New Addition on 8-16-11

We had a beautiful little girl (heifer) born here on the farm on Tuesday morning,8-16-11.  She was very unexpected.  Based on when we had put the bull in with our girls we thought that we would have three calves born in the late winter/early spring.  Well we waited and waited and finally we had one born in April.  Then we waited and waited and waited some more but none to follow.  We had to face the disappointment that two of our three cows did not "take" if you know what I mean.

With everything else going on this summer we just sort of put it on the back burner and said well that's farming for you?!?  We had thought for a while that one of the other two cows looked like she might be in the family way but then nothing ever happened so we just wrote it off to eating a lot of grass.  The funny part is the mamma of the new calf is not even the one that we thought looked pregnant! (Can you tell we're new at this? lol) To add to our excitement the third cow appears to really be pregnant now so we're thinking she might deliver in the next month or so.  So much for planning when our cows will have calves!

Another exciting aspect to this is that it is in fact a female!  We have had only males up until now.  We had thought in the beginning that we would slowly grow our herd by adding any females born to the breeding stock (it's safe to do that for one generation) And then of course we had male after male after male until now and finally a girl! And she's a real cutie! The girls named her "Snow" because she looks like she's been walking in the snow and got it on her feet and ears and face of course.

White Christmas 2010

We got a RARE snow on Christmas Day and the day after. 1963 was the last time we had a white Christmas. Snow is always a treat but to get it on Christmas is special indeed.


Some years we don't even get a snow; but to get enough to build a snowman is rare indeed.

It's Finished!

Melissa has been working on a quilt and today it is finished! It looks great! Check it out!

Makin' Bacon!

Last year we grew out a pig and had her processed but we chose to make our own bacon. We made up our rub from salt, brown sugar, and honey.

And then we rubbbbbed it in!

Then we bagged it up and refrigerated it for seven days; turning it each day. Then you take it out, rinse it off good and let it sit uncovered for 24 hours in the fridge and you got bacon! We cut it into one pound pieces and froze it. We got ~16 pounds of bacon from our pig.

Stud

This is our Hereford Bull, Samson, or Obeast as the girls lovingly refer to him. He is a fine specimen and gets along good with our girls. We have the cows in the pasture closer to the house so we get to see them more. He was so posed for this picture I couldn't resist!

New Residents

We picked up these two porkers on Sunday afternoon up in Pickens county. They are a cross between a Hampshire and a Yorkshire. The black and white one (Templeton) is a barrow (a fixed male) and the pink one (Buttermilk) is a female. They are VERY tame piglets. The kids are having a great time with them. They were born on October 1st so they should be ready for the freezer by March 1st or a little later. Our thinking is that we are going to grow them both out and sell one and see how much of the cost that covers for both of them. In a perfect scenario,
the profit from one would cover the feed and processing for the other and you end up with a free pig in the freezer. According to estimates, we would have to raise 7 pigs and sell 6 of them to have a totally free pig. We'll see how two goes for now.

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Have a blessed day counting your blessings and enjoying your friends and family. I hope your house is smelling as good as ours does. We cooked one of the hams from the pig we raised last winter and it looks and smells great. Of course I had to break into the browning bag and do a little "quality control" and it tastes pretty good as well. Only a few hours now until the festivities begin. Friends, Family and food. A great trio for my favorite Holiday.

I went deer hunting for a few minutes this morning. I looked to the west as it got daylight and it looked cloudy-dark and then it started to gently rain so I decided to head on back to the house. Hopefully I'll get another deer or two before the season ends.

We hope to pick up another piglet this weekend. I've been talking to a guy who has some that should be ready to go. we'll get some pictures of that and some other stuff around here we need to catch up on and put them up this weekend hopefully.