowing to never birth children. After a few meager attempts, in dreadful fear to push with my palms and not my fingers lest I burst a hole through the uterus, I called the vet back in defeat and scheduled him to come out after his current clinic procedure.

Baby number two, the beautiful spotted buck, wasn't doing so well. Momma was able to get up and allow the little guys to get some colostrum, but he didn't have the strength yet to nurse. We dug out a bottle and nipple and milked some colostrum, then worked on getting it in him. He struggled weakly throughout the night, sleeping in a basket between the girls who blessed me by babysitting and multiple feedings so that I could get some sleep.

The vet eventually made it out, gave us all an educational, hands on science day and expertly reinserted the uterus and stitched her up with instructions to watch her so that she didn't push it out again. Right, wrong or otherwise I kept the momma goat doped up on some pain killers/muscle relaxers that I had for when I put my back out over Christmas and anxiously checked her rear end for protrusions. By day number three she came out of her stupor and was obviously tired of being in the basement. She wasn't very pleased with us, either, when we had to remove the stitches, but we appreciated her fiestiness.

Both bucks are thriving in the barn as of chore time this morning. But now Dixie is in the basement with supposed milk fever, another new goat issue for us. She lost all of her milk, which leaves us bottle feeding her month old doe. Only three more deliveries to go . . .

Babies, Babies, Babies

 Our first baby goat of the year, born to Dixie.

A tiny, spunky little girl who has us hoping for a "doe year."

Two other mommas are due any day now.

 

 Cole's baby bunnies. Such sweetness!

 

Six baby chicks peeping in the basement,

enough to supplement our older flock of hens,

and more eggs in the incubator.

The Countdown Begins

The countdown is on ~ only two more days until Goat Watch 2013 officially begins.

Two older does are due next week, with their first potential due date (if I calculated correctly) being Saturday, but most likely happening later on in the week. Three more does are scheduled for the middle to end of the month, and the last three will be a guessing game after that.

If the weather doesn't warm up considerably before then they will be birthing in the old wood-filled basement again -- right next to the 100 chicks that are scheduled for arrival next week and the five baby bunnies that were born this morning . . .

Farming

Blogger is being a bugger. For some reason they won't let me upload any new pictures today, so I had to dig through the archives and use some old photos. I've read that others are having troubles recently, too.

 

Anybody have any advice???



 

 

Kidding season is fast approaching. In about two weeks we will officially be on "goat watch." Doing routine checks of back ends and udders and ligaments until it drives the girls and us crazy. My favorite time of the farming year: baby season. The delivery of goat kids ushers in milking time, which also means we get to look forward to raising bottle calves from all that rich milk. Jacob (on the left) is our main herd sire this year. He comes from Brenda's farm in Missouri.

 

Dreaming about lots more colorful kids like last February, except hoping for a girl year this time around. The little guy on the left is our second herd sire this year. Any locals looking for purebred Nubian goats let me know! 

 

Having all that good goats milk also means more soap making. This crazy soap dream has exploded into an obsession and a small income to help keep the farm running. There are a couple of soap making classes scheduled in the next two months, plus craft fairs and expo's to prepare for, but no milk in my freezer. I've been adding to my wish list of scents, colors and designs plus am excited to try out some new soap recipes~ now I just need some milk. And talking about soap, this was a sweet encouragement: Backyard Farming Guide.

 

In other farms news: we are anxiously waiting for chicks to hatch, both from the incubator and from Cole's Silkie hens who have decided that the middle of January would be a great time to set on some eggs. There are also 150 little pullet peepers on their way from the hatchery for resale this spring. Baby season is almost upon us~ I can't wait!

 

A Farm Catch-All

Today was pig loading day. More evidence that Summer really is winding down as we head into Fall. Our seven pigs that we purchased in April were a month bigger than we had hoped to raise them, but it only means more bacon for us and a few other families who help support our farming endeavors. We will all look forward to home grown pork in our freezers. Again, we prayed before the locker plant truck arrived, and again, the driver left smiling rather than cursing. They didn't walk single file into the trailer with no prodding like previous years, but there wasn't a fight either.

The garden is dwindling down for the season, and soon it will be retired to rest for the winter. We are already enjoying the harvest of canned pickles which we were desperately short of the last couple of seasons. The freezer has a nice supply of corn and green beans, besides all the veggies we ate throughout the summer. A few tomatoes are still clinging to the vines, but another picking should clean them out. Soon the pumpkins will be baked and frozen for all those yummy pumpkin bars and breads this winter. The goofy crossbred squash, and the zucchini that we couldn't come up with one more recipe for, is being enjoyed by the rabbits and the chickens.

