Of goats, delayed gratification and procrastination.

Yes, the WannabeFarmwife has been remiss in her duties of blogging. A particularly large project at work, and some other things have occupied my time, and now that some of those priorities have straightened out I am able to concentrate on things that are more enjoyable.

Enjoyable is a funny word, isn't it? There's no common definition to what people find enjoyable. Just like one man's trash is another man's treasure, one man's joy is another's burden. Fascinating really.

I was greatly dismayed and delighted all at the same time to be told about another blog, which I can't believe I missed before...www.thepioneerwoman.com Now, when you go over there, please do come back because though she ALSO has confessions (and had them before I did, dammit, though I didn't know it) she has a slightly different take. Well, different geographic location, different set of circumstances leading her to where she is...you know...okay...well, I found through reading it that we were more alike than not, and she's definitely a more riveting writer than I...so...

Anyway.

We've made great strides on moving towards the farmette. So many, in fact, that I haven't had time to post. At all. What strikes me as somewhat amusing is the fact that though a good 6 months has gone by, I'm still fighting the same things, still dreaming the same things.

For those that know me, that's a long time in my world.

So, yes, I'm still fighting the chickweed/pigweed/weed from hell - whatever that is that is overrunning my garden. This year it totally strangled my herbs, and was doing a number on my tomatoes before I had the epiphany that maybe smothering IT was a practical way of dealing with it. So, off to Lowe's I ran, and picked up landscape fabric, cackling gleefully as I cut it into strips to cover the walkways between the garden rows, and around the areas that are not currently planted.

This is what my garden was looking like pre-smothering:


And this is what my garden was looking like post-smothering:


After declaring victory over the chickweed/pigweed/weed from hell, I decided that if I could tackle THAT I could tackle ANYTHING (both thoughts may be a bit premature, but I digress), and decided that RIGHT NOW was a very good time to bring goats into the family.

Lest I sound a bit impulsive, I do want to point out that I have been thinking about this for at least 6 months, if not years before this, so it's not exactly a *new* thought, but doing it just the other day WAS a rather impulsive thought and one that was not necessarily approved of by extended members of the family.

To them, I stick my tongue out.

Essentially what happened was that I had been researching goats (again) and discovered that there were these goats that were on their way to auction. Several of them dairy goats. They were being offered at a very reasonable price, and you know, if I wanted to get them now before they went to auction it would probably be best before they were with unknown herds and could get sick and...

Okay, well, that was my train of thought anyway. So the lady said, can you be here by 2? Never mind that it was 12:30, and I had to drop my son off, and she lived 2 hours away from me, and I was in my work clothes (and I mean work as in office, not work as in...well...actual work). I called the Reluctant Farmhusband and said "Okay, this is going to sound crazy but..."

And to my surprise...he said "I've been wondering how we would get goats home" - I could get my goats!

Some people transport goats in trailers. But, due to a family history of bringing animals home in odd ways, I decided to honor the tradition and bring them home in my Honda Pilot.

So, away I drove, breaking several land-speed records in the process and met the gal who had the goats. She had several goats, all in the back of a pickuptruck in a cage. I didn't really have a minute to inspect the goats, and I guess by virtue of driving two hours I had pretty much committed to the goats, so...I ended up with two unnamed goats in my car.

An Alpine


And a Mini-Nubian


Goats generally travel well in vehicles but there were a few things that I didn't think of. One is that when they traveled in my father's car, they went a rather shorter distance than that which I was traveling. The next is that my father's car was not nearly as spacious as the back of a Honda Pilot with all the seats laid flat. This is not meant to be an endorsement for the Honda Pilot (although I do love the car, and think it is indeed roomy back there) but rather it presented me with an interesting problem.

This is not my Pilot, but it works


See, goats will not soil themselves if they are in a confined space. In general, they are too ladylike for that. However, if the space is less confined, they are free to use the facilities whenever nature intends to. And use the facilities they did. All over the upholstery of my pilot. So, there was much chagrined laughter on my way home about how I was going to get the smells and erm...droppings...out of the upholstery before the Reluctant Farmhusband had a proverbial cow.

