Calving in a Winter Wonderland

As always when we send the bulls out in late June, we're hoping that the following spring will be nice and warm, high and dry, and full of healthy, hoppin' newborn calves.

Well, the healthy, hoppin calves is what we have.  The rest, not so much....as every single one of you knows!

I'm not going to spend the whole post talking about the weather, because there's not a darn thing we can do about it.  However, it's sure nice when the weather's like it was last spring for calving compared to how it is this spring. 

Yesterday, I watched Matt and Bob doing chores for a little bit.  They were going in to feed the calves.  Matt had to unhook the bale processor from behind his tractor, get in front of the tractor pulling the mixer wagon, and pull that tractor through the calf pen to feed the calves.  Sounds like a lot of progress, huh?  Yuck!  I don't know what he's going to do to feed the calves this week...I'd just dread feeding them if it were me.

Matt's now experiencing what it's like (for me) to have a new baby in the house.  What I mean is: I had a baby in January and have been up at least one or two times every single night since then.  We had our first calf the middle of March, and he's been up at least once every night since then, now, too.  Now we both know why we're pretty tired each day.  Oh well...it won't last forever.  Matt's dad has been over the last two weekends to help out.  It's been really nice of him because Matt really needs extra help out there since we still have all this snow, and I have the kids in the house...at least the two youngest.  Clarence lives outside these days. :) 

On Easter, Clarence talked my brother, Nathan, into moving his little fence panels over by the barn with the little square straw and hay bales.  He's been out there every day since then setting them up, pail feeding the heifers right beside his pen, and dragging a bunch of dry straw bales from inside the barn out to his pen.  He told Matt that they'll dry out this summer....no big deal.  He spends hours outside. I look out the window and see him carrying a bucket in each hand full of oats, carryiing them over to his pen to feed to the heifers that have calved right by his pen.  That pen of heifers is special to him because his heifers, Dolly, Regan and Andi all live there, as well as Regan's calf (which is a black bull calf....totally the opposite of what he wanted, which was a red heifer calf.  Regan is red, so he was hoping she'd have a red heifer calf...then he could keep it next year and name it.  But, since he got a black bull calf, he didn't name it and he doesn't want it.) 

Clarence is all business when it comes to living on the farm.  I asked Matt today if Clarence could stay home with him when I go into piano lessons or if he wanted Clarence to go to the sitter.  Matt said, "He can stay home if he wants."  I told him, "Clarence doesn't farm to live, Matt...he lives to farm."  It's so true, too.  Anything and everything about him has to do with cows.  He carries a little black book around with an orange, blue and green marker.  Every time Matt comes in the house, Clarence asks, "Any new calves, Dad? Write their numbers down for me." So, Matt or I will take the book and depending on whose cow calved (Matt has blue tags, I have green tags, and Clarence has orange tags), we use the correct color marker and write down the cow number and her calf's number.  It's so adorable. 

So anyway, we're making progress on the house, but not much these days.  Matt finished our bedroom last week, so we're getting used to sleeping in a bigger room with huge windows.  It's beautiful, too.  I just love my new bedroom.  Thanks, honey!

Adina's been doing well.  One minute she tells me I'm her best friend, then another, I'm not anymore.  She picks out her own clothes, puts on her own undies and pullups, wipes herself, but when it comes to helping me do something, she'll say, "I can't".  She's got Cinderella almost memorized, right down to what the birds say to Cinderella at the beginning.  Talk about movie overload, I guess.  I'm thinking she'll be out more and more as the days warm up (at least I think the days will warm up, but maybe not before the first day of summer!).  She does ask to go outside, and she'll play out on the hill or with Clarence or in the mud, then come back in.  She likes coloring - sometimes.  She can walk in high heels better than I can, and she loves wearing makeup and dresses and looking like a princess. 

Clifford is perfect.  He smiles, eats, sleeps, and does it all over again.  He's just a wonderful little boy, and growing so fast.  He's three  months old today.  Yesterday was his baptism at church.  It was a wonderful day, and we had a bunch of family come and celebrate with us at church.  He looked so handsome in his baptismal gown.  He likes our new bedroom now, too, since that's his room right now too.  Now he doesn't have to take naps on the couch wondering if he'll be jumped on, poked, or be woke up by a yelling or crying sibling.  He's so relieved and sleeps so well in there.

As for me, I'm just trying to enjoy every minute of Clifford's baby stage.  With the other kids, I'd try and prop a bottle, let them cry in their seats a while, or just leave them be, but with him, I don't.  I pick him up, we talk, cuddle, smile, and don't get much work done.  But I know that next year at this time, he'll be walking and not little anymore.  And I'll miss it.  And there will always be work to do....

Well, off to take advantage of naptime.  Have a super day!