Willow and Autumn came with us to the Sam's Farm Festival this week.  Elizabeth brought milk to share with kids.  This is the last week of the farm festival and the girls have had fun but are ready to wait another year before we come back.  This year we were able to share dairy cows and calves, baby pigs, and rabbits.  

The girls participated in the Bon Homme Poultry and Rabbit Fun Show with great success!

Rabbits - which are shown first, by class, then by breed and last there is an overall.  

    Elizabeth was able to win her class and breed with her Mini Lop, Hellen.  She also earned Resserve in Show with her lady Rhinelander (Inga Dudley). 

    Lydia also had a fairly successful day with her Sebrights getting a 3rd in show, her D'Uccles placing in top five and her homeraised RIR Single Comb placing in the top five.  

Our singer in the family was able to stretch her skills by participating in Region V Festival Choir in Platte today.  Mom felt a little stretched with a 10:30AM dental appointment, 2:30PM concert, 5:00PM pickup from basketball, and a 7:00PM Recogniton Night.  

Elizabeth has been accepted as a South Dakota Beef Industry Council Ambassador for this year.  She is so excited to help promoted the beef we produce.  Her first event was at a meat processor and informative meeting.  She now has seen this process a couple of times and is starting to understand it more every time.  So if you live close by keep an eye out for the local SDBIC information.  

The ladies, Willow and Bluey, have been giving us 4-6 gallons in the morning and 3-4 gallons in the evenings.  It seems like a lot more than that each day as we spend the time, first cooling, then separating (hoping Santa will bring me a seperator), and then either making butter, ice cream, soup, or cooking with it, and washing it all up.  

I have never seen the Northern Lights from my home before.  However we had the opportunity to see them tonight and it was amazing.  Of course, these pictures were with some help from our iPhones.  I hope my girls never forget.  

We had a couple of boys who wanted to get in on chicken butchering.  They had so much fun chasing the chickens around before we scalded them and pulled feathers.  Lydia also had a friend that wanted to know how it was done also, so she came to help.  For those of you that think it is inhumane to butcher, we hatch our own eggs and when the rooster numbers get to high we have to put them in the freezer for the safety and humane treatment of our hens.  Now they will provide nurishment for our family. 

It is time to get the weaning weights on all the calves that we will be keeping at home and/or later selling as bulls or replacement heifers.  We had great help this year with Morgan staying home from school and Elizabeth and I decided to take a day off to help them.   

We sell registered Angus Bulls which requires weaning weights and yearling weights to complete their paper work to get them registered.  We also like to have all of our heifers we are keeping as cows to be branded to help us identify which cows are ours if the stray off.  Angus cattle are all black and most producers in our area are raising black cattle which can make it difficult.  Plus this also helps with theft of cattle as there are brand inspectors at sale barns to make sure everything that goes through belongs to the person who is selling it.  

George came to milk his cow and Angus tagged along.  Both boys were very interested in the process and took it all in.  We can't wait for George to start showing with the girls.  The boys then helped carry in the milk and separate it out.  For some reason both were very surprised the milk that was separated tasted like milk.  Remember what you say sticks with kids for a long time.  

Bluey is the first Jersey to have her calf.  May the milking begin!  She had a backwards calf but is up and cleaning her calf. Now we wait to let the calf eat before we start milking.  We will be saving colostrum for actual calving season. But the bottles are ready.

We went from Watertown to Faulkton for a competitive cheer competition.  The girls didn't score as high as they had hoped but on to practice, one more competition and then state.  

Elizabeth's pet rabbit, Flame, left us a year and a half ago and ever since she has been looking for another Rhinelander.  On Friday morning she heard a whisper in the wind and her face lit up.  So we went and bought a couple bigger cages and wrote the check.  The people we purchased them form said she could show them on Saturday, so entries forms went in.  We had no idea that they were going to be winners. Liz won Best in Show for State Youth Show B and Reserve in Show for the Brookings Rsbbit Club Youth Show B.  Needless to say Liz was estatic!

Elizabeth also earned a 1st Place in the Royalty Contest for 24-25 and that would not have been possible without these two...Reada McConnaughy and Randy Woehl!  These two have answered late night Mini Lop questions, have helped reset our barn for success, answered many breeding questions, judge questions, and worked showmanship with Elizabeth even when she wasn't in the mood.