Here is Joseph taking up the old wood in order to lay new wood down on the floor. We expected to have to strengthen the beams and stuff, however what we found was much worse (like every other project we have started with this home.)














This is the wood rotting in some poorly mixed cement that has crumbled to powder.









This is what it looks like now, after Joseph shoveled out the crumbled cement. Can you see that the beams are rotted away so that they do not touch the wall?















This is Jizelle fallowing me around.















This is a pup who showed up at our back door in the morning yesterday. We have been looking around for its owners, but haven't found any. Tiki loves the pup and wants to be with it all the time. It would be nice to keep it to keep each other company though the long winter months.

Jizelle Arrives

Here is Joseph putting the gate on the new goat pen. It is really supposed to be for Jaccapo, but because of all the nice grass in it and because the other goats have to get used to a new one, we have put Jizelle in it for now. Here is Jizelle in her new pen.












Then we put Myrah in the pen with Jizelle, since we actually got Jizeel to keep Myrah company. The problem was that they did not hit it off too well. Whether Myrah was being playfull or putting Jizelle into her "proper order" (goats have a pecking order), or if she actually didn't like her, I don't know-- but It made Jizelle scared, so we separated them. We will have to give them more time to get used to each other.

































Other then that, Jizelle is getting along fine. She loves all us people, enjoys the company of the other goats (when they are on chains so she doesn't feel threatened), and is curious about the other animals and her new home.











I have been working on fence and yard stuff, while my son Joseph has been working on the home. (We have been working on this very old home for the past six years). This summer he is fixing up a family room. He started by taking out the old carpet and pulling the lath and plaster from the walls. (We put new windows in a few years ago.)

Putting Up Fence

Joseph has been helping me put up fence around the big pasture I am making for my goats to graze most of the year. The fence is looking nice. The problem we are running into is allergies.
For the past week or so the grasses have been pollinating and then drying. Working in it is terrible! Almost intolerable!! Joseph takes pills and I take showers trying to control all the allergic reactions. The field next to mine grew some field grass this year. Some of the seeds scattered over the fence into my field. Great for the goats to eat, but absolutely terrible for us to be around and have to work in taking down the old fence and putting up the new one. (The old fence is not a fence that can hold goats.) I am going to have to spend the next couple of weeks stratigically chaining the goats to places to eat and trample down the grassess where we need to work before we can get in and get the fence done.


We went out to visit Jizelle. I was planning to bring her home last week, but we don't have the fence and pen finished enough. We are letting her stay with her mother another two weeks, which means we should bring her home another week from tomorrow. She sure has grown. She is two month old now. I am very nervous about getting a new goat, especially a whole new breed of goat. (She is an Alpine.) I wonder and hope this all works out. Myrah has been together with Jaccapo for close to three months, but I can't t tell if she is pregnant. I kind of think not. (Most dairy goats are seasonal and only become pregnant in the fall, but my research has told me that Nubians have a bit more flexibility.) I don't know how I will be able to get any more Nubian goats unless Myrah has babies.

Enjoy the pictures of Jizelle.