*slaps forehead*

Dexter is living up to his name. He escaped the back yard this morning and tried to kill chickens (keep in mind they are significantly larger than he is) and then while we were gone destroyed my lovely bookmark and Tsu's good headphones. That is the highlight reel of his greatest hits of the day, there was more, but I am trying to not dwell on it too much lest I give in to the desire to punt him.

And now he is sleeping beside Nigel, curled between my feet, looking up at me when i move and disturb him with eyes full of adoration and worship. Stupid obnoxious dog.

Gosh he is cute. I want to strangle him so bad right now. My beautiful bookmark, that was a one of a kind work of art gifted to me by an anonymous friend. *sob* He actually pulled it OUT of my library book and destroyed it. What dog DOES that?

I'll tell you what dog does that, this one does.



He is much more adorable when he has eyebrows and whiskers but i groom him myself and last time i oopsed his face.

This was prior to the oops:

as a new puppy, with the toy he has now completely destroyed and we have thrown away...



and more recently, with his usual grown up haircut...




*sigh* From now on he has to go in the crate when we leave the house. He has been sooo good for so long, but he is still only 9 or 10 months old and i think we trusted him far too much far too soon.

I can't wait until his eyebrows and whiskers grow back.

Baby news: never a dull moment.

So, early this week we got a call from the OB about the results from Tiff's ultrasound. They found a Choroid Plexus Cyst in Demetri's brain. She very strongly stressed that these are not uncommon and are harmless in and of themselves but they can be a marker of another issue and we needed a level 2 ultrasound with a specialist to rule out anything more serious.

Luckily they were able to get us in with the specialist almost immediately. Unfortunately, because we live in a massive no man's land, the specialist was almost 60 miles away, and our appointment was early in the day. Of course Tiff was nonchalant as always but Josh (daddy-to-be) and I are the worriers in the family and we stressed enough for everyone.

Thankfully, after the second ultrasound they found nothing, not even the initial choroid plexus cyst, and none of the physical deformities associated with the genetic issue it can be a "soft marker" for in some cases.

*phew*

It was a stressful busy week for me, and i am glad it is over.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

One of the great things about this blog is that it is mine. :-)

I can't control actual conversations, which right now are mostly about why I haven't "made" Tsu get a job (Um, hello? 1. have you seen the job market around here? You know MI custody law says we can't move more than 100 miles until Tiff turns 18, so we are sorta required to stay here in this awful market for another year and a half.  2. I can't 'make' anyone else DO anything. I sorta wish i could sometimes, but I can't, so I'm getting sick of being yammered at about that.) and how somehow if he isn't putting in 20 applications a week i need to make him do that, or being told how I have to do this or do that or make Tiff do this or do that (again with me having to "make" other people do things? *sigh*), or being either pitied or chastised because I'm not thrilled about having an infant in my home again. I'm tired of people trying to fix me because I don't like babies. I'm equally tired of people telling me how screwed up I am for not liking babies. THIS is nothing new, I just thought once I passed child bearing age people would be off my back about it forever and the constant "what is WRONG with you, you don't like BABIES and KIDS?" would never come up again. But no such luck. I seem to be in a never ending loop of trying to explain that I will love my grandbaby (I HAVE ULTRASOUND PICTURES!!! SQUEEE!) but that doesn't mean I will be overjoyed with having him (IT'S A BOY!!!!!!) living here for his first year, no matter how strongly I feel that it is the right thing for us to do for both Tiff and the baby. I did not at all enjoy Tiffany's infancy and childhood (but I got some great pictures of her to show off out of it, because she was adorable as all get out). But she never felt anything less than loved and wanted and adored and Dimitri will never feel anything less either. I didn't enjoy talking about "baby" stuff when I was pregnant/had an infant, and I enjoy it even less now. (Right about now my CF friends are all laughing at me derisively or feeling sorry for me, depending on how much they like me, lol. Don't worry my dears, you should be catching on now that this is not going to turn into a constant baby blog, lol, and any baby posts i DO make will be clearly labeled and separate from farm posts).

I can't really avoid that all in my daily life. But I can here, because this is MY blog, and MY domain, and if I want to update on things about all that I can (did I mention I have ultrasound pictures of my grandbaby??) And if I don't want to.... *crickets chirp* *subject change*



Last night I weaned Rosie.