I will add, at this moment, the fact that I have not succeeded in doing so yet, and as of now he does not know that his precious Pilot has been defiled in such a way (though it wouldn't surprise me if he expected it).

So, I got the goats home, and plopped them in a stall, and then noticed something. You see, the larger goat, the Alpine, she was supposed to be pregnant. This was expected and I thought it would be a good way to offset her cost as well as milking her to feed our family. But the smaller mini-Nubian was NOT supposed to be pregnant.

Well, at least not *really* pregnant. There was a guess that she might be a little pregnant.

I know, I know.

So, this is the way the NON-Pregnant goat looks


And this is the way the SUPPOSED-TO-BE-PREGNANT goat looks


Well, from the top anyway.

I wouldn't suspect anything except for the fact that the Mini-Nubian (the supposedly non-pregnant one) bagged up in a big way, and the supposed-to-be-pregnant one has started as well.

This proved to be a rather interesting issue, as you're not supposed to milk a goat if it's going to deliver soon, but if you want milk and you have a goat that's bagged up, well then why not milk it.

So, we built the milking stand.

I say we, but really we gave the project to my oldest son, who...well, he did an admirable job of imitating what the milking stands that he saw on the internet looked like, but kind of missed out on the functionality part, so Grandpa had to help.





So I have an almost finished milking stand and possibly pregnant goats. Possibly, I don't know.

Any goat experts out there that can analyze my goat photos?

Diaper Cakes and Soybeans

My sister in law sent me a bizarre text message that had only a picture of what I believe to be a diaper cake. She JUST sent it, so I'm still in the process of deciphering what exactly it is. My Reluctant Farmhusband is away, all the chores are *gasp* done, and I can't sleep yet, so I'll talk about Diaper Cakes and Soybeans.









Diaper cakes make GREAT unique babyshower gifts and they are not all that hard to create. Sure you can buy one, but why not make one? It's fun and you don't have to be all that coordinated and/or crafty to make it. If I did it, you can do it. Trust me. The Wannabe Farmwife can be...well...not full of grace when it comes to such things.









My Diaper Cake "Recipe" was a little different than others that I found on the 'net that called for rolled up diapers. A cake made of rolled up diapers would undoubtedly be suitable for someone using cloth, or fewer diapers (unless you wanted to make a really really BIG cake) but I wanted a big impressive cake and to leave a lot of diapers for the new parents (who are my brother and sister-in-law).



So, without futher ado:

One large mirror from Michaels (you can decorate these so the expectant parent can use them in other ways if you'd like)
One package of newborn diapers (for the first two layers)
One package of the next size up diapers (for the bottom layer)
1-1 1/2" ribbon for the "holding together of the diapers"
Tall rose (which is what I used) or really skinny dowel for stability of the "cake"
Small decorative bears, pacifiers and other assorted doodads. I used Rose garland easily accessible at your local superstore. It went with the theme of the shower, which was butterflies and roses.



-Place your mirror or base on a flat surface that you can access from all sides. This is important, trust me.



-Get your ribbon ready by unwinding a large section - don't cut it yet, but have it unwound unless you have a lot of other hands to aid you



-Start by placing the larger size diapers on their sides with the folded end sticking out towards the edge 4 or so to a bunch in a N, E, S, W type of pattern (like a compass)



-Fill in the diapers between the "core set of diapers" as tightly as you can, bending them to one side as you go so they form a continuous loop - try to keep them straight, but they will need to bend a little to all fit



-When they are at the point where you don't feel you can fit any more, wrap the ribbon around the middle (you may have to hug the whole thing as you do it) and do a single knot tightly. The ribbon needs to be quite snug otherwise you'll start losing diapers.



