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Sunday, September 9, 2012

We May Burn Down The Town......

But neither fire, nor broken truck will keep me from bringing my goats home some hay!!

Just as he did last year when he played "The Hay Fairy", my father in law has saved me this winter... He baled up quite a bit of very weedy mixed grass hay and on a trip up for a visit, he loaded me up with 4 round bales to bring home…. With the drought, and no grazing here in west Texas, hay has been hard to find and even harder to afford... Rounds are averaging $120.00 each.... Small grass squares are in the $12.00 range and I won't even talk about the surge in grain prices.....

Forget diamonds and pretty things, give this gal a gift of hay and nothing makes me happier!

As my readers may have noticed, NOTHING in my life, even the most mundane task, can be simple.

Oh no, everything I attempt to do must have extravagant fanfare, drama, or in this case, FIRE.

Trucking on along with a trailer load of hay, I was blissfully happy. Nothing better for me than the security of having hay… Jerimiah is driving, I’m discussing where we are going to store it and we’re hoping traffic won’t be bad as we are just outside of Dallas/Fort Worth….

Cars behind us, and one very slow car in front of us… We move on over to the far left lane to pass and just as we start getting up past them, we feel this bone jarring *thud*….. The trailer broke loose, with four, 900+lbs bales of hay, in the middle of traffic….

Ya ever wanna clear metroplex traffic, just lose a trailer and watch those folks scatter!! Hate to admit it, but the look on the other driver’s faces was just fabulous…... Yes, I am aware that my sense of humor is warped...

Gotta hand it to Jerimiah, he pulled some slick maneuvering. Swerved the truck in front of the trailer, it smacked right into us, and he was able to get it across the lanes of traffic and into the bar ditch.

Had a terrifying moment when we split a large sign…. His truck went to the left, the trailer went to the right, just barely missing it by about 4ft!

We jump out, absolutely astonished that we didn’t take out the sign and didn’t cause a wreck… Only to panic about the possible damage we did to my father in law’s trailer…. You never, ever tear up something when it belongs to you, but I’ll be damned if the first time you borrow something, ya end up breaking it..

Ok, I admit, I was a lil shaken, and was giggling like a fool…. Couldn’t go look at the trailer as I just knew it was busted and twisted up… Jerimiah checks it out and yells: “It’s alright!! The trailer is FINE, it was my truck bumper that snapped off and my truck bed is warped!”

Giddy with relief and our freakish stroke of good luck in a bad luck ordeal, I kneel beside him to check it out…. He’s giving it a good once over and I’m staring above his head in disbelief…

 “Honey….. Honey… It’s not ok, can you call 911?!?”



I may giggle like a fool, but hubby poses with disaster.... You can see the poles of the sign we barely missed in the background...
 He stands & looks in the direction I’m staring in and I’ll not type here the words that came out of his mouth next….


Check out our lovely lil fire...... Fire department just arrived...

The trailer, scraping across the asphalt, sparked a nice fire, catching a huge stretch of the bar ditch on fire, and thanks to the dry grass, it was spreading quickly…

With us, it never ends, I swear, I don't know why anything even shocks me anymore.....

Poor Jerimiah, my giggling while he called 911 probably didn’t help, but it was either hysterics or giggles… Giggles don’t bother the kids like hysterics would..


Our bumperless, warped truck..
Anywho, once again, luck was on our side and the fire department came & got the blaze out before it did more than burn a bunch of grass, and by some miracle, we didn’t get a ticket!

I also didn’t get my hay that day....... Had to call my father in law since the truck was broke and he hooked up and toted my pretty load of hay back home with him… Such a sad sight.

Ya know how they say good things come to those who wait?? Well, I was chomping at the bit to bring home my hay, and a few months later, we were finally able to trek back up there again, and this time my father in law loaned us his big pretty trailer and put 10, yes I said TEN, round bales up there for me…. Couldn’t have made me happier!

We made it home in one piece, didn’t wreck, burn or break anything, though I must confess after we pushed that 4th round off by hand, I wasn’t loving the fact that we had 6 more to push off….


