Spice cabinet organized.

I am moving on to the next project.  The kitchen countertops are 100% done.  I installed the outlet covers yesterday and managed to not electrocute myself again.  I touched a hot wire two days ago inserting spacers to get the outlet the correct distance from the box.  It hurt, a lot!  I even cleaned up the spice area, took everything down and washed the cupboard.  I threw out the duplicates and nearly empty spice jars and installed some plastic shelves in an attempt to make everything more visible.  It looks a lot better and I was surprised at how many spices had spilled inside the cupboard.  There was some green colored goo on two shelves.  I have no idea where it originated.  I had to scrape it off with a knife.
We cleaned everything as we put it back on the shelves.  The only thing left is the downdraft fan custom cabinet and install.  Annmarie says I am stalling because it is going to be difficult. My reason is I am trying to catch up on all the stuff I had put off while doing the countertops and backsplash.  I just finished our annual financial summary for the farm.  We need that to do our taxes.  I just need to print out the mileage for the pickup and my part of the taxes will be complete.  Annmarie does the hard part and I don’t want to be the holdup.  In reality I don’t mind the cabinet portion of the downdraft fan, I just don’t want to cut the hole through our outside wall.  I cannot be off even a little bit or bad things are going to happen.   I really do need to do these other things and am only procrastinating a little.  It looks like next week it is going to happen. 

Left kitchen countertop

Right kitchen countertop.

Chicken coop

Yes, chickens really are dirty.  They are the dustiest creatures known to man.  My perch needs to be about two inches farther out from the wall to prevent the poop paintings.  Unfortunately, I don’t have the room for that as I would have to move every perch two inches forward.  I am thinking about adding another high perch directly over the lowest perch.  Almost no one uses the low perch and with a second high perch I think its use would vanish.  The chickens want to be the tallest person in the room. 

I seem to have stopped whatever virus/disease was present in my coop with some timely vector elimination practices.  Not a sick chicken to be had in the last week.  I am going to have to cull another rooster.  My babies from this fall should start laying in March and I just noticed this week that my “pullets” are not all girls!  One of them is a boy, he is starting to grow a larger comb and develop darker neck feathers and some longer tail feathers.  We are going to let him live and kill off the old rooster.  The rooster will help integrate the flock and having a new rooster will make the old guard more prone to integrate.  They won’t be so insular, at least that is the theory I am going to postulate.  Time will tell if I was right.  The egg yolks are starting to get a little more orange in color.  The chickens are starting to roam about more during the day. 

Today I used a metal rake to finish getting the mud in the barn lot out of the front creek and spread out more pasture grass seeds along both banks of the creek.  I am hoping the grass will grow and help stabilize the bank.  I would love to plant the bottoms in new grass seed but I am going to wait until after March.  I don’t want a freeze killing my new plants.  A little area like the creek bank is easily replanted.  I have 300# of chicken food left out in the coop.  Just enough to get through the winter.  I need to start watching out for the sales again.  I think I will buy it in 1000# increments.  It certainly makes it easier and really cuts down my feed costs. 

We had another set of twin lambs on Friday.  On Sunday, I decided that the momma needed a companion.   They just do better with a companion.  I decided that our old lead ewe #1 is pretty pregnant and the friendliest of the bunch so she should be easy to wrangle into the baby area.  Yes she is friendly, but she is also a Dorper so she is our largest sheep.  She did not want to go in the baby area despite the food quantity being endless.  I ended up having to catch her and straddle her body and neck and drag her forward with my legs and arms while straddling her.  Not the most gracious movement.  We were almost to the pen gate when she decided to bolt for the open door out into the barn lot.  I had to catch her by the neck at the last minute, I finally got the pen gate open and the dog stopping her from rejoining the main herd caused her to go into the pen.  The worst part was it had been raining all day long and her wool was saturated with water.  My jeans were soaking wet!  They have been doing fine and today I noticed her udder filling up with milk so hopefully she will have her babies in the next few days, or she is feeding the other ewe’s babies. 

