Goats

Our newest addition to the farm are goats.  We traded 3 of our ram lambs that were born last spring that were ready to process for 7 goats; several of which are pregnant.  Here are a few...



Our sheep do a pretty good job of keeping pasture grasses down, but there are a lot of things they won't eat, such as blackberry bushes, cedar trees, and other goodies that they would have to reach up high for.  Fortunately, goats do eat all of those things.  We'll eventually need about 20-25 goats for the amount of land we have.  Since we have several that are pregnant, hopefully we'll have some kids (baby goats) very soon.

The goats are very friendly.  They'll come right up to us and like to nibble on our clothes.  This one wants to say "Hi"...






I'll get some pictures of the kids posted as soon as they're born!

Garden is in!

Last year our garden was pathetic.  It wasn't for lack of trying though.  Last April, May and June were so wet that most crops didn't get in the ground until almost July.  Although it was nice having tomatoes in November.

Since we've had such gorgeous weather this year, Dan got started on it early.  First he put fencing around the whole garden - no small feat since our garden is 50' x 100'.  Then he tilled up the whole garden prepping it...




The first thing Dan planted was wheat.  You can see it coming up below (looks like grass) and you can see the 7 foot high deer fencing and stronger chicken wire at the bottom...



We also have a boat-load of other things planted...  kale, swiss chard, collard greens, spinach and peas.  I'll be sure to give you updates as our goodies start coming in.

Spring chicks are in!

Our first batch of chicks have arrived!  Actually our first two batches... 150 chicks then 160 arrived 2-weeks later.  We're hoping to double our production this year.   The chicks below are about 4 days old and are mostly meat chicks, although there are a few egg layers in there too.



Here's a close up of the cuties...




The black one that you see above is a hen.  We're adding about 25 hens this year for ourselves, plus we're raising about 16 for two friends in St. Louis that have decided they want to raise hens for eggs also.  Once the chicks are about a month old, we'll transport them up to their new home.

Pink sock monkey

Samuel has a sock monkey that he sleeps with every night.  Our friends Carla and Dylan gave Evie her very own sock monkey - and it's pink!  How cute is this!!...



Evie's kind of a crazy sleeper.  First, look at her crazy bed head.  She sleeps best if she's swaddled, but she gets hot really easily, so we've started having her sleep in just her swaddle.  This morning I changed her diaper at 5am and put her back to bed.  Around 9am, I found her like this... swaddle around her belly and arms up.  She slept another hour and then woke up happy.  She looked at sock monkey and her mobile for another hour before I got her up to eat.  When I got her up at 11am, she had her swaddle completely off, but still happy as could be!

Pups getting big

The pups our Great Pyrenees gave birth to are getting big.  They're probably around 4 months old now.  We're still looking for a home for the two brown pups.



Right now they are in a large pen that have goats on one side and the pasture the sheep roam in on the other side.  We're doing this so we can try to make sure they "imprint" on the goats and sheep.  The last thing we want to happen is to have them imprint on our neighbors cattle like their mother.  We've been letting them into the sheep's barn area to get a little more accustom to them.  Hopefully soon, they'll be able to go out in the pasture with the sheep soon, without fear of them running off.

Updated pics of Evie

Evie's 3-month birthday was last Monday.  While I was taking some pictures of her, it occurred to me to that I never posted pictures of her at 2-months.  As a result, you get a 2 for 1 deal today.


Here's Evie in her swing at about 2 1/2 months.  Samuel didn't like swinging very much and spent little time in it.  Evie, however, LOVES her swing!  She swings / naps for hours in it.  Although, she doesn't look very happy in the picture below, she was having fun.  She just has something about smiling for the camera.





She's just shy of 3-months old in the pictures below.  Here's Evie doing some tummy-time while chewing on her hand...




This picture really isn't post-worthy because of the lighting and shadows, but it's the closest picture I have to her smiling.  It will have to do until I can get a better one.

Farm boy

Samuel finally got his first taste of farming.  After spending months watching Daddy drive his big tractor and walking around the house imitating tractor sounds, Samuel finally got his first ride.  He rode from the barn, through the pasture and back up to the house. 







I think he was a little intimidated while he was up there, but seemed to have fun nonetheless.  One of these days he'll be able to help with the animals and tend the farm with Daddy.

Elusive picture

For quite some time I've been trying to get a picture of Samuel and Evie together.  It's proving to be quite difficult.  Well, I have lots of pictures of them... it's just that none of them are very good.  In most cases, Samuel is doing something goofy.  Let me show you what I mean...




One of his current interests is to snort and growl like a wolf (see above).  Or he turns into a complete ham when he see's the camera.  Often he comes running towards me so I end up with shots like this...




I'll keep trying.  Hopefully, one of these days I'll be able to post a cute pic of big brother and little sister.

Like father like son

I informed Dan we had a leak under the kitchen sink, so he went to work to fix it.  Since Samuel's the inquisitive little boy he is, he decided he'd get down there to help Daddy...



I have a feeling it will only be a matter of time until Samuel is taking his toys apart to see how they work.  Hopefully, he'll be able to get them back together, too.

Corn chowder

This post will kill two birds with one stone.  First I can show you the awesome soup bowls my in-law's gave me for my birthday.  I also realized I haven't posted a recipe in quite a while.  Since what I have in the picture below is a corn chowder, I'll share the recipe for it.  This is one of my all-time favorite soups and it's super easy!

Corn Chowder

Ingredients

• 1/4 pound bacon, diced finely
• 1 large onion - chopped
• 7 oz can of green chilies
• Kosher salt and black pepper
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 4 cups chicken broth or stock
• 4 cups peeled, finely diced all-purpose potato
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper (pretty spicy… add less if you like less heat)
• 2 tablespoons Italian parsley
• 2 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels
• 1 cup half-and-half

Directions

Cook bacon until super, super crispy!  Scoop out the bacon and drain on paper towels. Save for later--don't nibble too much.

Pour off all but 1/4 cup of fat from the pot. Toss in the onions and green chilies, seasoning them with a pinch of salt and pepper. Cook till soft and then throw in the garlic, cooking it all for 1 minute more. Sprinkle on the flour and mix into the veggies. Dump in the broth, potatoes, thyme, cayenne and parsley. Cover the pot and bring to a boil; then lower the heat and simmer for about 1 hour, or till the potatoes are tender. Add the corn. Cover and simmer everything 5 to 6 minutes longer.  Stir in the half-and-half and crispy bacon. Check seasonings… add more salt if needed, and lots of freshly ground black pepper to taste. Give it one last stir, and ladle it up piping hot.

Evie's first trip

At 7-weeks old, we took Evie on her first extended car trip.  We drove 5 hours to Arkansas to visit Dan's parents.  Samuel doesn't sleep in the car (he's not bad, he just doesn't sleep) so we weren't sure how Evie would do; the furthest she'd been was a 1 hour trip.  I'm happy to say she slept the entire way!

We had a great time visiting and happy that Grammy and Grandpa finally had a chance to meet Evie.  Here's Grammy and Evie snuggling...




After 5 days, we packed up and headed back home.  We figured Evie sleeping the whole way down was a fluke, but much to our relief, she slept the entire trip home too.  It seems we have two great travelers, even though they're completely opposite.

Sleeping beauty

We never fail to get a good laugh when we watch Samuel sleep.  When he was about 6-months old, he started this odd habit of crawling into the corner of his bed to sleep.  This continued, and every time he sleeps he crams his head into one particular corner of the crib.  We can't even get him to try a new corner.

You can see here how much of his crib is never used...

And when we say he crams his head into the corner, he really crams it in there!...




And then he wakes up with some crazy bed head...

Puppies

A while back  you may remember me telling you about our Great Pyrenees - Shy and Tim.  We bought them to guard our sheep, but they've turned into mooches.  They disappear all day, hang out with our neighbor's cattle and then sneak back over at night to eat food we put out for them.  (Yeah, we know... stop feeding them and they'll find a new home, but we don't have the heart to stop putting food out.)

