Bloom where you are planted.
I am worried about my little brown calf. He is not taking a bottle very well. I am having to force him to take the bottle.
He is still getting up and moving around. I have him under lights in the calf nursery. It rained most of the day. The tarp over the nursery pen has kept the calf dry. I am worried about him getting cold and Ill. Tomorrow I will push electrolytes and get some bolus tablets to help him with his bowels.
I often wondered why people wrote under different names. Now I know. As a writer you become very vulnerable. Who knows what you will say that will offend family and friends. There would be great freedom if we were people of no governors. In reality our care for others emotions is what makes us great at what we do. If we are not in tune with what others think or what shakes them up then we are not able to capture that on paper and pen.
I have a sister in law named Karen. She has her quest bathroom decorated in seashells. This year for Christmas I gave her some of my watercolor originals of shells and fish and coral. She was touched by the gift. At our age we both have everything in our house that we could imagine. We are both in the stage of downsizing. The gift to her was more from the heart. I also found an art glass conch shell at an antique store that I gave her. I am very fond of art glass.
OK I am concerned for my little calf. He has a tummy ache. I have googled and realized that he has been through a trauma moving around to my farm. I have put an extra heat lamp in his pen. I have fed him some electrolytes and I have not made his milk replacer so dense. Hopefully this will encourage his intestines to not be so traumatized. I will see if this works.
The first thing that many farmers do is to give the calf antibiotics. I think I will use this as a last resort. Sometimes calves, like people just get a little bit of a stomach ache because of change in their environments. I will take a look how he is doing tomorrow. He is not taking a bottle well on his noon feed. I think that might be because he is still full from his morning feed. I will not try to cram it in. That might be stressing him more. It is just like motherhood, you have to figure out your child’s routine and work with it. I child will eat when it gets hungry. Probably the same way for a calf.
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One of my favorite breakfast food is a bowl of cream of wheat. It is one of my ultimate comfort foods. I take mine with a pat of butter, a splash of cream and a spoonful of homemade jelly. My mother would feed it to us as children. It was cheap to make and very filling. It also would warm you up on a cold day.
When I was in the hospital with my forth child I remember the impact Cream of wheat had on me. I had given birth prematurely to my son.he still weighed over ten pounds at birth. He went into respiratory distress and they careflighted him to a larger town hospital. That was a very long care ride. The hospital put us up in a family room. We stayed for over a week. I remember eating a bowl of cream of wheat every morning during our stay. We would walk down to the cafeteria and get our breakfast. Cream of wheat was the cheapest and it came with lots of toppings. I would get nuts and brown sugar. It was a comfort to eat that. It felt like a giant hug from my momma.
I still eat cream of wheat often. Every time I stay at the hospital with someone I make sure to eat a bowl for breakfast. Today my brother is in the hospital for respiratory problems. I told him I am eating a bowl for him. Prayers for my brother to have a quick recovery are appreciated.
Today was a symbolic beginning to Chuck and my retired farm living. Today at 4:30 pm our little brown calf was delivered to the farm. We have purchased black Angus pregnant cows in the past. They are pretty expensive. I enjoy seeing the births but it takes a wile to turn a profit. We are going to put raising bottle fed calves into the mix
Here is our first bottle fed calf. We have lovingly named him Ribeye. I used to get calves from the sale barn. It was hit-or-miss if the lived through the shock of going to a new home. I purchased this one from an individual. Her mother owns a dairy. I may be working with her more often.
It is very fun to bottle feed a calf. It reminds me of days when my children were young and we bought bottle calves. There was so much excitement when the kids would give them a bottle. It is also a great feeling as a mother and grandmother to nurture something. It helps fill an emptiness that grown children leave us with.
As you see from the picture I was getting an early start on the day. I had to get this pen ready for my doodler (bottle calf). This pen has been used for all sorts of animals. My mother kept chickens in it. My daughter kept bunnies in it. Now I am getting ready to turn it into a nursery for doodlers.
It looks pretty grim in there. I have my work cut out for me. I got Chuck to help me lift that dog house out. We had to lift it over the pen because it was too big to fit through the door. I moved the cages out and raked all the leaves and put them in a compost heap.
I took the old tarp off the pen and used it to drag all my trash down to the dumpster. I probably could have used that for something but did not think about it at the time.
Now it’s time to go get some hay. I burnt up the electrical system of my utility truck. Note to self: do not jump start a small battery with a tractor diesel battery. Live and learn.
It took me a wile to find that key. I put it in a safe place last time I used it. I am using my zero turn lawn mower to haul my hay. Crazy I know. Sometimes you gotta do what it takes. I am saving for a truck.
Here is the last of the square bales. I like to have some so I don’t have to use the tractor.
This is how I move the square bales.
This is how I move feed barrels.
Dang I broke a nail.
They hay is ready for the calf. I am not sure when they start eating hay.
The water bucket is set up too.
I spread a heavy layer of pine savings. This keeps the baby warm . It also makes clean up of poopage easier.
I ran electricity out to a heat lamp in the pen to keep the baby warm.
I also put across the top of the pen for protection against the weather.
Now it’s time to feed the big girls. I toppled over in this hole. That looks like another opportunity for a project.
Everybody is here for breakfast. This is the donkey. Here name is Parsley. She protects the herd from coyotes. She is very important.
