All in a day

Blooming:

Storing:

Clearing:

Eating:

Shedding:

Strutting:

Playing:

Another busy day.

And the 30th made up for all the others

March 30th turned out to be a wonderful day! After 28 days of rain, it didn't rain once. The sun didn't shine much, but it was warmer and drier... and, quite simply, it was a day meant to be spent outside.

Do you know what this is?:

It's a Trillium. They've started to bloom!

Honey hen completely bypassed my arm this morning and went straight for the scratch bucket:

Skippy was totally taking notes:

Since the rain had stopped, it was finally time to try to fix the part of the fence my goat boys have been escaping through:

It sure isn't gonna look pretty, but you know what?

I'm the girl who's using orange baling-twine as fencing in the adjacent chicken pasture. I'm not too concerned with "pretty" at this point - it just needs to work:

And it does:

Because I could contain them again, look who got to come into the middle pasture and help me with pasture clean-up today:

And they were in prime helpful form, too:

Pete assisted by scratching his head:

rubbing his nose:

and licking the rake:

Reggie did his part by staring intently at me. This wasn't uncomfortable at all:

I'm always a little nervous when everyone is in one pasture together, especially Chester and the goats:

- but everyone did just fine.

I still would never leave Chester in the pasture alone with the goat boys. It just wouldn't be prudent:

But with me right there, raking up dead moss and dried blackberry brambles, everyone grazed peacefully:

Beau came over repeatedly for hugs and pats. He was very happy we were all outside together again:

There was even a bit of kissing going on:

After some time, I took a break:

and that's when I noticed the audience on the hill behind us:

It was then that George decided to scoot through the electric fence to be with us:

Reggie gets really intense when he's nervous about something. Neither he nor Pete care much for George. George just freaks them out for some reason:

This was as close as Pete would get. Big chicken:

Even when George went back on the other side of the fence, things were still a bit tense. Here's George:

And here are Pete and Reggie staring at George:

It was 8:04pm when I finally came inside for the evening. These are the days I have been waiting for! The air smells fresh, the frogs are croaking, I can be outside in a sweatshirt instead of my huge coat, and I can hear things growing.

Today was a really good day.

We all thought so:

28 out of 29

These are the number of days in March that it has rained here in my part of Oregon. --> 28 out of 29 days <--.

Stop and think about this for just a moment. And now, let's quickly move on.

Rather than belabor this sobering bit of weather trivia, I'd much prefer to share a few things that I've seen around the farm recently. You see, my little farm remains very sweet to me, even though the weather surrounding it has been unusually sour.

Last week, I pulled a kooky egg out of one of the nest boxes. It wasn't fully formed:

The inside membrane was in tact, but the shell never fully fused shut. Such a strange thing:

I watched my nephew's face speak volumes about the tactile experience of touching Roopert the rooster's wattles:

I observed my two nephews being more fascinated with the fire in the fireplace than with their elaborate Star Wars game:

I watched my donkey, Beau, watch my niece, Julia:

He was enthralled with her:

and she with him:

And the two connected in a very gentle way:

And the one day this month that it didn't rain? Please note the squinting llama and my heavy farm coat hanging on the post. It was delightful:

Later on that same day, everyone took full advantage of the warmth and had a delicious afternoon nap:

Yet, while I've been dodging heavy rain showers and dealing with dead mice in goat water buckets, my barn cat, George, has been conspicuously absent:

This is where I found him, smart guy that he is, obviously waiting for drier weather:

See? He really is a barn cat (and doesn't this look like a cozy-dry place to hang out?):

For the first time, one of my hens flew up and landed on my arm when I walked into the run today:

It made me feel really good until I realized that Honey's sole motivation was the corn I had in the orange bucket:

Another first today: George has made it clear that the *entire* property belongs to him. This includes the donkey/llama paddock:

This boy cat has no fear:

Kai llama was her normal inquisitive self:

and needed to get much closer for a good look:

At which point, George quickly and solidly put her in her place:

No hard feelings, though. Kai was happy to escort George out of the paddock:

And had Kai been any closer, George would've been happy to give her another smack:

When last seen this evening, I was sitting on a stump, cracking myself up because I realized I was living an idiom. I was...waiting for my chickens to come home to roost: