Well, here’s a touchy subject….. We had our first refusal to stay this month. We had some people come out who had business in Columbus. After their drive up from the south, probably around a 10 hour drive, they arrived at our doorstep, and didn’t “feel welcome”. Giving us reasons such as “We’ve been to the country before, but it was neater”, and the landscaping was “overgrown”.

So, carefully, I’d like to address a couple of things. First - the house was open, and I had a note of welcome, keys to the house, and a bill indicating amount due - as well as a series of maps that I’d created for the family to get from the house to both of the locations in Columbus where they would be (60 miles of turn by turn directions, an overview and detailed maps down to the street level - which they took, by the way). When they arrived, the first thing they did was close up all the window coverings I have, and lock all the doors. I’m wondering if it was maybe the neighbors they were afraid of….. oh, you can’t see the neighbors from the house. Maybe it was the birds?

Second - we’re in the country on a gravel road. The house is at a bend in the road, and has no houses on 3 sides. On the forth side, the house that’s nearest isn’t visible through the trees. I live 1 1/2 miles away, and I don’t even have any curtains in my house - and never lock my doors, unless we’re really taking a trip - then it’s more to keep the unexpected visitor from letting out my cats while I’m gone. We’ve done a tremendous amount of clean up since we bought the place in January of 2007 - including tearing down two old sheds and an outhouse that were more falling down than standing up - along with removing several bushes and improving the drainage around the front of the house.

Third - we are in the country! Sorry that we are so far from the city, and own 170 acres combined farm land that my husband keeps neater than most of the surrounding countryside, maybe even better than many cities keep their city parks. There’s no trash, and my husband personally uses his weedeater several times a year, walking the 5 miles or so of fence. Can’t keep the electric up and functional to keep the wild cows (that come to a moooooo), and crazy sheep (that come to a baaaah) in if the weeds get too high.

Oh, and by the way, we are a working farm, so the 5 car garage has 4 bays filled up with our farm truck and equipment, but the 1 bay closest to the house is available for parking.

So I’m wondering - how did I mis-represent the place ? We’re 60 miles from Columbus located on a gravel road 4 miles from the nearest LITTLE settlement (Bladensburg), and about 25 miles each from the cities of Zanesville (about 50,000 people), Newark (about 65,000 people) and Mount Vernon (about 15, 000 people). The house is an 1830’s restored cabin - with a log home added to it and a 5 car garage…… read all about it on my site…. but then come see it. There’s wildlife around…. deer often walking in (and nibbling on)the landscape in the front yard. The ground hog that lives near the back porch really appreciates that we’ve got a deck and resin chairs for him to stand on to survey his territory.

The people who had been there the day before these guys came had come down (because they wanted a quiet place to vacation, and wanted to make sure we are reputable, and that the place wasn’t just a cabin in a complex of other cabins like a place they’d stayed before) are staying with us this weekend. The people who stayed this week also came from the city - and their biggest disappointment was that we didn’t have the satellite internet functioning (the service guys are coming today!). They stayed a whole week, and we didn’t pull any weeds especially for them - because we didn’t see the need.

I hope you all will take a look at my pictures and website before coming! But please don’t hesitate to call me if you have any questions or concerns. I think you’ll find that both my husband and I are brutally honest people, and won’t try to “sell” you something that we don’t have. I’m really sorry that somehow I didn’t effectively communicate that we’re on one of the last frontiers in the populated state of Ohio. One of my friends once said, upon being told that we lived in the boonies, “No, I passed the boonies back there about 10 miles before I got here to your house….”, and we live on a paved road.

This week and last week, we had a couple of neat adventures. We’ve started walking a little more, and of course, now that there’s 3 dogs we’ve got to take all of them on leashes. You won’t believe this, but Ellouise has been walking with us also. We walked this weekend over to the Weston House from our house (about 1 1/2 miles) with all the pooches and Ella. She’s actually a better dog than the dogs - as she stays right with us - only stopping now and then for a little nibble along the side of the road. She has a little difficulty passing up the pink clover flowers now that she’s learned to eat grass, but she still runs to catch up as soon as we get about 30 feet ahead of her.

She’s a big hit with the people staying at the house - they just can’t believe we walk with the dogs and the sheep too. The other night we got over to the house just as they were sitting down to what looked like a really good steak dinner. They were so excited to see Ella when I let her in the house that they all jumped up and ran to get cameras, and were running around the house following Ella trying to take pictures of her. She’s really quite modest, and doesn’t mind all the fuss - just give her a little scratchin’ between her front legs or under her chin, and she’s a happy gal.

