Praise The Lord For Little Angels!

Good evening everyone! How are you doing tonight? I am fairly exhausted!

I got the boys up early today so we could get chores done and be finished and washed up ready to leave by 10 a.m.  I was set and all ready to walk out the door at 9:58 when Nathan called me and asked to to pick up our truck at the mechanics. We had to have our rear U-joint replaced. So, aaron and I ran over to the mechanics, picked it up, then dropped it back off at home.

When we got home, we loaded the car with food that my sweet sister-in-law made for the family that we've been praying for. In case you hadn't heard, there's a family that does karate with us. This family is extra special. The dad and mom have adopted over 20 kids over the years. They always asks for special needs or handicapped children. They still have nine kids at home right now. They have a sweet 9 y.o. Daughter named Gracie. She was born with hydrocephalus and had a shunt put in. Two weeks ago, she developed meningitis around the shunt. She has been in the hospital this whole time. Mom and dad take turns staying with her overnight at the hospital and day time too, around the clock.

I found out that they had been receiving meals to help them, but that their time was up and they had no more meals lined up for the next day. It was just by God's grace that we found out. I got busy making some calls and posting on Facebook to see if anyone would like to help provide meals for this very dear family. We had a great response and we've had meals provided through Monday! Thanks to all who volunteered and showed them God's love and compassion when they needed it most!

So this morning, we came back from the mechanics and loaded up the food my SIL made and loaded my boys in the vehicle. We stopped halfway to Albuquerque and picked up one of the boys' friend. Then we dropped the food off at Gracie's house. 

I had to stop by the main dojo in town and pick up some stuff that Sensei Nagatomo had for me. Then we met up with Nathan's cousin Darin and his family and a good friend of ours, Avram. We met for lunch and enjoyed Dion's pizza. From there, we took all the boys to Cliff's Amusement Park. We had a blast!

I left the boys with Avram at cliff's at 4:30. I had to go back to the main dojo again for a mandatory training session for registration for the karate summer camp and National Competition. At six, I met back up with everyone and Nathan too for dinner at Cracker Barrel.

After dinner, I was driving home and something in my mind clicked. I was supposed to pick up a meal that Avram (a bachelor and former Marine) made for the Gloetzner family. So I met up with him and picked up his potato soup. I then drove back to the Gloetzners to give them their meal for tomorrow!

Leslie and I made it back to the house about 9:30 tonight. Boy, am I exhausted!

I am just so very thankful that God has blessed our lives with little angels like Gracie! She sure brings happiness to her family and those who know her. I pray for her continued healing and strength for her little body to cope well with having had the shunt completely removed!!! She has never been able to be without a shunt, so thank you from the bottom of my heart for prayers on her behalf!

Well, I need to turn in. Nathan fell asleep on his recliner in the living room and I have tried twice now to wake him, unsuccessfully I might add! May Gods peace and love surround you tonight as you rest well.  God bless!

Swing Your Partner Round 'N Round!

Good afternoon! How is everyone? I am doing great!

I woke up this morning a few minutes before six (without my alarm clock to rouse me)!!! I got up, curled my hair, put on my make-up and got ready to head to Albuquerque this morning for a karate business meeting over breakfast.

We had a wonderful visiting, spilling coffee all over the table...blaming other people...lol! It was a riot! We actually did accomplish talking a little bit about business!

I came home. I had to call over to the main dojo to find out some information and Sensei Nagatomo and I got to talking about camp. He asked if we had already gotten our rooms. I had given all our information to our Sensei. Our Sensei thought we were taking care of reserving our own rooms. We thought he was taking care of lining things up...you see where this is going??? Well, I called the hotel. They did have three rooms left, but they all only had one king bed. We have four people staying in each room. I contacted the manager and ey were able to switch our rooms to two queens in each!! Yaaaay!

Aaron and I had to go by the mechanics and drop my vehicle off for some repairs. He also took a look at our truck while I was there. Looks like we're going to have to replace the U-joint on the rear if the truck as well. :/

Right now, I am baking several dozens of cookies for the boys drama club tonight. They are hosting a fund raising square dance! I am so excited for the guys! They can't wait! I'll try and take some incriminating photos and post them!

