Shearing is almost over!!

Despite the rain and snow and Sunday, we were able to shear today. We still have about 300 ewes left to be sheared. Because I am so new at this (and trying to figure out how to add and move or replace pictures) the shearing pictures are backwards cronologically. I love living on the ranch. It's a wonderful way to raise our children. Cooper is a very hard worker and enjoys going to help his Dad. I hope by posting this you can see what our life is like during the spring time. (CRAZY!!!!) We will start lambing on Friday. Then it goes to 20 hour work days for Lane. Hopefully I will be able to keep posting events as they happen. Unless they bore you out of your mind. Then I'll probably keep doing it anyway:)

Newborn Lamb and his Mama

This lamb was born early. He decided to make his apperance while his mama was in the corral waiting to be sheared. We had to keep them seperated from the rest of the sheep until they could go to the lambing sheds.

All sheared and nowhere to go!!

Here the sheep are in the pens waiting to be counted before releasing them back in to the herd.

Baa Baa black sheep has alot of bags of wool.

Here the wool is put into the tromper. The big white squares are the bales of pressed wool. They weigh between 350 to 400 Pounds. We will have about 50 bales of wool when we are done.

The Purple Shearing Shack

The sheep go into the shack to get sheared. The wool comes out the side after it's sheared off. The wool grader puts it into different grades(fine, corse,black, belly are some).

Cooper and Clunk (aka Clark)

Cooper took our dog Clark out to shear. But early on he got into trouble and had to stay tied up.(I'm not sure that he really has any "sheep" sense.) At lunch Cooper tied him around his waist and walked around with him so he wouldn't get in more trouble.

Lainey loves her PINK Cowgirl hat.

Lainey is looking over my shoulder as I post these pictures and wanted her picture in her favorite hat put up. She was so excited when she found this piece of wool on the ground. She carried it and a stick with her for the rest of the time.

The Shearing Crew (he's feeding an Ak Bash pup)

The shearing crew consists of 7 shearers (2 Americans, 2 Peruvians and 3 Australians). Then we have the wool grader (she's also Australian and married to one of the shearers). Then the tromper who is from Wyoming.

Daddy and his Girls.

Lane was eating lunch and Lainey wanted to be right by him. Mommy was still grilling the burgers, so he took Sophie. The girls love to be with Daddy, especially outside.

Waiting to be sheared.

Shearing began on Saturday at Little Mountain. We had 1050 ewes get their yearly "haircuts". It was a very busy day. Lainey and Sophie and mommy took lunch out for the shearers and workers. Daddy and Cooper had been at the corrals since 7:00 that morning. We grilled hamburgers and had lots of salads.

Let the Countdown begin....

It is only 2 weeks until we shear the sheep! And 3 weeks until lambing starts. When we shear this year we will be out at little mountain. I will fix lunch for 3 days for the shearing crew we bring in and for our guys. ( some of the shearers are from Australia or New Zealand-it's fun to chat with them.) Our back yard looks like a gypsy camp with all the camping trailers the shearers live in parked on any flat dry spot and plugged into any electric outlet available. This is the crasiest time of year for us. Lane works about 20 hours a day and sleeps for 3 hours. (if he's lucky) Cooper and I go out the sheds when he gets home from school to help dock and brand. Even though this is a really rough time of year, we feel blessed at the end of it. Hopefully our lamb numbers will be high and the weather will be good. A few years ago we were losing lambs left and right because there was so much mud on the ground. When the temperatures flucuate alot we tend to lose more lambs then also. So we'll keep our finger crossed and pray alot that this year things will go well.

Little Bo Peep and her 2 little sheep

For Halloween Jennie and I thought it would be so fun to dress our girls in outfits together.

We went to San Diego at the end of January for the National Wool Growers convention. I was so excited to go to the beach!! The weather was in the 80's the whole time we were there, except for the day I had to drag the kids to Ocean Beach It was rainy and wet and full of homeless people. Needless to say, the love I have for the beach was not passed onto my children that day!

Many of you may be surprised to know that Clark is our first family "pet". Clark Finnegan Grisbear is an Old English Sheepdog. Living on the ranch we have at times had over 25 dogs. Even though we have so many dogs, they don't live at our house. All of our dogs are herding or guard dogs. Even though they are good with my kids, they aren't really people friendly. So for Christmas Lane and I decided to get a dog for the family. Clark (aka Clunk) is very funny and is growing so fast!! His paws are huge! We are used to big dogs. Our Ak Bash guard dogs are very large. (We actually buy our dog food by the pallet.) Then throw in the Border Collies. We are definetly dog lovers.