So far, so good

The little calf is coming along. She sleeps a lot, but eats "aggressively" - meaning, she goes after her bottle. She will most likely stay a bottle baby - her mom has been letting other calves nurse now. She is not yet ready to return outside. I hate the idea of making her coat not as good, but since having a live calf is most important at the time, she will remain indoors, moving into a heated garage once she becomes more active.

So far, she gets up to eat, do her business (not too hard to catch with bucket or whatever as she isn't active as normal calves are), stands and walks slowly about her enclosure for about 15 minutes, then lays back down to take another nap. Her color is good and she is sleeping in more of a normal position, though she still gets the pillow next to her to be sure she doesn't roll off her mat and onto the concrete floor.

I am hoping it only takes a few days - I know when we brought in a lamb (6 months old) that was cold, she slept for almost two days before returning to normal. It took her about a week of recovery. We have just been using similar steps to help revive the animals as would be done with a human.

Calfy no longer shivers and doesn't have a blanket anymore. Respiration is normal as is temperature. Now her body needs time to allow food to go to more than just maintenance. Hopefully within the week she will be back up and normal. If she does end up as a permanent bottle baby, more pictures will come.



Izzy has adjusted to the calf living indoors, she is no longer completely afraid. Now the only issue (other than time and tlc) for the calf is the screen we had to put in front of the fireplace to be sure she doesn't touch the front (it get's hot and we don't want her to burn herself as she is not 100% stable on her legs yet).



Oh - calfy will eventually get a name, however, until we are sure she will survive, we won't choose one. She can now stand up without help again, so her signs are continually improving.

Doing Better

Yesterday - the calf was up and nursing. The vest was on because we knew it would be cold at night and wanted to help her out a bit.



Hypothermia and a calf - never a good thing. However, when you are born at -10 and your mom is a 1st calf heifer who doesn't want anything to do with you - life can really be tough. She was good the first 24 hours, but the last 18 have not been good.

Baby calfy looked about dead, but she is coming along - warming her up slowly this is an hour or so after bringing her in. We found her laying out flat in the field, away from the rest of the herd. She wasn't frozen, but she was not very responsive either, and the inside of her mouth was cold. In the photo, she has a vest (heated in dryer for 10 minutes first) on her, then a heating pad, then another pad and finally the kitty blanket to keep out any drafts.



3 hours later - when offered a bottle again - she got right up to eat!!! That is a wonderful sign! She is still shivering - but after walking around (very limited area - boy am I glad I said no on the new flooring for now :)) - she found the same spot as the lamb - in front of the warm air from the fireplace. We can't leaver her alone in the basement, but she is beginning to recover. After a meal, she is now wearing just the calf pad (Udder Tech, Inc.)


and now it is back to nap time - still no where near 100%, but after a full tummy - get back in a nice warm spot for a nap.


Oh - and Izzy (the lamb who went through this a few weeks ago) is doing much better, though not amused that she must remain in her kennel and that the small pen has been given to the calf




Queen Izzy, chewing her cud, after removing the dog from a chair - she is afraid to be on the floor with the calf (who is too busy sleeping to even consider the lamb)

Just found this and want to be able to find it again :)

Been working on all sorts of Christmas things - a few pics, but no indicators of who they are for:

Journal Spots

Journalling spots seem to be all the rage these days. In a recent issue of Creating Keepsakes, there was an article about creating your own, using supplies on hand. This is my second result. My first result turned out rather poorly, trying to line up punches with specific patters is a bit more difficult that I thought. However, lining up punches is way easier than taking close-up photos LOL The journal spot is setting on a piece of white paper.




I will be offering the above journal spot as a make and take over at Scrapbookingfun.biz for a while. Quantities are limited.

Snowy Monday Morning

So much for the weather system not containing enough moisture to create real snow - lol. Woke up to the picture below:



Good day to stay indoors and work - wish I had that chance :) Instead, there were errands to run and such. I have been busy with swaps - here are some paper piecing pieces created with cricut cartridges - they have been a blast. I would have liked to ink the snowman, but my samples that were inked just didn't look the way I wanted.

Card creations

Had fun making some cards for swaps and challenges. I always need one to send, so here are some of my latest (the kitten would not stay out of the way, so he is included in one of the shots):

Cricut Cartridge Giveaway

Details can be found over at http://www.cricut.com/messageboard/http://www.cricut.com/messageboard/tm.aspx?m=5316808 They are giving away 100 cartridges!

Tag Class 3

Way fun! I completed the two tags below - the gold looks over powering, but really isn't - it may be the flash.

