GOOD BYE AUGUST AND DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU ON THE WAY OUT

Just to think only four short weeks ago I said "self it is August the last of the summer month the last of any really hot temps" I think I jinxed it. We had some moderate days for the most part and then a few days that were strangely reminiscent of August in Fresno county. Such as 107 but after a few days it righted itself and once again I was lulled back into complacency. In the last week we have experienced full payback for my apparently over optimistic expectations. 

We will have a fire cracker HOT Labor day. Yes Labor Day not Memorial Day. And how does that work? You may remember from my June post http://walnetto-farm.blogspot.com/2017/06/almost-post-shasta-district-fair-and.html we had a bit of heat. Approximately ten days of the annoying stuff. So now it appears that is on the agenda again. We are talking 110 yuppers our tempatures here in the old foothills of the southern cascades will be 

Then we will slowly cascade into under 100 degrees with great hopes of not seeing that again until next summer!

If you pop the lead photo you'll notice that it appears the road is dipping into a bowl of pea soup fog. Close but no cigar. In addition to our toast up we had a wind shift that lands us in pea soup smoke from our neighbors in Oregon  and Trinity county California who are experiencing fires. God bless them and I am grateful that as mildly annoying as it is I will take their smoke over their fires anyday. We are also under a two day Red Flag warning since the weather is hot and the ground is dry but there are some clouds brewing up in the high elevations which could lead to dry lighting and more fires.

Heck of a way to end the summer but we here at the farm are looking forward to fall and getting into the greenhouse that has been way too warm and sticky to even think about . But I have been thinking and I am looking forward to getting some salad greens going and perhaps radishes and some carrots too.

The excessive heat also delayed Willie and Waylon's trip to their new home.
                   Willie

                           Waylon on right is now about twice as big.                          

Moving away from home brings enough stress as it is for the goats . Adding extreme heat to the equation is just asking for trouble. Our goats welfare always comes first in the decisions we make regarding them. So we will enjoy their company for another two weeks until we are sure the heat isn't coming back again. 

Leaving you with this great quotation from the "keeper of the board" at my Chiropractor's office.

WHEN LIFE GETS TOUGH THE TOUGH GET GOING OR HOW TO SURVIE ROUND TWO OF SPOUSAL CANCER

Geeze is spousal a word? Wow it is I just looked it up on Yahoo. I am wondering if doing that means I should be worried about my mental stability or do I care ? Basically because I know that in the last few months and those to come my mental stability is questionable at best.

When it became clear to me even prior to medical confirmation that Geoffrey was coming out of remission (wives know these things, heck , anyone who has lived with someone for 46 years gets it) I started a mental list of how I was going to lighten my load so I could be able to be there as needed. First thing on the list as painful as it was to admit was letting more of my LaMancha goats go. I needed to do this now while I could still find a home of my choosing for them not a home for them anywhere because I put it on the back burner until they had to leave and right now. That would not of been fair to them or me.

So two weeks ago I took Twist and her two 3 month old doelings, Jamboree a two year old buck to a dairy run by a friend in Marin county . Check out Marin county on the net pretty nice zip code to live in. And the last weekend in July I took my last three yearlings to a friend in the foothills of the central valley above Fresno. A win win for all as it was the appropriate placings for all involved.

This coming Wednesday I will take Waylon and Willie two wethers to another friend about 10 miles up the mountain from me. All this is difficult but there will still be goats on the farm. I will retain a ten year old doe, two six year old does, a three year old doe, a two year old doe and her 4 month old doeling. I am planning on parting with the doeling to correct home also but I will take my time. In  addition I have two bucks a 8 year old and his 6 year old son. Of course in spring of 2018 they will all be a year older.

I have decided not to breed this year and next spring will be odd the first in 32 years with no kids on the ground. But I will not say I will never breed again as I am very fond of both my goats and the lovely milk they provide.

Even doing the not so joy filled journeys in our lives bring joy. After the trailer was emptied at the dairy my traveling companion and I had a nice lunch at Point Reyes Station .

Then we headed towards the Pacific ocean and found four cow dairies established around 1850 three still working and one that is now part of the state park system.

/

The dairy barn in the old days then in the early 1900's a hay barn for beef cattle.

The original house built by the first owners . It survived the 1906 San Fransisco earthquake with only loosing its chimney.

