The Real Life of a Ranch Hand's Wife

How Time Flies

It’s already fall, the cows are home from the mountain, calves are being weaned, and the leaves are falling. I keep having the urge to break out the crock pot just about every other day. We’ve even built a fire a few days. Seems like just yesterday we were gearing up for branding day. How time flies!

 

It feels like I’ve barely blinked since I saw the positive pregnancy test and now I’m looking down at a giant belly with my son rolling around in it. I’ve never been much of a “plan ahead” kind of person, this is nothing new to my family. So I’m surprised at my motivation (most days anyway) to clean, organize and rearrange in preparation for the new arrival.  It’s kinda freakin me out actually. Less than 2 months to go…how time flies!

 

When I first met the Cowboy my biggest concerns when I looked in the mirror were a bit different than now. Fluff the hair, check the lip gloss, arrange the girls, and hurry back to order a drink before you hit the dance floor. Now it goes a little something like this… seriously another hair on my chin? Where do they come from? OMG someone needs to get control of their eyebrows. Let’s not even mention the current conversation between myself and my belly button. Is it time to invest in anti-aging products? You know, because in “just 4 weeks time”, when I’m in coveralls and a scotch cap feeding cows, the ladies will all whistle and comment about the noticeable difference. How things change and how time flies.

 

As I’m going through the munchkin’s baby boxes, I can’t ignore the small adult hovering over my shoulder. 3 going on 30 some days and I can barely stand it. I see the picture of her and I snuggling in the hospital bed and wonder where the time went. I have all the usual mommy feelings of “will she feel left out, and how will I ever handle 2”. Growing up I always said I wanted 6 kids. The day when I’d be a mommy, much less to more than one, always seemed so far away. How time flies.

 

Snow was trying to fall this morning, and it will for sure by tomorrow. It’s a never ending circle of things to be done around the ranch. The changing seasons signal the changes in duties. Now it’s time to gear up for daily feeding, double checking the snow chains in the feed trucks, counting and double counting the stacks of hay to make sure there’s enough to last even a bad winter. Soon we’ll be checking and rechecking our lambing and calving supplies, spending late nights in a smelly barn, flashing spot lights around to find heavy bellies and tight bags full of milk. It was only a month ago that we were bouncing around the pastures in irrigation boots, now I’m breaking out the coats. How time flies.

 

It all goes by so quickly. Soon I’ll be blogging about high school graduations and my daughter’s wedding. Never take a moment for granted, I know I’m learning not to. How time flies.

This time of year

 

    I’ve sat at my computer trying to get a story out of my head for almost 3 days now. Obviously, it hasn’t worked out for me. It’s a not so happy one, and too fresh to deal with I think. So I’m putting it on the shelf and going to share some other things that have been happening around the ranch at this busy time of year.

 

    The seasons are changing for sure now. The smell of fall is swirling all around. The temperature is finally starting to stay down…thank-you God. Cattle trucks are rumbling down the road much more often. The sale barn is the place to be these days. Every rancher is holding their breath, till their calves bring a good price and they have the one paycheck a year in their hands.

 

    Our irrigation water has been shut off, much to the Cowboy’s annoyance. Not that he’s overly excited about still being able to irrigate in October, but our stock water was also shut off. So that meant that a few cows had to be shuffled around and brought home a bit early off the pastures without live water year round.

 

    The Cowboy and J brought home about 60 pair yesterday morning. I now have cows back in my “yard” (the pastures around our house) and one bellowing bull. You know how I feel about those…ugh. J’s wife and I “helped” by flagging traffic on both ends for them, since it’s a pretty busy road and these cows haven’t been trailed that way before. I had to park the truck in a couple cattle guard gates since 10 or so thought it would be a great idea to cross one earlier in the drive. The boys came to the rescue before the silly wenches took the whole herd with them. No injuries were had by any involved, so it was chalked up to a minor annoyance instead of major catastrophe.

 

    Speaking of minor annoyances…My girls are starting to lay eggs and that’s the good part. The annoying part is you never know where. They started off in the chicken coop, but have found it better to make every day Easter.

 

    I put straw in the nesting boxes and everything. Nope. Not good enough for my silly chickens. They want to find a box of junk in the wood shed with an old dog food bag tucked in it so they can spit them out there. My favorite “Margaret” (yes they’re all called that, since you can’t tell them apart, plus it’s so cute when munchkin says it) stunt is in the back of trucks. Yes, that’s right. 2 now have been laid to rest in the bed of a truck. J came over to change a tire the other day and almost left with an egg. Another one was found in the bed of our truck just yesterday.

 

    The munchkin doesn’t mind at all. She thinks it’s great to go out several times a day and wander around looking for eggs. When she finds one it’s like she won the lottery. She checks the fridge constantly to make sure “her” eggs are still there. She got very bent out of shape when I started putting them in a carton and she couldn’t just open up the door and look at them. So far we have one dozen “bootiful” eggs, according to the munchkin.

    It’s nice and cool outside this morning. A bit overcast. One of those days that make you want to stay under the covers for at least half of it. The Cowboy left in the dark this morning to do a bit of deer hunting before the rest of the day sets in, so I didn’t stay under the covers like I wanted. I’ve been waiting for some days like this, it’s supposed to be like this through most of the weekend. This weather puts me in the mood for making applesauce (I’ve had the apples in the fridge for a while now) and starting a lamb roast in the crock pot. But first, cinnamon rolls for the munchkin and I for breakfast! Have a great weekend!