Farm Life Chronicles on the Prairie - peacecreekontheprairie.com

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It seems my readers enjoy our stories from the farm. So, I would like to try to share a few farm life highlights each week.

Spring Forward Slows the Farm

Spring Forward has been a long time great thing for farmers as far as crops and livestock go. However, me, I like that earlier hour of darkness of an evening. Farmers for the most part come home at dark. This seems to make a long day for the mom who is home all day with her dear children and she can quickly start missing that extra hour of adult communication. This week, most days I didn’t see The Hot Guy home to stay until near or after 9 pm. Not horrible, but it does make for a long day when you don’t see or talk to another adult, except for my lovely group of ladies I chat with online each week, in a blogging group. Y’all know who you are, and you don’t know how much of my sanity you save by being the only other adult voice in my home.

I was actually asked this week if I was an introvert…umm, well, we shall just let that one rest. I think y’all know the answer to that.

As I mentioned earlier in the week, we moved one of our horses, for two reasons. One they quit getting along and two…she is expected to foal in about six weeks. Monday when we woke, we noticed she had not drank well, even though we attempted to teach her how to use her automatic waterer. So, every hour to hour and a half, we went out to “hold the ball” down for her to get a drink. Being pregnant, we don’t think this is a good time to test the fact that if she gets thirsty enough she will figure it out. Talk about a fun way to disrupt the day. Whoever was sent out to hold the ball, would get distracted on the way back to the house and end up being out there for at least thirty minutes. Lesson? Farm life is full of unplanned interruptions…go with it!

Automatic Waterers only Work if the Animal Knows How to Use them

Tuesday morning, I woke better, as in not so late. Two of our chickens were out, and the dog was quite upset they were not where they belong. We have lots of coyotes in the pasture behind our house and well, penning them is the only way to keep them alive. Stormy was still not getting this whole automatic waterer thing, but doing a little better. We fed our beef cow herd, and watched a few deer nibble on the alfalfa that is showing signs of spring growth, thanks to the wonderfully blessed snows we received a couple of weeks ago. We managed to get through all our chore and homeschool assignments, and watched some Leave it to Beaver before bed.

Working on her Creating a Masterpiece Colored Pencil Drawing

New Toilet Cleaner from Your Kitchen

Wednesday morning was much like earlier in the week, except I woke to a plumbing problem with the one and only toilet in our home for eight people. Yes, ONE toilet for EIGHT people… Uh Oh… And that led to this new discovery of how to clean and break up toilet clogs in one single step. Again, the chickens were out…not sure why they keep getting out, but I guess the old saying “the grass is greener on the other side of the fence” seems to be true for chickens too. We were missing one for about four hours, and finally let the dog back outside to see if she would point us to it…and she did, up in a tree, with a kitten chasing the poor hen higher and higher… We managed to get most of our homeschool done and some of the chores. Something about spring and animals throwing us a few extra miles in our days seems to slow us down on the bookwork part of our homeschool days. Y’all know that climbing trees to rescue chickens is lots more fun and somehow has to be some education in there, than sitting at the dining room table writing about James Garfield for your history.

New Baby on the Farm brings extra Joy to Farm Life

Thursday morning, thankfully the chickens had stayed in, but The Hot Guy received a phone call from the other guy who rents the pasture here and has cattle here. He had a three day old calf, whose momma wasn’t taking care of her. Well, The Hot Guy went out to the pasture and brought her in. She is so tiny…less than 40 lbs, and a normal beef calf is 75-100 lbs. Her first night in the barn was bad, and honestly, I didn’t think she would make it, but…she is still going and getting stronger every day! We have named her Scooter. Book work didn’t happen today, as we figured out how to work four calf feedings into our chores and other parts of the day. Today was also our Fifteenth Anniversary!! Farm Life interrupted our plans for a supper out, but a new baby calf is always fun to have on the farm.

Hannah feeding Scooter

Farm Life Date

Friday, The Hot Guy and I took off to a larger town forty-five miles away…we went on a DATE. However, fairly certain a few of you would balk at what we did:

First top, a Steel Warehouse—as in iron
Next, Tractor Supply Company—Needed some goodies for little Scooter
Starbucks-yeah, that was for me.
Out to look at some tools at a place where an auction is scheduled for next weekend
Lunch—wonderful bar-b-que place
Bulk food store
Grocery Store

Inside the steel warehouse

Ladies, I am telling you, a date is something you do with your husband, without children and whenever, no matter what you are doing, you can just be the two of you together. The whole idea that it has to be romantic is not realistic in my life. Romance here is giving The Hot Guy a hug when he isn’t covered in grease, oil or cow poo…

Saturday, I woke to a sick four year old and walked around on eggshells trying to decide if she would need to go in. With antibiotic drops for her ears, she is better, and now I am sick… Love the things they share. Hence, why what seems to be a review of last week’s Chronicles from the Farm is posting today. Most of my farm life, was spent inside.

Farm life is full of blessings and challenges. God is by our sides every day, keeping us safe, offering us comfort and giving us blessings and humor all around.

Farm Life Funny :

The Hot Guy is sitting down to lunch and keeps asking who smells like calf poo. We are all looking around, checking our shoes, when he wipes his nose and notices the smell is worse…the inside of his shirt sleeve is umm covered in, yeah, you guessed it. So, now the calf is producing laundry with the kids. I sat there trying to remember if he had given me a hug recently… Sometimes, farm life literally stinks.