His name is Jacob and he's black, but he's no werewolf!

Jacob the little LaMancha goat made it home finally!  He's absolutely adorable.  He's also a very sweet boy who likes to be where ever we are.  At all times.  He follows us around the farm as we do chores, he follows the kids onto the trampoline (yeah, we had to nip that one in the bud), he climbs the playscape along side the kids and has braved the little slide.  Otis the Wonderdog met him and greeted him like any other dog.  There was lots of..erm...sniffing.  They get along famously.  Jacob likes to follow us onto the porch and lay at our feet while we relax in our chairs and enjoy the view.  Otis on one side, Jacob on the other.  We're absolutely thrilled to have him and can't wait for his partner Makalo to join us.  Makalo is a Dwarf wether who will come live with us once he's weaned.  He and Jacob will make up a two-goat team of landscapers.  We'll move them around to different fields and pastures here on the farm in hopes that they'll keep the brush growth down.  Now for the best part--pictures!


He was NOT happy about the ride home.  Not liking the crate.




He decided he wasn't speaking to me.



Carter loved feeding him--can you tell he's grinning like a madman?

Nina Cate thinks he's adorable.  I agree. :)

Yummy!

Hello there.

More yummy!

What's going on over there?

See?  He follows us EVERYWHERE.  No, Jacob, you are not a house goat.

Nina Cate is apparently his fairy godmother.

These steps are a bit big for such small legs.



He was trying to catch the pullstrings on my hat.  He succeeded. :)

We'll see what tomorrow brings--it's bound to be funny.  Or disasterous.  Maybe both.

All work and no play makes Roxie a sunburned girl.

Today was spent doing the wonderful manual labor-type jobs that come with the territory.  We cut up and moved a huge tree that fell across the fence of the horses' pasture. We repaired said fence.  We cleaned off the porch--which doesn't sound like much until you see our porch...all 900 square feet of it.  We got the pen ready for Jacob's arrival tomorrow (yay!) and attempted to mow the yard.  Attempted.  The lawnmower had a different idea and decided it would be a good day to break a belt.  Did I mention that it was 91 degrees here today?  No?  Well it was.  Which is better than 31 degrees, so I'm not complaining!  (Ok, maybe I am.  A little.)  I did forget the sunscreen again today but atleast I wore my trusty straw hat.  No, there will be no pictures of me in my trusty straw hat. I want you to keep reading, not run away screaming in terror!

On with the pictures!  First off, here's what's left standing of the tree.  The large cedar grew up along side the original tree.  Parasites those things are!


It was a huge tree!

Next are photos of the fallen part and the fence, which may have been repaired by this time.  Dunno.  Let's see!


Tree, part 1



Tree, part 2

 Aaaaaand tree, part 3 seems to be missing.  Well if that's just not the way this day's gone.... LOL!  I'll hunt it down and post it.  Here's my heroic husband breaking out the tractor (*gasp*  He actually didn't hide from the camera for once!  Could be because he had no idea I was taking this pic while I was hiding on the porch like the paps...).



Luckily the tractor had no problems pulling the rest of the tree down.

 I don't have any pictures of Jacob's pen because it's just not anything special without him in it!  Don't worry, tomorrow's post will be CHOCK FULL of cuteness!  More cuteness than you can shake a stick at.  But before I leave you, I'll leave you with these darling photos of Ang, one of our Easter Egger chicks napping in my shirt pocket.  Ten points if you can figure out why his name is Ang. ;)

Hello there, cuteness!



Ack!  Too bright!

One last warning.  Be prepared for cuteness overload tomorrow.  I know I've said it before but I'll say it again---baby goat arrival imminent.  Bottle feeding will commence and will make you SQUEEE in cuteness frenzy.  You've been warned.  G'night! 

Holy lots o' happenings!

Today has been chock full o' blog-worthy goodness!  Let's start our day by discussing my minivan, shall we?  Well, it's a good minivan.  Never hurt a soul, never uttered a bad word about anyone, never given us any lip.  So what it did to deserve THIS, I'll never know:


Can you tell what this is?!

Yes, ladies and germs, that is my air filter.  Care to know what made that hole?  A SQUIRREL.  Wanna know what she did while inside there?  Made a huge nest.  HUGE.  Wanna know what happened when alllllll that nesty stuff dislodged from the filter?  THIS is what happened:


Oh hai Mr Tow Truck Man!

My van sputtered and died.  Dead.  Luckily the guys at Tippers Automotive took excellent care of it and now has me back to running amok in Lincoln County!  *waving at Tippers' mechanics*

After the van was up and running again, I went to the local sells-it-all store and bought azaleas.  Wolfpack azaleas to be exact.  They're a gorgeous red and aren't too tall which is perfect for the little flower bed I put them in.  Nina Cate picked out the yellow Gerbera daisies. :)  The flower bed went from this:


Was that a tumbleweed I saw just blow by?!

