Self sufficient living

Yesterday Paul, my Dad and I spent the afternoon making pork sausage from some of the meat from the pigs we butchered a month ago. Then Paul and I came home and made spaghetti with the pork sausage. There is a really good feeling about becoming self sufficient. Being able to control exactly how the animal is raised and cared for, what it eats and then what you do with the meat. It's just a good feeling, plus delicious!

Tardy's a big horse now!

So Friday night Tardy had his longest ride yet; probably about 10 minutes. And he was out in the big boy arena instead of the small pen! He did very well; no buck, spook, jump. The biggest issue was that he stalled out, yep, went to neutral and there was no getting him moving; so Paul actually had to come out and help him move forward; what a lazy pony. But I guess I'd rather have that then leaping and launching!

Deja Kittie?!?

So this was bizzare. We currently have two felines living with us. Junipurr, a solid black, petite female who is still about 60% feral, but will now sit on the couch and has decided that living with dogs is better than sleeping out in the rain. And COB our huge (13-15#) Siamese, who is solid muscle and a big alpha male.

Last night Paul and I were sitting watching tv after a hard days work in the yard and at the farm. Paul comments that Junipurr is perched on the back hill scanning for mice to 'play' with. Then I see COB coming from the other side of the yard marching toward the house...with a solid black cat about Junipurr's size 3-4 feet behind him marching to keep up...

So here are Paul and I looking from one cat to the other; 'The one on the hill is our's right?'

Garden!!!

Yeah! The garden is planted, it seemed like 'spring' was never actually going to arrive and we would never be able to put in our garden, but I finished yesterday.

This year we expanded from our 2 little raised beds to an 8x20 foot area, which is now full of kale, chard, beans, etc; yum, I'm hungery just thinking about it!

Today I'll be going to this great plant sale to get our tomatoes plants which will go in the little raised bed that we've converted into a green house area.

Now it's just time to be patient and wait for everything to grow...not my strong suit.

And the battle with the deer has already begun :( Paul spotted two sniffing around yesterday morning; Smudge is going to have to go onto alert mode!

Road Trip!!!

We have arrived home...3 dogs, 2 people, 1968 camper, 9 states, 12 days, 3000 + miles...wow what a trip!

The adventure began on Friday, April 6th; we left home, stopped by our last pet sitting job and headed east for Missoula, Montana for a dog show on Saturday. The drive was long, but good; Paul had to drive through a small snow storm in Spokane but otherwise it was clear. It took longer than thought, so our first night in the camper was spent in a small truck stop. We had no idea if we would be warm enough and comfy; the camper (now known as 'the dog house') was more than we could have ever dreamed. Paul slept in the over-cab area, which is even long enough he can stretch out, I slept on the lower table area which was perfect. The dogs all found areas, Smudge with me every night, Renoir upstairs with Paul, and Boots being the kind soul he is spent the trip bouncing back and forth between the two of us pretty equally. The five of us were warm, cozy and comfy.

Saturday morning we headed to the trial site; the sun come out, so even though it was cold the sun felt wonderful!!! Boots and Renoir did very well at the trial; Renoir even qualified in his first ever elite chances course...what a good boy! Everyone at the trial was very nice and friendly, there were some great dog/handler teams, it will definately be a summer destination for a shorter road trip. The trial was quite a bit smaller than we are use to which was great as we were done by about 3 pm so hit the road to head south for Denver.

Our drive from Montana to Denver had us on the road for 2 more nights. The first night we were near Bozeman, drove through the part of the main stretch...what a fun looking college town. Lots of bars, galleries, funky shops; it was SO tempting to pull over and wander around, but we didn't know where we were sleeping and it was getting late, so we decided against it. Driving through Wyoming the next day we stopped at this great battle site where over 800 Indians ambushed 70 US military; there was this great trail we walked the dogs along and even walked through wagon ruts from one of the old settler roads; very neat!

The faint lines going down the middle of this picture are the wagon wheel ruts, in places they were quite deep, amazing to think how many people must have rode across this country.

Montana and Wyoming had some gorgeous ranches and beautiful rivers! So Paul dreamed of fishing and I longed for my horses. We found this great state park in Wyoming for the second night that was on this huge lake; we had the entire campground to ourselves, as we pulled in there was even a lucky wild turkey wandering around...although it didn't stick around long, as Smudge began his high pitch shaking squealing. We even arrived early enough that we got to watch the sun set and play cribbage outside, victories for Julie!

