Farmer Patrick, AKA the hubby, took off from his normal Saturday work shift to finish the barn. He took the back bench seat out of Pearl, the red minivan, spread an old tarp and put a disassembled large dog crate over the tarp- 2 haves- making 2 'beds'. Early that morning I received a message from Kellye that one of her goats at her farm was expected to kid, and she asked if I could be sure to get there early in case she needed to leave quickly. Thus began the scrambling to see how quickly we could now get things rolling. As the girls and I were preparing to leave, my mom called and wanted to ride with us. While we waited for my mom to join us, Carissa and Elyse made her a lunch to go with ours, and Farmer Patrick checked the oil. What we didn't remember was the straw bedding. But that was of no consequence until later. With the smell of burning spilled oil in our wake, we were soon off and cruising the hour and a half drive to Dream Come True. Beautiful, sunshiny Texas weather made the trip pleasant.
After arriving, we quickly located my two breeders, and made the sale. We bought Water Lilies, AKA Lily, from Harlequin and Material Girl, AKA Mattie, from Twincreeks. Since we are wanting to get acquainted with this show stuff, we stayed a spell to get a feel for things. During the wait, I received a text about possibly getting another daughter next weekend. Boy, did I get flustered! Apparently we will be expanding the herd in all sorts of ways! I handled the news accordingly (in other words made phone calls to the hubby back home and a few other necessary contacts) and we soon loaded up. First we collected Mattie. She happily followed on a leash to the van. However, it took several of us to get her into the van. Having never handled a goat before, much less one with a dangling udder, it was quite the gymnastics. With Mattie bleating stress-fully in the back of the van, I was off to gather Lily. Lily did not walk so well on the leash as Mattie did, but desperately darted toward her former breeder in the opposite direction. Since she was so much smaller than Mattie, I was able to scoop her up and carry her the rest of the walk to the van- dashing Lulu's fantasy picture of happily leading her doe while skipping off into the sunset. We arranged her in the back with bleating Mattie. Immediately, Mattie began butting and ramming Lily violently. While the two girls held the does, Mom and I closed the back and hopped in the van for the ride home. Off we went, with a choir of bleating, and an ultimate fight showdown rumbling in the rear of the van (which resulted with bloody scrapes on Mattie's head and Lily's rear end!). Within minutes, I realized quickly the ramifications of forgetting the straw as the smell of urine and goat berries filled the car. With nothing to absorb it, the goats were forced to share the small space with their waste. This whole combo did not make for happy goats. Fortunately, the long highway miles helped soothe them to stillness. As we approached our exit to home, Mattie took a huge pee in her crate, letting us know exactly what she felt about this whole arrangement. Windows down, but spirits high, we pulled into our driveway with our now soiled does in back. I anticipated them to be ecstatic to get out of the van, but these soiled babies decided they wanted me to carry them from the van. And carry them I did, proudly straight into their new goat home away from home- pee-soaked fur and all. Quickly we settled them in and cleaned everyone, including the van. Everything was sunshiny happy- until milking time.
Generally, I think I am a fairly humble and modest personality. For some strange reason though, I thought I would be immune to the first- time milking horror stories that are predominant in all literature about dairy goat raising. I genuinely thought that I would bi-pass this initiation ceremony between goat and new herdsman. Silly me! 2 hours later, I was creamy soft in my milk bath, and the milk stand was well bathed in milk as well. The pail was empty. As I sat trying to manipulate milk to come from teats to no avail, I began to wonder what in tarnation I had gotten into. Surely I had lost my ever lovin' mind getting these goats! Prayer works wonders though, and as surely as I asked Jesus to help me figure out how to get milk from those teats, milk began to flow. Yes, Jesus answers even the simplest of prayers. We may not have gotten any milk for drinking that night, but dad-gummit I milked those udders out.
If there were sabotages to getting the goats, it came in the weather. For as beautiful as Saturday was, the next few days were equally ugly. Storms, winds and cold air moved in early Sunday leaving my goats shivering- especially the recently clipped Mattie. Goats don't do so well stressed. Strike one: new environment. Strike two: Novice owners. Strike three: cold, wet weather. Strike four: Lily did not have food from her former breeder to help transition her rumen, and had to go cold turkey on the new feed. Needless to say, milk production dropped and Lily's poop indicated her stress, as well as draining eyes. The herbals I ordered from Molly's (check out Fiasco Farms) where not in because of a back order, and they would have helped this situation significantly. As it is, Jesus answers prayers, so I sent one up again, and just as surely, He answered. The goats corrected their health aliments on their own, and the weather cleared up. We are now warm and sunny. Milking was immediately better the second attempt, and we continue to improve on the milk stand. Lily likes to dance and Mattie likes to sit during milking, but we are even getting around those things as well. Farm life is an adjustment, but the Wallis clan here is loving every minute. Farm living is the life for me!