Bumps and Bruises

 Baby Girl and I take walks out to the goat pastures sometimes. We walk out with the goats and sit with them for a while. After a couple hours we try to sneak away before they notice. But they always do. Then when they see that we're getting away they start running as fast as they can to catch up with us. Sometimes they don't stop before they reach us, they just run right through us! or rather, into me.

They don't mean to get me with their horns. They just get excited and start running and then run into me... with their heads. They do it to each other too... I guess they think I'm a goat.

I got this bruise a couple weeks ago. It really hurt and was swollen for a couple of days. I couldn't even sit down comfortably for days. Actually it still hurts!

I don't mind the bruises. That's life on the farm, and really it doesn't happen that often. The only thing I mind a little is that William gets in a fight with a tree where the tree tries to eat his leg and he comes out with a couple of scratches, some sore muscles but not much else to show for it. I take a walk outside and come home with my leg falling off.

Wednesday Morning Surprise!

 SURPRISE! Two new baby goats!

While we knew that our goat, Bella, was pregnant we thought she was due on July 15th.  So it was a bit of a surprise when this morning she popped out these two little beauties.

 We had a boy and a girl. 

Our boy is Denny...

 and our girl is Dottie. (I think... we may change that)

 They are much smaller than our last batch. Denny is 7 pounds and Dottie is just 4 pounds. So small!

 Bonnie Rose is very in love with them.

Growing Things

 William keeps very buy all day long working on the farm. Somehow between building fences, shoveling goat poo, cutting down trees, fixing the tractor and a bunch of other stuff I don't even know about, he managed to build us two garden boxes!

Having a garden was something we really wanted to do this year since it was so impossible for us to do it in Shanghai.

 We have alot of trouble with our seedlings this year for some reason but my mom did manage to get some stuff to come up. We have three tomato plants, two zucchini plants and a pumpkin as well as some peppers and a small forest of basil.

Look how fast it's all growing!


Besides all the wonderful vegetables we are looking forward to, I found some vine guide thingys in the shape of animals and I've really enjoyed watching them grow.

My Rabbit vine is already so tall!

 My Doggie vine had a rough start and I thought we'd lost it but then it came back.

 And my Kitty vine took a while to come up but then all of a sudden all these leaves popped up.

Baby Girl is really enjoying watching everything grow too and loves helping water and take care of the plants. She's such a good little farmer girl.

Ice Cream, Vines, Goats and Sunset: It must be Summer 142/365

 I only like to eat ice cream if I'm hot. Sitting on the porch at dusk, watching the plants grow and the sun set is the perfect time for an ice cream treat.

 Speaking of plants growing. I'm pretty excited about this vine we have growing in my rabbit shaped vine guide thingy. I swear  you can see it growing. It grows about 6 or 7 inches every day. Soon I'm going to have a lovely rabbit shaped vine with pretty purple flowers.

 Baby Girl likes to watch the vines grow too. This is my cat shaped vine guide thingy.  These seedlings popped up over night.

 Baby Girl's favorite part of the day is also dusk when she gets to walk out with the goats to the back pastures and watch them eat. She's guarding their water bucket here and making sure they are all drinking plenty of water.

 William calls this time of day "The Golden Hour" I really do love it. The more I'm here the more I fall in love with living in this area.

The beauty of the nature all around us is so peaceful and perfect.

Old Friends 138/365

 A few weeks ago we found this snake skin in the back yard.  Horace the snake left it for us to admire, as he does every year about this time. 

Horace has been living in my mom's yard for a few years now, and every year he gets bigger.  He keeps the rodent and large bug population down and keeps the cats entertained as they try to catch him.

We were starting to worry a little bit this year when we hadn't seen him around the yard. We thought maybe one of the cats finally got him.  But today we were very happy to see Horace out sunning himself and chasing a large beetle.

He's very fast and very beautiful and we're happy to have him around.

New Toy 131/365

When we lived in Shanghai William and I both had really nice bicycles. I was really sad when we had to sell them but William promised we would get new ones again someday... even if we did live in America.