This takes us to Monday morning and a short drive to Broomfield, Colorado to Paul's parents. We were with Cheryl and Kenn through Thursday morning; we helped with some yard projects, had a couple great bbq's outside in the sun and heat. The big motivator for this road trip was going to the Conference of World Affairs (CWA) at CU Boulder; so we headed there on Tuesday. CWA is a week long series of discussions on current world topics with top leaders from different fields; it is free to the public, I highly suggest everyone attend this if possible. We were only able to go to two talks; one was a musical performance that was amazing! The other was a panel of 4 speaker on 'Who is normal?' What I took away from the second talk was that I am definately not normal; and I'm thinking most of you reading this don't qualify either :)

While we were at CWA we took the dogs to their first ever doggy day care, Rocky Hill Ranch. Paul and I were like parents taking their 5 year old to school for the first time wondering, Will they make doggy friends? Get along with everyone else? Will they play well with others? Yes, I know, pathetic. This doggy day care is a non-traditional day care; there is a huge yard, about 2-3 acres, where 30-40 dogs, mainly larger dogs were all out running loose together with a few people out with them. I don't think all dogs would like this environment, but it was perfect for our boys. The people were very nice and our boys came home smiling and tired!

On Thursday morning we left Colorado heading west for Reno, we drop I-80 west through Wyoming then dropped down into Utah. I don't suggest anyone ever drive that section of highway through Wyoming...it was horrible. Constant wind, joined by huge gusts of wind and mainly all semi-trucks driving faster than seemed needed...not fun.

Cooking in the camper was delicous, though a little challenging due to space. But the dogs each found their begging locations, I have my relaxation corner; so Paul could cook us wonderful meals!!! We even brought pork and bacon from our recently butchered pig from home.

The drive for Colorado to Reno was, as I said above, windy, and also pretty boring. We had a mission to arrive in Reno by a certain time on Friday so I could take a dog lesson with a trainer down there, so we didn't spend much time pulling over at scenic spots. We did however make it in time for the lesson, which was well worth the push, and the 14+ hour drive on Thursday. Friday night we were advised to go to a little local mexican restaurant for dinner that was a 5 minute walk from the trial site...it was awesome; good service with cold beer and great authentic food; Paul had a beef tongue burrito, it was yummy. The second dog trial in Reno that Saturday was ok, it was super windy and cold, the site was outside on dry grass, which the dogs aren't use to running on so were slipping a bit, but dog trials are always fun, so overall it was great! Paul walked into Reno and spent most of the day at casino's so he had a great time too!

Saturday afternooon we headed west for Northern California. Important road trip lesson here: Even if the upcoming directions seem VERY obvious, ALWAYS check them to make sure there isn't some back highway you are suppose to be taking! We had jumped back onto I-80, headed west in California, driving for about 45 minutes, when we realized that we were actually suppose to have headed north out of Reno and instead were headed for Sacramento; way further south than we wanted to be. We found a connector hwy that was a gorgeous drive and only added about an hour all together.

We arrived at Sue and Caren's house mid-day Sunday. We took the dogs to the ocean for a nice long walk on the beach. Even Smudge got the chase some ocean birds, sort of sad how much slower he is now, although he wasn't aware of that. We went for a great dinner at this funky little local place that had some live music playing. Walked around Humboldt State University which was gorgeous with all of the rhodies coming into bloom. There is something very relaxing about being at Sue and Caren's; it was a great 24 hours there, just wish it had been longer.

Monday we headed north to Paul's grandfathers place where his brother Scott is living and cleaning up the place. It's a really neat piece of property, 14 riverfront acres with lush pasture space and and old orchard. It was great seeing Scott for the day and the boys enjoyed visiting Mama Dog.

Tuesday morning we headed north; we stopped at Paul's other brothers house in Salem for a few minutes and made it home around 7 pm or so. It was a great trip. We can't wait to plan another one sometime in the future. Although it is great being home now too! (This post took me a few weeks to get out; our trip was April 6th-17th, just a slight delay)

Happy ducks at last!

Earlier this spring we got 3 little baby ducks, 2 Indian Runners and 1 Crested, to help with the ever growing slug population. They had been living outside for the last couple months and had a fenced in area so they wouldn't wander away. About 2 weeks ago we removed the fence so they could fulfill their slug eating duties. Well it didn't take before the ducks got spooked by the dogs and took off into the woods. The first time it happened we were able to find and herd the ducks out of the woods. But unfortunately the second time it happened the 2 Indian Runners kept on going out into woods and we have been unable to find them. While the loss of the Indian Runners was sad, what was even worse was the lonely Crested duck who was so scared and lonely that she wouldn't even leave the comforts of her home to go swimming.

Luckily this only went on fo one week before we were able to find a new duck friend for her. So after a 50 minute drive and $5 bucks we introduced the two ducks. It was love at first quack. And luckily this duck seems a lot more use to people so hopefully she won't get spooked as easily.