Well, I need to get my coconut almond cookies out of the oven!

God bless and take care!

Another Girl!!!

Good evening to you all! How are you? I am busy as always, but I'm good!

We woke up this morning to see one of my alpaca mommas in labor. Their labor is usually pretty quick. Momma had no complications and delivered us a happy, healthy baby cria. She is absolutely adorable! We named her Lily. As you can tell from the picture her momma is white and her daddy was a darker brown color. We love her white legs!

After baby was born, we picked Lily up and momma followed very closely. We put them in a temporary pen while we moved the three alpaca boys to the non-milking pasture. Then we moved the girls over to the milking side where we set a temporary nursery. We also put the other expectant momma in the pen too.

This was momma's first pregnancy. Poor thing didn't have a clue what was going on and we were concerned whether or not she would be a good momma. She never left her baby's side! Jordan held her around the neck to make her be still. I held her rump in place so that she would move side-to-side and Aaron got Lily to latch on to momma. Momma's gotten the hang of it and baby seems to be doing well. We were really concerned since we have had three crias in the past and none of them survived. We are praying that we've done more research and know a little better to give them the best chance of survival. 

We are happy she has joined us here at Cogburn Rancho Loco! She should fit right in!

Please take care and God bless!

The Rooster Strikes Again!

Good evening to everyone out there! It seems like an eternity since I have written on my blog. My hope is to get back into the habit of writing each night.

Nathan and I had an absolute blast on our cruise! We got to see lots of new things, tried new foods, saw lots of neat places and admired some of the most beautiful artwork I have ever seen! Over the next couple of weeks, I want to blog about the places we went, things we saw and things we did.

As soon as we arrived home, we hit the ground running! To start off with, the airline lost both of our check-on luggage. Thankfully, they finally located it about five days after we got home! Yes, we did make it home with all of our honey! Since we have our own honey bees, Nathan has become a honey collector. We bought honey in all but two ports of call that we stopped in. We were a little worried about clearing customs, but since they lost our luggage, we didn't have any trouble at all. We actually found out that you can bring honey back through customs, no problem at all.

Anyways, we had been traveling and awake for about 24 hours. We were absolutely exhausted. Going over to Europe, we had no difficulties making the time change adjustment. Coming back was a totally different story! The luggage the airlines lost had all our over-the-counter meds like Benedryl. We sometimes take that to help us get to sleep and to also sleep through the night. We went to bed around 9:09 p.m. (NM time) and our internal alarm clocks woke us up at 1:30. At 3:30 a.m., Nathan was still awake and couldn't go to sleep.

Let me back up a second. On our way driving home from the airport, a friend of ours had a cow named Honey. Honey had had a calf two days prior and she just up and died. So they now had an orphan heifer. They called us to see if we could take her in since one of our cows just had a baby about a week before. So five minutes after we drove in our driveway, the Schwebachs brought over their little girl. Let the fun begin!

So when Nathan couldn't go to sleep, he got up to check on the Schwebach's little heifer. When he went outside, mind you...it's 3:30, he looked and low and behold, our other cow Ruth had just had her little baby! The calf had just been born and was still on the ground and wet! We finally got another GIRL!!!! So Nathan came back in and woke me up and we had to get her all settled in and milked momma and fed the baby.

The day after we got home, we got an order of 20 turkey chicks in. The day after that, we got our order of 9 goslings in. Unfortunately, we think they had some sort of virus. They began dying about the second day after we got them. We now have no more chicks. I am so sad. We have never lost two entire shipments before.

Oh well...on to my real story. Paula, now is the time for a restroom break!

I kind of had an eventful Tuesday morning. Nathan called me and asked me to go outside and take a picture of our bull calf that we were trying to sell. The guy that was interested in buying it wanted a better picture. So I went our with my iPhone and started taking pictures.

Once more, let me back up. While we were gone, our rooster (his name was Eagle) had "attacked" several people. He had never been aggressive. He actually belonged to my brother-in-law, Chad. His boys hand raised him and used to carry him around as a pet! Chad had some people over and he tried to attack one of the young kids, then later he tried to get one of Chad's kids and then he snuck up on Chad and tried to get him. Fortunately, Chad had a pitchfork and the rooster never really hurt anyone. 