-Rearrange any diapers within the ribbon that have become during the tying process, snip the ends long enough to make a pretty bow and tie :)



-If you're not too frustrated, start the second layer with the smaller diapers right on top of the first, if you are frustrated, breathe deeply, walk away and come back - I swear, if I can do this you can too!



-The process is the same the rest of the way up the cake. When you do the second layer, prior to snugging it up, insert the dowel so that when it is snug the cake pieces are really locked together. This will assist in travel.



-Insert your various doodads around the edges of the cake. They are particularly useful for hiding any "oops" diapers that you just couldn't get arranged correctly.



This was a huge hit at the baby shower, and I'm not a huge fan of baby showers in general but I thought this craft was fun for me too, and immensely practical.

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And because I am feeling so immensely practical this evening, I am going to soak some soybeans in preparation for making some burgers for the boys tomorrow evening.



I grew up vegetarian, so soybeans are not foreign to me, but they are to many people and certainly cooking them dry is an odd thing. They are so easy to store this way though and nice to have on hand. (And cheap, for those of us who are trying to be frugal so that we can buy goats and such).



Simply rinse your beans under running water in a sieve or colander with SMALL holes (soybeans are quite small so you'll be chasing them everywhere if your colander's holes are too big). Then soak them in a pot in your kitchen (covered, unless you want bugs, which do add protein) with water overnight until you're ready to cook them. Then drain the water and add just 1" water to cover and simmer for an hour or so, depending on how firm you want your beans to be.



I'm going to be topping these babies with goat cheese (not the stuff I make (yet) that's waiting until the weekend, but I bought some :) and serving them sans bun on a tomato salad.



Summer Soyburgers


Your favorite frying oil
Goat or Feta Cheese crumbled
2 c. soybeans, cooked
2 sm. onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/2 c. tomato puree
2 stalks celery, finely chopped
1/2 tsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp. cumin
soy sauce, salt and cayenne pepper to taste
Fresh Parsley
Cornmeal to bind

In large bowl, mash soybeans (once cooked) well. Add all ingredients and enough oats or cornmeal to bind. Make 10 patties. Fry on both sides in oil. Directly after frying lay them on a paper towel and add feta or goat cheese to the tops, then after a minute or two of melting lay them on a bed of sliced tomato or halved cherry tomato. Yum!


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Off to soak my soybeans! Good night all!

Of Goats, Chickens, Junk Mail and Cheese-Making

One of these things is not like the other.
One of these things is not the same.
Dah dah dah dah duh dah dah...oh you get the point.

So, I have decided that the family needs to be more self-sufficient, not in a hippy "get off the grid, man" kind of way, but in a "hey, what I really believe is that our lifestyles when we were living rurally, growing our food largely and buying locally was healthier for everyone involved, including the ecology" kind of way. Not that there's anything wrong with getting off the grid, and I certainly commend anyone with the resources to do it. I'm looking for baby steps right now, and baby steps involve things I know.

I know chickens. I know goats. Both of these animals will be great animals for this particular homestead as we do have 3 boys, one of whom is just entering teenagerhood (with the accompanying stomach) and two others that follow closely on his heels. We live in the woods, but there are 12 acres available to us, and though I'll have to build a super-heavy-duty henhouse and goat shed...the thought of having fresh eggs, of waking up to the sweet sounds and smells (not bad smells - if any of these animals smell bad then they aren't being taken care of properly) of the animals as they await their morning rations. It's work, yes, but it's GOOD work. It's the kind of work that you lay down at night and think - wow, I was productive and I was needed.

Which is not the feeling I get when I come home every day from my day job (although I have just elected to work in academia so I may no longer feel that way very soon). Regardless, there are so many benefits here, the downsides are:
a. convincing the Reluctant Farmhusband that we do, in fact, NEED chickens and goats
b. convincing the elder ex-Farmfolks that on their land it would be an improvement and would benefit the family
c. obviously the getting tied down etc., which I already am due to the other animals so we might as well just add to the list.

