Courtesy

When the majority of people in our society invite their neighbors over to help them with a project, they offer them drinks or maybe order a pizza or two.

Not us.  We choose a different route and wet down the old, dusty manure in our corrals so it doesn't get into people's noses, eyes, boots and shirts.  Also, it allows Danish Cowboy to unleash the inner fireman that is present in all men.   A couple of neighbors are headed to our place tomorrow to help condition the calves which means applying Verified Beef tags, administering vaccinations and checking the general overall health of the overgrown babies.  We like having their help and we want them to come back so we offer them muddy manure.  Hey, it's a gesture.

Treat your neighbor well, you know?

The Price of Spring

Today is the day that I resolve to attack this blog with a new fervor! A new dedication to keeping you updated on the fascinating detals of my life. I've been busy, you know. We had calving season. There are 8 cows left to pop a baby out and the excitement has worn off. Every year, I pester Danish Cowboy about when the first calf will arrive. And every year, after about 75% of the way through, the newness wears off. The calving smells start to linger in the house and I try to feign a mild interest so that Danish Cowboy and I can report our days to one another.And that underground sprinkling system I told you about last year: it, along with the sewer line replacement and months of ice settling on the lawn, have left us some nasty scars in the form of bare spots which have required raking, shoveling, tamping, and leveling. God forbid the lawn is uneven and large clumps of dirt remain behind! This is a ranch, for pete's sake. Manicured lawns required.

At some point I got tired of leveling underground sprinkler trenches and just threw down some weed fabric and made a new flower bed. It also takes more time now than it ever did to get the kids dressed and ready to go out. They insist on helping, which, while cute, can make one scream as they put shirts on their legs and yank the socks off that you have just wrestled onto them. The thing that has sucked the most life out of me over the past three weeks, however, has been illness of the family. I can't chalk it up to swine flu, but I want to.

I also managed to plant the cold season portion of my garden: potatoes, onions, peas and shallots. Danish Cowboy, if I tell you that I put shallots in the supper rather than onions, would you eat it then? And the mini-sprinkler system shown above? We should have an ecology chat on the virtues of microirrigation. It fascinates me.

Okra!

Marigolds!

Weirdly angled photos of my tall and lanky seedlings! (Note to non-gardeners: tall and lanky is not good in this situation. Shine on, sun! Shine on, because you haven't been doing that for the past two weeks.)
I've also created a new rubber mulch walkway where there used to exist a wheelchair ramp. A few stairs, a new rain barrel and some better planning on my part and we shall be good to go. The moral of this story: when thine Wal-Mart with thou rubber mulch existeth over 100 miles away, buy enough of it to completeth your project.
Does it ever end? Seriously. Does it?

Cake Day: An Interview with Danish Cowboy

Q: It's blizzarding outside. Do you want me to interview you for my blog?

A: (No response.)

Q: Great! What is cow cake made of?

A: Oh, it can be a number of different things depending on what ingredients are available, their market prices, what phase the moon is in and whether or not I had Cheerios or Lucky Charms for breakfast.

Q: So are there Cheerios in it?

A: The stuff we have now has peas, distiller's grain, sunflower screenings and maybe a few other goodies like molasses. We feed it so our cows get the necessary protein for their diet. Q: Distiller's grain? Does that mean the cows get intoxicated on it? Shouldn't we stick with Cheerios?

A: (Sideways glance.)

Q: Boy, you're fun tonight. Next question. How much do you feed?

A: We shoot for about four pounds per animal every other day during the cold winter months. We also feed chopped hay or roll out hay bales so that they get a total of 30 pounds of feed every day, sometimes 40 pounds if it's really cold out.
Q: Or if your wife whines that you aren't feeding these poor starving creatures enough?

A: Who's the rancher here?

Q: Where do you get the cake from?

A: Our local town has a feed mill, but we need to shop around for the best price. This last load of cake came all the way from Fargo, North Dakota.

Q: Fargo, like the movie? Aren't you worried about what's in the cake then? You betcha I am.

A: Well, the cows don't seem to mind this batch. Just like any other time they hear the diesel pick-up start, they come running to get their ration.

Q: Why did I only get pictures of them chasing the pick-up down and milling around, waiting for the distribution of the cake? Why didn't I get pictures of that cool scene of them all lined out behind the pick-up as cake is tossed on the ground? Why can't I have a video camera that captures their soft breathing and snorts, the crunch of their hooves on the snow? The kind of stuff that gives you a sense of purpose in the morning?