 To this:



Oh look!  Flowers!

Please ignore the crooked edging bricks and focus on the LOVELY flora that now inhabits what was once a desolate, arid wasteland! :)

And lastly, we visited a local goat farm where we met Jacob.  Say hello to everyone, Jacob!



Hello!

Jacob is a 4-week-old LaMancha buckling.  He'll be coming to live with us this Sunday.  We're thrilled to be welcoming him home to Appaloosa Hill.  He'll be wethered (neutered) before coming and will be kept as a pet and landscaping assistant.  He and the kids (my human kids, that is) played together while I spoke with his owner.  They ran uphill and down, chased each other, and generally had a grand time.  Jacob is very affectionate and quite possibly thinks he's human!  We'll be bottle feeding him for the next month or so, so expect to be innundated with adorable baby goat pictures. :)  And, no, your eyes are not playing tricks on you--Jacob has no ears. 


Look, Mom!  No ears!

Now that we're home and are settling in for the evening, one thing has made itself apparent---I must never EVER forget the sunscreen again... 


A rarity indeed!

Wow.  Today was a fairly un-crazy day!  Those are few and far between here on Appaloosa Hill and I've come to appreciate them.  I'm sure tomorrow will MORE than make up for today's lack of action.  No new hatchlings today, the chicks and ducklings in the brooder are doing wonderfully, the horses are loafing about the pasture, the flock o' nutjobs is doing whatever it is that a flock o' nutjobs does all day.  I'm sure it involves eating bugs and annoying their fellow farm inhabitants. :)

I'm thinking that we need goats.  See?  Neeeeeeeeeed goats.  Not want, but neeeeeeed.  I have my sights set on a couple of Nigerian Dwarf goat wethers (billy goats that have been given the old snipsnip), but a little LaMancha buckling popped up on my goat-dar today and boy is he a little looker.  Have you seen LaMancha goats?  No?  You MUST go look them up.  They have no ears.  None.  Zip.  Zero.  They're oddly very cute little things!  The little guy's name is Jacob and he's a bottle baby.  Can we say SQUEEEEE!  Nothing cuter than a little goat kid with a bottle, folks.  If I'm lucky enough to bring Jacob home I will undoubtedly flood you with pictures of the handsome guy. 

Appaloosa Hill's resident crazies

     I'll begin this journey to crazy town with an introduction to the animals that live here on Appaloosa Hill Farm.  First off we have Holly, Stella and Star, the three Tennessee Walking Horse girls.  These girls came from a defunct breeding facility and their owner had allowed the horses' health to suffer since he couldn't afford to feed them.  A wonderful place--CC Farms Horse Rescue of Tuscumbia, AL--stepped in and took in all 21 horses.  Having not been handled a ton, my girls are still learning that we funny-looking two-legged animal CAN be trusted.  They're coming along beautifully, even though they are muddy, obnoxious, treat-seekers. :) Here they are:  (Forgive the mud and horrible lack of grooming--they're not quite ready for me to go all day-spa on them!) 

Holly, the 18-year-old HBIC



Star (left) who happens to be Holly's daughter and Stella (right) who is Star's cousin



Next we have the dog.  This is Otis the Wonderdog.  He showed up here at Appaloosa Hill Farm about 6 years ago and just stayed.  He's the perfect dog.  Really, he is.  He protects everyone outside and then comes inside to crash.  He lays in one spot.  Forever.  And ever.  And we have to step over him.  Every day.  He's 28 pounds of pure mutt and we simply adore him.  Even if his head IS twice the size of his body...



Otis the Wonderdog




He's great at holding the floor down...



Aaaaand now onto the chickens.  And what lovely chickens they are.  (Did you hear the tiny bit o' sarcasm there?)  These birds are absolutely hysterically insane.  I have a huge flock of free-range (mostly) Phoenix chickens and roosters.  They get themselves into the most confounding predicaments.  Laying an egg in the van?  Done it.  Sneaking inside only to be trapped in the laundry room?  Yep, that too.  Squeezing into the watering can to lay eggs?  Of course!



Fawkes, the (mostly) Phoenix rooster




Mama hen and one of her fluffy babies peeking out :)




The Overachiever--she's setting about 30 eggs here.




Make a nest out in the open under the tree?  SURE!



This is just a brief over-view of the resident comedians.  There will be MUCH more to follow, but now you know the players!  Wait until the goats get here...

Welcome to the insanity!

Hello!  Welcome to the craziness that is my blog.  Well, the craziness that is my life, really!  I'm a thirty-something mom, wife, and hobby farmer.  My farm, Appaloosa Hill, is in the hills of southern-middle Tennessee and is the source of the hilarity that will make up many of my future posts.  From chickens laying eggs in the van to squirrels grooming the Welcome mat (oh yes, there was grooming), my days are full of never-ending surprises and WTF moments.  I hope you enjoy my reading my tales as much as I enjoy living them!