Clinging to Summer

I do not want summer to end! I have been spending as much time outside as I possibly can to enjoy the weather and scenery before it's cold and snowy. Yikes! I don't even want to think about snow yet! The picture above I took at Backbone State Park in Delaware County, Iowa. I have been obsessed lately with rocks and fossils and living in northeastern Iowa gives me a great opportunity to study the Hopkinton Formation- Backbone in particular being a great place to observe the karst terrain, such as caves and springs. You can learn more about Backbone State Park and the Hopkinton Formation here: http://www.igsb.uiowa.edu/Browse/backbone/backbone.htm

Another project I have been working on outdoors, is cataloging and photographing headstones at rural cemeteries in the area. I have started with Plum Creek Cemetery, just down the road a couple miles. Once I was finished, I got really interested in the people buried there and have done a ton of research on the people who were pioneers to this area in the mid to late 1800s.

A lot of the stones are almost unreadable and some have been broken and repaired. I wanted to get pictures before they are completely unreadable and for people researching their genealogy who don't live in the area. I plan to start a blog or site with my pictures and the information on the people I have gathered, but that sounds more like a winter project. :)

After having an udder full of milk for four weeks, Nellie finally gave birth last week. To a whopping four kids, no less. Here she is with 3 of her kids, the fourth was very weak and cold, so I had taken her into the house. She couldn't stand, could barely hold her head up, and couldn't suck, so I fed her with my finger and a syringe and warmed her up with my rice bag. A few hours later, she was walking and sucking strongly, so I took her back to the barn and Nellie welcomed her back. I sat with her awhile and helped her figure out nursing, and now she's absolutely fine!

This picture was taken shortly after I brought her in, so she doesn't look very good. I need to get out and take more pictures, because they are running and jumping and going crazy out there! There are two doelings and two bucklings and they are in a variety of sizes! One of the boys is huge- easily twice the size of the smallest- and he was trying to eat oat straw on the day he was born!

Here's Tate and Annie perched on a trailer load of the oat straw. Tate loves sitting up there and watching the goats and chickens in the front hog lot. He made me sit up there with him the other day and tell him all the names of the goats. Several times, actually! Annie climbs on top the pile every time she walks by it, rather than walking around, she goes over.

Not to leave Sullivan out, here his is with his newfound storage method for food he has no interest in eating. Which isn't very often. The pea fit nicely, but tonight he was trying to stick in pieces of his pork chop, which didn't work so well!