A: It might be because you insisted on tossing the cake out to them and then complaining about how it was such hard work.

Q: Oh.

A: It might also be because we had these two funny little characters with us who don't allow for much picture time. Overheard as the kids relaxed in the cake (aka over-sized rabbit pellets) truck: "This batch of cake sure tastes good. Must be that distiller's grain Dad was talking about."

So Long and Farewell,

Em

Siberia

Upon awaking this morning (at 6:00 A.M., courtesy of the kiddos) my husband and I began preparing for a long morning of chores in the cold. Basically, this consisted of an incredibly unhealthy breakfast of pancakes from a mix and an unidentified smoked meat sausage, and also a healthy dose of whining about how cold it is and how unfair it is that I should have to go help with chores when it is so cold. 30 degrees? Great! I'm there! However, our digital thermometer read "OFL." Although we are unsure of exactly what this means, Danish Cowboy and I have our own theories which I can't repeat here. Vulgarity just is not a part of ranch life. At least public ranch life anyway. We are pretty certain the temperature was somewhere at -30 degrees F, which is quite cold.

We donned our winter gear with Kevin and the kids choosing coveralls, mittens, snowboots, face masks and other such appropriate attire. I, being tough and slightly stupid, chose a much more fashionable approach to feeding: a North Face jacket, a Bula hat, REI gloves, and black plastic muck boots with one thin pair of socks. And may I note that my Gap jeans had a very cool hole in them on the knee. I looked great! This would come to haunt me in approximately 1 and 1/2 hours. We headed to the hay yard to feed five bales of hay, each weighing approximately 1200 pounds and consisting of either grass-alfalfa or hay barley.As the girls do every morning in winter, they patiently milled around the hay yard, waiting for the hay to appear like magic. We set the first bale on the ground and they dove in. These are some tough cows. -30 degrees and still moving after a night out on the prairie? You have to give them a little credit. The frost on their backs usually disappears as they eat and warm themselves up. Danish cowboy is in the background, rolling the hay out with the tractor. And to think that some ranchers feed their cows absolutely nothing in the cold winter months!The kids have started to become regulars at feeding time, never wanting to miss a trip outside. Apparently a love for tractors can start at a very early age.Danish Cowboy's grandfather homesteaded on this site in a little wood shack with two coal-fired stoves. No insulation, no electric blankets, no hot cocoa on a cold wintery night. The strength of our forebears never fails to amaze me.I like to think she's saying "Thank You." You're welcome, #825. We left the cows munching peacefully on their hay, with the sun shining brightly on their backs, soon to melt the frost and provide a little relief for this cold day (-9.6 degrees at 1:30 P.M.)

And as I said before, my fashionable chore attire was soon to bite me in the butt. We went off to feed my precious (oh so precious!) horses and the bulls. As we opened the gate, the ponies took off. And not just a few feet. They ran a mile away, noses in the air, tails flying like banners in the wind. So beautiful until I realized that I would be the one that would have to get them in because when I'm around they become my horses. So I caught them and proceeded to walk a mile back to their pasture while Danish Cowboy enjoyed a Diet Coke and maybe a hot toddie and some eggnog. My kneecap, so stylishly exposed earlier, became dangerously close to being frost bitten. About halfway home I wondered if they would have to amputate the whole leg from frost bite or if they could just amputate the kneecap. I couldn't see by the time I shut the gate because my eyelashes had frosted over.

I decided that for the moment, but only for this brief moment, house life was a better fit for me. So I retreated to home for tea and to bake the ugliest and scariest holiday cookies. Ever. And not a single soul felt sorry for me and my cold kneecap all day long.

Another Year Completed

Wheat harvest is over and so ends another cycle of farming out on the Hanging H X. The next few month's will be lots of fun. We'll plant some winter wheat, ship some calves and have a rip roaring time moving into a new house. Actually, not so new. It's a Sears and Roebuck model from the 1940ish era and it needs some lovin'. My MIL lives there now and she's off to a new place in town. And me and the fam-damily are out of the trailer house that has given us lots of love. It's a flashback to the 1970s and I'm ready to move on up! I've already been told which room will belong to me, where the kids will sleep and where my panties shall be stored. Adventures in country living with the in-laws - there's nothin' like it!
Cheers!
Emily