I think we were missing the dog.

On Saturday, David told me another calf was born.

Me:  From a cow you bought at auction a couple of weeks ago?

David:  Yes.

Me:  So all three of those bred cows who were supposed to calve in February have now calved?

David:  Yes.

Which begs the question:  Who is doing the pregnancy checks at this auction, I ask you?

So, we have Babs’s calf and three new auction calves.  Babs’s calf and one of the auction calves have tags in their ears.

Yes!  Tags!

It is a new service we just added here at Maliblahblah Farms.

We don’t yet have a squeeze chute set up, so we cannot tag our cows.  We can only tag newborn calves because we weigh more than them for about 10 minutes.

Anyways.  I take Charlie on walks to check the cows daily, and I always check on the calves.  I am supposed to find two tagged calves and two untagged calves.  The hope is to find them alive and healthy.  And everyday, I would only find two tagged calves and one untagged calf.  So, I believed in my heart of hearts that David was just confused and one of the auction cows did not yet calve.

What is the point of this?  Is anyone still reading?  I do have a point.

I found the elusive newborn on Monday.  And here is photographic proof:

And I was very thorough with my investigation and also took photos of the other three calves so I could be sure I truly had four calves on my hands.  It was a very successful lunch break walk for Charlie and I.

Yes.  I walk and take bovine inventory on my lunch break.  What do you do?

I LOVE teaching from home.  I am home alone, surrounded by a plethora of animals.  And between communicating with animals and with my precious first graders, I am sure I speak more words in one hour while being “home alone” then David speaks in an entire day out in society.  I do not get to teach from home everyday, which is a bummer and a half.  But I entertain myself quite nicely and enjoy the house being clean and staying clean and it is all quite pleasant.

Yesterday, we got a lot of snow, and I found this little calf to be quite clever.

All other cows looked quite miserable, chewing their cud while snow dumped all over them.  This dude was living his best life, keeping dry and cozy under the massive girth of his mother.

Speaking of girth . . .

Norman, one of the new puppies is a chubster.  He really likes to eat and sometimes his belly gets in the way when he is trying to do everyday tasks.  Like walking.

Me:  Well, I am going to have to bring Norman with me to the beach from now on.  He will make me feel a lot better about my swimsuit body.

LD laughed a bit too hard at that joke, Friends.  It made my feelers sad.

Norman and Niko, the new puppy brothers, are very cute and sweet and healing our hearts from our losses of Tank and Abbie.  Charlie is being a good big sister dog and all is well so far.

On days that I am home, I can take them outside for little 10 minute walk breaks.

Niko is in the front and Norman is in the back.  They come in, exhausted, which is good, because I need to teach first graders.

They go in the kennel and nap while I teach.

And then I let them out and they wreak havoc on our entire house.  And we love them.

New Family sends many happy updates on Abbie.  It is such a blessing and so nice to know she is loved and doing well.

I have had numerous good reports and only two not-so-good reports.  One not-so-good was that she chased her cats, which the cats found to be unimpressive.  I found that to be hilarious as she lived in our house through the year of 16 kittens and never seemed to even notice the felines existed in our house.

The next not-so-good report was that she jumped up and tried to eat food off the table.

For shame, Abbie!  She never tried that at our house.  That I know of.

So those were the two not-so-good reports.  Everything else has been wonderful.  She exercises with their teen girls.  She goes on walks.  She lets all the kids pet her and love on her.  She tries to socialize with the neighbor goats, but they are not interested in meeting her aquaintance.

New family is a big family with 8 kids, and Abbie is their first dog.  I was told by New Family Mom that one of her children said this the other day,

“You know how sometimes we feel like we are missing someone, even though we are all here?  I think we were missing the dog.”