My nice lil hay stash all lined up..
This weekend we borrowed a hay spike to put on our itty bitty tractor to get those bales moved……

It doesn’t look like the prettiest hay in the pictures, but once you peel off that outside layer, the inside smells fabulous, has a lot of green and is chock full of big leafy weeds that the goats just LOVE.



Sweet Miss Ginger....
We put one bale in the grown does pen and smooshed it against the fence so the bucks could share it, then tied a panel across the front so they wouldn't jump all over it & waste it... You can see Tonka and my new Alpine herdsire, Austin, hanging out in the background. Doe in the picture is the almost 9 year old doe, Ginger, who I brought home in the back of my car on that last road trip mom & I took.. She is Heidi's dam...



 
And here is Star enjoying the new bale.... Yet another doe I never got around to introducing here.... Star and a cute lil Lamancha doeling named Mocha came this summer after Casper went on to her new home.... I'm up to 10 goats total now: 1 Alpine buck, 4 Alpine does, 1 Lamancha buck, 3 Lamancha does and of course, our 1 token Nubian... The very generous gift of hay will definately see us through the winter...

Thankfully all the goats are in hog heaven and are just crazy about this hay... Had they turned their noses up at it, I think I would have had a nervous melt down after all the drama we went through to get it here....

8 comments:

Cali said...

It's always an adventure, isn't it! Looks like you've got some happy goats!

petey said...

You crack me up...seeing the fire would have definitely pushed my button, but I LOVE the pic of your poor unsuspecting DH! Way too funny!!

Leigh said...

Nobody can make a major adventure out of something so simple, nobody buy you! Whew, so glad it turned out so well.

Anonymous said...

ROFL!!!! If that picture of ur husband is anything to judge by, I'd say the 2 of u are well matched in the humor area! I could not have smiled so big for the shot in that situation. Very nice of your FIL to hook u up on the hay, we need 2 trade inlaws!!

Anonymous said...

Woah if u didn't have pics to prove it, I'd think u were telling tall tales! So nice to have the hay even if u did have to few hurdles to get over to get it.

Pretty does, u definately need to do a blog post with updated pictures of ur current herd.

Are u breeding that doe Genger this year? To the new buck, Austin? If so, whats the breeding behind both & will you be keeping the kids or selling? I would be interested in a doeling ;)

Becky in Fort Worth

* Crystal * said...

It sure is Cali!

Petey- I love that pic of Jerimiah too.... He's such a goober :)

Leigh- Life is an adventure, and apparently I'm incapable of having simple adventures ;)

Anonymous- Hubby and I are very well suited.... Our sense of humor is about the only thing we have in common though :) Food, hobbies, movies ect. ect we're almost complete opposites in preferences..... Gotta love a man who can make ya laugh though..

Becky in Fort Worth- Nope, no tall tales here! It's why I take pics of everything, otherwise folks wouldn't believe me ;)

I do need to get updated pics of my current goats, I've not shared Mocha (LM), Star (LM), Ginger (Alpine), or Austin (Alpine) with y'all yet...

Yes I will be selling kids as bottle babies.... I usually keep them the 1st week or 2 to get them started right & disbudded, after that they are ready to go.

Ginger is a nice doe.... Has held up well with age.
Her registered name is Waiilatpu Wrat Ginger 4*M and you can look her up on www.adgagenetics.org to see her linear appraisal scores & such....

Austin is an AI baby out of Free Radical:
http://www.cherryglenfarm.com/free_radical_family.htm & his dam was the dam of the girl I lost, Astra... Dam is Ch Brynnestone Aurora (can look her up on ADGA Genetics too).

Ginger has great feet, milks well & I love her teats.... Only thing I'd change is her teat placement as they are too far apart.... Austin's dam & 1/2 sister had fabulous udders with perfect teat placement, so I'm hoping his daughters will be an improvement over Ginger in that department.... Only thing I don't like about Austin is he doesn't have much width, but he's very dairy.... So, we shall see how the breeding works out. 1st choice buck kid is already spoken for... If you email me, I'll shoot you an email when I start kidding & if anything I have suits you, we can go from there.... And if not, I know several good breeders here in Texas that I'd happily refer you to for good, clean dairy stock :)

Anonymous said...

You always make me laugh!!!

Coloring Outside the Lines said...

Oh my gosh- that was quite an adventure!