When things go wrong

We took Grant to the only true flat spot on the farm this past weekend.  He had a great time riding circles. At least he had a great time until his four wheeler stopped working. 

Being the ever resourceful out-pf-the-box thinking guy he is, David quickly figured out how to haul the now dead four wheeler back to the house. 

Pretty good, huh?

The mud on the Rhino is from maple sap runs when trails were wet and muddy. No one was complaining about doing a little mudding along with our sap collecting. I just wish there was a car wash nearby to clean all of that mud off now!

Grant can now check off "milk a goat" from his bucket list. 

Lucy, our last pregnant momma, gave birth a couple weeks ago. Would you believe she stepped on her only baby and broke its neck?  

Mother Nature - 8

Shupe Farm - 0

We are having quite a string of bad luck, but I am optimistic things will start getting better. Baby calves should start making an appearance in the next month or so. Hopefully our bad luck is all used up by then. 

And for the record, Grant was the only one brave enough to taste fresh goat milk. He said it was awful. I'll take his word for it. 

Jake and Courtney are doing fine. They are staying with family and beginning to put life back together. I hope they are all out of bad luck too. 

Have a good evening. I have to get kids home from various activities and finish spreading the dump truck full of mulch that has filled our driveway the past three days. 

Total Loss

David called yesterday to tell me he was on his way to the farm.

Our neighbor found the trailer on our property on fire.

Being a trailer, it was gone before firefighters arrived.

Jake and Courtney, the young couple living there the past year, were not home. They were working when it happened.

Their dogs and cat were in the trailer. No one was able to get them out.

They lost all of their belongings.

Right now we are trying to figure out the best way to help them move forward.

With their families nearby and help from friends and neighbors I hope they can pick up and start moving forward quickly. They are tough country kids. They will get through this. 

Before and after

9:00 this morning

9:30 this morning

Do you notice anything missing?

Braces came off today. She considered this a terrific birthday present. I should have saved my money and not bought her a gift!

Speaking of gift....

Here is what ten year old girls want for their birthday. It is a horse stable. 

Ten year old girls also want chocolate cake instead of decorated sheet cakes. 

Mothers of ten year old girls are much appreciative of this development. Cake decorating was fun about two kids ago. I'm too busy now to really enjoy it. 

So no more nine year old girls in our zoo and no more creatures with braces. 

I would turn a cartwheel for sheer joy. 

Except I stopped turning cartwheel about twenty years ago. 

I think I'll celebrate with a nice long nap instead. 

Goodnight!

Whirlwind Weekend

So the crazy meter was reading pretty high around the zoo this weekend. 

To celebrate Grace's birthday we had a group of girls over for a sleepover Friday night. 

There was pizza. 

There were cupcakes (made by Kroger).

There was a lot of giggling and playing. 

And there were boys!

Just to add to the fun Grant had a friend spend the night too. 

These two did everything they could to avoid the partiers.

Nice pose, John! He was imitating the girls. 

 My last post which posted on the wrong day floated in cyberspace for a day before showing up on the blog. We did go to the farm Saturday and Sunday after the sleepover kids left and after the baseball open house. Busy weekend to say the least. 

When John wasn't posing like a girl, he was busy restacking rocks at the farm. 

This looks much better than it did. It is a flower bed in the front yard. 

We worked a lot and played a lot too. More later. I'm off to chauffeur kids for a while.