Lambing is over!

Every year I look forward to lambing, and after three weeks of checking at 9 p.m. before I go to bed, and not leaving the house for more than two hours at a time, I look forward to lambing’s being over. This year was no exception…In addition, the goatie-girls came back from the neighbor’s, as my knee was feeling well enough that I was feeling guilty about farming them out, so to speak. And, this past Sunday, I was supplying for our priest, so she could get some rest after a grueling Holy Week. Friday, John went to NYS to pick up a friend and head to some antique car show in N.J. That meant I was alone, with still one ewe to lamb, and with having to milk two goats morning and evening.  Not that he could do either of those things, you realize, but he could CALL someone if there was a problem, or if I had to leave and there was a ewe in labor.  Saturday a.m. I got up and out there early, by 5:45, just to see how long the whole routine would take me.  I was back inside in an hour, at 6:45, which meant that if all went as well on Sunday, I could get back in by 6:45, change into priest clothes, and get out of here by 7.  The only tricky part was what if the ewe was in labor Sunday morning and having trouble.  I checked her again at 11 a.m. on Saturday, and with great relief, found she had just had twins.  After penning them up, I got the iodine to dip their cords, and mama, thinking I was a mean person, came over protectively and knocked my hand, the one with the iodine in it, and so I spilled two ounces of iodine all over my hand…no big deal…and my ring.  The ring is now reddish brown gold with reddish brown sapphire and diamonds.  Jewelry cleaner didn’t do much.  Clorox didn’t do much…Tomorrow John will take it to the jewelers to be cleaned properly.  Anyway, the guy who called about buying the goats, who was to come on Sunday, called on Saturday afternoon and asked if he could get them then.  YES!  He came, loaded up Daisy, Rosie, Violet, and baby Petunia (the baby in the car so she wouldn’t get stepped on or fallen on on the way home), and off he went.  He was thrilled.  I think they’ll have a good home.  I miss them, but sure don’t miss milking them…I have found that milking goats is just not my thing.  I don’t like accepting limitations, but there it is.  I’m not a goat milker.  They are in a better place with someone who has milked animals all his life, likes it, and is happy with these goatie-girls.  That meant Sunday morning was a breeze…

However, after standing in high heels for 4-1/2 hours, going up and down steps here and there from nave to altar and back and pulpit and back, my knee was not in a happy mood…and I, not used to the amount of energy it takes to keep a congregation in thrall, anymore, was exhausted, so I went home and took a long nap with a couple of aspirin and a tylenol.  The knee was fine with a bit of rest, and so was I.  John came home, and I announced that the “pig stand” (our name for the ice cream/hamburger/etc. outdoor summer eating mecca around the corner) was open, first day, and so we went out and got hot fudge sundaes, another spring ritual.  All in all, a good weekend…and as a bonus, since I was sleeping downstairs, I figured it was a good time to get rid of Lizzie’s crate and see if she would sleep on her “night-night bed” in the corner.  So, for two nights, she slept there, with me on the couch next to her, and for the last two nights, she’s slept there with us upstairs.  Yahoo!  Another step toward adulthood and civilization for her.

It rained all night and is pretty mucky out there this morning, which means she didn’t get to go out and run up and down in the muck while I fed the animals.   She is not particularly happy about that, but is consoling herself by chasing “chicken” (her rubber dog toy that sort of looks like a chicken) around the house.

I finished Laura’s leopard patterned zebra fish costume (granddaughter is having a play about diversity in first grade: most of the kids are dressed as traditional zebra fish; a few as leopard patterned zebra fish–apparently a real mutation which occurs among same–and they will reject and then accept “someone different from us”.), so today I have to mail it off to her.  So, I’m off to the post office later this morning…and it’s Tuesday, so it’s a spinning group day.

Yesterday, I ear-tagged the last of the jugged lambs and let them out with the flock, took down all the jug panels.  Now, I can bring the box of lambing supplies in the house, order CDT vaccine, and relax until next week, when I have to start to put fencing up, a length or two at a time, given the knee, so that in a couple of weeks, when the grass is six inches tall, the girls can go out on pasture for the summer, another sort of ritual to mark the coming of the warm time and the grass.  Then, the piglets come…life on a farm goes on and on, over and over, new life, death, warm, cold, pasture, shed…life is good.