Cria Girls

Our girls have been growing a lot. Tehya's mom is still very dotting, but Tehya can be fiesty herself. Shelby is a strong little one too. Often her mom, Victoria will sleep outside, and Shelby will too. I frequently find them in the morning with frost on their backs.

Here is Tehya (fawn color) and Shelby (brown - eating at the feeder):


Tehya's face up closer:



Shelby's stance:



Shelby's face (I love how wooly it is!):

Heat

We spent last weekend splitting, hauling and stacking wood.

The extra that is stacked outside:



What we were able to put in the garage:




Our plan is to use the furnace less often and use the fireplace more. We hope to save a little bit of money by not using so much propane. We'll see what our next propane bill looks like. We do like a nice fire, but in the past we didn't turn off the furnace to do so.

Slowly we are becoming more self sufficient. We have plans to put in a big garden next spring. We will see how much we can do here at home to save money and live better.

Other Farm Animals

Here Is Quinn begging to come down to the barn with me. Sometimes I let him, other times I leave him home (he doesn't always listen very well, if I take him to the barn, I have a hard time getting him back in the house later on).



Since the cold weather hit, Nala has enjoyed spending her time up on the hay pile:



Fluffy is queen of the barn (I've read in the cat world whoever is the highest up, is the leader. This is why cats will fight up on top of furniture).

Apollo's Griffon

We exchanged Maxito with Picasso Farm in Illinois. They want white and we want color, so seemed like a really good trade. As I mentioned in the post with the pictures of Max, the kids were very sad to see him go. He was a sweet alpaca. But so is Apollo (we can't seem to decide if we should call him Apollo or Griffon, we tend to use nicknames on the farm).







He has been getting along well with the other boys. Of course there is the usual hirarchy to determine. So far I think Snowstorm rules the roost. Even Tucker didn't challenge him enough for him to lose that role. Now Apollo has tried, but Snowstorm still seems to be in charge. I wonder how things will play out when Lightning gets older.

Here are all the boys:

Cold Mornings

Victoria and daughter, Shelby, with a bit of snow on them. Don't they look alike!



I don't think Tehya knows what to make of the snow:

Goodbye Maxito

After aquiring Maxito this past spring, we decided that he really doesn't fit into our breeding program. He was supose to be sort of a replacement for Remington (who died in transport to our farm). But he's not like Remington, we were were replacing with a different type of alpaca (Max being white and Remington having been rose gray).

This is Maxito when he came to our farm last spring:




Here is Maxito a couple weeks ago:



And here he is the day of the trade, it was raining pretty bad, and there was some snow (and of course, Max was out in the rain where he always seems to go):


The kids started to cry when Maxito left the farm. He's such a sweet boy. But J came back with Apollo Griffon, a light brown (or dark fawn) boy. I didn't get pictures of him yet, as it was really wet when he arrived. I'll get some pictures this week.

Santa Clause

Lightning has gotten so woolly on his face it looks like a big full white beard:





I tease him that he looks like Santa Clause :0