How To Shelter A Shelter From A Battering Ram

Goth, our big boy here, has destroyed many fences , gates, trees, and even another ram. We have tried to provide him with shelter to protect him from the rain but he has taken out solidly installed corner posts on buildings and the shelters over the years. He, his father and grandfathers killed the huge cottonwood trees in the ram pen by ramming them, for fun. See this post*Goth And The Spot of Ugliness. For a few years I have had this idea for a perfect shelter for rams, bulls and horses ( our sons' horses also contributed to taking out the corners of shelters) but not being any good at all in carpentry or building construction, and knowing my husband has many, many other more needful things to do in spite of my pleading, well, nagging~ my bright idea went undone. I have even spent many hours on-line looking for ready-made shelters of my simple design. I am sure there are many of you who read this ( or not) who will exclaim this is an old idea and YOU might have even incorporated it, but no one has ventured forth with this plan as of yet,( and I have asked many people on-line and in the sheep business around here)....so here is finally, the culmination of my idea and my husband and youngest son's handiwork. THANK-YOU! My husband and son have so many more important things to be doing, but our ram pen is right by the turn-around in our driveway. You see it right away and I don't like such destruction , ripped tarps, bashed in fences, demolished and dead trees to be the first thing so many people see.Hey, I don't like seeing it myself, but I do want to keep Goth. Above is the beginning of the structure. A structure supported by 3, THREE posts, all on the outside of the fence.See, if there are NO posts inside the fence, the ram cannot bash the post and cause the shelter to lean and eventually fall~ which has been the demise of all our previous sheep shelters. You can see on the other side of the fence, the huge wet hay and manure pile our youngest son cleaned out of the pen for me, with a bit of help from our oldest Grandson and my husband. This build-up is from Goth and the 4 ewes that spent the fall with him. I could not get into the pen to clean because I did not want Goth to be tempted to ram me. After our son helped my husband get off to a good start on the shelter my husband finished it, a bit at a time. He is a busy man and the weather has been bad. He had me be the watch-out just in case Goth took an interest in him and the bright green ladder.You can see part of Goth in the background of the picture above, and you can see the trunks of the very dead cottonwood trees killed by years of ramming.

My dear husband!

And here is my Valentine's present this year , the 3 post ram shelter that looks nice! I can also clean out the manure and wet hay stems with a 3 pronged forked hoe, from the outside of the fence~ yay! No risking life to have a clean ram pen. What is funny is that until my husband could get to finishing the roof, he had one strip of the corrugated metal roofing on the top and Goth would position himself perfectly under the strip to keep himself dry. He's not so dumb after all.

My husband presented me with a dozen red roses and card to melt my heart yesterday. Then he finished my ram shelter ~thank-you Jim, I love you!

Valentine's Day Project With Love

Here is a very easy project to do with children or for you to do up a little finer , and very quickly at that! This can be done almost last minute and economically too. Take a can, a nut can works fine, glue pretty wrapping paper around it, or paint the can, then decoupage a picture or Valentine on it, plop a plant, such as a primrose or African Violet into it and stick a skewer, or sharp stick through a home made heart proclaiming your love, then present this gift to Mom ( or ? ) with a hug and a kiss added to boot!Of course this can be done very, very economically but must be done with lOVE!Our granddaughters made this for their Mom, our daughter....

"And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient, love is kind, love is not jealous, love does not brag, and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek it's own,..." I Corinthians 13:3-5

Jamie Oliver's Sweet Pastry~

This is the last Jamie Oliver Friday I will do for awhile. There are a few more recipes I want to post but they are very seasonal and this is NOT the season for them, and then there is the one last recipe that requires a lot of wild game which my husband has brought home from the hunt and he will prepare it , in his time. This is the sweet pastry, which in the book is directly opposite the savory recipe I posted last week. I like this pastry but instead of using it as a fruit pie pastry as Jamie suggests, I will in the future use it as a ONE crust pie pastry for cream pies, or lemon meringue.The pastry is rich enough for me to be dessert by itself! You will need:

