Grader stuck

The area where our land is the lowest is right at the road in front of the house. Right there, there are a couple big culverts that let water go into the neighbors land. I noticed the other day that it was pretty washed out down there and apparently I should have called the county about it. They showed up this morning with 6 dumptruck loads of fill and a big grader to fix it. When Jessica drove by them she stopped to chat (country-style) and they asked why she had never called them. Umm....well....we didn't really ever figure that they would come fix it for free I guess. I'm pretty stoked though because some of my fence posts were starting to slough off into the abyss so this should fix that.
The real fun though was that the big ol grader got stuck in the freshly dumped fill (which was a bit muddy.) After getting stuck, I considered taking the Dodge out to offer him a pull, but soon after, one of the dump trucks came back (they must have radio, eh?) and after a lot of head scratching, they finally hooked up a chain and proceeded to pull him forwards THROUGH the muck. They really got him stuck even worse and really into the nasty. The dumptruck was backing up to get slack in the chain and then gunning it till the whole rear end of the truck was hopping up and down. I thought for sure they would break the chain and the dumptruck would go flying off into the muddy hole on the other side of the road, but alas, no such luck. The best though was when the grade was backing up for a good run at the same time as the dumptruck was shooting forward for a good yank. I bet somebodies kidneys got a good racking right there.
Anyway, after 10 minutes or so, they eventually got it out and the grader driver was very careful to avoid a repeat. I have to say, it is a lot less stressful and much more enjoyable watching other folks extricate their rigs than trying to extricate one's own.

Lazy

Ginger, Max, & Cookie - Good times!

Where to start to describe the craziness that has transpired since Christmas Eve? I don't know, but I can say that we have been having some great times with all the family in town. Here's a few highlights:

• Christmas day rabbit massacre with Mark, Neil and a new 6 million candlepower spotlight (thanks parents)


• B-day party for Lille and Winter in which the farm was changed into a mini-petting zoo. There were tons of good friends and family


• New Years fireworks over our lake with Nancy, Richard, Mark & Kelly


• Tractor repairs, field mowing, sheep-hoof trimming and general farm-fun with Mark

It's been good times. Unfortunatly, something nasty struck the house as evidenced by Sterling's vomit shortly after we were winding down from the New Year's celebration in the middle of the night (what a way to start the new year eh?) We all were feeling it by the next morning, so things haven't been so great for a bit here.

Christmas Eve Present Giving

I love mine because it is so warm...it's mine so I can do whatever I want with it."

"I'm going to make sure to never make it dirty so it never has to go in the laundry."

"My blanket."

Quotes from the weasels (Winter, Sterling, then Ginger) after opening their "Quillows" (quilt + pillow) from Aunt Angela & family. The kids were stoked and they could tell that each of their fabrics were chosen with care. I think the presents were intended for tomorrow morning, but Grandma figured they would be better for tonight to help the kids get to bed better. Thanks Ashurst-McGees!

Cookie's New Friend

Christmas came a bit early at the farm for Jessica. She has been wanting a horse to ride for some time now, and we finally got around to procrastinating the rest of the stuff around here so we could get her one tonight. It was a cold run from Terrell (E. of Dallas and prolly 50-60 miles south of here) to Leonard, but the new horse, "Believe the Power" (I know - what kinda name is that) seems to have made it OK. We put her up in the stalls by ol' bessie (the cow) for the night and while we were fussing about the horse, ol' Bessie gave us a real treat - her first words! That's right, Bessie moooooo-ed tonight. It was actually pretty funny to hear that big, low moo coming out of that little calf. Jessica's going to see if she can borrow a saddle tomorrow to actually put in some saddle time. The pic is from the seller's barn - not ours.
"Believe the Power" seems to be a pretty solid horse. The weasels tend to do a lot of yelling, jumping, sand-throwing, arm-waving, twitching and other general non-horse-friendly type of stuff and she took it all in stride. Hopefully she will act the same on our farm and will be a good all-around horse for Jessica and the kids.

It's a cold day in Texas

Check out the ice on the pond!

Leonard

Cuz that's the way we roll!

Predator

Workjing from home has its advantages and I have been enjoying it. Of course, it is also easy to let the day go by without even stepping out of the house, so I have to watch out for that. The other day, if I hadn't taken a few minutes to cast a couple lines, I wouldn't have gotten out all day. One of the cool things is that I was sitting in the kitchen nook working on the computer when I picked up the binoculars to check out some ducks on the pond. Something on the other side caught my eye and it wasn't long before I was watching a trio of coyotes sniffing around the field over there (in broad daylight.) It was tough to keep from grabbing the scoped 30-06 and making a sniper out of myself, but they weren't on my property, so I kept my cool and just watched them for a bit hoping they would cross over the fenceline onto my side (they never did and eventually melted into the woods.) One of them had kind of a "tripod" thing going on - like he had an injured foot or something. He was kinda bouncing around alot.
You can tell there are coyotes all over out here once it starts to get dark. When they get to howling, it feels like you are surrounded by them. I figure once the weather gets a bit better, I might just have to make a perch on top of one of our sheds and take care of a few of them. Jessica is aiming for chickens these days (paying $3 for 18 eggs really gets her going) and coyotes roaming around in broad daylight could be bad for free range chickens.

By the way, did you know that "the whole nine yards" refers to the 27 feet in length that WWII machine gun ammo came bundled in? I guess giving the Germans the whole nine yards meant to keep the guns rolling till they ran out of ammo.