Montana Spring and baby animals.

Well, I'm sorry I wasn't able to keep my promise of posting once a week. God had other plans for our family. We've been back and forth to Salt Lake City, UT several times since my last post. Currently Cortney's health is improved and she's been weaned off her high dose anti-seizure medicine, thanks be to God. She will be undergoing MRI's every two months to watch the remaining, inoperable portion of the tumor. We did speak to an Oncologist team in UT a week ago and they said her only option for treatment is Radiation. Well we've also been doing a lot of research into alternative treatments and have been putting some things into play already. Radiation really is not an option for her, you see with her genetic disease, Neurofibromatosis 1 or NF1 her chances increase from a normal person receiving radiation therapy risk of a secondary cancer at 30% her chances increase to 80% for a secondary cancer.  That is why we say we are researching natural ways to help the body heal itself and there is a lot of testimony out there to support this too!  For those of you praying for her and our family, thank you and please continue to do so, it is of great comfort to us all.

Now onto Montana Spring and Spring babies. Montana Spring is truly unpredictable, leaving us with weeks in March and early April with temperatures into the high 70's to low 80's F and now the end of April we've had a week of some much needed moisture, which is a blessing indeed.  This is what my husband terms as "time released moisture" otherwise known as snow! Here is a picture from yesterday

The pastures are emerald green and when the sun and warmth arrives first part f next week, you'll surely be able to stand and watch everything grow. I was worried about our fruit trees, because all are in full bloom, but their is no evidence or damage. Now all we need is warmth and bees to pollinate it all. In the garden we did get our potatoes planted before this moisture and thinned the asparagus as well. We've been enjoying asparagus, rhubarb, chives, green onions and some volunteer lettuce. The plan is to get radishes, spinach, beans and a few other seeds planted when things dry out enough to plant. We hope to get our cabbage and broccoli plants in as well, but have covers available just in case. The tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and some herbs will go into the greenhouse.

Spring babies started arriving for us in early March and we still have a turkey hen setting her nest with hatching due any day. Our goats blessed us again this year. We were a bit concerned with two first time mamas but they did great. We ended up with an even split, three doelings and 3 bucklings. Our one first time mama had triplets but the first two were born dead and the third came our screaming and is doing well. Here are a few pictures of them at a day old and some taken a week or so ago.

 Maggie, our registered Nubian doe, had triplets( 1 female and 2 males) this picture above is one of her bucklings and the picture below is the doeling and other buckling, warming up by the wood cookstove.

 This is Isabelle, she is almost three years old and daughter of Maggie. She had triplets( bucklings) as well, with two being stillborn  :(

 Sadie is also almost three yrs old and blessed us with twin doelings, and lots of color!

They are Alpine Nubian cross.

 Maggie and one buckling( Jasper) and the doeling ( Cinnamon)

 Isabelle's buckling( Panda Bear)

 Sadie and one doeling( Hazel)

 Sadie's other doeling ( Sally)

 Hazel showing off on the big tire!

 This is Maggie's other buckling ( BB, short for bottle baby)

 BB enjoying the warmth of the sun on the tractor tire, after a morning of romping with the other kids

 Nice picture of Jasper

and Cinnamon !

Not a lot new going on right now with our wet weather, but our busy time will soon be hear, so trying to enjoy the last of our slower time. 

Blessings to each of you, as well as good health and productivity on your homesteads.  :)

Our journey and life in MT continued

Good morning everyone!
      
Well we went to Salt Lake City and Cortney underwent a 7-1/2 hour brain surgery. Let me tell you, that was the longest day of my life thus far. She did well and Praise be to God the doctor was able to remove all of the tumor from the right side of her brain. Now the portion that has grown into the left side is another story, it's grown next to the artery and far to dangerous to try to remove it. The remaining portion is 7 mm in size and is shaped like a finger. She will need to undergo some form of treatment, we're waiting on the plan. They are testing the cells of the tumor and then will go to the national database to see which therapies nave worked on killing those cells, it's called cell mapping and the way it was explained is that 2 or more people could have the same tumor diagnosis yet when the actual cells are tested they all would be different. So it's helping them cut out the guessing game portion of treatments now.  Here are a few pictures of her after surgery.

 This was the morning after her 7-1/2 hour surgery 2-5-16

 Now in her private room after only two days in NCCU. Her Aunts sent her the balloons and she loved them. This was 2-7-16

 She was dressed in her new loungeware from Grandma Nita, ready to spring the hospital. 2-8-16. We stayed in SLC for a couple more days just to be sure she was ready for the flight home.

We went to a mall on 2-9-16 and I had this made for her, she loves it!  She is our miracle, walking and talking and has undergone two major craniotomies in less than 7 months and was walking the next morning after surgery. She is a tough Montana cowgirl! Keep her and our family in your prayers. 

Have a blessed and productive day, soon we'll have baby goat pictures to share! I'm planning on taking pictures of the prego mamas today!