Most people in China have bicycles as their main form of transformation. Some people are lucky enough to have electric bikes or scooters. You can fit a lot of people on a scooter, a whole family really.

A few weeks ago my parents bought a new bike to help William get around on the 70 acres better.

It's not quite what William had in mind when we said we'd get new bikes, but we can and do fit the whole family on it.

Baby Girl loves going for a ride. She asks to be taken out on the bike every day.  If she's really tired she will even take a nap on it.
She doesn't like to fall asleep in her car seat, like most babies do, but she'll fall asleep riding on the ATV.  She's such a good little farmer girl.

Growing big and strong 130/365

Remember those baby goats that were born back in February? Well they are growing so big so fast! 
Here's a video of them playing with their mamas on one of the fallen trees.

Rosie talks to the goats 128/365

Baby Girl is growing and learning so fast. I can hardly believe it's been just a few months that she's been walking. Now she RUNS everywhere and is talking. Here's a little video of her talking to the goats (it starts with her baaing at them) and telling me what the other animals say.

Aaand We're Back...121-122-123/365

Blogger was down for a couple of days there so I couldn't post anything.  I have three days to make up here, but luckily most of our days look alot the same.  

One thing that was fun the last few days was the number of packages that came for me. That was very fun and exciting and made my birthday extra special. Every morning I had something new to open for my birthday. None of the packages, however, had a "From" name on them so it was a fun guessing game trying to figure out who they were from.  I was going to post a picture of all my goodies and tell people to let me know who sent what, but in the days blogger was down I got a couple emails and all was cleared up. 

 

My dear friend Julie sent me the box of Gluten Free goodies for mother's day from The Inspired Cookie, so freaking yummy!

William's parents sent me all the books and CDs. I feel very loved and spoiled.

And my darling Anandit sent me a designer t-shirt from the Demi and Aston Foundation (DNA), to raise awareness about child sex slavery. The design is called "freedom." It's a nice shirt. I love it.

On Wednesday a package came for Baby Girl. Her Nana loves buying her things, espeically things that she can use out side. One of our favorite things to do is sit out in the field with the goats. So Nana got Baby Girl her own chair. It looks just like Mama's.

Baby Girl loves her chair very much and get very upset if the goat knock it over. She likes to rest in her chair after chasing the goats around.

The goats, especially Charlotte, like resting in my chair. This is what I came back to once after I got up to take a picture of Baby Girl.

The majority of the last few days has been spent outside. It's the first thing Baby Girl asks for when she wakes up and she never wants to go in. We spend all day out there and some times eat breakfast and lunch out there. There are some day we only come in at nap time and as soon as nap time is over we go back out.

110/365

Spring Saturdays are for planting in the garden,

sitting on a moss covered stump in the back pasture with the goats...

And spending the evening sitting on the porch watching the baby chase the cats and cuddle with the dogs. 

Spring Saturdays are perfect.

Work Day 94/365

Happy Thursday! Thursdays are always my most productive day.  Today my crazy baby slept till NOON! When she FINALLY got up we went outside and she lazed around with the dog while I made lunch.

Then we vacuumed and mopped the floor while Nana mowed the lawn...

And William repaired the goat fence that a tree fell over on.

Also, the flowers starting to bloom. They are amazing. I'm in awe of the spring colors in this area.

It was a very busy and productive day for every one. Now we're all going to take an aspirin and go to bed.

Goat Pile 70/365

Our baby goats are so sweet. They all love the be held and they love attention. But they don't always love sharing the attention.

They were climbing all over me so much that I couldn't stop laughing, which made me helpless to their climbing. Silly Babies.

"So what does William do all day?" 53/365

William takes the tractor out to dig holes for fences

 People ask me all time about William and how he keeps busy all day.  When we decided we needed to move back to the US from China it was because it was the right thing to do for our family. William's job in China was taking him away from us (he was sent to northern China for 3 months, and even when he was finally allowed to come home we barely saw him) and I had some concerns about Baby Girl's health. So when we decided to move we did it for our family and our marriage, but we didn't have a job. Luckily, my mom has a farm that needed some work done.  She generously offered to let us move into her house and she said she'd hire William to help her out around the place.

