Calf Watch

We have Mable on calf watch now...she is due the 10th of January, but she has already dropped and her bag is getting huge, so we are thinking she will be early...maybe even this week, who knows. We want to make sure and be around, in case it needs pulled like Daisy's did, plus with her having bag problems, we will have to give it some colostrum we saved from Daisy soon after it is born...and may have to supplement her baby with Daisy's milk for a while too, so no going very far from the farm for us till the calf is a little older.

Prayers that the calf makes it and grows up would be appreciated, as the last one she had, she lost from what we were told.

If we do have to bottle feed the calf almost totally, it will need at least three feedings for a while...which means morning, noonish & night. I know Daisy would probably adopt it, but then we would stop getting butter once again, since she is good at holding up the cream...so I don't know if we want to go there or not. Guess we will see how things go and wing it this round...next time Mabel has a baby, maybe we will know what to plan for better. LOL

Sadly having to stay closer to home this month makes us miss a couple events we would love to go to. The preacher who married us and his wife (their daughter was my best friend in high school) will be celebrating their 50th anniversary on the 1st, and I would have LOVED to have gone over for that....but alas, we don't dare leave with the calf due.

Also a great-niece, we've never seen will be back in Nebraska and celebrating her 3rd birthday on the 9th...but we will be staying home with our animals then too since if the calf IS born by then, it will still be young enough to need fed three times a day and with cows being far more expensive than goats, I would really hate to lose even a calf if we could prevent it...so that makes them take center stage in our lives when young...or calving.

Farm life really is worth the sacrifices...I miss being able to just up and go, if we have the money...but yet I wouldn't trade it for anything! I get way to much enjoyment out of the animals and beauty that surrounds us. :)