Baby, Baby, Baby...

Clementine was our second lamb, born on February 1. I was trying to get some of her momma's colostrum in her to get her warmed up and moving.

 

 Clementine was a few days older here.

Dottie and her twin ram lambs

Momma and her twins

They learn quickly just how much they love their hay.

When bellies are a full it's time to play!

Time to eat..

One of Martha's twins, her baby girl.

All nestled in.

Lambing Season Quickly Approaching

With lambing season quickly approaching I think about all the long cold days and nights we'll be having out in the lambing barn but I also think about all the sweet babies that will be born. There's nothing like snuggling those fuzzy little lambs!
This last lambing season I quickly became protective over our 70 lambs that were born. Between bottle feeding each of them 4 times a day for 30 days and running back and forth with them during play time, I felt a lot like their momma. It's been so much fun watching all these baby lambs grow and a lot of excitement in knowing that in a couple of months my babies will be having lambs of their own.
So for the next month I'd like to highlight some of the special moments with these precious girls from lambing season past. Hopefully this will also help keep us motivated on getting the lambing barn ready in time for lambing season 2013 :)


This is Esther aka my baby! Our first born from lambing season 2012. 

This was playtime. Esther loved the challenge of jumping on my back! This wasn't so bad until she got bigger!

This is Esther with our second lamb of the season Clementine. These two girls became pretty good friends.

 And this is what Esther looks like now. She's the one in the middle looking back at me.

My First Real Felting Project

My husband bought me my first sheep needle felting kit for Christmas. I was so excited to get started that I started late Christmas night and finished the next day, taking maybe two hours at most to complete it.  I wasn't too confident about taking on the task but at the end of completing it I was quite proud of what I had accomplished.

This is what I started with: White, black and pink wool.

This is the finished product. I named her Esther after our first lamb this past season. Adding a little black spot on the back of the left ear to replicate my little Esther.

I think I'm ready for the next project now!!! :)

Dog Days 2....

Yesterday you met our two wonderful guard dogs Maggie and Marley. Today I'd like to introduce you to our three border collies; Jim, Nan & Eoghan (Owen). These furry members of our family have some really great and different personalities. They always seem to know when we need a good laugh!

Jim came to us from New York where he worked about a thousand sheep. Jim made his home here on the farm about two years ago. He's very athletic and very, very serious when he's working and herding the sheep. When it's time to relax though, he's a completely different dog, he lives for affection, loves to be touched, and tries to not lose sight of his shepherd. He loves to watch shows about sheep, farming, and dog shows.

Jim freshening up on his herding skills.

Jim even enjoys watching himself on KET's Kentucky Life.

Nan came to us about a month or two before Jim. She's a sweet older girl that loves to work and play, she even has a bit of a crazy side, her eyes let you know that real quick!! Nan has never been able to have pups of her own. She has this fascination with smaller things and people, she loves small dogs, stuffed animals and babies. Oh and especially the ball, she loves "the ball" or even a ball of yarn will do! She don't let those two boys get anything on her.

 Nan babysitting little Rainbow.

Last but not least we have Eoghan, our precious big, big baby. He was our first border collie that recently turned three years old. Eoghan's not a working dog, he's never herded the sheep like Nan and Jim do. However he loves to herd the "buggy" (AKA our Kubota side by side),  tag along during chores, and riding in the truck. Eoghan is also a big fan of twirling, he likes to think he can twirl and run faster than any other dog. We'll be in the middle of putting fence up and here comes Eoghan dragging the biggest tree limb along behind him, like he's so proud. He's a lot like a younger brother, just always goofing and ready to make us laugh.

 Eoghan looking to steal the frisbee out of the back of the Kubota.

 Cooling off for a bit.

He may be goofy but he's the sweetest thing ever. Rainbow needed comforted and he was the right guy for the job.

I can't end this with out mentioning a very important member of this family that's no longer with us but lays under the old oak tree out from the house. Shadow was our 11 year old sheltie whom we loved and adored. A piece of our hearts have been gone since he left us a year ago. My heart smiles though, knowing he got to experience life on the farm and to really see what it meant to be a "shetland sheepdog". We miss our Shadow so much!!!

 This is a family picture from 2006, before there were ever even thoughts of a farm. My father, mother, two brothers, shadow and I.

 Shadow enjoying the farm.

Dog Days....

     I'd like to take a second to introduce you to some of  our furry friends here on the farm. These are our two guard dogs Maggie and Marley. We haven't lost any sheep to coyotes or any other predators. We keep these two with their girls (the ewes) in the electric netting, fence that we break down and set up each day to keep them rotated and on good pasture.




















Maggie is our 3 year old anatolian shepherd. She still acts like a big baby at times. She absolutely loves to get her belly rubbed, but if a stranger or predator gets to close to her sheep she'll show you a completely different side. Maggie is currently protecting and snuggling up to our older mamas from the past three years.

This was last lambing season in the barn. Can you spot Maggie in this picture?

Marley was our first guard dog here on the farm. She was given to us, so I'm not exactly sure about her age but I do have to say this farm wouldn't be the same with out her here. After she got use to us it's been love ever since! Marley is half anatolian shepherd and half great pyrenees.She's currently loving and protecting our ewe lambs from this past spring. There's definitely a special bond there between Marley and us and Marley and the sheep. I had this idea in my head that I wouldn't feel as close to an older animal that was given to me as to one that we had raised our selves as a pup, but boy was I wrong. Marley is exactly what I said, she's special!!! We have so many stories of her going out of her way to protect these babies that it would probably sound as if I were telling tales. But I'll save those for another day!!!

Between these two girls, our East Friesian Sheep are in great hands!!!

Ladies can drive tractors too!!

Christmas morning started off  much like any other morning on the farm. We woke up, got dressed, & went out to the pasture to tend to the sheep. Fed them hay, salt & mineral, gave them water, took down some fence. But before the chores were over I found myself on daddy's tractor. Yep, after three years on the farm, daddy finally gave me my first lesson on the tractor, and if I do say so myself, I think I did pretty good! 



Picture taken by Becky Mahon, Summer of 2012 here on the farm.

Starting Out...

    My husband Daniel and I are currently living on the family sheep dairy farm. Still considered newlyweds we moved in with my parents to help our financial situation and help lift some of the work load that seemed to be growing each lambing season on my parents. Daniel and I have been married for two and a half years. We both grew up in a small town. It wasn't until a few months before our wedding that my family changed our complete way of living, moving from our log cabin home, packed everything up and moved forty minutes away. My parents bought a 132 acre farm, 6 dairy sheep from Vermont, and a double wide.
    Leaving our home that I grew up in was very difficult but I didn't expect to fall in love so easily with the life I was about to begin on the farm. The simple life! Living on the farm for a few months before the wedding was enough to get a taste of the life I've always longed for. That's how my husband and I knew that when hard times came we had to go back to the farm.
    We've had to learn so much the past 3 years about farming, shepherding, dairying, and just trying to learn how we can live off the farm. Still learning, but my folks have successfully became the first sheep dairy in Kentucky, producing Kentucky's first sheep cheese. And that's how this adventure began!


Our first six momma's that we started out with. Meg, Mary, Martha, Molly, Dolly, & Dottie!

 This is my husband and I on the farm 2010.

 Mom, Dad, brother Josh & I. This is the name of our sheep dairy Good Shepherd Cheese.
www.goodshepherdcheese.com

My husband and I married on the farm in 2010.

 

We had to incorporate the sheep in the pictures somehow!! :)