Emily Turns 1!

Emily turned one year old on Monday, June 6. She is a big girl now. Here she is ready to go to the mall and do some shopping. All she needs is a little push to get her going! Before long she really will be going to the mall and not hanging around boring-old-mom and dad!



Emily had a party and I got her special made cupcakes. I had to get them with farm animals on them, of course.



Here is a close up of her goat cupcakes!



Here's the birthday girl ready for her party!!

It all goes by too fast!!

Procrastination!

I really shouldn't procrastinate but I can't help it. I have no reason to put things off, especially considering it has not rained in the last 2 days and it may not rain for another 2 days. I really should be out planting the garden each night and making soap and weeding the garden and sorting the recycling and cleaning the barn and doing fecal sample tests on the goats and walking the dogs and, and, and, etc... I don't know why I am procrastinating. I just seem to not get anything done when I am home in the evenings. Well, other than doing the dishes, doing laundry, doing chores, taking out the garbage, feeding the child and the husband, and tidying up. I really need to do more. Time is a wasting and I need to get on with it! Summer is here! The sun is out and the plants are ready!

Hopefully tonight I can at least get my garden started. We'll see.....

Adirondack Goat Club

I have decided to create an Adirondack Goat Club. The club will be for all people who have goats or for those interested in getting goats in the future. It's open to all goats whether for milk, meat, or play. Check it out at www.adkgoats.blogspot.com.

Brain Tumor!

I think I have a brain tumor! If the doctor's were to take a scan of my head they would see a goat-shaped tumor taking up a large part of my cerebral cortex! The reason I think there must be a medical explanation for this is because I can't help myself when it comes to goats and goat-related things. It's totally uncontrollable. It's a tick, an obsessive-compulsive tendency, an unavoidable driving force. There must be a neuro-chemical explanation!

Some of my new symptoms are: Buying a baby Angora buckling to add to the herd; spending 3 hours per day in the goat barn taking care of my goat babies; contemplating keeping a doeling from this year's kids to add to the herd; wanting to start my own "Adirondack Goat Club"; making weird goat-keeping decisions that I wouldn't normally consider (like doing CAE testing and using herbal dewormer).

It's a brain tumor! Eek!

Argh!

Maybe it's the three weeks of rain we've had recently.... Maybe it's the threat of my employer laying everyone off and moving to North Carolina.... Maybe it's just me and my luck...

I am very discouraged today. It seems like every smug thought I have had lately has blown up in my face. I was just thinking yesterday how well I was managing my goats and how all of them should be very healthy this year with all my good decisions. Karma is a bitch because she reared her ugly head by making my doe, Gloria, sick this morning. She was very lethargic and didn't eat her breakfast. I tested her for mastitis and she tested positive for it in both teats. One teat was worse than the other so I treated the worse one with ToDAY treatment. Hopefully she will be better by this evening when I get home from work. I guess I won't assume that I am doing a good job, just in case karma hears me say it.

Other things have gone that way recently. Every time I assume something is a good idea, it turns out that it isn't. It's very discouraging.

Oh well, thanks for reading about my problems. Hopefully with the promise of sun will come the promise of better things to come.

Baby Goats!

Finally things have settled down enough that I have time to post pictures of some of the new kids.

This is Snickerdoodle. She is one of Cookie's doe kids.


This is Oreo. We call her Double-Stuffed a lot because she is a lot bigger than her twin, Snickerdoodle.


Pepper had triplets all by herself! I was 10 minutes late for the birth and came home to find three cute kids sitting there all cleaned up and ready.

This is Blue Moon. She is the first kid out of Pepper with this coloration. I am considering selling Pepper in order to keep Blue Moon. She is quite a looker!!


This is the buck Rosco. He is very handsome. I may keep him for breeding next year. I love all his gray spots!


Here's all three of the triplets. The one in front is a doe named Silver Dollar. She has a perfectly round silver spot on her side.

There's 4 more Alpine kids in the barn now. I will post pictures of them soon!

That's All Folks!

Kidding season is over now. I had 4 does produce 9 kids. I was there for 1 out of 4 of the births. I missed the other 3 kiddings by mere minutes. Luckily all kids were presented normally and all came out with no problems. Six kids are does and three are bucks. The moms are all doing well and producing milk well.