Pit Fall!

Hello everyone! I forgot to say something about yesterday's blog. Nathan was pretty cute! As soon as he jumped up from the ground (when the flying alpaca knocked him down), Nathan was laughing and he said, "If only I was in my karate stance, he wouldn't have knocked me down!" I laughed so hard I almost cried. I told my Sensei last night and he about busted a gut laughing! He thought it was absolutely hilarious!!!

I had an ok day today. Got up and around and made breakfast for Nathan and Jordan. I had to go to the post office to pick up Jordan's stock whip that he ordered. Then I headed over to where Aaron works and bought 2 dozen ears of the Schwebach's sweet corn. Aaron asked me to make some more fresh cream corn and freeze it for later. Then stopped by Harts Hardware Store and picked up a roll of duct tape for Nathan. Afterwards, I stopped at the bank and cashed a check. Lastly, I stopped at the grocery store and purchased some items that were on sale to put away in our long term storage. When I arrived home, it was already time for lunch.

After lunch, I spent some time cleaning house since we are expecting company to stay with us tomorrow night. Earlier in the day, we got a call from Wagner Farms petting zoo (who bought the flying alpaca and dead-beat calf from us) and they were interested in driving out here to pick up two more male alpacas. So, Connie came out. We had three boy alpacas already put in a pen by themselves, so it would be easy to let her pick two and we could load them. We haltered the first one and were getting ready to load him in her trailer when Nathan realized that the alpaca needed a pedicure before we loaded him. Jordan held on to his head/neck, and I held the rope while Nathan clipped his toe nails. He definitely did NOT like that, but somewhat cooperated with us. Then there was the second alpaca...he was very skittish and had not been halter trained. We tried giving him his pedi, but he blew up! We had a complete rodeo on our hands. He was rearing up and twisting and turning just to get away. It was a little scary when he would rear up because we were standing right there trying to get control of him again. He reared up and the next thing I know, I felt a little pain on the knuckles of my right hand. I'm still not sure if his toe nails clipped me on the way down or if it was Nathan's shears that got me, but it just thankfully skinned up my knuckle. We eventually got him clipped and loaded. I think we have sold all the alpacas we are going to sell.

Later this afternoon, Nathan needed my help setting and leveling our beams for the shop we are getting ready to build. He had already dug the holes with the tractor. We had to toss a cinder block in each of the six holes, hoist the beam on top of each block, then measure and level each beam to be sure the structure would be square. We got the four corner posts done without any mishaps. Jordan was busy doing school and Aaron was still cleaning his room for company, otherwise, I would've had the boys out there helping him instead. It started lightning, so we took a break and moved all the tools inside. We had a downpour! When we went back outside, we found one of our holes completely filled with rain water! Nathan and I tried to set the first middle post (which had two beams attached together about five inches apart, so it was considerably heavier than the single corner posts). As I was attempting to hold the post in place for Nathan, my left foot slipped on the mud and down I went...well, at least half of me did. It was then that I was extremely grateful to my Sensei for having us do splits at karate class! I was sunk up to my hip in the hole. One leg in, one leg stuck up at the surface of the hole. I kind of tweaked my back and I know I popped my hip out of place. This is going to feel lovely tomorrow. Maybe I'll get an appointment with my chiropractor if he's in tomorrow.

This is when I finally called Jordan to come help. We set and leveled the two center posts. Jordan was putting all the tools away. I went inside to set supper on the table. It was then that Nathan decided to move some gravel into the standing water in front of the soon-to-be shop. As he was making the final pass with the bucket, he barely tapped the front center post. We did have all the posts braced and staked, but the tractor bumped it a little too hard and the post fell over. Thankfully it didn't land on anyone. I was standing there watching it in slow motion. Oh well...

We reset the last post and came in to a kind of lukewarm supper. Tasted great though. Found out that Shepherd's Pie is one of my favorite meals!

I am definitely going to have to soak in the tub tonight! Sleep well my friends!

Blessings!