Ah mothers day. The only day of the year that is mine, mine, mine! Not Super Farmers, not the llamas, not the trouble maker (Dunkay), not the mini tank, not the old goat, not the turkeys who bark at the neighbors, and definitely not the pig that who now waddles because she wont stop eating!
I will not share it with any of them. I’ve been working on my ‘you all must do for me on MY special day’ list for 8 weeks now! It is now up 35.5 pages…I’m so proud of myself! The first thing on my list is breakfast made before I get up from bed with all my favorite foods! I woke up this morning to the aroma of maple syrup on pancakes…so far Super Farmer is on my other list…the one everyone wants to be on today…the mama is still happy list! He is now doing dishes, took the trash out, took care of the dogs, and is waiting on me. If he keeps this up, he will be as happy as I am all day! The animals know from past Mother Days, that they too want to be on my ‘happy mama’ list. Super Farmer already gave them his famous ‘ you better be good and make your mama feel special all day’ speech. He ran out there after breakfast, lined them up, then did his drill sargent walk and talk. I could see him pointing (mostly at Dunkay) and his mouth moving. And of course, the horse fell asleep, the old goat walked away, the alpaca nodded his head in agreement, the llamas Sweetie and Violet keep glancing at each other, Sammie slowly backed away and snuck back into the barn and Remi the waddling pig, followed him as he marched back and forth, waving his arms drilling the animals, snorting and grunting trying to get him to feed her! I can check off my early morning amusement and concentrate on the honey-do list that starts before he gets back inside the house! Oh it’s going to be a wonderful, relaxing, happy, lots of things done for ME, ME, ME kind of day!
Oh Chadwick…my coffee needs to be refilled and chippie has to go out! Can you please put those twigs down and come inside the house to fill up my coffee cup again?? Yes, honey, your still on my ‘ if I’m happy, your happy’ list!

So, the other morning, I was sitting in my nice comfy lazyboy, relaxing with my kitty when he started to act all playful by swatting at my red puppy dog robe. I kinda giggled at his playfulness and kept watching the news. Then I started to hear a loud buzzing noise. I sorta looked around as the kitty was picking up his  not so playful swatting at my robe while standing in attack mode! The buzzing became louder and angrier. The kitty was now in a frenzy!  Biscuit perked up and ran over to see why  the cat was excitedly jumping around attacking me!! Thats when I realized the buzzing sound was coming from INSIDE my robe! I jumped up, the cat fell onto Biscuit, he barked at the cat, I did my own little yelp with a ‘get-it-away-from-me dance’ as I frantically struggled to get my robe off as the buzzing became louder! I finally torn off the robe, threw it on the floor and stepped back! Im not kidding, a larger than a humming bird bumble bee, flew out going towards the glass door! The cat sprang into attack mode again, sprinted between my legs and crashed into the door! At this point, I’m like…’really’? I opened the door, the bee flew out with the cat a buzz behind him. Last I saw, the bumble and its feline nightmare were headed towards one of the llamas munching in the front yard. Maybe that’s why I saw a couple of llamas gallop past the window a few minutes later…the cat was still chasing the bee in their direction!

So, I was in wal mart yesterday looking at the flowers because I need prettiness, some color, a girly look on the farm besides hay,  fur balls and feathers floating through the air, gray duct tape holding up our fence, or animal poop…you know, the classic farm look. Anyhoo…I was standing there looking at all the colorful flowers trying to remember which ones the llamas ate or left alone. As usual,  I was talking to myself out loud (like I do with the Kroger self check out machines), saying things like…

” now, did those llamas eat these last year? I wonder if the goat would eat this plant, of course Dunkay will eat them all, so I have to keep him away from everything, wait a minute, if I put poop on the plants, the animals wont come near them, but then my whole yard will smell like poop,  why cant I just get the flowers I want without an animal chomping them down to sticks!!”

As I was having this discussion with myself out loud, I saw an elderly couple standing there. She elbowed her hubby and nodded towards me. I shyly smiled at them.  He grinned and she grabbed his arm pulling him away from lady who talks about putting poop on her flowers to nobody but herself!

Sheesh. Its storming outside and I could hear my kitty meowing to be let in. So I opened the front door and called her. What did I get? Three hens and C.S. (our rooster) who came running out from underneath the furniture. There they stood, the four of them looking up at me with a ‘well…you gonna let us in or what?’ expression! I go out the door, in public, in my puppy dog robe and pink minion slipper socks to chase them off my porch, back towards the barn where they belong! I got half way through the front yard when it dawned on me that once again, I was in my fluffy red robe, in the front yard where everyone can see me chasing a small flock of chickens through the rain! I turned around and ran back to my porch as the chickens followed me. Thank goodness I made it safely to the house without anyone seeing me! The chickens snuck back under the furniture, and the cat ran to the back porch where she is now meowing to be let in!

Yep, its sale day alright! All the animals are lined up at the fence waiting for Kyle to come babysit them for the day! I can see them whispering to each other, making a plan on how to make his visit an unpleasant one! They know that they can tease him, intimidate him into giving them extra treats and just plain ol harras him because it’s fun. I always have to do a little fast talking with my son to get him to agree to sit at the farm all day. I promise him things that are impossible to fill, like the animals WILL behave (hahahahaha), there will be NO trouble, the day will go fast…you know little white lies that I pray will come true for him. After Kyle gets here, I will do my famous, ever so boring lecture to the barn animals before I go (that puts them in a zone) , say a desperate prayer, and head out before Kyle realizes that the animals already has his day planned out for him!
Good luck child of mine, it’s been awhile since the llamas and Dunkay has had a good old ‘tease the humans’ day… they are long overdue for some barnyard mischief!!

