Sunshine, Sports, Travel & Black Dots!

It was a busy weekend on the farm. To start the weekend off, my sister and I along with our friend Debbie from church traveled to Poplar Bluff, MO for the 2010 Maximizing Ministries conference being held at the First Church of God. It was an awesome conference w/Steve Rennick serving as guest speaker. He spoke on holiness. GREAT JOB!!! On Saturday we each attended two break-out sessions. We all attended the Seas of Change conference by the speaker. Then Renee and I attended the youth ministry session: Daycare Part II? and Debbie attended the children's ministry session: Fun with PVC. After the individual sessions we all met together again for a final worship service with the awesome praise and worship band from 1st Church an the speaker. Great time!

Since I wasn't home Friday night or Saturday I missed out on the new black dots being born. It was a busy night for dad. Friday there were three new baby calves: #145, #114 and #141. Saturday there was one new baby calf: #138.

We had to hurry back on Saturday because both the Lady Falcons and Falcons from Dora were playing in the District Class 1 Championship games. I think we got back around 4:30pm. I took a brief nap....guess I was really sleeping good because my family honked at me for 10 minutes and I never heard them. Finally my dad came in my house to see if I was going. I was SLEEPY. It took me a while after I got to the game to wake up. Anyway, this isn't about me. So, the girls played agains Bakersfield and brought home the victory; 45 to 40. Then the boys played Eminence and brought home the victory; 62 to 47. What a spectatular night for Dora Falcon Basketball. This is the first time in a long time the Dora boys have won the district title, but the first time in the school's history the girls have won the district title. Plus, it's very rare that both teams from the same school win the district title...PLUS, we were on our HOME COURT!!! Great night!

Sunday morning was active for dad as he had to pull another calf before coming to church. #110 delivered this morning. I might add she is very proud of her baby and extremely particular. As dad says, "She's a little ronchy and would like to get my hip pocket if I get too close to her baby!"

Had a great service at church this morning. Everyone seemed chipper with the lovely weather. We had an awesome service with Justin F. filling in for our pastor. He grew up attending the Needmore Church of God, but has since married and moved to Springfield; serving on the police force and actively involved in the First Church of God. We are so proud of Justin and his work in the Church.

I grilled out today on my BBQ. YUMMY is all I have to say. Mom and dad were checking cattle when I was grilling and wanted to know if dinner was ready. I told them they weren't invited, but I was just kidding. They thought I was kidding when I hollared at them later and told them dinner was ready. It was nice having mom and dad up. As always, we had a lovely visit. Had contata practice today for the Easter Contata. It is a very pretty piece and arrangement of music. I just hope we can pull it all together in the next few weeks. I'm sure we will.

Sunday evening I made my normal 10 pm cattle run with dad. One of the soon-to-be mommas was showing signs that she would calve soon. We figured this particular girl would be a bit salty..aka she's somewhat on the sassy side, so we decided to go ahead and put her in the corral for 'just in case' she needed help getting that baby here. Of course this would mean coming back in a couple of hours to check her, but I'd rather try and put her in the corral at 10 pm when she's not hurting as bad than chasing her after midnight when she's really hurting and doesn't want anyone to mess with her. So, that's what we did. We didnt' have too hard a time getting her in the corral. Dad picked me back up just after midnight to go check her. Still no baby. So to help her out and insure the calf was ok we ran her in the runway of the corral and assisted in the delivery. I really got to help on this one. I held the tail for a while, but dad needed help with the pulling. So, dad and I both were in there behind that cow, pulling chains on the calf's front feet, dad had one hook and I had the other and away we went to pulling. It didn't take long (about 15 minutes maybe) to pull the calf, but she sure needed help. That calf hit the ground with a thud and we then went to tickling it's nose with a stick of straw to get it to sneeze give. It's so funny when those little babies are all gooey and shake their heads and blow snot so they can breath. New life is awesome to experience!!! Soon after we let new momma #108 out so she could meet her baby. She looked at it a minute like, "what is that thing over there?" Then she went to smelling it and mooing like crazy at her new baby. Needless to say, she's a proud mamma. But, much to our surprise, she wasn't salty at all. She just stood there until that baby hit the ground.

So 11 babies in 9 days = 11 more to go!!

To top off this wonderful, yet extrememly busy weekend....the weather was sunshinny and BEAUTIFUL!!! Windows are up a little and the heat is OFF!!

Until next time . . .