A Little Bit of Everything

Well, it was another busy weekend. Lots of fun, food and fellowship! Three families met at our place on Saturday, which made a group of 22 or so. What a grand time for our boys, as out of 13 children (including ours), 12 of them were boys! The only time we saw them was at mealtime.

Sometimes it takes new people to help you learn to appreciate what you have. One family had never been up here before (they were the ones that sold us our goats), so Jim took us all for a grand tour of our property. Dawn was so excited at everything she saw, commenting on such things as all the burdock plants and how they could be dried to go into essiac tea to take for cancer. I had been told last fall by neighbors that they are noxious weeds and should be destroyed! We walked down by our old log cabin to where the barn used to stand (there is nothing left of it now); there is a slough there, and as we were talking a loon swam as close as I have ever been to one to check us out, and another from a distance away began its long, mournful cry. It was beautiful! Made me appreciate where we live.

We now have 50 Cornish Cross chicks brooding in a metal watering trough, which is situated in our hoop house. Our son Jonathan rigged up a heating lamp, and they seem to be thriving in there. Those chicks were not exactly planned for, and our regular order from the hatchery will arrive some time this week. Then the flock will swell by about 65 more chicks. The Cornish Cross chicks came with the company yesterday. Life is getting interesting! I need to learn how to care for these chicks as well as milking the goat in one short week, as Jim and Jonathan will be leaving for a trip to Iowa, where Jim was invited to speak at the Iowa homeschool convention in DesMoines.

This morning our son Peter and I spent quite a bit of time trying to scrub used motor oil from the hair of 2 of our cats. I have no idea what or how it happened, but our one long haired cat must have gotten dunked in the oil. Jonathan found him when he stepped out to milk the goat, and he sure looked miserable. We scrubbed and scrubbed him with Dawn soap, and then rinsed him and used a hairdryer to dry him off. Needless to say, he was not a happy camper. I just hope he didn't ingest too much of the oil, since we don't know when it happened or if he tried to clean himself off during the night. I had just taken a shower to get cleaned up myself when Peter brought in the other cat to clean up! This one fought any attempts to clean him up, so I cleaned him up as best as I could and let him go. Haven't seen him yet tonight, so I hope he is okay as well.

Then 2 days ago we discovered that our German Shepherd is having skin problems. The troubling thing is it is located where he had his hide pulled back during a fight with something about 2 weeks ago. No one seems to know what it is exactly, but a couple of people have wondered about mange. We are treating him often with colloidal silver, and hope that will help. Samson is losing hair in that area and has small spots that are scabbed over. I sure would appreciate it if anyone has a clue on what it is and what to do about it. So far it hasn't seemed to bother him, but it sure bothers me.

Tomorrow is garden day for me. We drove over to Paulette's health center to pick up plants today, and it was then that it decided to start raining. So, we'll give it our best shot tomorrow. I have been so busy with getting ready for company and working that I haven't done much in the gardens yet, so this is my turn. I can't remember all that I picked up, but there were peppers, tomato plants, melons, herbs of all kinds, and lots and lots of flowers. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.