So, the first order of business for this Farmwife (Wannabe, I know) is to research and read. Which is how I deal with everything (am I suited for academia or what). By now I have researched every breed of dairy and meat goat that exist on this continent and every use and season and...I still come up with wanting Nubians. I grew up with Nubian goats and for anyone who hasn't seen one, prepare to fall in love. They are the CUTEST things ever if you love floppy ears and personality galore.


Picture courtesy of wikimedia.org

Nubians also have a really high milkfat percentage in their milk which makes them great for cheesemaking. So, this weekend, I'm going to venture into my first experimental cheeses with goats milk that I can buy, so that I can get all the botches out of the way in preparation for winning over the Reluctant Farmhusband. If I can make some decent cheese, baby, I'm in like flynn.

Chickens are another matter. We had Rhode Island Reds and Banties when I was a kid. The Banties were fun little birds but the Reds were...better layers? I guess? I don't really remember so I need to do some research on that. I'm studying plans to build a hawk/bear/raccoon/weasel/local cat and dog/anything else that wants to eat my chickens coop that still allows them to free range during the day. I'm thinking I'm going to have to use electric netting, but I'm still concerned about the red tail that I see right outside my back porch in the mornings. He could swoop off with a chicken a day, easily. He's a biggun.

So what about junk mail, well, today, I pick up a mailing from Redwings horse sanctuary (www.redwings.org) from my mailbox. Perhaps it's a bit ironic because they are not a place I have donated to in the past (though I have donated to other rescues) nor do I know anything about them, nor could they POSSIBLY know that I just bought an auction horse. I'm not sure how I feel about the mailing yet, they invoke the same thing in me that the Humane Society group mailings always did. It's sad - the situations are sad. But somehow I feel like rescuing Iggy from a bad situation and ensuring that his situation stays safe...is part of my part. There IS a glut of unwanted horses in the market - the auction prices told me that. Iggy has years potentially left in him, yes, even years left as a pleasant trail riding horse (well, on trails that are trimmed back high!). He would have been shipped from auction to auction until finally ending up up North somewhere.

But at the same time, I'm not anti-slaughter. I'm anti-inhumane slaughter. I'm bummed that in most areas of the US I can't take my old horse and return them to the hounds as they do in VA. I don't have enough land to bury him, and I don't even know if there are renderers that will take them in this part of the country (post-mortem, obviously).

To me, death with dignity doesn't mean necessarily being propped up on many medications just to stay alive. It means having a peaceful death and having my death MEAN something. Perhaps that's why I'm so attracted to having a small farm, a small farm is in balance. The manure fertilizes the crops that feed the people and the animals that make the manure to feed the crops to... (yes, it's more complex involving bugs and organisms and chickens are great for all of that but you get my point). To be fodder for some other critter after death would be a great honor for ME, and that option isn't available to me as a human. Culling herds of chickens, goats and other animals is hard - and to apply it to horses seems unthinkable - but we do the same with dogs and cats. I have an asthmatic cat, who, as long as I can keep him relatively comfortable on the medicine that he's on (which isn't expensive) has a safe refuge here. But when he becomes uncomfortable, he deserves to pass on with dignity.

I don't know, I'm rambling, but it made me think. And thinking...well, it makes me type.

Water Problems, and Garden Weeds

The Wannabe Farmwife got home from work yesterday, rushed upstairs to get into her weeding outfit (which is not, at present, the same as her work outfits) and used the rest room (TMI, I know). Much to her dismay, I went to turn the water on to wash my hands and...well, nothing happened. Not just nothing notable. I mean nothing, nada, no single thing, not a drip.

We have well water here at the homestead (which really isn't a homestead...yet...) and I reset the pump circuit, which wasn't tripped but I thought, why not, it *might* work.

And my efforts paid off, the water flowed plentifully through the lines again and I happily went on to start the dishwasher and some laundry and got dressed for weeding.



