May Has Been The LONGEST Month!

I am so glad May is almost over.
It has been the longest month possible for myself, family and most of my friends.
Everything that could have gone wrong DID go wrong!
Accidents, illnesses, breakdowns (people and cars!), financial problems, you name it, every problem slammed into someone around me this month!
I am hoping June will be a much better month, not only for us, but for everyone else out there.
My next post will be farm updates!

Wanna Meet Ryan Gosling...uhmmm...Sort Of?

So yesterday morning in the egg incubator:

A few hours later, he's taking a break from his efforts..

It took him about 8 hours of struggle to finally get out, from first little wee crack to finally kicking off the last bit of shell. Another hour of resting and drying and he looked like a proper little gosling!

Handsome little guy, isn't he?
We are pretty sure he is a gander (male) because of his breed (African Gray Goose) and the baby sized little bump on his bill. Female geese usually don't have that at hatching.
We went round and round on his name, but finally settled on Ryan.
Seemed appropriate...and I sorta see the resemblence.

Surprised Again!

Remember Nugget?

We thought we had lost her, then she came back.
She would spend a few minutes here and there and then disappear again to who-knows-where.
Well, she showed up again...but not alone!

Nugget is a momma!
She appeared with 10 little chicks, but we were only able to catch 9 of them. We put her in the old hutch that Ugly Betty and her chicks were in, which meant we had to put Betty and her chicks somewhere else. We temporarily put them in with our new ducks...but then one of the chicks drowned in the ducks wading pool.
So, we built Betty and her two remaining babies their own little coop with a small house so they can have shade and get out of bad weather. Betty was so pleased, when my son had just finished attaching the gate to the pen, she walked her chicks up and marched right in!

So, our flock has almost doubled! Nugget is being a very good momma. She makes sure her  wee chicks eat plenty of the chick starter and the treats we give her, clucks to get them over to the waterer and fluffs out her feathers and snuggles them all down at night to keep them warm.

I guess that explains Nuggets prolonged absence!

Just One of Those Days...Weeks...Months...

Yeah, it's been that way.
We have had some losses in the family and other family members with medical problems, some with financial problems...all way 'round, the past month has sucked.
So...just going to ramble on a bit here...and vent a bit.
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The Darlin' Man's sister-in-law passed on. She was only 35 and had an 18 month old baby son. The Darlin' Man's brother is distraught (as is to be expected) as well as the rest of the family. Cancer was the reason for her passing. Cancer sucks. If I could banish only one disease off the face of this planet, it would be cancer. She was her parents only daughter and they are devastated by the loss. They watched their daughter as she endured the past 6 months of surgery, chemo and radiation...every time hoping the doctor would stumble across the one treatment that would bring a cure. Her husband hoped and prayed, too, but to no avail. It was discovered too late.
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My daughter in law lost her beloved grandfather about a week or so ago. She and my son adored the old gentleman and had arranged for his care at a nursing home just a few weeks earlier. He passed on in his sleep. Still, that doesn't lessen the pain they are feeling.
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PLEASE, before anyone mistakenly posts such gawdawful platitudes such as "They are in a better place" or "The Lord only takes his favorites" or any crap like that, STOP and think!
Inane platitudes like that only annoy the grieving and make them feel guilty for their grief! You do NOT acknowledge their pain by saying such things, you NEGATE the pain they are feeling. Those banalities do NOT comfort the living.
Yes, death is a part of life, but the people left behind have pain and sorrow. Allow them to have that pain and sorrow! Say something like "This is so awful", or "I wish you didn't have to suffer this loss" or even "This fucking sucks" Let them grieve, they need to.
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As for the medical problems in the family...those are working their way through, more or less. Some getting better, some getting worse, some issues still up in the air, so to speak.
Sometimes all you can do is hang on and wait.
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The Boy is going on a school field trip. It turned out to be WAY more expensive that the teacher originally told us it would be. We were able to scrap together the money needed at the last minute, thank goodness.
Still, the students had to sell candy for months to fund the trip. LOTS of cheap, awful tasting candy. I got so damn mad every time that poor kid lugged another case of candy home from school. He sold loads of it to friends and neighbors and his sales covered a teensy bit less than half the cost of this field trip. We still had to pay $275.! Cost of field trip total is $500.! PLUS, he has to take extra money to pay for meals!
What ever happened to "booster" clubs that the parents participated in? Our field trips were funded by cake sales, car washes, a haunted house at Halloween and concession sales at football games. The students and parents working together!
I sincerely wish that schools would BAN students having to sell stuff to fund trips, etc. It's a bunch of BS!
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 That's about all the rambling I'll do today. Been stressed out a bit, angry a bit, sad a bit...all the negatives have out weighed the positives recently.
Basically, I have wanted to scream, punch somebody and vent! But screaming upsets the animals, if I punch somebody around here, they will most likely punch back, so I'll confine myself to venting here!
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Here's hoping that things will get better, that we will all be able to cope with whatever nasty things are thrown in our paths...and I wish all that for all my blog friends out there, too!

A Puppy Pic!

Well, the puppies are mobile and attacking toes with wild abandon.
Here's one of them:

They look like tiny baby Ewoks!