Coming Home

Remember when I blogged about my daughters's new litter of golden retrievers?  Remember when I said it would be the first litter not raised in my house?  Remember when I said I wouldn't be having anything to do with this litter?

Guess what?

The puppies have moved in.

They were to live with Oldest at my husband's farm but she was offered a spot in the dog grooming academy at work.  An unexpected offer as she was told they only offer it to employees 6 months after employment.  She'd only been there a month and they were so impressed with her work ethic and perseverance they offered her a spot only after one month of employment.  The academy is a month long full-time training facility.  She would only be coming home weekends and hence the puppies needed a sitter.

So mom to the rescue.  Or in this case, grandmom.  Nay, greatgrandmom as the litter belongs to Jewel who is of course, Emma's daughter.  And Emma belongs to my daughter, Farm Girl.

Proud Grandmom.

This is our third generation litter.  It means kinda something to me.

Isn't this photo just perfect?

All By Myself

Bridget Jones is one of my favorite movies.  The opening scene of Bridget sitting in her apartment all by herself down and depressed and feeling lonely resonated with me.  Not sure why because in all my 47 1/2 years on this planet I have never been alone.  Perhaps it's the fear of being alone.  Which would explain why I stayed in a loveless marriage for 27 years.

But that is all about to change for an entire month!!  Alright, going by my boy's reaction when I dropped him off at his dad's for the summer makes me have serious misgivings that it will be an entire month.  He'll probably be home in a week.  So I will be all by myself for a week!!  Seriously, you have no idea what that is like a for a person who has never, ever, been alone.  In 47 and half years.  How do I make a meal for one person?  What's it really like in the house at night all alone?  Is it really indecent to romp around the house in my undies?  Oh the questions?  The experiences.  The self-discoveries.  Yes, I admit it, I am seriously looking forward to this.  I'm going to spend my days writing, writing and writing some more.  I may even read a little.  Oh and play with the new pygmy.  All by myself.

But I know me and I know how much I love my family and like having them close.  By the end of the week I'm sure the boy won't be the only one singing "Don't want to be by myself anymore"!

Published

Many many years ago, long before I wanted to be a farmer, I wanted to be a writer.  I wrote several manuscripts, attempted to get them published, received rejection after rejection until I eventually couldn't take it anymore and didn't want to waste any more of my life chasing a dream.  So I put the books away, found myself a new interest and goal in life and never looked back.

Until recently.  From much encouragement from my ebook addicted daughter, I pulled the old manuscripts out of storage, reread them, fell in love all over again and have decided to self-publish them myself.  If for no other reason so that all the time and work I put into them did not land them abandoned in a dark and dusty corner of my closet.

I am starting with my first real full length novel, On the Mountain.  It is a historical western romance set in the Rocky Mountains of Canada.  Here is the synopsis for anyone interested in following the link to my e-publishing site.

"On a cold and still night, a frightened woman makes a frenzied escape down a wooded mountainside.  Fear is her only companion.  Silence is her only salvation. 

                Anna Nicholson had lived all her life under the shadow of prejudice in the remote village high on Mount Louis whose reclusive people were considered as wild and primitive as the wilderness from which they lived.  So when she awakes one morning to find herself in a stranger’s barn with a rifle to her face and no memory of how she got there, she is overcome with a gripping fear.  Yet, instinctively knew it did not arise from the big and burly cowboy standing directly behind the Winchester rifle or the other nine fierce cowboys who called the ranch home, but instead from a memory she could not recall.  One, she feared, in which she was the source.  Mistaken for a mute teenage boy, Anna is able to hide unseen and unheard from an evil she could not recall.

                Wade Haddock is the rough and tough but lonely cowboy who finds a frightened Anna in his barn.  Convinced the isolated wilderness was no place for a woman, he allows Anna to hide away on his sprawling Rocky Mountain ranch believing her to be a mute teenage boy.  While gradually succumbing to the bond growing between them, the wall around his guarded heart begins to slowly crumble.  Only to discover Anna’s deception.  And a memory that could destroy their love."