As you can see, the garden is protected by wire and fencing. This would be because we live in the woods and if it were not for the wire and fencing there would be *no garden*. 12-14 deer are found in my backyard every single morning, as well as countless squirrels and three black bears that make an appearance periodically. Though I have found no solution yet for the squirrels (but if those buggers take another bite out of my cukes I'm going to have a fit).

It seems that chickweed has taken over my garden in huge abundance, so that was largely what I was focused on. I took Obie out and tied him out there with me and he was puzzled as to why I was in the cage and he was out of it, which he didn't enjoy at ALL. So he spent the weeding period whining. Loudly. Chickweed is an edible weed, but I wasn't in the mood to be accommodating, so into the compost bin it went.


When I returned to the house, full of dirt, with the Reluctant Farmhusband wanting to start his laundry, once again, no water. This apparently occurred during the weeding process, and while the dishwasher was running so the Wannabe Farmwife had dirty half-done dishes, dirty hands and no water. The Reluctant Farmhusband was due to travel the next morning to do a kickoff meeting (another reason the Wannabe Farmwife is tired of the rat race) so yea, I panicked and called the senior Farmhusband (who actually qualifies as such, being the Wannabe Farmwife's father and having owned a farmstead/homestead himself. The senior Farmhusband was nowhere to be found, since he has now gone back to the rat race and given up on farming for other reasons, and so...panic ensued.

As it turns out, a bug, a very small bug was the cause of all of the problems. They somehow get into the pump and short out the circuit. This has happened before at the homestead, and ironically it was a lightning bug. However, the senior Farmhusband had not showed me how to de-bug the pump and so I had to wait for him to get home, with flashlights, to fix the problem.

However, once debugged, the pump ran and once again, the water faucets ran, dishes were done and laundry was accomplished.

Other animals at the homestead

I suppose it's time to introduce formally the animals that are actually AT the homestead instead of the ones that aren't. SO...without further ado...

This is Oberon, my almost year old Doberman baby. He's instact still, and an absolute love. The nasty looking collar actually doesn't hurt him in the least, but it saves the Wannabe Farmwife's arms and legs and back from being dragged down the road because this boy is BIG (roughly 80 lbs at last tally) and still filling out, so when something catches his attention that his training (which is coming along quite nicely) cannot handle, the Wannabe Farmwife doesn't get her arm ripped off in the process.

This is Oberon and the asthmatic cat named Baby Kitty (no, the Wannabe Farmwife did NOT name him), that we adopted from my parents to keep the mice population down in the house (we live in the woods, and mice happen). Contrary to how this photo looks, Baby Kitty and Obie get along great, much better than Obie and Tikka, who is featured in the next photo.

Tikka, though she looks approximately the same size as Obie in this photo, is a small-medium Terror *ahem* I mean, Terrier cross. I'm not sure quite what she is, but I believe there's Jack Russel and something else in there, whatever it is, can be downright evil.

For a size comparison, Obie is 8 weeks old in this photo, and Tikka is 3. Tikka was holding still and paying attention only because the container on the right is the T-R-E-A-T container, which she knows and loves very well.

Actually, Tikka is a love for most people as long as they are not small darting children which make her nervous. She is extremely food/possession aggressive with anyone who she deems beneath her in pack order, which seems to be anyone except me. I've been working with her for 3 years now and it doesn't seem to be getting much better, if any, so...we'll keep trying, but for now it's a management issue.

Other than the boys, 3 of them, who don't really feature as animals on this homestead, though there are days when I'd certainly like to classify them as such, there are really only the fish, which are 3 in number (suspiciously) and all bettas. No, I have no pictures of them as they really don't take very well through glass bowls. But we have a blue betta, a red betta, and a blue and white half-moon betta (go Penn State!).

Those are the animals that exist on the homestead in it's current state. Not much of a homestead...yet....

Iggy gets his feet done

Just a brief blog, but the farrier showed up to trim Iggy's horribly flared and cracked hooves. Overall I would say he was...decent, about it, considering the conditions.