A few weeks ago, our neighbor called (the one whose cattle they so proudly protect) to tell us he saw Shy and thought she was pregnant or perhaps just gave birth.  Sure enough, she started hanging around during the day and it was obvious that she, umm,  had a large quantity of milk production going on.  We started following her to see if we could find out where she hid the pups.  After a couple of days of recon, Dan found that she stashed them in a hollowed out brush pile to keep them safe and warm.  We left them with Shy, in the brush pile, for another two weeks or so.  By that time, we figured they would be old enough to be moved and start to be weaned.  We didn't want to try sooner in case Shy wanted nothing to do with them after the move.

Dan built a new pen and a shelter big enough for Shy and her pups.  Turns out she had a 7 pups - rather large for her first litter.  Unfortunately one died.  Looks like Tim fathered 3 of them, so we have 3 white, full-blooded Great Pyrenees. One black pup that we think is from a black lab we see running around and 2 brown pups that look like a boxer we see around some times.  We're going to keep the 3 Pyrenees for ourselves (hopefully we can train them to guard the sheep since their parents failed to do this) and we'll give the rest away.  In fact, we've already given the black pup to our neighbors - the same neighbor with the cattle.  (Perhaps if they train the pup to guard the cattle Shy and Tim will come back to us???)  Now we just need to find homes for the brown pups.

Here's a pic of the Pyrenees and the brown Pyrenees/Boxer mix:



These brown pups are ADORABLE!  We'd really like to find a home for them soon.  If you're in the St. Louis/Potosi area and are interested, leave a comment with a way to contact you!

More pics of Evie

Here's Evie (a.k.a. Sweet Pea or Bean) at 1 month old...

Very awake for some tummy time.  She's getting pretty good at holding her head up (although she's not in this picture)...





For those of you that have high speed internet, here's a short 35 second video of Evie during tummy time.  She's not always happy about tummy time, but she has one of the cutest cries I've ever heard, so I had to capture it on video...

Mr. Ham

Samuel was on a hat kick for a couple of days, dragging it around with him all over the house.  We encourage it hoping he'll get used to it before summer to keep the sun off his face.  Otherwise, he just likes wearing it and hamming it up in front of the camera...

First hog of the year

The first hog we processed this year was for ourselves.  We don't generally name our hogs, but this one received the name, Oreo, due to it's coloring...




We decided to have Swiss Meats process it for us, but Dan field dressed the hog himself, which is to gut and skin it.  It's much easier to transport this way.  We had Swiss process it so we could have hams and bacon cured and smoked for us.  As much as Dan likes processing the hog ourselves, not to mention a lot less expensive, we miss having bacon.  And best of all, Swiss Meats can cure without using nitrates (reason being, there is pretty conclusive evidence that nitrates cause cancer, for those that don't follow this topic).

We can't wait to get the call letting us know our meat is ready to pick up!

Mmm... pork!

Mmm... coffee

Last Saturday was my first day home alone with both kids.  Dan had to drive up to the meat processor to pick up pork and deliver it to St. Louis - he was gone from 8am-7pm.  The morning started out pretty well and I was doing an okay job juggling Samuel and Evie.  However, after lunch you could tell Samuel was getting a little tired of sharing me with Evie and started looking for the wrong kind of attention. He was opening cabinets, pulling books off the bookshelf, etc.  He finally settled down a little so I went down the hall for a minute to do something while he was playing in the kitchen area.  When I came back into the room, he was holding a spent coffee filter that he dug out of the trash can.  This is what a 15-month old looks like when he gets his hands on a wet coffee filter...

 

It took all I had not to start laughing.  Of course, that was before I saw the rest of what he did.  After getting him cleaned up, I followed the coffee ground trail from the kitchen, through the breakfast room and into the family room.  I got that all vacuumed up before seeing the final present he left for me...




Fortunately, the coffee grounds were a couple of hours old and dried out a little bit, so the couch and the See 'n Say vacuumed up pretty easily.  Needless to say, the kitchen trash can is now behind a cabinet with child proof latches!

Random pics of Evie

Evie's first bath...

First nap in Mama and Dada's bed...

Showing off her long legs...

             


Showing us her cute pink outfit and bow...

Bright eyed and bushy tailed...

Christmas 2011

Here are a few snapshots of Christmas morning at the Thayer house.

Samuel opening presents from Grammy and Grandpa and our neighbor...

 

Samuel and Brian after opening stocking stuffers.  Samuel shows us the meaning of "bed head"...