• 3 1/2 cups organic all purpose flour, plus extra for dusting ( *I did not have organic, just used regular)
• 1 cup icing (* confectioners' ) sugar
• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons good quality cold butter , cut into small cubes
• zest of one lemon
• 2 large eggs
• a splash of milk (* and he means JUST a splash)
• flour for dusting

"Sift the flour from a height onto a clean work surface (* from a height?) and sift the icing sugar over the top. Using your hands , work the cubes of butter into the flour and sugar by rubbing your thumbs against your fingers until you end up with a fine crumbly mixture. This is the point where you can spike the mixture with interesting flavors, so mix in your lemon zest." "Add the eggs and milk to the mixture and gently work it together till you have a ball of dough. Flour it lightly . Don't work the pastry too much at this stage or it will become elastic and chewy, not crumbly and short. Flour your work surface and place the dough on top. Pat it into a flat round , flour it lightly , wrap in plastic wrap and put it into the fridge to rest for at least half an hour." Jamie Oliver I pulled this out of the oven around midnight and had to let it cool to taste it. The pastry is delicious, my winter apples are a disappointment. Even with the right amount of sugar, cinnamon, and lemon...the lack of flavor the apples show cannot be disguised. My lesson here is that if I am going to invest such rich ingredients and my time into a recipe I will make sure ALL the ingredients are worthy! I think my sheep will appreciate the remaining winter apples from our trees NOT baked into a pie. * asterisk denotes my comments or words

New Arrivals to Cedar Pond

Introducing Bide-a-wee Buttercup's new lamb, a son ( ram) I have named Basil. I find this picture touching as she nuzzles him and he leans into her. This is a big ram lamb and he is very strong and sturdy. He is also the son of Goth, the dominant ram here at Cedar Pond. I am excited to see how his horns grow, will he have 4 or 6 horns? We'll see. Buttercup's half-sister Bide-a-wee Chicory gave birth to TWINS today. She had a ram lamb and a ewe lamb and I am overjoyed by this. Aren't they cute? In this picture they are still wet from birth and learning to nurse. She is proving to be a good mom. Goth is also the father of these lambs. The boy lamb is on the left and it is obvious he will have at least 4 horns, they are already popping up out of his head . ( YIKES, can you imagine giving birth to already horned babies? ) And then there are the warm, fuzzy, and ridiculously cute babies...chicks! Yes, more chicks arrived in the mail to replace those that did not fare well in the last package. All seem to be doing well now, but i took a picture of them as they will be grown up so very quickly. You can see I have a lot going on around here and later on today my shearer will be here to shear a few more sheep, then there will be the skirting and washing of the fleeces so I can begin anew the dyeing, carding, spinning and locker-hooking of the wool that starts as a lamb late in the winter at Cedar Pond.

Delilah Has A Little Lamb

I am so happy with my newest lamb, she is sooooo cute! I am so thankful for her too. Last year Delilah's lamb died. I believe it was my fault, I should have been home. I had noticed her showing all the signs of lambing but as usual we had obligations away from home and in spite of my reservations , I went away for the day and came home to find a beautiful, full term lamb, dead on the ground with Delilah guarding it. She had not cleaned the birth sac off from around the lamb's face. Had I been home I could have easily done this and also made sure the lungs were clear of fluid, and the little lamb would most likely have lived. This was one of those times I got frustrated with so many aspects of my life conflicting with one another. Friends and family are important, but to me, my flocks are too. I cannot do a good job shepherding my sheep if I take them no more seriously than a casual hobby...to drop it when it is inconvenient and then pick it back up when I FEEL like it and it fits into my busy schedule. The little lambs are the fruition of months of planning, waiting, feeding and caring for the ewes when they are pregnant...joy when the lambs are born and then the new year of watching the lambs grow and deciding which lambs I might keep. Lambing time comes for a brief time every year, what kind of a shepherdess am I if I take this too casually , and what does this say about my stewardship of the flocks God has blessed me with? I am thankful and comforted my Shepherd, THE Shepherd, is not at all conflicted about His care for me and you ; "Like a shepherd He will tend His flock, In His arm He will gather the lambs, and carry them in His bosom. He will gently lead the nursing ewes." Isaiah 40:11

And look, my husband made fudge this weekend, it is delicious! Don't you just want to reach into the screen and help yourself to a piece of this?A very nice weekend, a new lamb , lots of yummy food to eat while we watched the Super Bowl, and fudge!