These two horses came from Fort Polk LA. We adopted them. They needed a home.
The water trough is uneven. The water is running over the sides. Gotta get that on the project list.
We got a text from the person delivering the brown cow. It is not taking a bottle well so they are bringing out this little one tomorrow. We are eagerly awaiting. Wonder what we should name him.
I am so excited. I have been looking for the first project on the farm to share on my blog, This little guy is it. A bottle fed calf is called a Doodler. When my kids were little we would buy a few doodler Holsteins at the sale and my kids would bottle feed them. It taught responsibility. Since we are retired now we will find alternative forms of income. We were able to get this baby for a good price.
We have an old dog kennel that we used to keep chickens in. Then we used it for a rabbit pen. Now I will put down shavings, cover it with a tarp, put in a hot lamp and use it as a bottle feeding pen. I will get the babies established and then move them to a larger area.
We will be up early in the morning to get things started. Our new baby will be delivered at noon. We are stoked.
Chuck meets many people working at the grocery. He had one customer who truly stood out. This customer is a 80 something year old 6 foot 4 tall rancher. He would come asking Chuck for the store brand orange soda in the two liter bottle. Once Chuck realized how much the rancher was buying he made sure to keep plenty in stock. Chuck asked the rancher what he was doing with that much orange soda. The rancher, Bill is his name, told Chuck that his wife was ill and the only thing she would drink was orange soda. Bill was taking care of and nursing his wife and he was making sure she had everything she wanted.
Bill has had an interesting life. He told us that during the depression his father had lost the family farm leaving his sons with no future in ranching. Bill decided to become a rodeo cowboy. He worked the circuit and did pretty well. He fell in love with his wife and planned on getting married. When he told this to his brother his brother laughed at him and said there was no way Bill could haves family making Cowboy wages. He suggested Bill become an electrician. He could get trained for free.
Bill became an electrician. He ended up contracting to a company that needed electrical work in Afghanistan. Bill and his wife lived there for several years. He said his wife was uncomfortable with the oppressive lifestyle.
Life was good for Bill and his wife. He was very successful. He moved back to the states and bought a ranch. He also planted a large pecan orchard. Him and his wife also had a storage unit business.
Bill’s wife developed Altemizer’s. He had to put her in a facility. It was about 45 minutes away from his ranch. We realized it was near our home in town. We offered to drop in and visit her from time to time. She was a petite woman. She was pretty lost in life. It made Bill very happy to know we had stopped by.
Bill goes to the Methodist Church in our small town. I was a song leader at the Methodist church in our community. Chuck and I have since become members of a non denominational church in the town where Chuck went to high school. Our preacher, who currently passed away from COVID, was also a cowboy. The preachers father and mother were good friends with Bill and his wife.
Bill’s wife passed away and we realized he was spending much of his time alone. Chuck and I have become his dinner friends. We go eat Mexican food at a local place about twice a week. He has even come with us to watch our grand daughter play in the district volleyball games.
Recently Chuck had a stay in the hospital. Bill was the sweetest ever. He has been calling for his friend Chuck for many weeks. He has been a great friend and has said many prayers for Chuck’s health. Tonight we enjoyed our dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant together.
While I was working on organizing the office at the farm this morning I found an old book about John Wesley, one of the founders of the Methodist church. I had a little voice in my head (God) tell me to put that book in a gift bag and give it to Bill. Bill was pleased with the gesture. On his way out of the car I reminded him not to forget his book. He smiled and told me most people do not even know who John Wesley is. Bill also told me that his father)s name was John Wesley.
I feel that God uses each of his children to follow him. This not only helps us in our walk but helps other believers in their’s.
It seems I have spent most of my life being a caretaker. I see posts of people who are burdened by this position in life. It is a great responsibility and I do not always do a good job at it. I was given this task by God on several occasions to take care of others. I remember the first time I was given this task. I was young and full of myself and my relationship with God. I was leading music at a local church and was also the Sunday school superintendent. It sounds like more responsibility than it actually was. We only had 30 members in our church. I was having prayer time in my car. I often chat it up with God on car rides. I asked him what great and wonderful task he had for me to accomplish in his name. I remember the words that rang through my head, “TAKE CARE OF YOUR MOTHER”. Oh Lord, please not me. I am the only one if my family that was not a nurse, service worker, or pastor. I just did not see how my introverted personality would handle this. My mother was a very vocal domineering and in charge type of person. My ex often referred to me as a doormat kind of personality. My mother had just lost my step-father to Parkinson’s. Her life was in utter chaos. I will refrain from the comments about my other siblings. It would not be in anyone’s interest to mention their role. I just knew that this was my task to perform.
I will not say that I did everything right but I did the best I knew how. I was not a perfect nurse. My mother remarried and moved to a farm down the street from my house. She married a gentleman that developed Altermizers. She had breast cancer. After trying to live on their farm she finally committed herself to a nursing home along with my step-father. It was very hard but I held down a job, took care of a teenage son, had a new marriage and checked in on her and my step-father many times a week. I am not bragging, just stating how it was.
I now live at the farm and have the project of going through the house organizing. This is a house built in the 70s by my step-father. He built is from two houses he had moved here. You will see in this blog my work on restoration of the house and farm. It will probably take me to the end of my time on earth to organize the chaos. Come along for the ride.
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