Some days I feel like such a PIG!

Wilbur

Okay, so we take the girls and my niece, Shiann, to the Union Fair in our little green Buick. The girls decide they want to put their names in the lottery for the pig scramble. We say Okay, that should be fun to watch. Now I thought 12 kids would be chasing 2-3 pigs, and what were they odds they'd get picked anyway? Well, ALL of them were chosen, Amber first. She was especially happy since she'd decided she didn't want to do it afterall, LOL!

Well, when they unloaded the piglets, I realized there were enough for everyone to get one, and everyone did! Shiann was the first of our girls to nab a piggie!

So all three girls ended up with piglets. Shiann sold hers to a little girl and we sent Alan home to get the truck and a crate to transport them in. None of us were too thrilled with the idea of the girls trying to hold the piglets in the backseat while we drove home!

So what happens when you're living in a camper, your dog has died, the kids are back in school and you have no TV or internet?! That's right, you spend way too much time with the piglets and discover how easy they are to train!

Wilbur and Petunia

Wilbur is a castrated male, shy and sensitive little guy. Petunia is bold and independent, and very smart. I taught Wilbur to sit using their favorite treats, grapes. It was easy. I didn't work with Petunia at all, but the next day when I went down and asked Wilbur to sit, Petunia sat too!

Wilbur

Wilbur loves his belly scratched and will lay down for you to do it. He loves being petted and paid attention to. He has now learned to get down on his little piggy knees for treats, and I'm working on getting him to lay down and play dead with verbal cues.

Petunia must have been a horse in a former life. She LOVES the horses. I can see her being a "pig-eyed, pig headed" Appy mare or something, she does have spots on the top of her neck, LOL! She heads straight for the horses when I let them out and "talks" to each one. They have taught her horsey language, which she caught onto quicker than I have! Molly has learned to ignore her, since its not worth the effort to try and chase, bite or kick her and she'll come right back. Angel has gotten her point across, she HATES pigs and will put in the effort to chase her if she gets too close. Maya is the same way. FlyAway doesn't care, she gets along with everyone! So Petunia has made it her mission to win over Angel and Maya. The other day, Maya was walking down the pasture and Petunia was walking beside her all the way, oinking away "Why don't you like me, huh, huh?!" Petunia not only sits, she smiles too. She's learning to hop up on a hay bale and sit for a treat.

Petunia smiling

The horses have gotten used to the pigs and they mostly get along. The pigs are pretty big now and know to stay away from teeth and hooves. I try to let them out to play once a day, they just love to run around, and they can run FAST. They always come when called and have no problem going back into the pen.

PIG PILE!!!!!!

New Puppies

We have two new family members! Chance and Tucker are now 10 weeks old. They are Corgi Poodle mixes. We don't know exactly what they'll look like when they grow up, but they sure are cute now! We got them when they were 8 weeks old. They easily transitioned onto raw food diet, and I found a shop that sells everything you need right in Farmingdale called "Naturally Good Pets". They have much better prices than the other big box pet stores around. I even put the cat on raw. They can't wait to eat, and can barely bring themselves to eat the dry food I leave out for snacking. They are eating a prepared ground diet from Bravo, but will go onto whole bones when they can chew them up. I found out about a butcher not too far away, from a lady in my Dave Ramsey Financial Freedom class no less!

Chance is the straight haired pup. He looks mostly Corgi and has that personality too I believe. He is very sturdy and solid. Chance is quiet, calm, loving, intelligent, bold and curious. He's harder to house train because he just goes when he needs to, no big deal! I picked him out when he was just a few days old. Chance loves to eat and savors his food. Pig ears are his favorite chewing toy. He also likes cat toys best.

Tucker is curly and has hair so will probably need grooming. I didn't think of that when I got him. They have the same markings, but look so different. Tucker has longer legs and is slimmer in body and bone. He is very intelligent but not quiet. He whines quite a bit. He whines when he needs to pee or poop or Chance has something he doesn't or Chance is picking on him, or he wants to be carried or he doesn't want to ride in the kennel in the car! It actually makes him easier to house-train because you know when he has to go. When he has to go #2, he chases his butt like "Oh no! Its coming out, I can't hold it, oh no!" or he drags his butt on the ground like the dog Toby in the steam cleaning commerical, LOL! When we brought them home, they took naps and then Chance got up and explored and Tucker stayed on the bed and didn't want to move. He likes to be held and "tucks" into your neck. He also gets "tuckered" out faster than Chance. Tucker INHALES his food, never seen a pup eat that fast!

You can see the girls and Alan are having a hard time bonding with them! I had never used the kennel to train pups, but its working out really well. They are sleeping through the night. I had forgotten, though, how labor intensive new pups are! I took them for a walk on the river walk in Gardiner yesterday and they trotted along like little men. They have been easy to leash train so far. Mittens the cat is getting used to them, they were raised with kittens, one used to stay with them all the time, so they are very comfortable with cats.

Electricity

We should be wired in 2 weeks!

Chase

We found out Wednesday that the tumor Chase has developed in the gum of his lower jaw is cancer. Its grown quickly and the vet recommended not doing surgery. I am looking for information on treatments, etc. He still feels good, although the tumor is big enough to make chewing more difficult. Everything else looks great, his ACL had healed very well, and he has just a little arthritis in his hips, still has good range of motion in them.
His heart and lungs are strong. Its devastating news and not having access to information really stinks right now.

