my mothers day

[Kali]

got asked how it went and thought I would share with everybody:P

woke up at 5, had the beginnings of a damn migraine but figured the coffee might head it off, went down to feed Stewie the bottle calf and asked the husband to feed hay to all the other bums. Loafed around with my two cups of coffee and a home made (by husband) cinnamon coffee cake and some scrambled eggs with homemade chunky salsa (yum) until one of the sons got up and gave me my mother's day candy and my new metallic blue mag light (how cute) then DPS called about a "cow" on the interstate - hey it's Sunday and a holiday - of course there has to be some kind of crisis. Told the dispatcher that it was probably animals on the hill INSIDE the fence like last time, but I would go look.

Drove around found some bad fence but no animals, reported the bad fence to the officer that also didn't see any animals on the right-of-way. Went home, headache getting worse. Got another call from my niece (who lives up the road, but that we raised) one of her friends saw a baby calf in the median up where the supposed "cow" had been reported. OK it will probably either get across on its own before I can get up there or get run over, but thanks for letting me know. Then DPS calls again - I tell them the same thing but I will go up anyway. Hit the bathroom first and they call back while I am in there - officer got it through the fence, no need to go up there again. Ah, small favors. Call my niece back and say I am getting a migraine, I need to go to sleep for an hour or so before we go to our annual Mother's day seafood buffet at the local Chinese restaurant.

Take a handful of aspirin, chug some iced tea and hit the bed. Husband wakes me up in an hour and I feel a little better, shower and off to pick up my niece. This kid had a rough start but she has turned into a sweet young lady. She had a long stemmed rose for me and her phone bill payment! Plus this outing is her treat. We had a nice lunch and stopped at the grocery store for a few things. I needed to buy the stuff for the male children's mother's day dinner:eyes: and she was picking up more flowers and candy for the three other mothers in her life - one of her friends just had a baby, and that girl's mother (she lived with them for about a year) and for the woman she is helping to take care of right now - badly injured in a helicopter accident last summer. Not that my yelling at her for 18 years had anything to do with it, but she has turned out pretty good.

Came home and took ANOTHER little nap before having to go redo a bovine gynecological procedure that didn't work from the day before. And I see I'm probably going to have to do it AGAIN today or tomorrow. Why can't she keep that thing in there???

Fed Stewie, the bum and hospital cows, and the bum horses again then time for a nice steak, some fresh grilled green chilis, a tortilla and a bottle of merlot. And clean sheets on the bed! :bounce: woo hoo!

So a couple good meals interspersed with some family contact added to a typical ranch day. How was that?:shrug: :rofl:

[MiddleFingerMom]

1. Compared to the frequent disaster days you have...

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...I'd say that was a pretty damn good one.
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And I'm glad to hear that about your niece. She's always been SO quiet that I've never
had a real REASON to like or dislike her... but there's always been SOMETHING about her
that I've always liked -- some sort of subconscious vibes. I've never asked you for any
details... just knew that she had had it pretty tough while at her previous home.
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You done good, Mom. Knowing that you had a role in the fact that she "turned out pretty
good" sounds like a pretty nice Mothers Day gift in itself.
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Not that it could compete with THIS one... but OK nonetheless.
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[Kali]

2. They all turned out OK.

I had some higher hopes in terms of education/careers, but looking around the area I think they all turned out ok considering the (lack of) resources available.

Her mother was (is) a messed up drunk and I suppress a lot of anger at and about her. My biggest fear was not transferring too much of that hatred and resentment to her kid.

Yeah the day was actually pretty easy compared to some and last week was really crazy. We have a LOT of calves coming right now, which is a good thing - but it was kind of touchy on feed for the cows this spring with NO moisture all winter and the mesquites being so late. A lot of ranchers hate mesquite and spend tons of energy and money (some of it from the feds/taxpayers) getting rid of it, but man, years like this sure makes me glad to have it around. Some of these old cows that were looking pretty skinny and poor have already picked up having that extra bit of green protein instead of dead dry straw that they were living on.

[Ptah]

3. Phrase of the day:

bovine gynecological procedure


Good news about your niece/daughter.

i enjoy hearing about modern ranch life.

thanks for sharing, Kali.

[Kali]

4. never quite sure how explicit I should be

:rofl:

[kimi]

5. Good that you got some sleep

Sounds like you deserved it!

And it sounds like you've been a great mom to all the young-uns in your life, including Stewie.

(Out of curiosity, what kind of cattle do you have? On the family farm here in Iowa (just moved here) we have Angus, the birthing is easier than with the others that the family raised in past years.)