Behind my friend Donna the school house where the teacher made $74 a month and educated all the farm children and the children of local fishermen.

The old equipment barn and what looked to be perhaps a piece of haying equipment now an oversized planter for indigenous vegetation.

The old dairy and below center some information on its production. Pretty amazing for its time! 

Looking northwest from the farm to the bay.










So here we are two weeks later. Having seen the doctor at the oncology clinic and arranged for six months of chemotherapy to begin in mid September. This trip as bittersweet as it was presented a diversion to what life is throwing our direction . And diversion is often the key to good mental health. 

WHEN TOO MUCH IS TOO MUCH

This is not here because we are at this place in time. I want to make that clear. A friend of mine shared it and I love it. It says to me so much.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/i-know-you-love-me-now-let-die-louis-m-profeta-md

Please give it a read. This is a very personal topic and I feel this Doctor has nailed it.

THIS'S AND THAT'S

When we first moved to true northern California almost 6 years ago it was fun to see the sites. I was wowed the first time I saw this flag flying high above Interstate 5 that runs the length of the state going north /south. It is always a breath taking site and always a breeze that ruffles her feathers so to speak showing how large it is.

We have had a lot of this lately . Thunder on occasion with no lighting in these foothills. For which we are grateful as there is little to no rain hitting the ground but the air smells like it is. Dry lighting isn't what we like to see when the grasses are dry all around us since it often is the cause of wildfires. We do have a minimum of 100 feet defensive space around house and barns but that at times won't be enough.

Please excuse my swollen tootsies.  Last Friday as I was putting the goats and Pyrs to bed for the evening I got strung and bitten numerous times by a "meat bee" who is technically a member of the yellow jacket family. They are scavengers by nature and we see them each summer to one degree or another. I kind of did this to myself as there hadn't been but a half dozen around so far this year and I wasn't thinking when I found a fledgling sparrow floating in a water bucket on the fence line earlier. I picked it up out of the water and tossed to the side a few feet intending to retrieve it for placement further out the next day. By the time I went back out that evening the word was out and these little scavengers (think hyena's with wings) were doing their job and sent out a scout to give me a warning. It felt like a knife was rotating in my toes, swelling commenced immediately and by Sunday it was creeping up my leg and itching like mad. I had been bitten multiple times the summer of 2012 when I was tending the critters while Geoffrey was hospitalized. To the extent that I have apparently developed an allergic reaction to them. Not a good thing.Finally now a week later I am doing much better. The photo above was taken on the first morning after the bite and here is a link for some light reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowjacket
And in case anyone is wondering I have no history of reacting to honeybee stings.

This is my latest project. It is a four shaft Nilus LeClarc table loom called Dorothy. This is one of the earlier models and I have had it a few years. Getting it ready for a new project.  A scarf of organic cotton gradient colors. Pictures as time allows.

I will interject a "Geoffrey update" if I have one. Today I do . He is recovering nicely from a diagnostic surgery and we are still dealing with CLL (chronic lymphatic leukemia) not Mantel Cell. Next step is a bone marrow biopsy for diagnostic purposes and then finally later this month a meeting with the oncologist to determine a treatment plan. He is napping more often and not as active as time passes but in good humor and trying to keep things normal as possible. Me too.



 

BREAKING THE SILENCE

A nice soothing photo of the river at one of my favorite places Burney Falls in McArthur Burney Falls State Park.

I apologize for my silence of late but a good deal of changes have occurred on the farm in the last few weeks.  And the one of most impact is large. I will be dropping in from time to time to do a "normal" post or update on my husbands new battle with the "C" word. Some of you may have known from the blog before this that my husband has danced with Chronic Lymphatic Leukemia since July of 2012.

We now know that he is out of remission and we are scrambling to get some more finite diagnosis and then learn of our choices for a treatment plan. I don't mind sharing as I hope that I can offer someone comfort by knowing that they and the one they love aren't dancing this dance alone. There are multitudes of families such as ours. But in the same token when the next new normal comes into focus I will be posting about the beauty, love and fun of life. This blog will not become one large pity party.

So with that said we are off to surgery tomorrow to get more info as to exactly what is going on. I hope you all can forgive my sporadic disappearing acts and stick around to see what is new and exciting as summer morphs into fall here at the farm.