Update

Hurray for good weather! Its helped tremendously, even if it is a bit hot now. We found a great swimming spot and go there to cool off most afternoons.

We have our well in, with 100 gallons/minute, so should never run out and it is crystal clear. Our septic system should be done today or tomorrow, so we can move the camper up to the spot near where the house will be by the end of the week. We have a bigger generator, so have been using air conditioning, dishwasher, stove, microwave, etc. The electricity has been a confusing mess, but we think it should be all set now. We got poles a week ago from Fairpoint, but CMP has been hard to figure out, hopefully we will have permanent electricity soon though.

I love the camper, I love living on our land. Its been a good experience so far. The horses are mostly settled, we just need to build one more run-in or small barn by winter and they will be all set. We haven't had time to ride yet though! Then it got so hot. We have been doing Pony Club, but using the farm's ponies since I had hay in my horse trailer. We got that out today, so maybe we can get to a trail ride or something later in the week.

Life in the Camper

Right now we have a generator and an extension cord, so can only run one electrical appliance at a time. Its Alan's first day back at work and my first day alone on the land. The guys wake me up as they get up to go to work, so I decided to head down and visit the horses. They are being eaten alive by mosquitos! Poor thin-skinned Arab Angel is just quivering all over and her neck line is covered with feasting insects. Molly's cheeks are covered and I'm sweeping the darn things off by the hundreds. Maya and Fly had been sprayed the day before with Zonk It to protect from horse flies while we moved and they were alone, so they weren't affected as badly. I had a little of the spray left and dumped it on a rag and wiped down Angel & Molly. That helped a lot. When I went back to feed, they were lined up at the gate looking at me like "Can we go home now?"! I felt so bad.



I decided to make the pasture bigger and started putting in the step in posts. I love those things! By 6:00 am, I had the bottom strand all up and let them into the new area, then went to have breakfast.



Before Alan left, he said if I wanted to use any other electrical appliances, just unplug the refridgerator and plug the other appliance into the extension cord. Sounded easy enough. Except he had tied the cords in a loop so the refridgerator cord wouldn't come undone and slide down behind the back again, but in doing so, made the cord so short, it wouldn't make it up to the top close enough for me to get. So I had to wrestle the big old refridgerator out of the tight space its in, and don't mind saying I was not using good language while doing it! I finally am able to get the cord and manage to start untieing them when I realized I needed to make sure the cord didn't slip back behind the refridge again. So I found a string and tied it to the cord and then to the rail on the cupboard to keep it in place, got the cords untied finally and by 7:00 am was plugging in the microwave to heat my water for tea! I put up a pasture faster than unplugging the damn refridgerator!



Went back down to finish the pasture and the horses looked much happier. They've been munching on all the saplings and plants growing there and tripping over all the rocks and stumps.



I decided to go empty the pot we're using at night in the pit Darren dug. We used to have a chamber pot in the first house my parent's had. My Dad would empty it every morning by dumping it in the row of grape vines we had growing beside the house. Those were the biggest vines and had the best grapes I've ever tasted. We have pictures of us kids sitting under the vines with our laps piled with bunches of grapes, blissfully munching away! Anyhow, after dumping the "chamber pot" that's really a bucket, I start rinsing it out with the hose and notice the writing on the front - Miricid, made by Miracle Grow, incredible plant fertilizer for all your plants!

Hey Dan-ell

When I was pregnant with my second son, we agreed we'd take turns naming the children. I got to go first with Ryan, so it was Alan's turn. He loved the name Daniel, but never said it "Dan-yell", he always left out the "y" so it sounded like "Dan-ell", or how the old-times say Dan-ell Boone. I told him if he couldn't pronounce it correctly he'd have to pick something else, so Darren it was.



In the post "They always know" Leigh made a comment about the other "boys" in the family loading themselves on the trailer to not get left behind. She had no idea how prophetic her comment was!



The first night on the land in the camper was not spent by Alan nor I, oh no, Darren spent the night before moving down there, communing with nature, looking at Mars, swatting mosquitos and having a grand old time. Woke up to a glorius dawn, whole nine yards.



So after the swirling hurricane that the actual move evolved into, all of us and our stuff was plopped onto the land helter skelter, no reason nor rhyme. I'm running around trying to get any type of organization going and need some help. I yell to Alan, "where's Darren?" and hear back "he's out practicing throwing knives!" "WHATTT? What's he doing that for, I mean, he's really throwing knives?!" Yep, and making squirrel friends, leaving them raspberries for a snack, and digging a poop pit, in his freaking glory. Come to find out, he's "always" wanted to live on the land like this, maybe we should have stuck with Dan-ell after all. SIGH!

The target Darren used for throwing knives.

Four Days to Go!

My mother came up and helped me finish cleaning the camper. It took longer than I thought it was going to for such a small place! Its not really dirty, dirty, they took good care of it, its just sitting around not being used dirt. Mom decided to stay the night and help me pack some more boxes and start cleaning the house as we moved things to the lot. She helped out so much!



We got all the boxes moved into the storage trailer and most of Alan's outside stuff.