Guardian dog

We got a new puppy last Friday!!

Honey

My guardian dog, in training, is a female 9 week old Great Pyrenees pup with badger markings. We call her Honey because she is so sweet, and after her first bath, she smelled sweet too.

I found her through the Thrifty Nickle ads, which is okay, but I can't really be assured of the quality of this pups genes. Is she full blooded? She seems kind of miniature right now, but maybe that's all we need for our micro farm! She does have the two dew claws, which I read the Great Pyrs usually have, and she has the face, and it really doesn't much matter  because I love her anyway.

It seems I have a special fondness for white fluffy animals.

My little fuzzball girl does the rounds with me every day as I collect eggs, water the gardens and eventually close up the animals for the night. She helps me herd the chickens into the coop. She doesn't chase them, but her presence sends them into a tizzy and they all run inside, just like that. Handy.

It is my job to teach her the farm and she has become my shadow...so much so I lose her sometimes, and turn around fast and there she is, right behind me, turning with me. She's great fun, and except for the puppy training (housebreaking and chewing), which always gets old, she is a constant delight.

Jealous Quinton

My chihuahuas, the male in particular, is extremely jealous and shows his disapproval by attacking Honey when I'm not looking. He's getting better now that we are almost a week along, but for a few days there I was carrying my Great Pyrenees around to protect her from my chihuahua. The irony. Maybe the tiny chihuahua will always be the "big dog" in the house.

We also visited Paul and Tammy at Wren's Nest Farm in Pueblo last Friday when we went to meet the dog seller at Big R. We delivered our "Lucky" horse trailer to them so they could go pick up their new Jersey milk cow in Walsenburg. How exciting is that? I wish we had the space to have a cow here...there was another for sale, reasonably priced, where they found theirs. I love visiting their farm. They inspire me to just do it...get out there and farm!

And now our little farm, the Green Desert Eco Farm has a farm dog to protect the livestock and chase off the deer...in a few months. We've also sold some more CSA shares which leaves us with only TWO left. The goats are in milk and Richard has a cheese-making class for the Canon Food Co-op this Sunday down at the Rockvale Community Center. We are planting...lettuces, radishes, spinach and transplanting raspberries. There are many shelves of plant starts in Richard's office and the gardens are being prepared. There are plans for another greenhouse in the upper garden and we have ordered our first flock of meat chickens. Things are moving along. Spring is definitely here.

Sunshine, birthdays and time at the farm

Spring time is so much fun, and one of my favorite seasons. I just have to learn to ignore the fifty mile an hour wind gusts and get on with the day. I've decided that the nice days tend to have the most wind, but if we stayed inside, nothing would ever get done. Learn to live with it, brace yourself and remember it'll probably get worse as global warming continues.

Today we built a trellis in the lower garden and planted some sweet peas.
 

pea trellis, lower garden

Our pallet fence has been improved with electric tape that rises to about eight feet...high enough to keep the deer out. Bambi and his relatives have been nibbling at my lilies and irises directly in front of the house, so Richard has put up make shift fences here and there to keep them out. I'm thinking of getting a big dog to scare them off--one that won't be carried off by a hawk like my chihuahuas. Been researching the giant guardian breeds like the Great Pyrenees. Might as well have a dog that will protect the livestock instead of hunt it.

Richard planted some spinach in the greenhouse and in his new cold frames. The planting has begun. There has been a lot of interest in tomato and pepper starts this year. It looks like more people are gardening this season. That's great! Good for them. We all have to be backyard farmers if we want clean, healthy and reasonably priced produce.

Free Birds

 

The fence in the upper garden is finished too, which means, the guineas are finally free. And what did they do but head straight for the llama pen, which they couldn't get into, so they opted for the goat pen. I chased them out and Richard stapled up some netting over the gate they walked through. Good thinking, because the goat kids would've walked through that gate too.

With the warm air today, I let the baby goats out to frolic in the yard, but Amelia's little ones decided to stay in the shade of the barn instead.

 

Ginger

 

All the goats are doing well. The babies are all healthy and active and looking pretty darn cute.They jump and play and butt heads. I could watch them for hours.

The llamas were gelded this past Friday. They don't seem to be mad anymore and are just trying to figure out who or what their new neighbors are. They stood and stared over the fence as long as the goat babies were out playing today. They are such inquisitive creatures.

Our son had a birthday this weekend too, so we took the kids to the Pueblo Zoo, which was great fun. We bought a season pass so we can drop by any time we are in town. Handy, and cheaper in the long run than even two trips to the zoo with two adults and two kids. 

We tried the cloth gift wrapping idea. and it worked really well, but I would advise everyone to have plenty of ribbons on hand to tie up the gifts. I was not prepared and had to rummage through my sewing boxes to find something suitable.

Festive cloth wrapping

The material to wrap the gifts cost less than wrapping paper would have, was a lot more fun and we can use it again for wrapping, or use it to make something else, like a birthday quilt at the end of so many years. Great idea put into practice. So, save a tree and dig out that old material you've been holding onto.Wrap some gifts. If I were the recipient of such interesting and thoughtful gift wrap, I would be thrilled. Think of the things you could make if all of your gifts came wrapped in material! A crafter's dream come true.

I also found an antique treadle Singer locally

Sewing, off the grid!

for less than I anticipated.

I am so excited. I'm still trying to find extra accessories for it, and I have yet to learn how to use it, but I can't wait to make those birthhday quilts without electricity. Can you imagine? What a wonderful thing.

Makes me wonder if the modern conveniences are really such a great thing? This machine is about 100 years old and still going strong because it was made to last.

Also this past Sunday, one of the guys from our local feed store came out to help Richard work on the Earthbag barn. Progress is being made. We picked up the cutest miniature scaffold in Pueblo, and it seems to work just perfect for hoisting those buckets of dirt up to the top of the Earthbag wall. Before you know it it will be time to put the roof on. Can't wait. Unfortunately, the tamper broke, so it's going back to the store we purchased it from less than two months ago. Apparently it was not built to last.

Babies

Here are the photos of Amelia and her big moment...delivering twins.

Amelia's first baby

Amelia's second baby

Two little ones: a boy and a girl

All the new kids together

When we let the mom's out into the yard for hay and water every couple of hours, the babies get to hang out together. They all have dog sweaters on to keep their core temp up in the chilly barn at night. Richard named Amelia's kids Vincent (lying down, in green) and Pixie (in black and red). Cinnamon's girl is Ginger (in green, orange, blue stripes) and Tres's boy is Surprise (on the right edge of this picture). Two boys and two girls. They are adorable, as baby goats always are, and in a couple of weeks, after the moms are not making the colostrum any more, we will be back into goats milk here on the farm. Lots of milk for ice-cream, yogurt and cheese.