Orpah & Obed

Naomi had the first lambs , twins- a boy and a girl. She is one of my older ewes. Nine years ago she was born to one of my favorite Jacob sheep, Ruth. I have kept the biblical names for this line of sheep, particularly names from the book of Ruth. I think I will name these twins Orpah ( the girl and not to be confused with the name Oprah) and Obed. "And the neighbor women gave him a name, saying "A son has been born to Naomi !" So they named him Obed. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David." Ruth 4:17 This is a beautiful story in the Bible and if you read it you will see the son was born to Ruth, Naomi was Ruth's mother-in-law, the mother of Ruth's first husband who died leaving Ruth childless and Naomi without children, or grandchildren . The book of Ruth is the touching story of Ruth, a foreigner, and her love and respect for her Mother-in-law Naomi . This little book in the Old Testament also"shows an oasis of faithfulness in an age marked by idolatry and unfaithfulness." comment in my study Bible. Ruth was the great- grandmother of King David.

The Best Savory Shortcrust Pastry~ Jamie Oliver Friday

This was an easy recipe for me and a chance to make pie dough in my food processor. I make a lot of pastry, but have never done it with my food processor and Jamie's recipe called for this so I was delighted to give it a go. The recipe in the book is simply the pastry recipe so I decided to make a chicken pot pie, a dish my husband always appreciates coming home to, especially on cool rainy days. You will need:

• 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 7 ounces lard, cut into cubes
• 2 ounces freshly grated Cheddar cheese
• sea salt
• a sprig of fresh rosemary, leaves picked
• a few sprigs of fresh thyme, leaves picked
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• a splash of milk
• flour for dusting

"This savory pastry is good for making tarts, quiches and the like.The two main principles behind making it are the same as for a sweet pastry; stick to a ratio of half fat to flour, and bring the pastry together as quickly as possible without pulsing the dough too much. Like sweet pastry, you can flavor this savory one in different ways. Try things like paprika, black pepper, nutmeg or mace instead of the rosemary and thyme. In my opinion an exceptional savory pastry is made with suet or lard, rather than butter. This gives the pastry a great flavor, a slightly richer texture and a delicious caramelized crust when it comes out of the oven. Feel free to use butter instead, if you're at all concerned about the fat intake of lard, but if you're eating this only once in awhile, why not spoil yourself and do it properly? There's nothing better! P.S. You can make this pastry the old fashioned way ( by hand) if you're feeling nostalgic. Put the flour, lard, cheese and a generous pinch of sea salt into a food processor and pulse for 20 to 30 seconds or until the mixture is crumbly and fine. Add the rosemary and thyme leaves or your chosen flavoring. Pour in the eggs, add the milk. Pulse for a few more seconds until the mixture comes together. Scoop your dough out of the food processor onto a clean floured work surface and pat it a few times to make it more compact-don't be tempted to knead it. When you have a flat round, wrap the dough in plastic wrap and place it in the fridge to rest for at least half an hour." Jamie Oliver I made up a chicken pot pie filling using leftover chicken and broth and added slightly cooked vegetables and thickening to the mixture, and after rolling out the pastry and lining a casserole dish with 2/3 of the pastry, filled it with the chicken mixture, then topped it with the last 1/3 of the pastry. I pricked holes in the topper and baked the pot pie for a little over an hour at 375 degrees. My husband said this was very good! As I do not like cooked potatoes or peas ( I know, I am way too picky) I did not eat any of this, but I did sample the pastry and it is delicious! A recipe I will most definitely use again and again~thanks Jamie!