Author: barnyardblessings

Journey, our first horse to be added to the farm, is a Missouri Fox Trotter. Well, she’s not quite at the farm, she’s at a local barn so we can finish our horse shelter and fencing. But she’s OURS! Yay!!

The Missouri Fox Trotters are known for their fabulously smooth gait and we are looking forward to eventually taking her on trail rides. She hasn’t been ridden much lately, so we need to work out some kinks and make sure she’s not going to spook on the trail, so it may be a little while… but we are all looking forward to the journey 😉

Milkshake had five little buns this time. Three broken black, one jet black, and one torted otter. So sweet!

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Spring is always so busy. During the long winter, I’m always anxious and ready to dig into spring. Then Springs comes and time just seems to fly. There doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day to get everything done.

Our goats are growing and are almost old enough to start finding their new homes. We are probably just keeping two milkers and one or two of the doelings. We are just doing a little rearranging because we are going to be adding Nigerian Dwarf goats to our farm soon!

Our Holland Lop had an adorable litter of 5 a few weeks ago. All five kits seem to be doing well! It’s fun to see what colors are in each litter. It’s always a surprise.

I went ditch digging across the street and dug up some elderberry seedlings to transplant behind my barn. Since they haven’t mowed the ditches yet, there’s plenty to be had. Elderberries and Elderflowers are notoriously good for the fighting the sicknesses that come with the cold and flu season. They aren’t the best tasting to just pop in your mouth, but I’ve dried them to use for tea, frozen them to throw in smoothies, and made them into an herbal syrup for the winter. And… we just cleared the old wood pile from behind the barn and have some empty space. Might as well fill it!

Speaking of wood piles, we’ve also been busy splitting and stacking firewood from a walnut tree that my parents had cut down. In addition to building back up our firewood piles (which were down to slim pickin’s by the end of winter), the kids have started a little side business of creating parakeet perches. We made one for our bird and she loves it! She perches on it for hours, going up and down the ladder and finding millet treats that we clip to the branches. Seeing how well it works for our bird, they’ve since started making them to sell.