So...he i am minding my own business, taking pictures of our cute little calf. By the way, might I remind you that I HATE CHICKENS??? The stupid rooster snuck up behind me. I had NO idea he was even there. My left thigh started hurting and I looked over my shoulder and all I saw was feathers and wings. I thought there were two chickens fighting behind me and so I took a step forward. My thigh was STILL hurting. I looked again and then it dawned on me...the rooster was spurring me! I was swinging at him to get him off me. He finally quit attacking my left leg and immediately launched his second attack on my right leg. Thankfully I was wearing pants, not shorts. He continued spurring me as I was desperately do anything to get him off me. I was screaming at him, swinging at him...I just couldn't get him off! Finally, I was able to get him to let go. The second he did...I kicked him like a football. Both my legs were killing me. Even after I kicked him, he tried to charge at me again, feathers ruffled! I chased him ready to kill him. I HATE CHICKENS!!!! I pulled up my pants leg and he had broken the skin in six different places. I already had welts immediately popping up and where his spurs made direct contact, it broke the skin and was barely starting to bleed. I was so angry! I was crying hysterically when I limped back up to the house. The boys came running as soon as they heard me crying. They thought that one of the main milk cows or the babies had died or something catastrophic had happened. They asked, "Mom, what happened? Are you ok?" I am still crying hysterically and figured out trying to talk at the same time was not a good idea! I managed to choke out between sobs, "The stupid rooster attacked me!" At this point, the boys were trying to hold a straight face, but they were dying of laughter. Jordan couldn't keep a straight face and just busted up laughing! Aaron told him it wasn't funny, but he didn't totally hide the smirk on his face! They just couldn't help it. I told them, "We're having chicken for supper. GO KILL THAT DUMB ROOSTER!!!"

Needles to say, we had chicken afritada tonight. I have been in a lot of pain since Tuesday. My legs are so bruised they look horrible. Nathan couldn't even hide his smirk when he saw my legs Tuesday night as I was changing. As traumatized as I was, he asked me to tell him what happened. As I'm relaying one of the most terrifying moments of my life, he's sitting there outright laughing his little head off!!! He wanted to clarify that he was laughing WITH me. I reminded him that I was NOT laughing at all. He said he laughed for me. My legs did not get infected, thankfully, and today the pain wasn't as bad. I'm hoping I get moving again pretty soon. I hate being stiff and not moving so well. I am thankful he will never again be able to hurt anyone else. I hope you did get a little laugh out of this. At least it provided entertainment for Nathan and the boys...next time I'll let the boys be the walking pin cushion! I can smile a little a bout it now. Maybe one day I'll find the humor in it!

Well, that's our funny farm story for the day...let's make that for the week or better yet, the month! Ok gang...until tomorrow, God bless and rest well.

Venice...An Interesting City.

Hello everyone! Sorry it has been WAY too long since I had a good Internet connection to write a blog. Nathan and I are spending our last night tonight in Venice Italy. We hope to catch our flight into London tomorrow evening, spend the night and head out first thing the next morning for good old Albuquerque!!! Woo hooooo!!!

I have enjoyed learning about the other cultures and the history behind these beautiful people. It has really made me appreciate our country and our history as well. I took hundreds of pictures and can't wait to share them with everyone.

After we return home, I plan on writing a journal each day for every day that we were gone. I'll tell about the highlights and some of the lowlights and about some things we learned along the way!

One thing I know for sure...I truly miss my boys!!! Hugs and smooches guys! And no getting squeamish when I hug you and smooch you to death when I get home, ok??? Lol! A million-and-one thanks to my mom and dad. Dad, for taking care of my boys and mom, for letting dad come. This has been a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me. Thank you honey for sharing this with me. We celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary in a most memorable way. Thank you sweetie for loving me and cherishing me.

Until we get home...ariva derci! I'm not sure I spelled that correctly, but I sure know how to pronounce it! God bless you and may God bless America!