You're in the grocery store, alone, a girl can dream can't she?!
You add a "not-on-the-list" item to the cart, for you *gasp*
Realizing this one item is already going against your "healthy lifestyle", what's one more?
So you add another, then ice cream, then end up at the check out looking like a hungover college kid binge shopping before studying for exams. Not the mother of five with a strict budget that you really are.
So yah, that happened, possibly more than once.
Not the shopping alone, let's be realistic!
So it went this way with children and then animals. Just one more...
It started with the cats, we are up to four. Cupcake, Pete, Ashes and Severus Snape.
A rescue dog named Sven. A German shepherd/Norwegian elkhound mix, who needed a friend and in came Juneau, a Siberian husky.
There were more, but we now have only one rabbit. A Flemish giant named Flopsy. She runs the barn. She stayed with Phoebe all throughout her labor, which gave her the nickname "the rabbit doula"
We had ducks and then chickens
A 6 month old highland heifer for our youngest daughters 5th birthday gift. She named her Queenie, after her favorite cow at a friends barn.
**FYI do NOT and I repeat do NOT ever buy livestock as a birthday gift. Because when said gift turns out to be a giant *itch that your child can't even go near you can't exactly get rid of it!
"Sorry honey, your birthday gift is going to be dinner tonight" doesn't sit well with a little kid!
Carrying on...two completely opposite personality Nigerian dwarf goats who recently had their first kids, two bucklings each
Phoebe, our super sweet girl. She is laid back and parents the exact same way. Her babies want to be loved on and held, give us kisses and love coming inside. She watches the babies play from a distance and rarely calls them over to her.
Now Matilda is the exact opposite. She rarely wants our love, and when she does she bites, and not in a cute way. She bites and draws blood. Standoffish describes her perfectly, and her babies as well. They will climb on us, but we aren't allowed to pet them, if we do they jump down. They bite, hard. She is a super attentive mother, always calling her babies back to her and keeping them away from the rest of the herd.
More about the goats later...onward
Turkeys, not a gift, and yes for dinner!
Miss Kimmy, a rescued lamb who spent her first month or so here inside, in a diaper, sleeping in my bed. She's a sweetheart and loves everyone! And also makes a beeline for the back door of the house anytime she gets out of the pasture!
To round out the crazy my oldest has a steer named Zeus. He is her 4H project for the next two years. A sweet angus bottle baby who is the sweetest most friendly cow around.
So for now the farm is complete. But as all things in life go, it won't stay this way for long!