Our first homegrown Guinea Keets!

I know that they are ugly and not the cutest birds in the world... but I sure love my guineas! Our lone surviving pair... Guiness and Ginny Guinea had babies!!! Guineas are known to be HORRIBLE moms! Miss O and I caught up with Ginny in the field with a gaggle of little babies... we managed to catch them and lock them in the nursery! Ginny was NOT pleased - but she started to really protect the babies :) We will see how hardy these little ones will be... keeping our fingers crossed!

Back to SCHOOL!!!

Happy First Day of School!!!! Miss O is starting second grade... WHERE does time go???? Little J is going to be a "big man on campus" - going to 7th grade at MMS!

Day two of the Fair!

Today the "big" part of the Fair was the Jr. Livestock Auction. This is the "best" part for us parents - haha - as we get to see how much "our child" earns from the 4H Market animal.... This year, Little J chose to auction off Speedy. Since Speedy was not one of the "top" pigs, they go in order of how they placed in the show ring... yep - he was on page 3 of 4!! haha! Little J really didn't care which pig he auctioned, but chose Speedy because he knew that Twister would be tastier for him to eat!! We were surprised that the person who bought his pig this year was the same as the one who bought it last year! Nice! AND he got $3.50 a pound!! Cool beans! He can now pay his good ole Mom back some of the costs AND have some college money to put away!

Day one of THE FAIR!

Today was DAY ONE of the Fair! Little J will be showing in Market classes today. Market class is where the judge is looking at the conformation, build, condition and market "value" of the animal. For pigs - they must weigh between 230 and 300 pounds to qualify for the Market class. Speedy weighed in at 230 (JUST BARELY) and Twister came in at a respectable 250. For goats, the judge looks at the same things and the minimum weight is 70 pounds. Lady Baabaa weighed in at 84lbs.. one of the smallest goats, but she is also the prettiest (in my opinion!)

Little J showing Speedy in the 230lb Market class. The judge was REALLY tough! Most of the class got Red ribbons :( But it was ok because he told the kids that these pigs were just not "market" ready - which is true because they were light weights. Speedy did a nice job, as did Little J.

Poor Mrs Hall!! She was thrown all out of her element the first day! She did, however figure out that because of her small size, she can stand in the feeder to see out!

Little J is showing Twister. Twister showed really well... thankfully, we have never had a pig that has been a fighter, or super agressive in the ring! Twister got a blue ribbon (for which Little J was really happy!)

Ahhhhh - the Market Goat class! This was Little J's very first time showing goats. He was very very nervous. Fortunately, Lady Baabaa behaved and he did ok. She qualified for the top 15. She came in 11th overall and was the only female in the class. Typically, they use males (wethers) because the bulk up faster.

Little J did an educational display and got a blue on that... so a pretty good day overall!

Just a few pictures of the fire action going on over head.... who needs tv when you have all of this going on????

The smoke bombers have been going back and forth from the Moses Lake airport numerous times each day... crazy stuff!

Canada sent down firefighters for the ground and one of their big Chinook Helicopters to help dump water. They are pretty impressive!

This "was" our neighbor to the South of us... only about a quarter of a mile down the road. The house burned completely to the ground - all that is left is the chimney.... sigh

The Taylor Bridge Fire 2012

Yesterday, we were evacuated from our home (Level 3 - Mandatory) due to the Taylor Bridge fire. Talk about some of the scariest times of your life! UGH! Fortunately, after it all - we had no fire damage, and are all home safe and sound! Here are some of the pics of the activity!

The above picture is the beginning of the fire as seen from the west of our house.

Later in the day the fire planes and helicopters started over head.

Family day of fun!

Today we headed to Yakima to go to the Family Fun Center... and well... we had fun! It was nice to burn off some steam and just relax for a bit!

Little J hit the batting cages!

Fun with mini-golf!

The water tag ride, that only Little J went on... we saw how drenched some people were getting off and said... "naaaaaahhhhhh - why don't YOU do it!?" He had a blast and did come off completely dripping!

Miss O takes a water break during mini-golf!

A week ago, we meet with some other adoptive families here in our town... as well as some of the "Children of Chernoybl" kids that were here visiting.. A fun night of meet and greet... kids playing at the park and a great BBQ! Well... it was all great, until someone got too carried away while playing blindfold tag. Apparently, Big Al had a bit too much excitement for the night and was amped up. During his 5th or 6th time being blindfolded, he ran head first into a tree. Luckily, the tree is fine!! Fortunately, the hospital was only a few minute drive away and we hurried down and got him all stitched up! It's gonna leave a nice scar!!

Miss O and Tubing

She is not too sure about doing the tubing by her self.... YET!!!

Did a little Mini-weigh in of the goatie-goats today!! Keeping our fingers crossed that they will make weight by Fair!

Wacky Summer Weather

Summer.... where are you???? We have had a really strange spring/early summer this year. Lots of rain, wind and just cold cold weather! Today we had some thunderstorms and just downpours.. ugh... we really would love some hot hot summer!!!

Crazy Kitty

It amazes me how patient this cat is! Gotta love Lyger!

The new boat

We got a new-to-us boat this spring. Today was nice enough in the late afternoon to take it for a quick cruise on the Columbia River. The kids like it - except it has not been warm enough to go around without a sweat shirt!

Lion travel to Lake Chelan

Miss O had to take her favorite, Lion, with us to Lake Chelan!

Family Drive to Coleman Canyon

Fishing trip

Had a great Father's day fishing at the Kids Pond!

Piggie Weigh In

All three pigs got to go in for the official first weigh in and get some fancy tags - aka bling! The piggies weighed: Twister 89 lbs Speedy 83 lbs Cookie 85 lbs Looks like we are going to need to push these piggies with lots of food this year to make weight by fair!!

Goat preshow

This morning was the first Goat Preshow that the boys have had to attend. Since this was all new to them - it was more of just a go with the flow! The goats were a little freaked out at loading into the horsetrailer and then going to the fairgrounds so very early in the AM. All the goats got weighed and got some new ear bling (tags). Mrs. Hall weighed 30 pounds, Ocho weighed 38, and Lady Baba came in at a big ol 51 pounds! Our little goats were the smallest goats at the show. But, that is ok, since we are not planning on eating them after the Fair. The boys worked together to get their feet trimmed and clipped before they had to take them in the show ring. Since they could only show one goat each... poor mrs. Hall had to sit it out! She got the hang out with me outside the show ring in the audience - which I think that she really enjoyed! Both boys earned blue ribbons and learned quite a bit!

The view from our driveway

No words - only beauty!

goats first outside walk

Today we took all three goats outside of their field for their first official outside walk. They did alright - took some time to get them used to being out, then they really enjoyed noshing on the weeds!