It’s always the young ones that cause the most trouble.  Steve had to take Larry to the Doctor this afternoon, and Sarah is working, so I was up for feeding tonight.  I got out of town later than I had hoped to, and it was closing in on 5:00 by the time I drove down the driveway.  This time of year, that means its beginning to get dark.  There was still plenty of light, and I thought maybe I could even feed without a flashlight.  Then I looked at the back hillside.

The sheep had not gone in.  There they were – little brown moving lumps still just visible.  I was still in my work clothes, with my purse, mail and coffee cup in my hands.  But I have a skilled sheep dog.  I walked over and let Zeke off the run, with the instruction that we were, “going to work.”  That’s his cue to behave and listen.  He also knows that usually means sheep.  He headed to the back hillside and I headed out to the middle of the Ram Pasture to supervise and direct.  All was going well.  Zeke went around the sheep and turned them into the gate like a pro.  He stopped and guarded that gate just like I asked him to.  Then I jinxed it.  I thought, “This is neat.”  Never, ever think something positive before the task is done.  It’s almost as bad as saying it out loud. 

Everything looked good.  The sheep had made the corner through the next gate and were headed to the barn.  I sent Zeke to guard the barn door.  Then I saw it.  A lamb had missed the second gate and was on the wrong side of the fence.  He knew he wanted to be in the barn, but lambs are not exactly critical thinkers, and all he could seem to do was hit that fence trying to get through.  I heaved a sigh, told Zeke to “guard” and set down my stuff (yes, it was still in my hands).  Now, work clothes consist of stacked-heel boots that are not terribly high, but not exactly working boots either, slacks, and a nice sweater.  Not what you would call practical for catching a lamb.  But, I didn’t want to go back inside and chance that he would wander away.  I really thought I could guide him back alongside the fence to the gate to where he could get into the barn.  That was the plan.

The first step was to get Zeke out of the way, so I called him to me.  Remember that he loves babies.  He detoured to see if he could greet the lamb through the fence.  The lamb was not impressed and bolted – back to the corner where he had started.  I thought for a minute that his head was stuck in the fence.  That would have worked for me.  I could have caught him and lifted him over the fence.  I was down to the creek and considering my crossing.  He got free.  And bolted.  At some point in there I got Zeke to the middle of the pasture and laid down.  That lamb ran right in front of him and out to the back corner of the pasture behind the hillside and tried to get through that fence too.

I could see the writing on the wall.  We leave that back gate open because we don’t usually need to close it.  The sheep are in the barn, after all.  I should have closed the gate.  Really, that’s what I should have done.  But I have Zeke.  He’s as good as a gate and easier to move.  I put him in the gate with the “guard” instruction.  That means don’t let the sheep past.  I walk down toward the lamb to push him back towards the barn.  All looks good.  He responds to my presence and moves out of the corner and down the path then he turns sharply left, gives takes three steps and makes a running leap – right over Zeke’s nose and out onto the completely open back hillside.  By this time, it’s full dusk and the fog is starting to set in.  The lamb is exactly the color of a rock, and isn’t making any noise at all.  I give up.  I head inside to change into more suitable clothing and get a flashlight.

While I’m doing that, I’m secretly hoping mama will figure out she’s missing  a baby and come get him while I was gone.  When I came back out, it was immediately clear that hope was not to be realized.  I heard a bleat out on the back hillside. 

There is a tried a true technique when you can’t get a separated single to go back to the herd.  Instead of trying to take the one to the many, it’s often easier to take the many to the one.  So Zeke and I went into the barn to run the sheep out.  We went in and to the back of the barn.  Usually the sheep run right out when we do that.  Of course that’s not usually right after we’ve run them in to feed.  They went towards the door.  And stopped.  Really, you’d have thought their was a fence across the alley.  They would not go any farther.  They just turned and looked at me.  It was back to plan A.

Zeke and I went out to the hillside.  The lamb was starting to get tired, and mom was now at least looking out the door and calling.  He knew where he needed to be.  This time it worked.  Zeke and I were able to guide the lamb along the fence line and into the gate.  He just kept following the flashlight that I aimed in front of him.  Thank heavens he was making noise at this point, or I’d have never found him.  And yes, I closed the gates behind him as he went through.

90 minutes later I have finally finished the 20 minute job of feeding.  It’s leftovers for dinner.