So far he's built and put of fences, re-built part of the barn, dug out tree stumps, installed a stove vent, plastered and primered a wall, burnt dead trees and stumps that needed to be gotten ride of, and of course there's the daily maintenance of the goat pens, which usually involves shoveling goat poo.

Most of William's work is outside, but when it was really cold and snowing he worked on my mom's dinning room wall.  It needed to be stripped of old nasty wall paper, plastered, sanded and primered. Before he started with the plaster he built this really cool tent around the wall so that plaster dust wouldn't get all over the rest of the house.

I called it the "man cave". I was pretty impressed with it. It was great that he could do the whole wall, sanding and everything, and we didn't have to worry about the furniture getting nasty or our food tasting like plaster dust.

William wears protective gear while sanding

William working in the man cave

Now that the wall is done William is back outside. Last year Mom had a bunch of trees removed from the property to make room for cow pastures. There are still a lot of tree stumps that need to be removed so William gets to work with this cool machine and dig them out.

After he digs out the stumps he piles them up and burns them. He is trying to get a lot of that done before summer when it's not safe to burn.

Other jobs around the place include putting up new fences so the goats can have more places to wander around and eat this spring. Also, the goats' pens can get pretty filthy so William digs out the old hay and poop and keeps them happy and clean. There are also lots of odd jobs around the house. Pretty much when anything gets broken or burned out William is right there ready and willing to fix it and make it better. It is so wonderful to have such a handy man around.

As good as William is around the house and with the machinery, he's even better with a pen.  William's passion is as a writer, and more specifically as an editor. He loves making words come alive on a page. He loves taking a piece of writing and polishing it to make it shine, to help the author say what they want to say and inspire them as artists. I love watching William when he's editing. Even when he's tired he loves doing it.  I'm always amazed how he can take a confusing sentence and make it crystal clear and poignant while still staying true to the voice of the author. Maybe I should have him edit my blog once in a while.

Right after we moved from China a friend of ours, Shelly, had a book come out that she'd been working on while we were all together in China. It's called Under the Ash, you can buy it here, and William wrote the introduction for it. I think it's some of the best writing he's ever done. I'm also a huge fan of Shelly's and her poetry.

William also has an account on Elance.com and is looking for at home Editorial work.

So as you can see, William is very busy all day long putting his skills as a writer and editor to work as well as his handy man skills.

I'm very grateful to my mom for opening up her home to us and giving William a job so we could come back home to the US. It's so nice to actually see William every day and even have lunch with him. It's nice that we all sit down for dinner every night and laugh together. And it's so wonderful that Baby Girl no longer has her "shanghai cough".

Eventually we are going to have to find a different job and even get our own place, but for now it's nice to have a place to stay and be together. And Bonnie Rose really loves being around the animals and her Nana.

All my kids 52/365

six of our nine babies, plus my baby

Bonnie Rose loves to be outside. She asks to go outside almost as soon as she as she wakes up.  Now that all the goats are born, healthy and running around, she loves to be out with them.

All the kids love to climb on Nana. I'm not sure who is happier in this picture. The goat, the Baby, or my mom.  There's a lot of love in this goat pen.

Here she is telling her Daddy about her day with the goats. Aren't they so cute together!

Welcome Clover 51/365

Today the last of our five pregnant mother's had her baby. William went out to feed the goats and radioed in that our last pregnant goat was in labor. My mom ran out there as fast as she could but the baby was born before she even got outside. William was there for the delivery. In honor of March he named our new baby girl Clover.

You can see a picture of her on my mom's blog.

Today Baby Girl and I spent most of our day out in the goat pen.  She now thinks she's a baby goat.  She loves giving them hugs and kisses, and she really loves butting them with her head.

Bonnie Rose gives Charlie a hug

 She also loves to chase the babies around their yard and climb on anything they climb on. She pushes them off whatever they climb on so she can climb up on it. She's such a good little goat. And she smells like one too.

Bonnie Rose and her new favorite chair.