Sometimes an owl is just an owl.

    If it sounds like an owl, and the hooting is coming from outside, it might be an owl - or it might be Dad.  Earlier this week, at about 10:30 pm, my daughter came downstairs to ask where Daddy was.         "In the shower," I replied.
   "Oh, then there might be an owl in the tree outside.  I heard the hooting and thought it might be Dad rehearsing his lines for a play, and I was going to ask him to stop so I could go to sleep," she told me.
    The thing about this exchange that made us laugh is that, in our family, the chance that someone was sitting on the porch at 10:30 at night, practicing owl sounds, was not at all out of the question.  I went in to let my husband know there was an owl in the tree, and he promptly hooted from the shower in exactly the timbre of the bird outside!  
     The three of us spent about half an hour listening to the owl, and trying to see it (no success). My husband had a "conversation" with it, hooting back and forth with the owl before heading in.  We guessed it was a Great Horned Owl and later listened to sound samples and determined that it was indeed a male of the species.
   If you are interested, this website has some wonderful recordings of various owl calls.  Just click the link here  ---> Owl calls
 

Summer catch up

    I am waiting for the day when I actually have time to do everything I need to get done, and actually plan for the things I want to do.  Here is the quick summer catch up:

* Our daughter made Dean's List  for the Spring semester.  Very proud parents!  
* Our daughter was working at the local cinema for three weeks, and she got a job at a fancy camp in PA as a counsellor, so she leaves tomorrow for 8 weeks.  Not thrilled that she is heading off again - our youngest is not happy at all, but, the money they are paying is 3 times what she could make at the cinema, so off to PA!
* Drew and I opened "Stella and Lou" at Chenango River Theatre about three weeks ago.  He was the director, I was the costume designer.
* Monday we have first read for the next show of the summer season, "Last Gas" by John Cariani. Drew has the lead role in this one, and I will be designing  costumes again.   Monday's first read may be interesting, as our youngest is getting four teeth extracted that day, and may need to come to the beginning of rehearsal since his sister will be inPA - ah, life is never a straight line around here - just a series of figure eights!
* I recently was in the Port Jefferson Long Island area for a visit with my wonderful Aunt Gerry and Uncle Tom, and then to visit  and celebrate with my "aunt/cousins by love not blood" as Aunt Georgie turned 80!  What a wonderful visit, especially the extra day I spent at my mom's!
* I finally got the garden in at the farm - mostly squashes this year with a few peas and beans.  Tomatoes do not want to grow there, so I put them in the raised bed across from my asparagus bed at the house.
* Our many sheep are growing - we have several rams to sell - gorgeous boys, and very sweet tempered, but they are repeat genetics as I have all their sires' genes living in the next pen!  Please contact me if you need a ram or two. Really.
* Working on another show - for the university, for fall.  Not thrilled with the timing of this, as I have another theatre obligation that I was contracted for first, but this year there was a lot of talk and no action about who was designing what,  and  in a very non-democratic way, I was told what two shows I would do.  Not asked...  and both are not good with my other schedule.  Due to the  dragging of feet, discussions could not begin about the show while we were still in session, so we are meeting now. I am also doing the musical for the second year in a row - not the way work had been balanced out in the past.  I do not even have a contract for this first show!
* Got to attend the Costume Society of America's  National Symposium in Cleveland this year.  Great people and some amazing scholarship.  I am hoping to present at this coming year's Symposium, and there are three other scholars and I who are planning a panel presentation/discussion for the following year.
* Building a website for the farm.  I will let everyone know when it is mostly done - I do not think it will ever not be a work in progress!

Have to get back to helping  my child finish packing.
As Tigger would say, "TTFN!"

     

Lambing at Rivendell Farm

     It started about three weeks ago.  The barn became a maternity ward, a nursery, and a giant playpen.  Our lambing season began.  The girls had been looking so uncomfortable, and Maxine gave birth to triplets - two ewes and a ram, all sound, all black hst* colouring.  We have named them Belladonna, Boromir, and Pearl.  So far, so good on the Tolkien names.

Maxine and her triplets.  She is such a good mother.

     Next Eowyn had a beautiful and sturdy pair of ram lambs.  We've dubbed them Fili (all white)  and Kili (black and white piebald markings).

Fili and Kili hiding behind mom.

     Arwen gave us triplets - beautiful little white ones, two ewes and a ram.  It was a difficult birth, and the last one, a ewe, was in the birth canal quite a while, emerging without the placenta.  She never really had strength to move much, and finally, despite our best efforts died.  It was rough, but a brain damaged lamb would not survive long.  Drew  buried her next to our llama, Thorin, up in Thorin's Hollow. Her brother and sister are Eldarion and Nessa, respectively.

Arwen settled in nicely

     Rosie gave us triplets, much to our relief.  She was a sextuplet herself, and we were a bit worried!  Elanor is a black hst ewe, Faramir, a black piebald ram, and the last, a skinny little white runt of a ram I call Hamlet.  Hamlet arrived, in the birth sac, and barely moved.  I prodded him a bit, to make certain he was alive, and he moved a little, but not enough to break the placenta.  Finally, he broke free and we met the scrawniest little lamb I have ever seen.

Newly cleaned Hamlet

 He was game, though, and got to his feet.  He tried to nurse, but was shoved out of the way by his sturdier siblings.  Not wanting to watch another lamb die, we began supplementing him with about three bottles a day.

 He is still a runty little thing, with nothing resembling a fleece, just lots of pink skin with white fuzz on it, but he is doing well, comes running when he sees me, and drinks eight ounces of  colostrum replacer in a couple of minutes!

      The same day Rosie gave us the triplets, Galadriel, our smallest ewe from last year's batch of lambs, began giving birth.  Her first one was a stillborn ewe, born breech, and with much effort.  She was fully formed, and beautiful, so I tried giving her CPR (not fun on a gooey newborn), but she was gone.  Drew went out and dug another hole in Thorin's Hollow for this little one.
     Next another ewe (Ruby) was born, also breech, but without as much straining.  While she was cleaning that one off, another arrived, also breech, and he popped out so fast, she did not even know he was there.  But this guy was letting nothing get in his way, and looking like the devil himself was ripping his way out of the placenta, he flailed and shook his head clearing out the mucus and slime, and got to his feet before his momma knew what was going on.  This little ram is entirely black, and a gorgeous creature whom my husband has named MacDuff.  (You know the line from MacBeth, "MacDuff was from his mother's womb untimely ripp'd" - well this seemed and appropriate name.)

Gal with Ruby and MacDuff

MacDuff - just after freeing himself of the birth sac.

     Merry surprised us with two lambs a couple days later.  We arrived at the barn by 8:30 in the morning and the babies were cleaned, fed and sleeping.  We had left the barn at 1:30 a.m. the night before, and she showed no outward signs of labor.  Merry's little ones are an all black ewe name Estella,  and a black hst ram lamb I am calling Bill, after Sam's pony in The Lord of the Rings.

Bill

Estella

     We are still waiting on Pippin to deliver, and I still have a few names on the list.  Shakespeare seems to have snuck in this year, but I don't mind!   So far our count is eight rams and eight ewes born, with two of those ewes not surviving.
    ***So as I was writing this, Pip was busy in the barn delivering white twins, a ewe and a ram we are calling Goldberry and Tom Bombadil.

Goldberry and Tom with Pip

 At last we are done for the  season.  Now we are in that happy, crazy time of socializing the lambs to people, feeding those who need help, and yesterday, introducing them to the great outdoors while keeping a watchful eye on the sky for hawks and eagles.

Faramir climbing Mount Rosie

So who is the big guy?

"This does not smell like a coyote or a badger, so I guess
I will leave it alone."

Learning to gambol (and Hamlet, falling down!)

Elrond herding the  sheep

MacDuff and Ruby with Hamlet serenading the sky

Nessa and Arwen 

MacDuff

Drew and our flock

*Note: hst = head, socks, tail - generally one solid colour with white on the head, socks, and tip of the tail.

accomplished children

   We all need to stop sometimes and look at our children with a critical eye.  Not to criticize, but to see the wonderful people they are and the special things they do, which we sometime lose track of in the busy lives we lead.
    My youngest studies karate.  His dojo is very strict about testing and the frequency of it.  He cannot earn a black belt as a child, only a red belt, which is the youth equivalent.  When he turns 15 he may  study as an adult, but he  will only be considered an adult green belt, so he will still need to earn brown and black as an adult.  He loves karate.  He earned his purple belt in Dec. or January - so  long ago I forget, and although I was very proud of him, I never mentioned it. Here is a photo of him after being awarded the belt, standing with his fellow purple belts in front of the  photos of the many black belts, as well as his sensei and Master Demura.

    My daughter made her college acting debut in a production of The Vagina Monologues this February.  I drove out to her college to see her in a show I, myself, had performed in some years ago.   I was very proud of her and the work she did. 

    My eldest started a new day program, twice a week, going out into new places, trying new things - last week he went to a fish hatchery,  this week a factory that makes goal posts, and to and art class to work in clay.  new places, new faces - not always easy, but he is doing really well.

     In the greater scheme of life, these may seem small, but the courage, dedication, and focus these undertakings require is not a little thing at all.  We cannot forget how wonderful our children are,  all children,  and honor them with our attention and praise.

Amazing normality

   Sometimes, when you have a child with a disability, or on the Autistic Spectrum, you get used to things the way they are and forget how far  this person may have come in one area or another of their life.  My son was very unsteady as a toddler.  He was able to  walk, run, etc., but swinging  meant  dangling over the seat, or using a swing with a back on it.  The act of stopping after running usually involved  bumping into something.
    He has grown into a young man. Tall and lithe, his balance has not been an issue in so many years, that I often forget it ever was.  Last week,  I watched him at his riding lesson.  I had not been to his lessons in a while, as I work late on that day, most weeks.  I watched my son sitting straight and tall on a huge horse (part Percheron, part something else).   Then, as he cantered around the ring, I was lucky enough to watch them jump.  Not a  really high jump like you'd see in the Olympics, but two rails, so not a walk over either.  He raised up, leaned forward followed the horse's  momentum.  Beautiful
     I was amazed and very proud of him.  This man, who could not stay upright on a swing is now able to canter and jump.  Sometimes it takes some time away to realize just how far he has come.

Late Winter on the Farm

    Spring break from the college  corresponded well with warmer weather at the farm.  This week has been a flurry of mucking stalls, having sheep sheared, vaccinating ewes, and planning the new barn.
Lots to do - and  a week seems very short.
     The lambs are due to be born in about 3-4 weeks - or more.  Last year we had one set born two weeks after the other.  With all seven ewes pregnant, we are anticipating being a bit busier than last season.  On top of this, we have a musical that my husband is directing and I am designing - which opens the third week in April - just in time to be on top of the lambing.
     We were aided  in some of this by one of our students - a dear woman who helped with mucking and  shearing day, as well as cutting brush out of a stand of apple trees.  A true friend!

      The shearer came on Wednesday, and we have 10 more fleeces to process.  I am looking at a commercial mill to process some of them this year.

Before

After

    We are talking about the new barn being 30' x 50'  with a smaller upper loft for hay and storage.  If all goes well, the main structure should be up before school lets out.  With the ewes all pregnant, we will need more "sheep storage" - places to separate the lambs and ewes at weaning time, as well as  a place for rams away from the ewes.  As with most things, the devil's in the details, and the electric and water need to be figured out, but it will happen.  

     More mundane things like spreading manure, giving the tractor a once over, and washing and carding wool have eaten up a fair amount of this week.  But it needed to be done and we were very lucky the weather made it pleasant.

We Have A Month to Find Names

     The lambs should start arriving in  just over a month.  In the meantime, we have a big task ahead of us - finding names!  As anyone who has read The Lord of The Rings and The Hobbit knows, there are few actual female characters.  You have to dig into the appendices for the genealogies to learn the names of folks like Rosie Cotton's mother (Lily Brown), or Frodo's grandmother (Ruby Bolger).   Well, a lovely person has done us a wonderful turn by listing most of the females from the Lord of the Rings/Hobbit on their website - including the ones only found in the genealogies!  Women of Middle-earth has  so many helpful names - like Theodwyn - sister to Theoden, King of the Rohirrim, and even the mother of Shelob, Ungoliant! (Not that I will be naming a sweet lamb after a spider-like eater of darkness - but still she is thorough!)
     However, dear friends, if you have your  copies of Farmer Giles of Hamm,  or The Smith of Wootton Major (mine are buried somewhere in a bookshelf)  please feel free to send any female name suggestions.  With seven ewes pregnant, (two of them having given us five lambs between them last year)  we may need every name on the list!

pregnant wooly beasts!