We’ve still been putting her out at night with the dogs, so it’s not surprising that she thinks she’s a dog. The pooches found the upstairs porch this week, and so both puppies and Ella have been sleeping up there. We can look out the window in the door and see them - and it’s pretty cute to see the lamb laying there on the porch next to the two white puppies. They’re all about the same size. She’s convinced she’s a dog, even coming when you call her - and she gets really bummed if we don’t put her with them at night.

One of these days it’s going to break her heart when we have to put her with the sheep. Gee, I wonder when that will be? Stay tuned.

The saga with Ella (our new nickname for her) continues as she still hasn’t decided that she wants to be a sheep. In fact, for the last couple of weeks, she’s called pitifully whenever anyone walks out of the house, and if you answer her, she comes running up from the barn to follow you around. Of course, I spend time outside just so I can interact with Ella. Lately though, in the last couple of days she’s decided that the two Great Pyrenees puppies we have are her best friends. She follows them everywhere if they are outside.

I woke up the other morning, looked out and saw both of the puppies licking at her face - and not so nice places, and while she really doesn’t understand why they want to do that - she loves the attention.

So last night, apparently she figured out how to not only come up to the house from the barn, but how to get into the pen we have for the puppies so Frank found her really cozy this morning with both puppies on the blanket they sleep on. I wish I had a camera at that moment to show you all the adorable trio.

We’ve got this little lamb - who’s mom decided she wasn’t ready for motherhood - so we’ve adopted her. She’s a little black and white lamb, with this little black dot on the tip of her nose - that from a distance looks like a fly sitting there. I wanted to name her “Bugsey” but Rach wouldn’t have it…. so we finally, after about 15 choices, agree upon Ellouise (at least that’s how I think it’s spelled). We’re calling her Ella for short.

Yesterday, Frank decided she needed some tender loving care - instead of the barn all day - so we baby-sat. We sat out on the porch first thing in the morning, and worked on Rach’s 4 H books while we watched the lamb. She likes the dogs pretty well. We took turns keeping an eye on her all morning, because as soon as we would all go inside, she’d start “baaaah-ing” her head off. Later, when I had a little work to do on the computer, we had to bring her inside, and let her lay in the corner so that we could tell her everything was “ok” every time she’d wake up and be lonely. It was pretty hilarilous. Not sure if she’ll ever figure out she’s a sheep. But it’s pretty cute to answer her everytime she baaaahs. It’s pretty much the exact same thing the momma’s and babies are doing out in the field. Cracks me up.

I’ll try to get some current pictures up - and a couple of her.

Gigi, our little Great Pyrenees puppy is getting big. When we first got her, at 8 weeks, she was able to easily walk underneath our Australian Shepherd without even having to duck. Now - she’s over 25 pounds and about 4 inches shorter than Kaya. They have been having a ball playing. Gigi came around the corner of the house this morning - with brown frosting on all of her hair - she and Kaya apparently found some really cool mud to roll around and play in…. The good news is after laying on the concrete this afternoon and drying out, she’s just as pretty and white as she was this morning.

She’s really adorable, having started almost to look like she’s grown into her feet. They’re still about a third again bigger than Kaya’s feet. And she’s got the most adorable personality. She loves it when I sit on the floor with her, and let her lick my face. She just wags her tail and wags her tail, and grunts in my ear. It’s enough to make me giggle every time.

She’s going to turn into a great big dog one day, but right now, she’s just the sweetest, little cuddly thing you ever saw!

The lambs have started arriving. Frank said the first lambs arrived on Friday 3/28, with the arrival of 10, a set of quadruplets, and 3 sets of twins. There are some really beautiful babies - black and white, brown and white and just plain white. Frank has now converted the middle of the barn into a lamb “nursery”. After a couple of days verifying that the moms are going to take care of their own babies, he puts them together all in one pen, then the babies start being all cute - jumping around, climbing on their moms. It’s really adorable.

Frank’s also been doing a little bit of bottle feeding, making sure the lambs are not hungry. So far - most of them aren’t interested in the bottled milk, it’s just not the same as Mom’s milk. At least we know their getting enough.

For those of you tuned in a couple of weeks ago, we got our little Great Pyrenees puppy this weekend. Gigi seems to fit into the household pretty well. She and Kaya hit if off immediately, and except for Kaya being a little too rough yet when they play, things are going well. The first thing Kaya does when she comes in after being outside is to go find Gigi and make sure she’s alright. It’s pretty adorable. They’ve been playing together outside as well, where Gigi really like to attack little piles of hay.