The abundance of rogue sunflowers are being fed to the goats. Breeding season is upon us already, and we are beginning to dream of spotted doelings in February to make up for our buckling year this spring. Our last little buck is scheduled to be picked up and brought to his new home {Lord willing} by another happy Craigslist customer. This will be the first year in a long time that we don't have major projects to finish before the snow flies, and probably the first year that I am too tired in every way to even dream up extra projects... except possibly that screen porch that is still waiting for a roof...

The Smell of Fall

With three bucks locked in a stall in the goat barn, the smell of Fall is in the air. I can feel the shift of the seasons beginning in my own body and mind as well. The slowing down of summer chaos has begun, and I am beginning to relish the thought of lazy, snowy afternoons with a cup of hot chocolate and books to read or write.

Home school thoughts are creeping in. Not that any of us are quite ready for it yet, but we're getting closer to being ready for it. I have yet to begin to put together any official curriculums, but rather have a vague list in my head of who needs what. When the gumption strikes(and Lord willing it will strike this week, perhaps after the corn is picked and put away in the freezer and the tomatoes have been canned)I will attempt to niche out a couple of quiet hours and type up a schedule and dig through the shelves to see if we need to order additional books. I have successfully ignored WalMart for several consecutive weeks, but I may have to break down to take advantage of their pencil sales.

This may be, by far, the easiest Fall farm preparation we have had since moving to this abandoned plot of our dreams. There are no falling down barns this year, no plastic to staple up to block the drafts, no half-built chicken coops to finish trimming before the frost comes, and no imminent projects to finish. The calves have shelter, the goat stalls all have gates, and the chicken's toes should stay warm in their insulated abode.

Soon the pigs will be shipped off to the locker plant. I never have to feel like we waste any food with pigs around as every little scrap is fed back to ultimately feed us back. The three steers will be a bit smaller this year as we have refused to pay the high prices of corn, but God always makes it enough. The three young steers are growing just fine on grass, and given the state of the pastures they make me think again that we could have raised four.

There are eight does to condition for the upcoming breeding season which ushers in the dreaming season of spotted kids in early 2013. Soap classes continue to be a success, and an invitation to host a goat's milk soap booth this fall at a local event is a good sign that their livelihood on the farm is secure.

The garden is dwindling down. It hasn't been a stellar year, but we have had it so much better than most of the country. If my world wasn't so consumed by grief I would probably be much more appreciative of the lush green that surrounds us up North.

Thanking God, again, for His sustenance on OurCrazyFarm.

Goats

We've still been playing our daily game of "chase the goats" around here. We keep telling them that all they have to do is stand in their lush green pasture and eat the grass, but Nooooo, they insist on sneaking through the fence to eat in the horse pasture. Then, not being satisfied with the grass that was on that side of the fence, they sneak through yet another fence to eat in my yard or flower gardens. Their favorite variety seems to be the morning glories that we have waited for two years to bloom. Another strand of electric fence just went on the never-ending list. Goats .... you've gotta love 'em to keep 'em.

Keep Repeating to Self

I don't need another buck. I don't need another buck. I don't need another buck. I don't need another buck.

This has proven to be a buck year with the last of the goat girls delivering two bucklings and a precious doe. These were the much anticipated babies out of Jacob, from Brenda's farm in Missouri. I'm loving the colors! And their conformation! And their sweet, bubbly noses (as the kids say around here), plus those long ears! But since I already have three bucks to breed with this fall, I am resisting the urge to keep a fourth ... even if he is one of the most beautiful bucks to have been born to date on our farm, and we could use some more blacks in our herd, and he comes from tremendous milk lines ... I don't need another buck. I don't need another buck. I don't need another buck.

A Day Late and a Couple Dollars Short -or-April Counts

If anything, I am late. And so it is, never failing, the April counts are in ... ahem ... on May 10.

Egg totals (from 15 laying hens, two of whom thought they would brood several rotten eggs for a few weeks and receive free room and board with absolutely nothing to show for it, poor bitties): 202 eggs, almost 17 dozen, averaging 7.48 eggs a day, all this considering that the farmers wife forgot to record three days in the busy month of April.

Goats Milk (from 6 goats at the beginning of the month, down to 4 goats mid-month, with one milking a day from does who also raised their babies): 54 1/2 gallons of farm fresh goats milk (I only missed marking one day, five days we didn't milk), averaging 2.3 gallons a day. The milk was used to finish raising the three holstein calves (that are now officially weaned! Yippee!), as well as lots going into the freezer for future soap making. I even tried my hand again at making cheese!

Lots of baby kittens were born~ twelve to be exact. Any reasonable offers are being accepted ~ they're "freer" if you take several ~ and I may even pay you to take some.

Ten more baby bunnies were born to Cole's prosperous farm business.

Several pullets were sold to many happy Craigslisters.

The eight pigs are fat and happy eating their cheese and whey.