This is the cover.

The image is a combination of photos I took while in the Rocky Mountains a few years ago, and the other day's photoshoot where I shared some of the photos I took in my last blog post.

To read a sample or to purchase the entire manuscript, please click here.  If you do, I sincerely thank you and hope you enjoy the read.  Two more manuscripts are being proofed and edited and will be published shortly so be sure to keep an eye out for those as well.  I will update this blog once they are available.

Cows

I went out today with camera in hand to capture some photos for a project I'm working on which I will share with this blog in a couple more days.  However, contrary to what the photos may imply, I did not buy a cow. :o

First Born

Our first born on the new farm arrived mid morning.  Lily our pure white pygmy goat went into labour.

Poor girl had no privacy since we only have shelters and no barns on this farm.

And she ended up delivering outside on a wet and muddy morning. But she did awesome for a first-timer.

She gave birth to a handsome pure white little buck.

Who cleaned up real well.

Name giving for the male goats is left to my son.  This little guy has been named Prime.  Go figure.

Additions

We have nine new additions to the family!  One of my daughter's golden retrievers gave birth to 8 beautiful puppies!

Out of the 8, they are keeping one female back to be added to their breeding program.

Oldest also bought a new male registered puppy to be used as a future breeding stud.

Usually all past litters and puppies have been born and raised in my home and I've had the joy of watching them grow.  But since I've moved out of home and into my own farm, I will be watching them from a distance.  Though I won't miss the work involved in raising a litter, I will miss watch their daily growth.

Accomplishment

Being out here at the new farm by myself leaves me with tasks that otherwise I would leave to my husband or more likely my daughter's boyfriend.  My husband is not the handiest person.  As a matter of fact, he won't even attempt so much as looking into the problem as opposed to ignoring it all together.  Such was the case of my push lawn mower.  Before I moved the pull cord on the mower had broken.  I asked him several times to fix it.  On one of those occassions, daughter's boyfriend was over and jumped in to offer to fix it himself which he did.  Last week, Farm Girl snapped the cord again while trying to start it.

I texted my husband about the problem but didn't ask him to repair it as I knew that wasn't going to happen.  Sure enough, his response was that he would bring me the riding lawn mower instead.  Though I would rather have the riding mower, he lives on a much bigger property then I and needed it much more than me.  Besides, it would be a pain to load on the back of his pickup truck and the added weight would put a strain on his already ailing truck which he is having some maintenance issues.  I told him it would be much easier for him to just fix the push mower, but of course he elected to ignore that and bring the riding mower.

My farm was badly trashed by previous tenants and then sat empty for a year before I moved in.  The result has been not a day goes by that I do not find trash or glass become exposed in the ground.  The yard hasn't seen a roller in many many years I'm certain causing a very bumpy mowing experience.  On my second day, I hit something and the pulley and blade came apart from the deck.  That was great, now I had no mower.  I of course texted the husband about the problem and told him he needed to come and pick it up and transport it to a repair shop.  That of course did not happen.  Not that I truly thought it would, but I do hope that his responsible and practical side would eventually show themselves.

A week later with a yard beginning to become overgrown, I new I had to do something.  So I tackled what was the easiest of the two problems.  The push lawn mower.  I bought a new pull cord, sat down at my computer and pulled up youtube. Of course my lawn mower was slighty different from the ones depicted in the videos and did not come apart as instructed, however simply adding the make of my mower brought up the exact instructions I needed.  I removed the case (with the use of a ratchet no less), removed the cord housing, repaired the spring which had been bent and not retracting the cord, replaced the cord with my new one, put it all back together and is up and running once again.  I have to tell you how very proud I am of myself.  I'm the type of person that hates asking for help and if I can manage it myself, the better.  Now that I am feeling mighty accomplished, I'm going to hit youtube on how to replace the broken pulley and blade on the riding mower.