It’s still a little bit too cool to spend much time outside, but it feels like spring is on the way!

This little red squirrel ran up the tree in the back yard. I think that it must enjoy teasing the dog. Anyway, Kaya began barking - and the squirrel just sat up in the tree, casually looking around like Kaya wasn’t even there. So, silly me, I think, I’ll go out and call the dog - I called her and she didn’t even look at me. So I walked out to the tree, and grabbed Kaya by the collar, pulling her along. As soon as I started away from the tree, that silly squirrel started down the tree, and Kaya started pulling on me. Well, since I didn’t look back so see what was going on, and just continued to pull Kaya, I didn’t realize that the squirrel was coming down the tree. Kaya lunged when the squirrel was about 2 feet off the ground, broke my hold and charged back toward the tree. Crazy squirrel dashed around the tree trunk to fake out the dog, dropped to the ground, and made a mad dash toward the woods. Kaya runs like crazy, is temporarily slowed by having to crawl under the fence, but catches up with the squirrel as it launches into the air - bullet style - toward the closest tree. Somehow, once airborne, the squirrel managed to get out of reach of the dog - makes a quick once around the tree trunk, as the dog is vaulting upward, and narrowly the squirrel escapes, only to scamper up to the closest branch to the ground, where she proceeds to chirp at the dog! Now, 45 minutes later, the dog is still sitting at the base of the tree, eyes locked on that squirrel, who is again casually looking around like the dog isn’t even there. It’s pretty funny. I’m surprised that squirrel could run so fast!

Hey ya’ll!
It’s Rachael here on the farm. My mom told me to write a blog for her about what we did all day (allegedly saying to “help me to practice being a writer”).

Yesterday, my mom and I stayed in our pajammas until right before 11:00 a.m. because every once in awhile everyone needs a lazyday(about once a week for us). Then we went outside and I went a bit crazy from being in the house all winter. The dog and I jumped on a row of hay bails and ran up and down them. I then jumped into a pile of snow,which wasn’t a very bright idea, because I’d dug a tunnel through that pile of snow the week before. Needless to say, I fell through and was picking snow out of my boots for quite a few minutes.

Next, Mom and I went down to our pond. We sat down and stuck a stick into the water slowly, lazily moving it. Then I stopped moving the stick noticing we had an audiece. Our audience watched us very closely,with their bugged out eyes. Suprisingly, our audience was a group if fish. After some fish watching we got some little motor boats, but then my mom helped my dad get some eggs ready to go to the store. Later we raced boats occasionally spouting out commentary on the boats.

Then we picked up pizza and drove to my grandprent’s house to ead dinner. Then we drove home. As we were brushing our teeth, my dad and I somehow got into a water fight. He squirted me and I threw a cup of water on him. Then he threw water on my back. I retaliated by grabbing a marker and drawing on his back before he could stop me.

All-in-all, a rather boring day except for a few instances.

It’s been wild here the last 2 days. It started snowing yesterday morning about 8:30, and has been snowing since. This morning when we went out - Frank to plow, and me to help shovel walkways, there was about 12 inches, and I think we’ve gotten about 3 more today. It’s absolutely beautiful outside, and quiet when you go stand outside except for the wind blowing.

The birds have decided that Mother Nature isn’t being very nice to them. We have several bird feeders in our yard, and there must be over a hundred birds hanging around like they’re starving to death. Makes you wonder what they eat on a normal day. Anyway, it’s been a lot of fun to watch them in the tree while they hang out. Just a few minutes earlier, I looked outside and there were cardinals, junkos, blue jays, sparrows, rose crown finches, gold finches, red-winged black birds, grackels, morning doves and even wood peckers. It was beautiful. Frank said if you could get a good picture of the tree, you could call it a Christmas tree.

Rach and the dog had a romp in the snow also. We walked around the pond - well, Rach ran falling and tumbling in the snow, and Kaya bounded like a rabbit. Then Rach found a place where we’d piled the snow this morning while shoveling, and started digging a little snow cave. We got cold and eventually had to come in out of the wind, but it was fun while it lasted.

Yesterday, we had our first calf of the season…. I told you just the day before we were due to start having calves. He was a little male calf, born to a first year heffer. She had a normal birth, and everything at home is fine. Frank and Rach, with the vet on the premises delivered the calf. If you have any interest in suggesting a name for our new baby, fill out our contact us page. I’ll keep you posted about his name…..