The only animals making the move with us are our three pretty farm cats and our loveable pooch! Too bad the rest of the animals were not small enough to fit into a vehicle with all of us!
These three below are looking sleepy, aren’t they?
Archive for Farm Stuff
Moving to Nova Scotia
We are looking to move back to the Halifax region, but realistically could be anywhere in the center sections of the province.
For many years I dreamed of moving back to Nova Scotia, however, my husband always had a job here in Illinois and his mom and brother were here. When we moved here to the farm three years ago, I had pretty much settled into life in Illinois. Then another death in my family occurred. My husband’s second bout of unemployment in six years was encroaching upon a year and we threw the idea of moving back to Nova Scotia out there. To my surprise EVERYONE was on board…everyone but me. I was the least excited person in our family. ME!? My husband wondered why we had not thought of this back in 2013 when he lost his job and so did I. We got our passports, started researching moving back, farming, housing, etc. with the intention of visiting Nova Scotia in the fall of 2014. When we visited Nova Scotia in November/December 2014 we checked out some farm properties and I worked on our children’s proof of Canadian Citizenship and getting other paper work started. Let’s just say it is not a simple or easy move! When I moved here to the United States, it was just little old me with a few pieces of luggage and boxes. Now we have a boat load of children AND stuff! We are in the process of selling our animals. It is rather bittersweet. We thought these were our “forever” animals. There is a lot of paper work and expense to transport animals across the border to Canada. We held out hope we might be able to take them with us, but finally decided it was just too much. We have a buyer for our cows, a farmer friend, thankfully. It is a relief to know they are going to a good home. We have a buyer for the 33 chickens we have left, they will be picked up soon. We have a buyer for our compact Kubota tractor. Our horse is returning to his owner, he was just with us on a free-lease (meaning we paid for nearly all his upkeep for the privilege of “owning” him). If we had of been moving within Illinois, his owner would have allowed us to keep him. He is nearly 31 years old and she couldn’t bear the thought of not seeing him again, plus a three day drive would have been rough on an older horse. Only the goats and sheep left to sell, plus a few odds and ends such as a goat milk stanchion, cow panels, t-posts (though we priced them in N.S. and are thinking we might take them with us!) and things like that. It is a bit surreal and I do not think it has really sunk in yet. I have not even seen all there is to see in Chicago, let alone Illinois. You do not know how many “if onlys” we have been voicing! Guess we will still have lots to do when we come back for a visit. Meanwhile we have sooooo much to do to get ready for a major move across country.
This beach is in the Pictou section in the map at the beginning of this post. And no, not all beaches in Nova Scotia are rocky!
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Hermes the Guernsey-Jersey Bull Calf – Wordless Wednesday
Remember our Guernsey-Jersey bull calf? We sold him in December. He was closing in on nearly 300 pounds at almost 3 months of age. We had to take some photos before he left for his new home. Of course, he was not very cooperative and moved quite a bit. Hopefully these photos show how big, healthy and cute he was/is!
We did not even advertise Hermes was for sale. Someone had come to our farm for something else and asked to buy him and we decided to go for it. He was picked up a few days later. Comet, his mama missed him for a while and still does at times, but she is adapting now that we have her mama, Miss Moo back from her date with the Jersey bull.
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Halifax Seaport – Wordless Wednesday
Halifax Harbour
While we were in Nova Scotia, we visited the Halifax Seaport farmers market. We went on a Sunday and I was surprised that is was not very busy. All the boys wanted to do was look out the huge glass bay doors at the Halifax Harbour! The water was quite choppy that day. Not sure this photo does it justice. It was a cloudy, cold day so we did not walk down on the boardwalk near the water or I could have taken better photos. I took this one from inside.
Halifax Seaport Farmers Market
The Halifax Seaport farmers market is a year round indoor farmers market, which I thought was great! I would have loved to have visited every day of the week just to see how much traffic it actually generates. My sister said that when she and her husband went on a Saturday, it was packed, which led me to believe that probably is the busiest day for the market. I was too busy looking around to think to take photos INside the market.
Do you have a year round farmers market near you?
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Washing Babydoll Sheep Wool – Wordless Wednesday
Our Babydoll ram has been losing some of his fleece. Our oldest son decided to collect it and wash it.
Steps to follow when washing Babydoll sheep wool:
1. Filled the sink with hot, hot water. He said he got it up to 180′ F.
2. Then stir wool around.
3. Put a tiny bit of dish soap or laundry detergent in the water. Keep stirring. Not too hard.
4. Change the water. Repeat the process.
5. Lay out to dry on top of dryer.
Here is what it looked like:
Kind of disgusting, isn’t it?
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#38 Saturday Top Five Laughs
It’s that time of week again to join
5. I went to a birth a while a go and when I got home my four year old goes, “Mommy, you have a baby?” He completely misunderstood me when I said goodbye today. He was really sad that I didn’t have a baby. 