Products - two tags from office supply store, one tag was chalked, then stamped with flourishes, used my versamark and added some yellow/gold chalk where it was, black and copper inking in spots, then red again over top - deer was cut from grungeboard, inked with palette ink pad, smooch gold to fill in the swirls, a flower, gems, and assorted other stuff. Green holly type is from stash - a homemade piece that is a scrap

Other tag - grungeboard deer, alcohol inks then pallete ink over top and some copper ink as well. card stock background, liquid pearls for the gold in the background, black and copper inking over the top, poinsettia from scraps and smooch for the center dots - lettering is on cork, trinket tag and heart found in my stash.



Next time, I will make a smaller poinsettia. Overall, I am happy with the results

Of Inchies and Tags

I did get some scrapping done yesterday. The class over at Scrapbooking Fun was a blast. Can't wait for next week. My snowman tags didn't turn out quite as I hoped, however, the cat jumping onto the table and into the chalk didn't help matters. But, I am happy with the initial results and cannot wait to make some more. Here they are:



I also finished up some inchies for a swap over at Swap Addicts Anonymous. Inchies - love to use them, but don't enjoy making them. I remembered this fact when trying to attach the tiny little jewels! Tiny backgrounds and I just don't work well together. I like the results - just the process is tedious. These inchies were made using Just Chillin' paper by Making Memories, some scraps (sorry, no idea what line), a pink paisly heart stamp, some tiny bling, inks (stazon and marvy), and Smooch pearlized Accent Ink. I am having fun using the Smooch inks - love the tiny little applicator brush. Still working on photo techniques


Below - no peaking if you want to be surprised - are some of the items for the Eeeeek Swap over at Scrapbooking Fun. I fell in love with the cats in this Halloween line - Spider's Web by My Mind's Eye.

Finally a bit of creativity

The summer has flown on by and we are back to school. Boy - I think it takes me as long as the kids to get used to a routine.

I decided that I didn't like my plain old grade/assignment book, so off the my scraps. Currently, I am participating in a challenge over at Scrapbookingfun.biz to do as many layouts from scraps and stash items on hand by the end of the year as I can. I have seen similar posts on other websites, blogs, and message boards. If you are participating in one - GREAT JOB and GOOD LUCK. It is really fun and allows me to not feel so much like I need to save a particular items for something.

Three total pages were scrapped - here are the first two (third one is just plain papers - denim and green pp). The laminating didn't quite go as I hoped, but it is ok and added some strength and stability to my binder. (one of the cheap ones that came with lots of stuff as a school purchase - lightweight, but fills the purpose I required).




I also finished a Christmas tag that Pixerframer is teaching over at Scrapbookingfun.biz. She is doing 12 classes on Wednesday nights between now and Christmas. Feel free to stop in and join us. She puts out supply lists before the class and I am pretty happy with my first tag! The one I tried on my own didn't come out nearly as well.

Scrappy Saturday

Had a blast meeting with the Twin Cities Crop Group. Waaay too much fun. Totally love the pizza and desert! I finished up some layouts I wanted to complete for DS Eagle Ceremony. Another is layout of another ds taking a nap - he didn't know I had the camera until after he was done stretching (journal will be added later). In the bottom picture, one of the embellishments has shifted - will fix, however, I am looking for a new adhesive. My tombow (loved it for a long time) tends to not lay down the adhesive correctly and the feed ribbon/paper has broken on the last two. They weren't purchased at discounts either, so I am trying new things. I don't care for one I tried, but the Elmers (never knew they made scrappy adhesive) seems to hold very, very well. Haven't compared prices quite yet - just trying to find another that I like. Any suggestions?

Beautiful Technique ATC Swaps!

My photography is slowly (very slowly) improving - these turned out better than my first set of pictures. Pictured below are the swaps completed by the swap group for Techniques Only ATC's.

The fun continues

Rosie and Waffles are adapting quickly. They are both comfortable enough with ds to roll over in a very small pile of sand (there will be more in the pasture, but they are getting used to other animals by living in the barn these days). Waffles seems interested in the kitten, but chases the cats.

Barney (below) is taking easy - sunning himself (he was eating something and didn't appear to be too worried that he was sitting on a piece to a gate he or Betty had knocked over).

Waffles is Wonderful!

No, the title does not contain a grammar error - below you will see the latest additions to our home - two beautiful Mediterranean Burros.

Rosie, the mom has a great disposition and seemed to take to the place right off. She jumped off the trailer and started eating. Once she made it to her pen, she seemed to like her water and is enjoying her hay.

Waffles, a baby girl, was very happy to roam around, and as one of ds discovered, is very light.