The Brink of Sanity, Casey's 44th, and Goats!

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One thing I've learned recently: major house projects should be avoided if you appreciate your sanity. I spent nearly two weeks patching and painting the kid's rooms and I am done. Done and done. They do look pretty amazing though. After 10 years of abuse, they were looking beat up and dingy. We also added carpet, realizing that with an increasing progeny comes an increase in ambient household volume. The carpet serves to absorb a small measure of the chaos.
 
 
The girls in their brand new room. Ooh la la!

Hallee wanted to paint the room orange (the color of her favorite animal--the tiger) and Sophie lobbied for blue, so we painted their room both colors. It turned out more awesome then I'd imagined.


Last week Casey Bert turned 44--a nice, even, divisible by 11, double digit number. We cooked him an amazing homemade waffle breakfast that morning and then the kids organized a treasure hunt for him to find his hidden gifts.

Success. The birthday loot was hidden in Wayne's Bar's dishwasher. The kids know how to hide stuff well and Wayne's Bar is where every good party starts.

Casey requested chili rellenos and green rice for his birthday dinner and homemade strawberry rhubarb pie for dessert. We got a surprise visit from my dad that afternoon, so he joined us for dinner and pie. It was nice to see him.
Last Saturday, we met our friends, the Sundbergs, in Wyoming for "goat training" because this weekend, all of our dreams are coming true. Casey and I will celebrate 10 years of wedded bliss with a 4 day goat packing trip into the high Uintas. So last Saturday we met Clay Zimmerman, goat man extraordinaire, to be trained in the ways of the goat.

Clay, calling his 25 goats down the hill on his 35 acre ranch in Wyoming.



Casey and the kids, merging with the herd.

Clay taught us how to care for, manage, discipline, saddle, and pack the goats. We are so ready for this!!



Zeke, making a new friend.

Of course this girl was in heaven!

Clay loaded up the five goats that we'll take this weekend (Patrick, Elf, Vulcan, Pursey, and Toby) and we took them for a spin--that is a mile long practice walk through the hills. Luckily we removed all of the ticks we'd inadvertantly  collected before they tunneled in. Walking with the goats was incredibly peaceful. They each wear a bell on their collar, so they create a pleasant pastoral music while they walk.


Zeke was interested in the sheep bones that we kept finding in the sage. He made quite the collection.


Zeke with some of his bones.

We'll spend this afternoon filling and balancing the panniers and tomorrow morning we'll join the Sundbergs and start up the trail into the Uintas. I have been dreaming about this for the past three years!! The next blog post will have the juicy story.

Comments

  1. LJ ElkinsJune 14, 2015 at 7:18 PM

    The goat packing trip is finally happening!! Can't wait to hear how it all goes. this is such a cool idea.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Eileen WhiteJune 14, 2015 at 9:14 PM

    I, too, am frothing with anticipation to hear how this tale ends. It's such an unknown-type of adventure. With all of your careful planning, it should be, as you say, epic. It will certainly be a nice break from crazy-hard work on those rooms...but they sure do look fine.

    ReplyDelete

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