And now, after I feed all those hungry critters, I'm going to start catching up on the May calendar.

A FewToo Many Goats

I have come to the conclusion that we have a few too many goats. I guess that's what you get when you keep all the "favorites." To help ease the hay bill a bit we have been letting the goats out on pasture to eat some fresh green grass~ but being they won't stay in just any old fence, and our fence is still just "any old fence," I have come up with the fantabulous idea to spare cuts from the barbed wire and just let them free range in the yard since that's where they end up anyway. Being they are herd animals they tend to stay close together, and as long as I make frequent window checks, I can detour them from the new raspberry plants or the flower beds. But every once in a while they decide that the neighboring field looks tempting and I have to call in the back-ups on bikes to herd them a little closer to home. "Come on girls!"

March Counts

Once upon a time I used to keep detailed farm records via blog posts of all the productivity around here. It served as a good way to remember just when the goat kids were born, or when the calves should be weaned. So .... in the hopes of it being a monthly occurence once again, the counts, tallies and farm news are in for March 2012.

The most recent excitement on the farm has been the addition of eight new pigs as of yesterday. Although the idea of raising a sow and farrowing our own cute little piglets is appealing, the idea of castrating them is not, so we are content to bring them home in the back of the truck ready to eat all the left-over Dairy cheese and whey (plus garden and table scraps) that they want until they reach an average weight of 250# and head off to the locker plant to fill our freezers as well as those of some other happy customers.

Sadly, Boaz the pup has found a new home. My heart strings nearly made me keep two big labs, but the pocket-book strings realized that we really don't need to feed two big labs. Plus, I have hopes of actually reclaiming the couch one day. Sigh. Those eyes....

Cole's farm was blessed with seven new additions this week when his bunny surprised him a week earlier than expected with babies. Of all the kids, Cole is the one who loves farming and critters. It helps that he is also a hard worker and financially wise (and I think God just enjoys blessing him) which has enabled him to build a little farm enterprise of rabbits and Silkie chickens. He has been my right hand chicken man for several years, and has outdone me on chick sales already this spring with his intuition of what the chicken-buying public wants.

We are watching Lightning and Sassy pretty close this spring. Last year it was on the agenda to get a certain stud colt gelded, but due to being otherwise preoccupied, it never happened. Which leaves us guessing .... are they or aren't they expecting??? Hmm.... lot's of fresh green grass or baby bulges???

The three big steers are growing well. We have ended up already with pasture dilemma's this month as we have one too many variety of critters and one too few pastures for them all. The steers are fed supplemental grain, which means they can't be with the horses. The goats could run with the steers, but then they climb in the round bale feeder and make a mess in the hay, not to mention that the steer pasture fencing is not all goat proof yet, which means there are goats in my yard on a regular basis. Then there are water issues, who to fence where so that everybody has access to automatic waterers. Fencing is on the list for the sixth year in a row as we continue to figure out a way for all these critters to co-exist.

The three bottle calves in the barn are doing great. Their ears are still going the right direction, which is always a good sign. I haven't done the math yet to know the exact figures if it is actually cheaper to raise two goats per year to feed one calf for six weeks, but I do know that it's cheaper than burying dead calves due to scours from raising them on milk replacer as we did for so many years.

And talking about those goats .... I think I may have too many. As the numbers have changed so often in the past couple of months I tend to lose track of just how many I have in any given week. This week it's eight babies, six milking does, two (hopefully still) expecting does, and one handsome buck, which equals 17 goats. Some of those babies will be finding new homes in the next couple of months after they are weaned, we will keep a couple of the bucks for breeding this fall, as well as keeping the doelings to build up our herd as we have a couple of does that will probably be culled next season.

March milk total: 68 1/4 gallons (plus the spilled milk, and the three days that we forgot to record). Wow! Sixty eight GALLONS of goats milk from one milking a day to sustain three calves, plus raise their own kids~ now that's a work force in action!

Besides the joy we get from raising these critters, we have also strived to make the farm animals profitable enough to at least cover their own feed costs. The goats provide in several ways: kids for resale, milk to raise the calves on, milk for soap (for family use plus soap making classes) and cheese for the Fair competitions. As odd as it sounds, we don't drink the milk. I really, really wish we could acquire a taste for it, but after all these years we just haven't been able to. Maybe after calf season we'll try again.

We can't forget the chickens. From 13 Light Brahma hens, and a couple of Silkie hens, we gathered a total of 267 eggs (besides the three days we forgot to record); just over 22 dozen eggs. Plus, we raised 200 chicks. Now I officially know why I have been so tired. This super busy season of farm life will slow down soon as all of the babies are getting bigger and will require less hands-on care before too long, and just about the time that happens we will be gearing up to plant the garden. Aaahhh.... Farm life!