rachels.haven's Journal

[Baymule]

Maybe you won’t have to move again for a very long time.

 

[rachels.haven]

Did you check the zoning on the 10 acres? Some zoning is peculiar and even with acreage wn;t et you keep animals. Make sure that animal keeping is a contingency.

It's agricultural. It's in the "agricultural reserve" where the county basically decided "we will not develop this, agriculture here" and put very dense development everywhere else. It's technically unincorporated and we can have stock animals and people have cattle there. That's one reason we had to hurry to move quickly. There are only so many houses in the agricultural reserve and the minimum lot size is something like 25 acres. This one was subdivided off before the rules so it's nicer for us. I think agriculture is slowly dying there because profit margins are shrinking, but there is still "parkland" they try to rent out to farmers to crop. They'll probably sell that off before they go to war with the residents.

Ag Reserve,Office of Agricultural Services, Montgomery County, MD

I still wanted Bowling Green Ohio or another area beside a university town in the Midwest, but hopefully this will work. It's more Agro-tourismy than I wanted, that's for sure.

Maybe you won’t have to move again for a very long time.

Thank you. That's a very comforting thought. A good 9-10 years would be nice. DH's company isn't one that's known for stability though (everything hinges on the quality of your manager and director) so if we get to 9 pleasant years it will be a blessing. He's not changing teams, at least.

 

[Margali]

I once heard someone say Nobody ever gets to the end of their life and looks back and thinks “Gosh I wish I had spent more time at work when my kids were little”.

🤦 I just told my boss the "work is my sane zone". I LOVE, LOVE my kids but I can only handle all 3 in limited amounts.

 

[rachels.haven]

🤦 I just told my boss the "work is my sane zone". I LOVE, LOVE my kids but I can only handle all 3 in limited amounts.

Gee, I don't know anything about that. I definitely don't escape 2x daily to get away from my crazy nuts (I mean beautiful little angels) and milk for an hour+ every day no matter how many goats I have to milk or not milk to restore my sanity. Work would pay better.

 

[Finnie]

Ladies, I hear you. We had 5 kids. The youngest 4 spread out over only 7 years. I remember I had occasional rare evenings where I got to go in my room with the door shut while Daddy took care of everything. All other times, I was on duty 24/7. But now, they are all grown and living far away.I can have all the “me” time I want. I can’t believe how fast it went. You can’t get it back, so make the most of it while you’ve got it. Then you will have awesome adults in your life, even if it’s long distance. Can’t remember where else I was going with this…🤷🏼‍♀️

 

[rachels.haven]

No worries, I need my "restore my sanity time" but I can feel time slipping and we have good times with the rough and I saver the good.

 

[rachels.haven]

Took the family on a loooooong road trip on a chilly day to visit a herd called "Puddle Haven" in Junction City, KY to pickup the mini buckling (he's an Old Mountain Farm sired buck out of a doe by a Buck Creek sire so I'm optimistic about his quality, plus mom was super nice). Dan forced us to stop for him to go every hour and got a hamburger for lunch, which always gives him an upset stomach so we stopped and stopped and stopped. Then we took the kids to Millennium Park to run around and find the covered bridge and all the playgrounds. Then we dragged our butts home in the dark.

Picture of bucking later when he relaxes.

I still have conditional reservations on a second mini buck from Buck Creek Stables in Smith's Groove, KY (which we drove through and stopped on yesterday, thank you Dan). His mom has to earn her milk star on the one day test they had last week and the breeder thinks she got it as long as her butterfat didn't drop this last test. Not sure if I'm bringing him home or not. Butterfat fluxuates.

We at least have one herdsire for the minis.

Dan's pick of the mini crop. Dan always wanted spotted cows and spotted Nubians. I see a pattern-a spotty pattern.

The other two minis are the "right" colors. One has wall eyes like mommy.

This is my chosen buckling as Pete's spare. He was not the longest, but his rump is wide, flat and square and as a result he's more dairy wedge shaped and his front end was more correct than his male siblings (I need at least some brisket and elbows need to fall naturally under withers) and when at rest and standing square his hocks fall under his pins with his rump angle not too steep but also not perfectly level as Don Hoy said they preferred. He's registered now for the move, but being used will be dependent on if I like him when he's grown. He's also a "right" color...but all three of the bucks in his litter were. I will probably always worry I saved a future wether and shipped my spare herdsire, but I'm a sucker for a nice wide flat rump at birth that just keeps getting nicer so hopefully he stays okay. If a better son comes up next year I may sell him but all of Pete's buck kids this year were either this one or long and narrow and almost tubey and I hate that style.

Summer is so stingy on the does. Triplet does or even one doe and I would not be having this conversation with myself.
Milder disposition as well (as opposed to bucklings we've had from other dams)

Summer is not getting any younger either and after selling off Elsa I don't want Summer's line to end with her.

 

[Mini Horses]

I love the speckles!! 🥰

 

[Baymule]

I’m with Dan on this! I love spots. I have 31 lambs and I think maybe only 5-6 are totally white.

 

[rachels.haven]

Hmm, rather than make two trips with the goats when we move, I'm probably going to Bacchus apron (w/chest straps) the bucks and hope everyone is too traumatized to figure out how to get around them and split them up on arrival into their respective gendered stalls. Everyone is also out of rut and probably not cycling (no one is hanging out by the boy pen). We only have a few adult standards and the rest are minis or babies. Hope the little truck can handle it! Darn it, now I'm wishing I went bigger.