The weather around here has been strange…unpredictable…frustrating…you name it. It’s been frozen in the teens and single digits, and then short-sleeves the next week! We’ve had no winter precipitation and then suddenly got tornadoes and monsoon rain…but it passed in about an hour or so! {sigh} Then we had snow flurries. Crazy, huh?

We had a couple young hens that got caught outside when the storm hit. You know that old saying “madder than an old wet hen?” Well, I don’t know how mad they were, but they were pretty sad-looking with their feathers all awry and bedraggled and out of sorts. When the rest of the flock hopped down out of the chicken house. preening from their little spritz, I guess they did look kinda mad.

And the ducks are loving all the puddles, of course.

Our sick sheep are doing much better! They are definitely down the road to recovery and will be rejoining the rest of the flock this weekend. There’s still a chance they will lose their lambs from the stress, but I think the odds are in their favor. Our sheep are pretty hardy!

We are going to be building a second feeder this weekend as well. Between adding Tag to the flock, pregnancy and full winter fleeces, and a couple of the smaller cows preferring to eat with the sheep, space at the trough is at a premium and we want to reduce the competition a little bit.

Actually, we already have two feeders, but I don’t count the cow trough because most of the sheep don’t use it anymore–thankfully! It’s plastic and very wide and slippery. Once a very pregnant ewe leap up in the trough to get more food (ok, it was Fatty) and her feet slipped out from under her. As she was scrambling to get on her feet, she ended up flipped over and stuck on her back like a turtle! The rest of the animals just kept right on munching around her, while her feet were waving frantically in the air…it was ridiculous. Our homemade wooden sheep troughs are taller, narrower, and no one can climb in them!

Lambing is right around the corner now. I need to go through our supplies in the garage and get everything cleaned up and ready for emergencies. Our ram, Tiberius, is also having some foot problems and we’ll be rounding him up for treatments. He is such a headache to handle–I’m sure I’ll have more to share about that next week!

In the mean time, look at these big bellies!

Doesn’t she look tired?!

It’s really just the picture. Being pregnant doesn’t seem to “bother” our sheep as far as slowing them down or changing their attitudes. But when I saw this picture I thought her face just looked weary and it reminded me of the end of my last pregnancy when we had a toddler who didn’t sleep through the night yet and I was just exhausted all the time. (The Cowboy and Speedracer are only 13 months apart.)

Long-suffering…that’s a great momma word! {smile}

Do you have plans for the weekend? The crew will be home with me on Monday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day. I found some fun printables and activities on Pinterest we might be doing. Or we might just enjoy a lot of down time and family read aloud time.  I have decided. We’ll see how the weekend goes.

See where I’m sharing this week…