First water fight of the year!

One week old and already getting in trouble. This little one somehow got tossed out of the nest box and crawled his way right out of the cage, it was cold and near death when I found it this morning. A little while longer and it would have been a goner. We are down to just 3 babies out of the 8, I don't want to lose anymore. First time bunny moms are not so great.

Here it is taking a nice warm bath before I put it back in the nest. No this is not a bunny snuff photo. A great way to warm up a baby bunny is in an open plastic bag (so the baby doesn't actually get wet) and floated in warm water.

5 or 6 min...rewarming the water many times, was all it took.

All warmed and returned to the nest. They should open their eyes in another 5 or so days, I can't wait to see their little peepers!

The little chocolate is growing well. I am leaning toward this one being a buck, the other two may be doe's but we won't be able to tell for sure for another 3 weeks.

Oreo, they are getting so cute now.

Momma is starting to get it I think.

Jericho was with me when I found the baby missing, we searched all over for the little white baby...I was starting to think mom ate it, then I just happened to look outside the cage on the ground. Jericho was so scared that the baby was dead...I'm glad we got to Cupid in time.

Hayden surprised me when she brought up getting her ears pierced. All week she talked about wanting to do it. So today after school I took her to get it done. I wasn't 100% that she was going to go through with it, but she did.

Some tears before anything even happened, then it was so quick she was like that's it? Not a single tear afterwards.

She is so super proud she did it and she loves these so much...she couldn't stop talking about how she "really got her ears pierced" all night. Lily is still not interested, we shall see if she changes her mind.

It was a beautiful day today.

Goodness I love this place...how did I ever get so lucky to make this dream life come true for me and my family. I have the best husband in the world...he works so hard to make all this happen. I am so thankful.

Jason and the kids thought it was a great day for the first water fight of the year. These things are awesome...I don't think we will ever use regular water balloons again LOL. You fill a big bunch up all at once, and they are self sealing WHAT?!

Lily Bug got blasted with the first chucked balloon, after an initial angry reaction, she came around and just look at her happy beautiful face!

The kids were using sleds as shields LOL.

The chase was on.

And the balloons were flying. Being the photographer usually keeps me pretty safe LOL.

Dad isn't afraid to get in the mix...look at the fists on Lily Hahaha!

When the minions team up...better run!

This pic turned out cool...that is water that Jason sloshed at Lily as she ran away.

Jericho just dodged this one.

Don't you dare Missy. Kitsune was having a lot of fun too.

I think Jason ended up every bit as soaked as the kids. Great end to a wonderful day! Summer is going to be so fun here!

Ups and Downs...T'is farm life.

Birth and loss go hand in hand on a farm, I have found it is better to not get too attached...you just never know who is going to make it and who won't. Thankfully we are all starting take the losses in stride, the kids are learning that's life on a farm, and so is this tender hearted mom.

We lost one of the white chicks, it took a while to get the truth out of him but it seems Jericho went in the baby chick run and the poor chick ran under his feet and got stepped on. Jericho was pretty upset, we had a talk about watching where we walk...but honestly that is an accident that could happen to anyone, those little chicks are crazy. They are getting bigger, 7 weeks old now and almost ready to join the grown ups. Still looks like the boys out number the girls, might be mean to say but I was happy it was not one of the girl chicks that got stepped on.

The jury is still out on a few of my chicks, I wish it were easier to tell the pullets from the roo's.

This little guy has started crowing...so yeah no doubt there. Anyone want an Olive Egger rooster?

Another loss, and this one was not due to lack of green thumbs. The chickens got to my bell pepper start before we got the chicken wire up. Need to go buy another one now that they are all more safe. From birds and chickens at least.

A couple hours, a small chain saw and lots of stinging nettle stings later the deforestation of the goat pen is complete. It makes it look so much bigger without all that Elderberry in the way.

One of the three giant piles of downed Elderberry...there was a lot more than we thought in there.

Two more giant piles...we are going to have to add all these to the burn piles.

The piggies enjoyed some Salmon Berry plants that accidentally got cut down....they make such short work of anything edible.
President Business is turning into such a handsome boar.

The momma's are getting bigger.

I think WildStyle should have her piglets towards the end of the month...so excited, but hope they don't need much help, these guys are not really big on people messing with them.

More sad losses of late. We have lost 5 of the 8 baby bunnies. 1 was kind of unexplained, 4 were the smaller babies and I think either they kept getting pushed out of the way at feeding time by the 3 chunks or Momma just plain didn't feed them. The three left seem to be doing well, this white one is one of the survivors...sadly the little runt is not. This is a pic taken at 4 days old.

These two also are still with us, looks like my first color guesses were wrong...I think I have a chocolate and a black and white.

Momma seems to be getting the hang of it, hopefully her next litter goes better. Since she only has three nursing babies we will be rebreeding her when these ones are 10 days old.  Always working on her nest LOL.

Here the survivors are at 6 days old. The kids have named this one Kiwi.

Oreo.

Cupid is still the biggest. Fingers crossed for them, I would really hate to lose the whole litter.

It's a jungle out there.

The goat pen is truly a jungle, but we must start clearing out all the Elderberry. We have been lucky so far that the goats haven't gotten sick...I'm sure they have eaten some here and there. We start deforestation tomorrow. They will lose a lot of shade, but there will still be a lot of salmon berry, and one or two good sized apple trees.

There is a ton of whatever this stuff is too, and of course they are swimming in stinging nettle. I was hoping they would eat it, no such luck. I have recently been told if we machete it down and leave it for 24 hours for the sting to go away, the goats might eat it then. Someone find me my machete!

Heidi and Lulu are growing so well, they are chubby happy 13 week olds now.

And so pretty!

Jason rearranged their bath tub climbing toys, the goats side eyed it like it was going to eat them for about 3 min...then the jumping and acrobatics ensued.

Is it going to get us Mom?

Nah...all clear.

These shenanigans are not just for the babies.

Our small, starter size, garden is under way. We didn't get the big garden area prepped in time to use this year, so this will have to do. It is so cute...and was actually really fun to plant everything.

Please continue to keep my poor plants in your thoughts...they are in the hands of people without green thumbs LOL.

Jericho funny from yesterday... I got out of the shower and found my sweet five-year-old had taken it upon himself to load the dishwasher with a handful of dishes that were in the sink. I didn't have the heart to tell him that all the dishes in there were already clean, and that you can't pile dishes on top of each other if they are to get clean LOL. Thanks for the help Jericho.