Oh, and clean sheets? That's a big Woo-Hoo right there!!

[Kali]

9. aww Kimi - sorry you are having man-troubles

I don't have any advice, but I hope you get to feeling trustful and happier soon.

We have a mixture of all kinds of stuff. Grampa had pretty much straight herefords, but starting about 1990 or so we added some brahma, saler, limousine bulls to the mixture, then we bought about a dozen longhorn cows and they have spread their colors and genetics pretty well so we have, depending on your perspective: diversity or a mess!:rofl:

saw a nice young hereford bull at the neighbors the other day when I went to pick up a black cow of mine that had gone wandering. I need to call and see if he is for sale because I think I would like to get a few and bring back a little more of that good gentle hereford disposition that is missing in some of our animals.

Around here solid black or reds sell the best, spots and fun colors are discounted, no matter what the conformation/carcass is - stupid and idiotic but we spent 10 years trying to make black hides so there you go.

[kimi]

12. This is really interesting to me LOL

I'll be helping to take over a portion of the farm soon due to health issues, so am trying to find out about this type of thing. The family is pretty much set with registered Angus but boy, those bulls are not trustworthy (well, not many bulls are). My aunt got chased by one last year, (not one of ours, a neighbor's Angus bull who got loose and came calling), she fell against the pickup and broke her coccyx, was in miserable shape for awhile, but it seems like around here Angus are the cow du jour, so to speak.

Maybe it's just an Iowa thing. But a gentle Angus would be a pretty sight.

ETA: Thank you for your thoughts regarding my man-troubles. When a man doesn't trouble me, I guess that might be more of a problem, yeah? :)

[Kali]

15. the black baldies are VERY popular and good "doing" cattle,

but if you are a seedstock producer Angus is the top of the list, I guess. Learn what you can about genetics and work to keep the defects out. A lot of high-tech stuff going on with purebreds. Not my area, but it is interesting.

No large animals are completely trustworthy and often it is the gentle ones that will kill or injure you because they tend to get taken for granted. Oh old Bossie wouldn't hurt a fly. Until you get between her and her new calf or her feed!

[vard28]

6. Sounds like your day was busier than mine

The best part of my mother's day weekend was that I finally got rid of my winter blues! I got to spend all day Saturday behind the camera on the farm taking photos of my son's animals for the county fair in July. His show cow from last year had her first heifer calf (which dairy farmers are always happy about) and his hogs are right on track with their weight.

[Kali]

7. Hey vard28!!

LONG time, no see! I thought you had left DU.
that first pic is ADORABLE

what breed of hogs? someday....

[vard28]

8. I'm still around

Life got really busy and DU got a bit crazy, so I took a break. Been sneaking peeks lately and saw that you and Ptah were still hangin' around, so I thought I'd catch back up! The hogs are Hampshires. Gonna be hard with these two come auction time. They are like puppies and love to be played with and come when you call out "Come on pigs, let's go!" The boy will be 16 in two weeks and he still gets attached to the dang things.

We were really excited that Nellie had a heifer calf. He'll show them separately and as his cow/calf pair.

Geez, I made those photos smaller when I edited them. Didn't realize they were still that big!

[Kali]

10. puppy pigs is probably the main reason I haven't ever tried them

I keep reading that and know that I will end up with ten year old pet pigs :eyes:

good luck with the shows, I never experienced that end of things (other than as an occasional fair goer/observer) I had one kid do a few moths of 4H and tried to ride and old ranch mare for his horse project - she was so out classed and we were so clueless that we didn't really go after the first event.

[vard28]

11. Pigs can have really cool personalities

They haven't been named yet, but he's leaning toward Willie and Waylon since the fair theme this year is Cowboy Boots and Country Roots. I'm sure I'll cry on the last day of the fair with this two. The good part about showing dairy cattle is they get to go back to the farm with you!

I didn't grow up on a farm, but the boy is 3rd generation 4-H so I've learned as he's growing up with it. Luckily where we are it's still family oriented and the kids do 95% of the work themselves. When they get to the state level some people start getting a little carried away and it becomes a lot less fun.

Nice to see you again. Keep in touch!

[givemebackmycountry]

13. A nice steak, some fresh grilled green chilis, a tortilla and a bottle of merlot.

ONE question.
How were the green chilis?

[Kali]

14. not bad

thick and meaty, slightly sweet with a touch of heat towards the stem, but a bit lacking in actual flavor. OK for this time of year, for sure. better the next day in a bean burrito, actually:9

edit - can you tell I take green chiles more seriously than I do wine?:rofl: