Living with goats

Charming as they are, goats can be a wee bit pesty. If you know any goats, you know what I mean. In their defense, it's a tough time of year; most plants aren't growing and it's a real challenge to fill their varied and voracious appetites. We've been letting them roam free in the yard to graze. I should have known that any attempt on my part to make it look like the people who live here give a crap would be quickly squashed.
I walked by the window and noticed they'd eaten nearly every blossom from the flower pot on the front porch...grrrrr. Ten minutes later I walked by again and saw this.

Adding insult to injury

Clearly they're feeling very contrite today.

Baa

Dining out

Anyone who has ever dined with a toddler in a restaurant knows there is a thorny time between the ordering of the food and the arrival of the food. The newness of the experience wears thin and hunger sets in. Crackers are thrown, silverware are danced around, napkins are shredded. All this in preface to explain why we're feeding our child a lemon...it's not just for comedy, he's hungry.

That face! I think the photo is blurry because I'm laughing so hard.

But soon we were saved by the Philadelphia roll. Hooray!

Lil' Snippers

After a first haircut fiasco here at home a few weeks back, we stopped at the kiddie salon for a quick trim. There was so much going on and so many things to look at that Ole was stunned into silent compliance. His stylist worked quickly and had him ship-shape in no time.

The Cars movie played on his personal screen while she worked.

And this photo I took only to capture the kid in the next car over *freaking* out. Mom does not look happy. He cheered up as soon as his hair was spiky.

So our first trip to the salon was a success. Ole no longer has a lop-sided Mom cut and is back to looking sharp.

Timber!

The strong east winds were a-blowing up here a few weeks back and we realized the spruce tree had to come out. It grew too close to an outbuilding and leaned precariously toward the house. When the wind blew, it swayed and shook and keep me up at night worrying. Crushed by tree trunk is fairly high on my don't-want-to-die-this-way list.
Columbia Climbers took it down in just an hour or so. He cut off a few branches at a time, then climbed higher with his chainsaw hanging from a rope behind him.

Can you see the tiny man near the top of the tree? Probably not, my photos are not so great.

Here he's climbing down after lopping off the bushy top.

They left the tall trunk for last, chipping up all the stray branches first. They left it so long, I started to wonder if they'd cut it down at all. Probably satisfying to hear that 'thud' at the end of a job.
I was concerned the gymnasium would look too exposed without the shade of the spruce, but it doesn't. It looks great. Now to tackle this giant pile of wood chips they left behind:

Coyote ugly

A visitor trotted through the yard one morning last week, just outside the boy's playroom. We looked up in surprise at the coyote pup moving quickly and cautiously toward the chicken coop. Having lost several chickens in recent months, I opened the door and scared her off with a shout.

An hour later, though, she was back. Ole and I were upstairs getting cleaned up, and he stood with his nose to the window watching her. She stood on the edge of the blackberry brambles for half an hour listening and looking left and right. From this viewpoint I could see that she was mangy. Despite the patches of missing fur and a nearly hairless tail, she was graceful in her movements and quite young looking. I stood on the deck wrapped in a bath towel and snapped a few photos, but as she relaxed and moved toward the coop again, I hollered and off she ran.

Alex offered to get out the pellet gun and scare her off for good, but I demurred. Instead I spent the afternoon googling mange treatments. Not much good news on that front, as it usually leads to an unpleasant death. The website offered warnings, though, and I'll keep saying it over and over until I believe it:

Treatment of wild animals is difficult and not advised. 

I'll end with this hen wandering the yard, completely oblivious to the excitement of the day.

Keep it secret, keep it safe little leghorn.