I’m peacefully sitting in my office with my pups, when they jumped up and started to bark like there’s something going on that I should be aware of. So I got up, looked out the window and saw Sweetie our llama trotting down the road. Really? A llama on the run? Where’s that pig! I run to the door tripping over a dog and a cat or two who is screeching over a stepped on tail. Super Farmer was out there already in his suit and tie herding not one, but two llamas back towards the farm.  You see, he left for work and was halfway down the road when a nagging thought came to mind…’did that gate shut behind me?’ He turned around and raced back home to find Sweetie munching on the lush green grass in our neighbor’s yard. Violet was standing in the road trying to decide which yard to attack first. He stopped his car in the middle of the road, jumped out and went after the nearest llama. Well, llamas don’t like it when you move quickly towards them, they go into flight mode. So off they went in the opposite direction! I cant go out there because I’m still in my red puppy dog robe and pink minion slipper socks (so much for a PJ work morning)…I have to draw a line somewhere you know! I’ve already had strangers watch me dance with a donkey, chase pigs, hide behind my Jeep in my robe spying on animals, stand on my front porch in my robe taking pics, sing to llamas, run around with a goat behind me to get exercise, have melt downs in the middle of the pasture where I stomp my feet, waving my arms…well, you get it. I am NOT going to run down the street in a red puppy dog robe behind Chad who is in a suit and tie, chasing a llama! Nope, ain’t gonna do it! He was on his own!! He came back (without a llama), threw the trash can lid open, dug through the trash to find an empty sweet grain bag to trick those llamas into thinking he had a treat for them! Back out to the street he went to get his girls!  One thing about 99.9% of farm animals, if they  see a bag or cup of grain, they will follow you anywhere! It worked! Sweetie came galloping back with Violet a hoof or two behind her! He led them back through the gate, threw the bag down and let them attack it. I clapped and told him what a good Super Farmer he is, he glared at me without answering, waved to the nice man in the truck who was forced to stop as the Addie circus  performed live before his very eyes, letting him know that it’s now safe to drive again.
At the moment, all is back to normal…whatever that is.

In this high wind, the chickens will stay inside the barn watching the world blow by. As they line up just inside the door silently looking out, I can just imagine what’s going on inside those tiny bird brains. This song comes to mind, chicken style…’I want to fly like an eagle to the yard…I want to fly like an eagle, let this breeze carry me…to the pasture…the humans back door…the bush…the trees! I want to fly like an eagle!’ Every now and then, one of those hens will sing that song to the point where she actually believes it! She waits for the next gust, steps outside, flaps her wings like there’s no tomorrow, and flys…sorta. For a brief second, she will soar through the air, wings spread out, head held high, her beady little eyes closed! She is an eagle…a real bird! Then she thuds back onto the hard ground, she gets up, fluffs up her feathers, shaking it off. The brave little hen proudly holds her head up, struts back to the barn where the other chickens welcome back their hero with feathered high-fives!

Oh my gosh, I almost made a spectacle of myself in public! Remi was waaaaaay in the back field so I called her while standing in the front pasture, by the road, in daylight, in the middle of the day. She was happy to see me standing there with a cup of grain in my hand and came running as fast as her short, stubby little legs (that I still cant figure out how they support her weight) could go with her tail wagging, making snorting and grunting sounds that only a pig could make.  So, to show her how much I was happy to see her too. I did a little jig with my arms outstretched singing out her name. I was about 30 seconds into my farm dance when I realized, ‘hey! I’m outside…by the road’!! I stopped and quickly looked around to see if there was a traffic jam in front of the house with stopped cars and folks filming the crazy farmer lady who dances with pigs! Thank goodness nobody was there!
Remi caught up to me, nudged my leg with her piggy snout, looking up at me with adoring, I-love-you-so-much eyes…OR she was gazing at the cup of grain, daydreaming about golden pieces of food falling into her open mouth in slow motion!

This is so funny! I gave Remi Doodles a cookie for a treat. One of the turkeys ran up, grabbed it out of her chewing mouth and ran with it towards the barn. The pig stood there for a few seconds with a stunned look on her face…then she took off after the turkey who made a right turn and flapped towards the front pasture with the treat hanging out of her beak where Dunkay was standing watching the show. The pig caught up with the feathered fiend who dropped the yummy morsal. BUT, before the pig could gobble it up, the donkey galloped over and snatched the cookie a mere inch away from the pigs snout! Dunkay ate it without chewing as poor Remi stood there looking up at the cookie thief snorting. I scolded Dunkay but I could tell he didn’t care. He strutted past the unhappy, snorting pig with a smuged look on his face. I patted Remi on the head telling her sorry.

Okay this was funny.   The neighbors  to our right have a very long driveway since their house sits waaaaaay in the back. The 4 llamas were sitting, not standing,  in the field next to each other facing their driveway. I’m always watching them out the window to make sure everyone is behaving themselves and for amusement…you never know when they’re going to put on a show! Today it was show time!
I could see that they were looking at something, so of course I go out and hide behind the Jeep in my red puppy dog robe.  I want to see if it’s  the gentleman with his fluff balls in the matching purple sweaters, the jogger in pink or something else I need to worry or laugh about.  Well, today it was our neighbor waaaaay behind us. They have some kind of scooter thingy that he stands on. He puts his can on the front, stands behind it and down the driveway he goes! The llamas are curious little buggers and watched him going down the driveway on his scooter with his garbage container! It was so funny! All four heads moving from right to left  watching a man and his trash can on a scooter! I swear I’m going to get cameras put up all around this farm! Four llamas…a man on his scooter with a trash can and me in a red puppy dog robe with minion slippers outside couching behind a Jeep peeking my head around it watching llamas watch the guy on his contraption!