Nov
30
2007
Paige is leaving Canada on Monday! I still don’t have the drop-site info, yet–all I know is when she’s leaving. I hope I hear from them soon with the details. It’s a bit nerve-wracking.
On top of everything else going on with my critters this past week, one of the kittens got injured when my bully cat Leo chased her off the couch. The vet thinks she’s just pulled some muscles and is sore, but she’s slow to heal. Poor baby, and she’s being such an absolute sweetheart through it all–it breaks my heart. Thankfully, she’s eating well and seems to be in relatively good spirits. I’m having her rechecked by the vet tomorrow. I’ve been really preoccupied with concern for her and haven’t had much time to get excited about Paige.
I don’t understand why things seem to all happen at once like this. 
Nov
27
2007
EEK!
I came home to the FedEx guy delivering my stall hardware! 
Now I have to go get the lumber for it and finish the floor up and I can get started.
Double EEK! I just got an email from my friend alerting me to the fact that the Upcoming Loads page on the Animali Farm website has been updated. There’s a load going to Ohio next week! I haven’t gotten a phone call and email yet, so if she’s in that load I should get one in the next day or so. I’ll keep you guys posted!
On a downer note, I’m not having good pet karma this week. Two of my cats have an eye infection, and Josie has TWO infected teats now. I wish they’d just do a total masectomy, with how much this has been a problem. The vet and I talked about it today, and it may come to that if we can’t get this under control. This is now round 4 of antibiotic treatment in the past few months, and 3 of the 5 remaining teats have now been infected. So now I get to put two medications in both cats’ eyes three times a day, and Josie’s getting antibiotics twice a day. 
I hope all this clears up soon.
Nov
25
2007
Yesterday I got the floor fairly leveled out, and I started moving in the gravel. Today I’m going to try to get the rest of the gravel and the stone dust in the back half of the barn, then I’m going to toss those bales of hay over to the newly done side and do the other half. Wish I had waited to get the hay, but I didn’t decide to do the floor until after the fact. Oh well, I could use a little exercise!
Can you see in the picture what a STUPID location the spigot is in? I’m going to have to have it moved over a few feet to the edge. I need to have a new one put in, anyway, as this one has heat tape wrapped around it and clearly isn’t functioning/draining correctly. But that can wait…I’m trying to keep things prioritized right now.
No word yet on when she’s coming, but I really don’t mind the extra bit of time to get some more done. I’ll let you guys know when I hear something.
Nov
23
2007
*Whew* I’ve been working hard all day today. Taking advantage of the day off, and boy am I pooped! 
Last night we had our first snow that actually stuck to the ground, so here are some pretty pictures of what I woke up to:
I spent the day tearing down the old stall that was in the barn. That was a job and half, but I’m so proud of myself. 
This is what it looked like before:
And this is what it looks like now:
There is still one more stall post I need to take out, but that’ll have to wait until morning.
Tomorrow morning I’m getting a delivery of gravel and stone dust. The barn floor is earthen, and it gets damp around the edges. So I’m building it up 6″ with 3″ of gravel followed by 3″ of tamped stone dust. Then I will put stall mats in the stalls. I would also like to have gutters installed around the perimeter of the barn, to help keep it dry, but that will have to wait until later.
Interestingly, when I went out to take the pictures a little bit ago, all of the lights shorted out. They’re incandescent bulbs, so the cold shouldn’t be affecting them. That’s a bummer, b/c if I can’t figure out what’s wrong I’m going to have to have an electrician out to fix it.