Mama helping Evie with her stocking...

Dada showing us one of Evie's presents...

Evie crashed about half way through opening presents.  That's hard work for a 2-week old...

Dan showing us one of the many books he got for Christmas...

Danny's helping Samuel with the toy he got him...

Baby tanning bed

When Samuel got dangerously high jaundice, the doctor explained it was because his and my blood type were incompatible - in short our red blood cells were fighting.  So one of the first things we asked when Evie was born was for her blood type to be checked ASAP.  Sure enough she and I are incompatible also, so hospital staff were on alert from the get-go to be on the lookout for jaundice. 

By the end of day one she was already showing signs of it, so we got her into a bili-bed right away.  Her levels kept going up, although not as bad as Samuel's since she was under photo therapy lights a full day sooner.  We were released from the hospital on Wednesday with a home bili-bed and instructions to have blood work done Thursday.  Sure enough, her levels continued to increase. Friday she had a checkup with her pediatrician and we had blood work done again.  Her doctor called us a few hours later telling us it had gotten too high and she need to be admitted to the hospital for stronger photo therapy.  I packed a bag knowing we'd be in the hospital for at least a few days and Evie and I got checked into the hospital Friday night around 7pm.  Here's Evie in her baby tanning bed...



Since we caught her jaundice quickly and it never got dangerously high, we opted to have her admitted to Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Festus, which is only 50 minutes from home, versus a hospital in St. Louis that is an hour and a half away.  Her pediatrician's office is also right across the street so they came in to check up on her each day.  Initially her jaundice went up a little, but by Saturday night it started going down and continually did.  By Tuesday morning, she was well below the danger zone and we were discharged.  Thank goodness for modern technology!

This little piggie went to the market...

Our hogs have been a challenge this year.  Not really the hogs themselves, but rather transporting them.  Back in April, when Dan was hooking up the trailer to go to auction, the truck got stuck in the mud and took us a week to get it out.

Fast forward to the beginning of this month when it was time to take the hogs to the meat processor, the same truck blew it's transmission.  So we were scrambling to find a truck to haul them in.  Good 'ole U-haul to the rescue!

Next, we had to find a larger trailer.  Six hogs-worth of customers replied that they were ready for their orders, which is how many hogs we can haul in our trailer.  The day before Dan was to leave, we had 3 more hogs-worth of customers say they were ready.  Dan went to talk to our neighbor who raises cattle and he was gracious enough to let us borrow his larger stock trailer.

Our hogs pasture a little ways from the house, and it hadn't rained in a while, so Dan hooked the trailer to the U-haul and backed it down to the hogs.  Of course, it was wet enough and got stuck.  So in the pitch dark, Dan hooked our tractor up to the U-haul and got it unstuck and finished backing it up to the hog loading area.  Unfortunately, right as he did this, it starting pouring rain, so loading of the hogs would have to wait for morning and we'd have to hope for the best to get the U-haul and trailer out of the soggy pasture.

Early the next morning, with it still raining, Dan went out to assess the damage.  Sure enough we had a soggy, muddy pasture.  Dan called our awesome neighbor, Sam, and asked if he could help us, since me being 9-months pregnant was of little help.  Sam came to the rescue.  With Dan pulling with the tractor and Sam driving the U-haul, they got out of the pasture with no issues.  Here's what the caravan looked like:

Fortunately, the 2-hour drive to the meat processor was uneventful and he made it home without incident.  With that said, we now need to replace our truck since we've decided we don't want to put $2500 into the truck to fix the transmission.  So, if anyone out there is looking for a parts truck, let us know! :)

Evelyn Elizabeth Thayer

I was scheduled to be induced on 12/12/11 because 1) it was easier to plan for Samuel's care since he's diabetic and 2) the last ultrasound at 38 weeks showed Evie was getting pretty big.  The weekend prior to being induced was pretty miserable.  I had severe cramping and spent most of the weekend on the couch, although I had cramping through much of my pregnancy, so I wasn't too concerned.

