Out of the fog, a colder morning

Hey y’all. Winter, we learned is hard, cold, long, dark and unforgiving. Definitely not a source of endless joy. We thought we were ready, surprise, we were not. Every single time we assume we’re prepared. In typical Goldie acres style, many things went wrong that we hadn’t thought about. Let me tell you a Christmas story that is both hilarious and an accurate depiction of how we spent our winter. 

It’s just after Christmas, that glorious week where in our old lives it was just a blissful sea of jingle juice and not knowing what day it was. It’s different now. 

Dylan’s mom is visiting, we’re having a swell time. Bella has had puppies so I have ten wriggly pups with their eyes still closed. Should be great. 

I get a text from Linda (Dylan’s mom) while I’m in town, no water in the house. Glorious. A couple weeks prior to this we had already had a pipe break and spill water through the hallway. At this point it’s at least forty below though we had some days that were colder than fifty below, I can’t recall the details of that particular joyful day. I assume the water lines under the house have frozen. Ain’t no thing but a chicken wing, we’ll heat it up and be good to go. We get home. It is not a frozen line. It is a burned out water pump. Hilarious, no water until we get a new one. This is a small town, and a holiday time. You would think at this point I would just assume the worst and have picked up a pump while I was in town and things were open. No, my optimism is our downfall. It’ll be at least tomorrow before we can buy one let alone install it. Cool. I always wanted to know what it would be like to have to walk outside in forty below every time nature came a calling. Inconvenience, of the medium variety. We had the shop bathroom, and though the walk was unpleasant it was better than nothing. At one point I looked at Linda and hysterically laughed at how terrible everything was. That clearly offended the universe. Boom, next hurdle. 

Now the water in the shop is frozen. Amazing. No water at all. Inconvenience of the highest variety.

Eventually we got water back both in the house and in the shop but let me tell you, winter has felt like one long year. Likely longer for poor Dylan who has kindly taken on the majority of the farm chores. My little reptile body rejects the cold. 

We had all kinds of difficulties, too many to list, and many days that we thought for sure we wouldn’t make it. But the days are getting longer, and warmer (relatively, it’s still cold, but now I only wear one pair of pants beneath my snowsuit) and we’re still here. 

Last month we had to treat the bovine for lice, y’all ever tried to use a liquid to pour onto critters that hate you in -20. Not ideal. Not ideal at all my friends. We lured with oats and climbed up on fences to get it on them. We also slunk around the feeders trying to surprise the critters with a sneak attack of ivermectin, quite the spectacle I’m sure. We need a squeeze and a chute, that much is quite clear.

 

Of course wonderful things also happened, Dylan and I helped whelp ten beautiful puppies and we got engaged! 

Let me tell you that story. 

Dec 16

Dyl wants to take me out to look at all the Christmas light displays, something we do every year. The farm has kept us busy and we have a list about ten miles long of things we need to do, one of those is putting up our tree, my favourite winter activity. We decide to enjoy the lights then come home and do the tree. Turns out in this town, there’s really only one major light display, the rest of the time we drive around like maniacs trying to find pretty displays. We go home, set up the tree and after the last decoration goes on I turn around to see Dylan down on his knee, turning me into a real farm wife. After I confirm that he is not pranking me, I say yes. We make the calls and plan to have a celebratory champagne brunch the following morning. 

Dec 17 ( 3am )

I wake up to hear Bella pacing restlessly and wanting outside. The puppies are coming. I get her off the carpet but she refuses to leave her dog bed and move to the provided towels. Typical Bella. The first puppy comes. They come slowly, by 5pm she is finished and we have ten little babies. Rocky is horrified, traumatized. We did not have our champagne brunch. My ring is covered in the unmentionables that coincide with birth. Bliss.

As spring is now within our sights I am looking forward to baby season. We have done lambing season before, it is our first known. We did spring last year, dealt with the mud and the babies and survived. I’m feeling prepared. Keep your fingers crossed for us, you know what happens when I think we’re ready!