There were kids and dogs and bicycles and horses and ponies and...utter craziness...everywhere, and since we didn't want to put him in the barn for this event he had to stand untied.

Anyone who knows anything about draft horses knows that usually they are put into stocks to be shod/have their feet done, so for this guy to just stand there and deal with it all impressed the heck out of me. He did have quite a bit of trouble getting the RF done, but I believe he has suffered from a nasty abcess for quite awhile and he is still quite afraid of putting weight on it. Either that or putting weight on it still hurts, because he was absolutely terrible in any situation where that particular foot was weighted, even to the point of sticking it out directly in front of him in mid-air as if to say "SEE, it HURTS"

I will get more pictures soon now that I found the charger for the camera which had been missing mysteriously for months...so, more to come later on the Iggy front.

The abcess has already blown out at the coronet so it just needs time to heal. We got 3 out of 4 hooves done, and 3 out of 4 on a horse that you don't know it's history on at all ain't bad in my book.

The saga continues

At dusk, we arrived at Friend's house and we started trying to figure out where to put said horse who she has decided is named Iggy. I have not yet thought through whether his name should be Iggy or not, but since she's calling him that, it has stuck.

There is already some existing fence in the pasture that we chose for Iggy, safely away from her other horses, but we weren't sure what shape it was in. So we decided to take the big country (like a beefed up golf cart) and drive around the fenceline to determine where it needed to be repaired. Iggy was still on the trailer, standing like a gentleman, I might add.

Did I mention that my back had been hurt to the point that I was in the ER from a fall that I had taken off of my younger, greener horse? It wasn't his fault though, it was the fault of one of those god-awful bomber flies that we call horse flies in the east. They are the devil incarnate, of that I am certain. This is him, for the record...his name is Rollo and he's a now 5 1/2 year old (approximate age) Belgian sporthorse gelding . This was prior to him being backed, he hadn't been handled much and he was a bit shy. He's a great guy and quite athletic for being as big as he is. If you haven't figured it out yet, I like my horses big...and looking a lot like overgrown ponies :)

So as we're jolting about in the big country, Friend and I are laughing and simultaneously gasping as the big country has poor brakes and it's getting progressively darker to the point that we are using a very large spotting flashlight to look for fencing that is down (or up, for that matter). This is not the most efficient way of also looking for things like holes in the pasture or dips that unexpectedly take you on Mr. Toad's wild ride, but we got it together and Iggy had his pasture. By about 10:30 pm. As you can imagine, it's now dark. Very dark.

Friend says "go get your horse"

My back is sore, I'm exhausted, I'm a cripple, I'm a whiner, and I realize that I am now terrified of whatever it is that is in that trailer because it is HUGE. Very huge and though said horse has been very quiet for the last 2 hours he's been stuck in an undersized trailer, I'm a bit worried about what is going to happen when he is released from said undersized trailer.

So I cautiously untied his lead rope from the inside of the trailer in the event of a pull back, and once I managed to figure out the trailer door, got the back of it open. Iggy, in all of his sweet Belgian grace, decided that he was going to turn around and NOT back out of the trailer. And, since I had let him decide by untying him first, well, I guess it was his perogative. I couldn't believe he tried it. And succeeded. Very slowly the large horse turned himself around and stepped out of the trailer.

Once in the pasture we walked him around a little to show him the rather professionally put together *ahem* fencing and let him loose. Far from doing...well...anything, he immediately stuck his head in the grass and began to graze.

I'm not a horse rescuer, though I've taken in my fair share of "we can't do anything with this horse can you ride him" animals. In fact, my confidence issues riding now are likely related to this because most of the horses I've had in the last 6 years have been either total greenies or whackos. This horse, however, looked so content and I felt so satisfied...whether Iggy ever is ridden or not, he's safe, eating grass and happy. Maybe he will only be sound for trail riding. Maybe he won't be sound at all (though he walks and trots out sound now). Maybe he'll be a pasture ornament....but he's MY pasture ornament. And I just adore him.