Say hello, Rosie:



Rosie isn't always the sharpest bulb in the deck of cards....





I was going to give her 12 to 16 weeks with her mom. We are at about 10 weeks and she is turning into a bitey little nurser. Look what she did to her mom's teat!





It was getting difficult to milk her without contaminating the milk with blood! YIKES!

and Rosie has been growing like a weed, I mean she actually lays down to nurse half the time, she has to kneel to get under there anyway.




So last night she moved out of the doe stall and into the other stall with Chickory.




Look at that! Chickory is 11 months old. Rosie is 10 weeks. Same dad, related moms. The only genetics they don't share are the ones from their maternal grandmothers. She has grown SOOOO much faster than the wethers I had last winter. And she was big when she was born but not nearly as big as the boys were at birth. I just wonder if being born at a time where all her food could go to growing instead of staying warm made THAT much difference?

Speaking of growing.... I think Nutmeg is starting to show a baby bump.




Nutmeg, on the right, should be due early March for kids with my mini fainter, Nightshade:



Ivy should be due mid to late april. I don't think Nightshade managed to do his job with her so she spent some time with Parsley. I know he did his job, lets just hope she did hers. I wanted them both to have kids with Nightshade the first time but the babies with Parsley will likely be worth more if I want to sell them instead of process them for freezer camp.

These girls are so pretty.

 

I hope next year to have either a meat bred myotonic to cross them with or a registered Toggenburg buck so I can register and sell their kids. But that will probably mean selling both the bucks i have now and buying a new buck and with our current finances that isn't likely. So I may just keep the boys I have now.

OH, Gratuitous roo pic! Jewels and Fluffy Butt are hoping to get some stray bits of cat food, so they hang out by the porch. We have to keep the gate at the top of the porch steps closed otherwise they roost up there and poo on everything. lol.

FaceBook, and the year that can't end soon enough.

 First, those of you on FaceBook, please "Like" my farm page, http://www.facebook.com/pages/PhoenixDown-Farm/136510583125084 I post there almost daily, sometimes multiple times a day.

My friends, thank you for putting up with my lack of activity and still popping in to comment when I do post. Hopefully that will change as the new year rolls in. Several difficult situations have been resolved or are at least at a point where I don't feel obligated to keep it to myself.

In a nutshell... my husband lost his job and still isn't employed. The state came after me for child support even though Tiff had been living exclusively with me for over a year, froze my bank accounts, hauled me into court three times, started proceedings to issue a warrant for my arrest for the child support,  and refused to drop it unless i proved my case by taking my ex to court. It cost us our entire nest egg we'd set aside for keeping us afloat and another chunk of cash we had to borrow from my father, and once I was able to prove my case in court they awarded me about 1/7th the actual court costs. Which means our 6 months of survival money is gone, never to be seen again, and i am in debt. But it kept me out of jail. *sigh* Then shortly after the court case was resolved I found out my 16 year old daughter is pregnant.

i think now you can probably see why I wasn't terribly chatty. On top of that I have always dealt with some level of seasonal affective disorder and without health insurance I'm handling it with lights and supplements... and to be honest with everything going on right now that's not really doing a lot for me. But as we close in on the shortest day of the year i know it's just a matter of time before the serotonin levels pick back up in my noggin and the chemical issues that bring me down start to back off.

This has really been the scariest, hardest, most heartbreaking year of my life to date. And the struggles are far from over. I've had to put some of my plans for the homestead on hold (I won't be planting a garden this upcoming year and i won't be able to start on beekeeping any time in the foreseeable future. I may also need to downsize the goat herd if things don't turn around soon). But for now we are holding on and making due.

I certainly hope and pray that the next year is better than this has been. I discovered a quote not to long ago that have been clinging to like a lifeline. It comes from an unlikely source.

“I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go, things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they're right, you believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.”
― Marilyn Monroe

Sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together. I've seen it true in my life in the past, I have to believe it is true now and in the future.

Thank you for following my blog, for those who have sent me emails and private messages giving me support without even knowing what was wrong, I love each and every one of you. Your kindness and support when you didn't even know if something WAS wrong has moved me and carried me through painful times and in ways i can't express here. There just are not words.  the English language is sorely lacking at times.

I have some more interesting and upbeat things to share with you now that the news flash is done. But for now I leave you with this... one of the most beautiful sights i have ever seen in my life... My heart horse.