It was Saturday morning that I went out to the barn and my llama Vanilla lay in his stall, and did not bother to come to eat his grain. This has never happened. He’s always had a very healthy appetite, and when I saw that I knew he was very sick. He did get up….
Silk Painting and the Fence Star, my pony, has been so good about respecting the one line white poly tape fences that I put up and move frequently. This gives her new sections of grass. She happily eats within the area and there is a line at the edge where eaten to uneaten grass meet….
And then I started a fire. I had set up the old hot plate with the double boiler in the room so that kids could do batik. I had carefully put down plastic around a couple dye buckets so that we could try the process. It was supposed to be simple and rewarding and the…
The wind swirled into the south window as my husband Dick and I stood in the upstairs of our old tenant house with my Mom and Dad. This house stood up the hill from our farmhouse and had been abandoned for years. Built in the 1800s, rumor had it that once it was a…
Star has been here now for two months. It seems like she just arrived in some ways, but the pasture is mostly eaten and the dry weather has limited the new grass that’s available. She’s very happy eating her hay. Star’s past is largely a mystery. She was brought here from Maryland by my neighbor’s…
A whinny greeted me this morning and all mornings now since Star arrived on May 11th. The sound is music to me and I love hearing her and seeing her pretty self at the gate wanting to know when I will be out to feed her, brush her, walk her, fix a new pasture section…
As my good studio cat Singer left the earth I walked with her tiny body that had given me joy for close to sixteen years. Her purr was strong and her little body would vibrate filled with happiness and gratitude as she purred and curled up next to me over those years. Steppin had left…
The seeds from the wildflowers fell softly to the earth that was Steppin’s grave. There were forget-me-nots, shasta daisies, marigolds, and wildflower mix seeds for bees and butterflies. They made a gentle contact with the earth. Steppin is buried here at the south end of the pasture, near some tall maple trees. She used to…
It was yesterday April 23 that I had to say good bye to my old best cow Steppin Up. Cows have been a part of my life for about fifty years now and Steppin has been our last cow. The winter was a hard one and Steppin turned 15 years last September. A few other…
We had been on our farm but two years and there was little to report as profit. The book work was long and full of tiny details and big expenses. Each category of expense had many breakdowns with in it. Barn supply, milkroom supply, medical expenses, bedding, feed for cows, calves (what kind of feed,…