We arrived at the hospital at 5:30am.  After a quick exam, they asked if I'd had any contractions over the weekend.  I told them 'no', only cramping.  Turns out the cramping were contractions because I was already dilated 4cm.  They decided to go ahead and induce since there was no telling how long it had taken to get to 4cm.  At 11am, they broke my water to speed things along.  I was dilated to 10cm around 3pm, but they wanted to wait to see if the baby would drop more on her own.  After a long, slow day (even the nurses and my doc though my labor would progress much quicker), they had me start pushing around 5:45pm.  After just one push, Evie decided it was time to make her appearance - a little too quickly though because my doctor wasn't there yet.  They called my doc (who is in a medical building attached to the hospital) and the nurses were doing everything they could to get Evie to stay put.  My doctor came running into the room, huffing and puffing from taking the stairs so he didn't have to wait for the elevator.  It was a pretty funny sight.  They had him in his delivery gear in no time, had me push once or twice more and Evie came into the world at 6pm sharp.  She was 8lb,12oz and measured 22 inches long (although her first checkup at 5 days old showed she was only 20 1/2 inches).

I'll spare you the pictures of her right after she was born, because, well... babies right after they're born are kind of gross.  So here is a pic of Evie at 17 hours old...



The cute little Santa hats are made by hospital volunteers for babies born near Christmas time.

First ice storm

We had our first ice storm back at the end of November.  It was really weird because St. Louis (1 hour north of us) didn't get any at all.  And South of us, didn't either.  It was just a narrow strip of a storm that came through our county.  Here are a couple of icy pics...

Old Iron Days

Every fall a craft festival is held about an hour from us called Old Iron Days.  It's an old-timey festival held at Maramac Springs State Park showcasing how things were done centuries ago... blacksmithing, glass blowing, basket making, corn brooms, sorghum, etc. It's a fun event to just browse around and talk to the craftsman.   The weather was perfect for the event this year!


Here's Samuel getting a ride on Dada's shoulders...

We also watched sorghum stalks being crushed by a mule to extract the cane juice and then boiled down into molasses…

I also picked up this cute handmade corn broom that a craftsman was making at the festival...





It's a small event, but we have a lot of fun.  It's also at one of the prettiest State Parks we've been to, so we'll definitely keep going back.

How time flies...

Well, I've gone and done it again.  Two weeks have passed and I've not done a single blog post.  I've had the best intentions.  Really, I have.  I've even started a post a time or two, but then something comes up.  It's been a crazy couple of weeks...

We had to get 9 hogs to the meat processor last week when our hauling truck's transmission decided to blow.  We had to scramble to get a rental truck to haul the hogs, which wasn't fun at the last minute. Not to mention borrow a bigger trailer the evening before because several people didn't tell us until last minute that they were ready for their orders.  I'll be sure to do a seperate post on this!

And then there's the fact that I'm 9-months pregnant, so I'm trying to get a bunch of loose ends tied up - food made and froze, Samuel's gear packed and ready to go, house clean, Christmas tree up, blah, blah, blah.

Last but not least, I work all day.  Thankfully, yesterday was my last day before starting maternity leave.  I have a few days to finish up before I'm induced on Monday, assuming little girl doesn't decide to come before then.  Thank goodness for 3-months of paid maternity leave.  What a huge blessing!

This is where a lot of people would say "I'm not trying to make excuses, but...".  But I really am so I'll just fess up to it and tell you that I'll get on the ball and gets some posts done soon.

Family Outing

Pig 'n Grapes

This past summer we made an arrangement with a local vineyard that helps us both.  After they harvest grapes for their wine, they're left with spent grape skins.  They used to throw these into their compost pile, but they decompose very slow and it was more trouble than it was worth.

Here's where our farm comes in.

We met the folks that own the vineyard at a dinner at the end of August.  They found out we have pigs at our farm and immediately a light bulb went on.  The owner, Steve, grabbed Dan and took him to their processing area and showed him giant tubs of grape skins.  He asked if we thought our pigs would like to eat them.  Not only would the pigs enjoy the grape skins, we've read that if you feed pigs fruit shortly before processing their meat will take on the sweetness from the fruit.  To say we were excited is an understatement.

For the last 3 months, our pigs have been dining on vineyard quality grapes every couple of weeks.  Here's a picture of them chowing down...



Our pigs will be going to butcher in about two weeks... we're really excited to taste the results!