Time To Work On Calendars!

Today I’m starting work on calendars for 2010.  Every year I design three:

1. Ellie’s wall calendar
2. Ellie’s desk calendar
3. Farm calendar

The big wall calendar is just that, BIG!  It’s 13.5″ wide x 19″ long, which means the pictures are about 13.5″ side x 9.5″ vertically.  We sell some of those, most mostly it’s a calendar for family.  Mainly because it’s so crazy expensive!

But you can get such great pictures on it, like the one for October 2009:

Isn’t she cute? (Yeah, I know, I’m biased. but she IS.)

The desk calendars are pretty neat.  They’re kind of a tri-fold deal, and I keep a couple on top of my computer monitor – one of Ellie, and one with farm pictures.

Of course, there are lots of cute pictures on the Ellie desk calendar too, like this one from February 2009:

And I always have a hard time picking out which pictures to use for all the calendars, because there seem to be so many I like.

Here’s one I used for March 2009 on the farm calendar.

Well, I need to quit looking at past calendars and get to working on the ones for this coming year!  I need to get them done sooner this year so maybe we’ll sell more.  Ellie is at Shriner’s Hospital this week for a check-up, and is likely to have spinal surgery in January, followed by at least two months of extensive therapy daily.

If this all works out, it will mean a trip to Vancouver, B.C.,  for the surgery, and then probably a couple of months in Orlando, Florida, for the therapy.

Wow.  I’d better get busy.  Now which pictures should I use. . .

Cool Chicks

It’s autumn, and the temperatures have dropped enough that I’m not wearing shorts when I go out to do chores.  Time for long pants!  Therefore I think it’s safe to say these are some cool chicks:

We got our first look at these little guys this past Saturday (September 26th) when their mama, Peepers, brought them out from under the shed for the first time.

The Farmer and I weren’t the only ones checking out the new chicks.  Our matriarch ewe, Coconut, looked them over.

Then Cinnamon the goat had to give them a sniff.

 And of course, the other chickens were curious about the latest arrivals, too. Peepers doesn’t like other chickens to get too close, so she fluffed herself up and called her chicks to come to her.

The chicks are all different colors. My favorite is this one little chicken that is two shades of brown. He reminds me of a cross between a moorit colored Shetland and a Hershey’s kiss.

I can’t wait to see what this chicken looks like when it feathers out.

Now Peepers is often out of sight under the shed with her chicks. So last night when I saw two little chicks hanging out with the guinea keets in the goat pen, I thought a couple of her chicks had wandered off with the wrong group.

I scooped them up, and set to the task of coaxing Peepers out with my usual “Come & get it” call. Then I quickly put the two little chicks down with her.

Thing is, six chicks came out from under than shed. The two I added made eight. Uh-oh.  How’d we get two extras!???

Peepers made it clear they were not HER chicks!

She had the equivalent of a chicken hissy fit, squawking and clucking, and pecking at the offending chicks.

Bottom line? I have NO idea where these two chicks came from. I can’t find any other hen with new chicks. The guineas didn’t want them. Peepers didn’t want them.

Guess they’re mine.

What A Sweet Face (And Other Goat Jokes)

See this sweet face?

Yeah, uh-huh.  That’s what she WANTS you to think.  But if you believe that, the jokes on you!  This little girl defines the “spice” part of the “girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice” saying.

She’s not called Cinnamon just because of her color.

No, this is one mischievous little goat.  If there’s a way to get into trouble, she’ll find it.  She climbs all over The Farmer’s tractor, flirts with Samson (our male llama), chases chickens when the mood hits her, chews the bark off tree trunks, begs for treats, and otherwise thinks of little goat jokes she can play on us.

Like this Sedum Matrona:

ALL of the stalks used to have big flower bud heads like the one in the background.  But while we were in Canada, some little goat, not to name names (cough, cough… Cinnamon… cough, cough), got into the back yard and munched up on those tasty flower buds.

So don’t let that sweet face fool you.  She’s a corker!

Friday’s Farm Fotos

Just a few random pictures from around the farm…

More Roses!

There’s an old fashioned red rose bush blooming by one of the woven wire fences.  It was already here when we moved to the farm.

I have a hard time getting good, true-colored pictures of the color red.  The camera just doesn’t want to focus in correctly on it.

I planted a ‘Dr. W. Van Fleet’ rose beside one of the wooden fences we put up. 

It’s one of the few roses that will bloom in partial shade and is supposed to grow 15-20 feet.  I’m hoping it will cover a good bit of the fence.

Cinnamon On A Mower

Miss Cinnamon likes to climb all over The Farmer’s tractor.

She’s always finding some way to push the envelope – just *not quite* getting into trouble, but almost.

Shorn Sheep

About a week ago we sheared the sheep.  We are not very good at it and they look a little ragged.  I really, REALLY miss the young man we used to have shearing our sheep, but he moved onto to a different career.

Needless to say, the wool is worthless.  For one thing, there are way too many second cuts.  But it’s getting pretty warm here, and at least the sheep are cooler now.

A Blast From The Past

I finally figured out how to fix one of my cameras.  The shutter button popped off, and I had to buy a new one and install it.  When I got it out to fix it, I discovered there was a memory card still in it with some pictures from last fall. 

Here’s a half-grown guinea trying to decide if it wants to fly or not.  The adult wants the baby to fly up to the top of the pen to roost for the night.

Sometimes it takes a while for the keets to get brave enough to fly up onto the top of a building, then into the trees, but the sooner they do, the less chance they’ll fall prey to predators.

Peepers and Repeep

I rescued this hen from an abandoned nest.  A few chicks had already hatched, and the Mama Hen had already left with them.  I tried to get her to take the abandoned chick, but she wouldn’t do it.  Since she kept pecking at the chick, I raised it.

I named her Peepers because, well, she peeped a lot.  I mean a LOT!  At first I had her in a box inside the house, but I eventually moved her to a cage on the back porch because the incessant peeping was driving me crazy(ier)!

Now she has a little clone, and SHE gets to listen to the constant peeping!  I don’t think she minds though.

And there you have it, a random selection of pictures from the farm.  Have a great weekend!

Mama Hen Protects Her Chicks

Hens with chicks are very protective.  I’ve seen them go after our sheep and even the dogs if they are getting too close to their chicks.

Well, remember how our silly little goat was trying to get our llama’s attention without success? When he got fed-up with her bugging him, he just kushed down and ignored her.

I guess she decided to see if she could get somebody’s, just ANYbody’s attention, and decided to get frisky with our Mama Hen and her chicks.

Mama Hen was NOT impressed. She got all huffy and let Cinnamon know she was NOT to get near her chicks.

And did you see that look she turned around and gave Cinnamon right before going around the corner of the building?  I’m not sure if that was a “Back off!” or maybe she was thinking, “What an idiot!”

Whatever that backward look meant, it’s clear she didn’t want that silly goat messing about with her babies!