I have three really big bellies so I started checking udders a couple of weeks ago, can you guess which ONE of these three has started an udder? Oldest first...
Milly Jo
Betty Lou
Peggy Sue
SOMEBODY is going to pop real early in October I bet!!
What a lovely distraction the foals will be!!!
Had a fantastic ride with Laurie Sunday night, was so upset yesterday I forgot to post it! We both had our Katies and we loped and loped... it was great! Last night we went out again, this time Laurie took her gelding Topper, I had Katie again, and Hilary didn't work so she came along on her Destiny... and everybody was POKEY!!! But it was still a nice ride. And yes I plan to go again tonight {grin}
Sometimes I amaze myself so I thought I would see if I amaze you too. Let me tell you about my typical morning and you let me know what you think...
The alarm goes off at 5. I hop out of bed {yeah, hop - well ok, I get out of bed} and lift Sherman, Rocket and Ty down to the floor, and grab Esmerelda, and down the hall and out the front door they go. Back to the bed and grab AJ and Angel, and down the hall and out the front door they go.
(If you don't know, the first 3 are adult, and last 3 still pups so after sleeping all night I don't quite trust them to make it all the way outside yet, so I carry them.)
Sometimes if I am really tired and there's nothing extra to do, I slide back in bed for a snooze alarm or two...
Then it's into the bathroom to grab my feeding clothes and {yes pee, I have to do that too ya know} and grab Vada and Darci who are sleeping with daddy, they go out the front door too. Then I put on my shoes and outside I go.
I am greeted at the back door by the 8 dogs I just put out the front door, plus the 6 bigger dogs that sleep outside. That would be Tank and Shasta, Samson and Delilah, Zacchaeus, and Jacob. Like the pied piper I lead my pack halfway across the property to the hay barn, and load the golf cart trailer with bermuda and rye for the horses and donkeys {and one mini mule} and alfalfa for the cows and goats. I drive to the main mini pen and make several stops to fill feeders there - In the diet pen are Becky Lynn, Nikki Renee, Ellie Mae, Susie Q, Mary Ellen and Josey Marie, then in the pregnant pen are Milly Jo, Betty Lou, Peggy Sue, and, although she not pregnant, Taffy Leah who is getting a little extra to put back on the weight after weaning her foal - and last but not least, Lucky, the little gray jack I am borrowing from my friend Jean (total of 11 mini donks there). As I drive around the back of it, I have the arena on the other side where the big horses are (right now just Katie and Destiny so 2, and Skeye pony, and Abigail the rescue donkey), and they get fed in between stops as well. Then it's around the trash trailer and over to where the jack pens are, and feed Dillon, and Wiley and Ozzie. A little further north and I am at the "garden", where the mamas and foals are - Foxy and Peter Pan, Betty Jean and Alvin, and Sarah Beth (5), and the cows - um, BULLS - Turbo and Hemi. {Remember these are MINIATURE cattle and only yearlings, so they are babies too.}
Then further north still, closest to the house, is the goat pen - Levi and Stetson, adn the 5 rescue goats so 7 total, and chicken coop - Sunshine and Daisy. Once all the "ranch" critters are fed, I fill the goat water as necessary, then it is back to the garden and fill water there. Randy has, over time, gotten automatic water to all of the other pens and, in fact, the large section of the garden has one too. It's just the smaller pens I have buckets in... Then I scoop the poop from the foaling pen, where Peter Pan and his mama Foxy still spend their days in the shade, and dump it over the fence for Hilary to add to her wheelbarrow when she cleans the garden. Back to the golf cart and it's back to the hay barn and first things first, the dogs are all waiting for their biscuits. 3 of those big Costco dog biscuits gives the right size bite to everyone, and they munch while I clean the scrap hay out of the golf cart and the hay barn, into the barrels it goes and when they are full I can feed them instead of 3 flakes of hay, no waste here if I can avoid it! Then I feed the dogs... and a couple times a week, O'Malley and Twister the barn cats (they have a BIG bowl and free-feed). Dodge the ram {yes I said Dodge the RAM, hey RANDY named him not me!} doesn't actually get "fed" per se, he is the one-man clean-up crew, keeping the weeds down, trimming trees, and vacuuming any scraps the horses and donkeys don't get. Then it's back to the big horse stalls I go, to clean them as even though the horses are only in there for dinner, they each manage to poop at least once before we let them out {sigh}.
Anyone want to take a guess as to what time it is now? Say I don't hit the snooze, but stay up... how long do you think it takes me to feed my crew? Oh, and did anybody do the math???
I'll answer these questions in one week ;)
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