Too cute, eh?
4. A few weeks ago a lady stopped by and asked my husband if she could buy a new dog house for our dog. My husband told her no and that he could not make our dog go in his dog house. Our current dog house is old and a bit dilapidated, as it was our landlords’ dog house for their dog when they were growing up. It looks like it is small but he fits in it and he goes in it when he wants to. It’s not like we can force him to go in his dog house when it is cold outside. So now we have a new dog house to assemble for our dog. Made us tempted to put out a donation box by our farm sign! Ha ha!
3. Early yesterday morning, like at midnight there was a ding-dong on our door. It was a persistent ding-dong and we couldn’t fathom who it was or what it was about. Should have known…it was our neighbor to inform us we had a cow in the road! Miss Moo has been an escape artist lately and we are beginning to wonder if she isn’t doing it for attention. You see, we stopped milking her to dry her up for her date with a bull so she is not getting milked, nor is she getting undivided attention and love like she’s been use to the past 18 months or so. Thankfully, she was fine and went right back home once she got the ok that the creaky gate was not going to hurt her.
2. Oopsie our wether sheep was so cute this week boing-ing along in the backyard. I wish I could have got a video of it because you all would have loved to witness his “happy dance”!
1. Comet, first-time heifer, likes to skip when she is happy. It is very endearing. Warm weather, new pasture or just being happy and we get to see her skip! Gotta love happy animals!
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#37 Saturday Top Five Laughs
I slacked off from doing my Saturday Top Five Laughs posts for the past month because life has had me in a whirlwind and to be honest there has been very little thought to what has been funny lately. Weird how our thoughts and circumstances can rob us of every day joy and laughter. Thought it was time to step up and re-join The Mommyhood Chronicles on week #37 (for us)!
5. Our six year old asked who invented kissing or why do people kiss? And before I could respond, our four year old said, “Because them married.” Nice logic, eh?
4. Our 14 year old daughter got peed on by one of our cats and said she now smelled like dead mice. Our 15 year old daughter told her it was because it (the pee) was MADE of dead mice.
3. Our 15 year old was feeding her baby goat raspberries and because B was not feeding him fast enough, he jumped up on her as if to say, “Come on, I’m hungry!” It was cute.
2. Hermes, our calf, has been giving the girls milk kisses and slobber at milking. They are milking twice a day and he has his side and they have their side. He seems to be finally getting use to them and is showing his affection! O got milk slobber in her hair this morning when Hermes sucked on her hair! Silly calf!
1. My little 11 month old niece cried when my mom’s dog sniffed her! Poor little thing, but I did have a chuckle.
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First Milking Experience – Wordless Wednesday
I always said B’s first milking experience was when we visited a working farm in Schaumburg, IL called, Volkening Heritage Farm at Spring Valley…but then I came across this photo not too long ago. It is funny because it kind of predicted the future. What was a fun little homeschool activity turned into what real life would be like 12-13 years down the road. B milking, B has the bonnet on, with O helping her. O is standing at the chair by B’s side.
By the way the Volkening Heritage Farm is an awesome place to visit as a family. For a few years we went there after an early 8:30am morning church service and visited the farm. Some Sundays we just walked, other Sundays we participated in farm events. One of which was B’s first time milking a real, live cow. She went to its tail first! She was only four at the time and had never been around a cow. It still makes us chuckle.
Gotta love memories, eh? What memory made you smile this week.
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Missing Calf – Wordless Wednesday
Missing Calf – Crazy Calf and Cow Escapades!
Our new calf went missing for 24 hours over the weekend. Thankfully, we found him and brought him back safe and sound. The “crew” found him at our neighbors 3-4 houses down. Not a mark on him. But what a scare! Now he and his mama are locked in their stall until we can get the electric fencing fixed, powerful enough and calf proof.
Then our older cow, Miss Moo, went into heat about a week early. We had someone tell us that the smell of Comet (our heifer that gave birth) could have triggered her heat. The farm who is willing to take her to their farm for a date with their bull could not come and get her due to their trailer being full of hay. So in two weeks Miss Moo will get her date with a bull! Anyhoo, this heat made Moo crazier than normal. She has been charging through fencing, chasing cars – our pasture runs along a busy rural road and she was running with the cars back and forth! She was trying to mate anything and everything not tied down or so it seemed. We had to separate her from Comet so Comet and the calf wouldn’t get hurt.
We really think Miss Moo has calf fever! She really wants a calf it seems. Here’s to hoping her date with the bull goes very well in a couple of weeks! Had an online friend call both these situations “cowrazy” funny or what?!
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New Calf – Bambi Legs – Wordless Wednesday
Our heifer, Comet, finally gave birth to a bull calf yesterday about midday. Hubby was the one to discover our newest addition, as he did with the goats.
No name yet. But he’s a cute calf!
