Spring break is just around the corner. Toni is hoping to get a couple of fencing projects done with the kids while they are home.

Well, it is Monday again, the weekend was so busy I don’t even know where it went. The dogs are all depressed that all the kids are in school today. Toni checked and Shiny foaled, Anna claims Shiny, since both were babies, and this is Shiny’s first filly. Anna has been waiting for Shiny to foal for a month now, yes, for the last month every day when she goes out she says she is heavy. Ann had her first day of tennis practice after school and then a FFA Creed competition on Zoom, so she did not get to see her foal on Monday. LOL, I feel like that LOL might have been slightly evil. Toni started Kade and Jaxsen fence building again after school, they are hoping sports at the elementary school start soon, so Toni can do it on her own. Kade at least has basketball Tuesday and Thursdays at 6:30. So she can only keep him so long those days.

Tuesday Kade and Jaxsen went to school. Mom, Dad and Anna took Susie into Othello to get clipped, Susie is mom’s little dog, and they went to lunch. Mom and Anna had planned it when dad was working, but he is off for a few days, so he tagged along.  They didn’t take Kaine, so I guess it was a girls trip with Dad? When they got back from Othello there was a guy at the house wanting to look at horses, so dad called Toni and Toni took him around to see all of the foals. He really liked Fancy’s colt. Dad took Anna and Kaine to tennis practice, and Kaine’s game, and then went back to get mom for the game. Marlo and I met them there. Dad, Luis and Kelten were recruited to run chains. The game was really good and Connell beat Royal. Toni, Kade and Jaxsen did chores and worked on more fence. Toni took Kade to basketball, and continued to build fence until it was time to pick him up. Ben was home late from work, because they got their crop plan. Kicker did the cattle chores, and then went out to pick up more posts that were still out in the corn field, there were still some around the ponds. Ben got home and got the bulls in to go in to get semen tested on Wednesday. Also, Kicker went and got the suction pipe from Othello welding on Wednesday. This one is way heavier than the old one. After Kicker was done picking up posts, he went to put on the suction pipe, since it was so heavy, Toni and Kade stopped to help him. They ended up hooking Toni’s tow strap to it and pulling it with her pick-up. Then for the last 4-5 inches, Kade, Kicker, and Toni used all the muscle they had to push it into place. Toni wanted to tap out, but they got it done. Yes, Jaxsen was there, but he was busy reading his book in the pickup.

Wednesday was another busy day. Ben took 7 bulls in to get semen tested with Sheena at Sagehill vet, and Scrat, the big Hereford bull, to get trich tested, because a random cow from down the road jumped in with him. Billy from TLC came out and butchered Disappointment 1 & 2, two steers that were supposed to go to Spokane but would not tame down enough to go to a show.  Disappointment 1 & 2 are the reason we got Tulip the donkey. They were so bad that even Ben and Kicker called it quits with them. One of the bad things about club calves is they can be weird and wild. And a weird wild combo is no good. Dad took Anna to practice, and then went and picked them up, Kaine did not have practice since they won on Tuesday.

Thursday Twiggy had a cute chestnut filly by Dude. The twins, McCall and McKenna, named her Quinn. Dad and Toni fixed some fence on Thursday. Anna started having stomach pain on Thursday, so dad went and got her from school. Dad took Kade, Totie and Abril to their last basketball practice.

Friday Anna and I checked the cows and horses, then Anna, Kaine and I caught the steers and heifers. Chad and Andrew came at noon to trim horses, or they were supposed to be there at noon, but it was 1 before they got there. Sara Ryan brought us lunch about 1 and told us about her new job. Dad ran Kaine and Aram into football practice. Then the bus almost forgot to stop and let Kaine out, so he had to talk back down the hill.  We trimmed up a big batch of the horses getting them ready to go out to the breeding pastures. Chad had an appointment after us, so we actually got him done and out almost on time.

Saturday we had steer weigh in in the morning. Then we tied them up after. Toni needed a picture for the cover of Irrigation Leader, so she went and caught Friday and we went and got new pics of her and Friday. After lunch we got the mares in and put them out with stallions. Kendel and Scarlet helped us get the horses in. Scarlet wanted to ride so we caught Reba and let her ride around on Reba for a minute.  Anna was still having stomach issues and Kaine and Kade were with Ben and Kicker, they went shooting for a bit and then burned the ponds so they were ready for water. After Toni and I got done hauling mares around we caught Zsa Zsa (the cow) out in the field, she was limping, and brought her up to the house and doctored her. We took Bebe over to Sagebug and put Voodoo in with Tanky. We are putting all of our eggs in the same basket. All of the pali daughters of Zink are in with Sagebug and all of the Double daughters are in with Leroy. I guess we like those two crosses. Then the boys went down and helped us do chores.

Sunday we had people our first thing to looks at horses. Ben, Anna and I went down and checked cows and horses, Money had a bay roan filly by Gunner. Also, 711 had a string wrapped around her foot, so we ran, like literally Ben and I ran and Anna drove the pickup (since she was still having stomach issues) to try to cut the string off of the cow, luckily with all the moving around it came off.  Toni texted me the fence was not hot, so I ran down and put the fence back up, and then grabbed Kade, and Kaine, Kade and I tied up the steers and heifers. While I was fixing fence and getting Kade, Kaine ran Ben down to get the tractor and harrow, and Ben started harrowing circle 5. Around 11 the wind picked up, Kaine, Kade and I had tied a steer to the halter breaking donkey, Tulip, so we turned them loose and then went in for lunch and listened to the wind. After lunch we discovered we were missing one of Jaxsen’s steers, obviously Kaine, Kade and I are not concerned enough with Jaxsen’s steers. The steer had gotten out and was running around in circle 4 with the heifers, we saw A LOT of sandhill cranes that had landed and were waiting out the wind. It was pretty cool.  The wind really started to blow around 2, I guess the wind before that was just a preview of coming attractions. So, we got Jaxsen’s steer in, let everything go, cleaned out the barn, and then went down to do chores in the wind.  While doing chores we realized that one of our loafing sheds was coming off the ground, and the t-posts had come out of the ground, so we put more in, tied it to some wood posts as well, and hoped for the best.

Spring break is just around the corner. Toni is hoping to get a couple of fencing projects done with the kids while they are home. And we get to go to our first cattle show. Easter is also coming up, will we get another Easter foal this year? Below are some Easter babies from the past, Easter Doll, Peanut and Lily.

Below is Tulip halter breaking a steer.