This week at the farm...

We disbudded the baby boy goat. That is always traumatic. More for me, it seems, than the goat kid. We changed his name to Coco, in keeping with the sweet/cookie theme. His mother is Oreo. His sister is Cookie. We haven't decided if we are going to castrate him. He's a nice looking buckling. His father is supposed to have good lines. I have him listed on Craigslis, but no interest yet. We may keep him to mate back to the other two female goats that aren't related. I'm still looking for another buckling that is not related to breed to all of girls. I'd even do a trade.

Fairy dust still has not kidded, and I was sure she was about to. Any day now....

Richard started a couple more avocado seeds, hoping to get some more trees going. We have one pretty good sized avocado tree, but no others to pollinate with. These trees will have to live in a greenhouse.

Avocado seed starts

We have moved building materials up to our Alamosa land, have moved some boxes into our storage unit, and keep on packing. We are testing the water system in the camper, and waiting for a 1600 gallon cistern to arrive. We bought batteries for our power system and are waiting for an invertor, which should come today. We are trying to get a well driller out to the land to blow out the well we found to see if it's any good.

I have decided against getting the mini horse. Horses are just too much maintenance, and it is not recommended to keep them in sandy areas, which our new land is--completely. There are so many toxic plants to avoid, plus teeth issues, digestion issues, and hoof maintenance and issues. Too bad. They are really cute. For now, we will stick to camelids and goats. The pigs are doing well. Richard has been trying to whittle down Choe's toenails a little at a time.

Harley and Chloe

The Hemp project is underway. We have our Indiegogo campaign up and running with a couple of donations already! Thank you! We have some seeds (don't ask, don't tell) and are getting them ready to start. We need more funding to really get this thing going, but we will continue on anyway and do what we can. At the very least, we can grow some plants for seed for next year. And make compost out of the mature plants. It's supposed to be great stuff.

We are trying to decide if there is enough time to move our compost and manure piles. There is so much to do still to get ourselves and animals relocated to an off grid situation.

I am proud to say, our Turkey feathers are on their way to the Hopi people to be used in ceremony. I can't think of a better use for them. I am honored. I respect the Hopi a great deal, and have studied and learned much from the Hopi prophecies.

My shamanic studies continue, but I am having a lot of trouble with the journeying aspect of it. I did acquire a lovely rattle from Wumaniti in trade for milk, cheese, eggs and yogurt, that I have begun to use in my own personal ceremonies.

There have been a couple of snakes hanging out around our kitchen door. One day, they allowed me to see them mating, which was interesting and odd. Snake medicine is strong right now. Healing and transformation. I thought they were baby Bull snakes, but now, I think they are Garter snakes.

Little Bull snake, I think male

Farm news

We lost a turkey this past week. Two days in its new yard and gone over night. Taken by a coyote, I'm pretty sure. A fox would be too small to carry it off, I think. And I found a couple of piles of coyote scat and foot prints. I tried to track the coyote, but lost it in the big field north of our house.Not sure what I thought I would find. Maybe the carcass of the turkey, but I didn't find anything. As I followed the trail of feathers and occasional foot print, I came to a place of peace within myself over the loss of the turkey. The coyote was feeding itself and its pack, doing what a coyote does. Too bad the turkeys weren't smart enough to get inside their house.They go inside at night now and we close them in, just like the chickens.

I believe this is where the turkey took its last breath.

In happier news, this week for home school we made rainbow fish based upon the book Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister. It's a great story and we made a couple of versions of rainbow fish with tissue paper and oil pastels.

We also went out to Our Place, our Taos land, to collect the glass windows we have stored down there, plus the poles for the windmill. Sad news...the wind blew down my coyote fence I built a couple of summers ago, and the adobe plaster is all but weathered off the shed. Shows what happens when you don't stay on top of it.

downed coyote fence

adobe plaster coming off pallet shed

We will have to get back out there to repair that plaster. We are thinking of taking it off and putting on cement instead, which will work better over paper and chicken wire. It may last longer too, if we aren't there to maintain it.

This Saturday we are headed north to our new land outside of Alamosa to watch a landscape company put in a driveway. That is exciting. Then we can get in there and decide where to build what. We need to get an office space up for Richard, and then we can move the RV up there and live in it while we build. We also need to get some batteries for our wind generator and an invertor. Plus some source of water, whether that is a cistern or we try to come up with money to drill the well.

Now we are taking stuff down on our rented farm. One of the landlords showed up and wants to renew our lease. They all decided they didn't want to do a month to month, which makes it hard for us. They came back with a five month lease, which is odd. I'd like a three month lease at most. We need to get out to the land and start building while the weather is warm, and we just can't dedicate the time to it if we are living here. Plus, we'd like to plant some hemp up there and get that project going too. So, it remains to be seen what will happen. The landlord is checking with his co landlords to see how they all feel about a three month lease. It seems it hampers their travel schedules. Must be nice to spend so many months abroad. Not good for the environment though...all that flying.

Next week we are taking the camper to an RV dealer/repair facility to have them check out the systems. We may need to replace some things. I hope it turns out that most of the appliances work and the water lines work. That'd be great news.