Good morning, I can't believe February is almost here! I said that I would try to catch everyone( for those interested anyway ). We've had lots of changes, so small and not worth mentioning and some much larger. First change is that our son, Jon and his fiance, April, were married in Nov. 2014. They had a small church wedding and our gift to them was we decorated, and helped with part of the reception meal, got their cake and help with other things needed. Here are a few pictures of the wedding. The only sad thing was that Jon's daughter, Jayla could not be in the wedding, because her Mom decided she didn't want them to have her there( another long story, because they were in legal battle over custody and until it was settled she had 100% of the custody and..... you can read between the lines) So Jayla didn't get to be in the wedding or at the reception, even though she was supposed to be a flower girl and her outfit was bought and hair appointment set. Okay here are the pictures.

In July 2015 we had a family reunion/ celebration of my Grandmother's life( she passed away in Dec. 2014 at 99 yrs old.) and we were enjoying seeing all of our family and met my step sister and her family. At this reunion Cortney spent time with her cousins at the swimming pool and Mike and I went into a celebration dinner and noticed Cortney didn't look like she felt good, so we asked her and she said she had a headache and upset stomach. After a couple days of her being ill, I started to worry about it being something else. So on the Wenesday after the reunion on Sunday I took her to the ER. After some confusion an MRI was done and she had another brain tumor on the right side, rear of her brain. She underwent treatment at two yrs old for an inoperable brain tumor. This new tumor was creating an extreme amount of pain. She was transfered to the ICU immediately and surgery was done to remove a portion of the golf ball sized tumor, the rest was to close to the brain stem and vessels. The neurosurgeon said he'd done as much as he felt he was skilled to do and we'd have to seek a second opinion from a specialist about what the plan would be for the remaining portion. She recovered well and at her two week appointment asked the doctor when she could return to work. He said she you feel like it but take it slow. Well two days after that appointment she was back to work, working 2-3 hours a day 3 times a week. When she returned for her 1 month follow up he asked how she was doing and if she'd gotten back to work yet. She told him she'd gone back just two days after her two week appointment and he was shocked and said this; " your boss does realize that you had major brain surgery, right?" Then he told her she was one amazing young lady and he wished all his patients had such a good attitude. Here are a few pictures of her head three days after surgery and we were home

Now to present time, we just returned from UT and seeing the specialist and we will be returning next week, where Cortney will undergo another major surgery to have all but a 1 cm. piece removed and when she is recovered from that then a one time high dose radiation will be done on the 1 cm portion. That small portion is just to close to the main blood vessels to risk it. The doctor is the Chief Neurosurgeon over all the NW US and is very sure they can get it all so she will have no further problems. She has a strong spirit and a positive outlook on life, plus thousands of people all over the world are praying for her. Here is a picture of her in Dec. and I think it shows just what a wonderful, fun filled young woman she is

Blessings for your homestead and families, we will keep everyone posted( again for this interested)

Some homestead animal updates!

I'm not entirely sure where to begin. I, obviously took a leave from blogging and I will share the many reasons why. When I last posted(I believe in 2012) our son, who had been out of contact with us for a little over 2 yrs. came back into our lives through many blessings straight from God. We had met our granddaughter only twice before seeing her again when she was 3 yrs. old. She is the joy and light in all of our lives and now she is going to be 6yrs old in March, my how time flies.

Other reasons for my stop in blogging was time. I'm not as young as I once was and I was having issues with not being able to multi task like I once did. This was causing stress in my family life, our homesteading life, my marriage and my spiritual life as well. So I can honestly say, I don't like change and had to work through all of these changes in my own way, which ment more time focusing at the tasks at hand and less time on the computer. I have now learned the ins and outs of what I can and can not do and have moved forward in a positive manner with the strength and guidance of God.  I now know my limits and will work to include some of my time blogging as a way to share, learn and grow with others who seek the same in their lives. I am of the belief that we should never stop learning until we die. So...... in the years away I've learned and challenged myself to learn many new things. I've learned to be a Grandmother, a mother to two young adult children, was blessed with a beautiful daughter in law and two, instant and beautiful granddaughters,

I am now an EMT on our volunteer ambulance service( coming on 3 yrs.), learning to knit, finished my first large quilting project and a few small and fun ones too, learning to sew on my treadle sewing machine, getting back into doing things I enjoyed but put on hold to raise our children and homeschool and my newest skill is from the sheep to yarn. I've always wanted to learn to spin and our daughter has the sheep and we have bags of fleeces that we've been shuffling around and around, so I bit the fleece( so to speak) and decided we needed to learn how to do something with them or sell the sheep. I started out in Sept. 2015 with a drop spindle and some washed and dyed wool. First I had to borrow a set of carders and learn how to card the wool, then I worked hard to learn how to spin the wool roving on the drop spindle I was loaned as well. At the next spinners guild meeting everyone was so positive of how well I'd spun the wool, they said I needed a spinning wheel to get going into some major production. So my husband and daughter got in touch with a friend in the guild and she told them of a wheel for sale and they made arrangements to buy it. Of course I had now idea, so I set out to find a deal on a beginner's wheel and that is when husband and daughter had to spill the beans about my Christmas gift. I ended up getting this gift early so I could take some classes. It's a beautiful wheel; a Kromski Sonata and it is designed for easy traveling. I am truly enjoying spinning and soon will learn to ply. Husband built me a lazy kate, so all I need to do is fill another bobbin.

 

Now there are many other things that have happened and happening in my life and the life of my family and farm and I hope to share those with you at some point in time.  I'm just glad to be at a point in life when I can spare some time to include blogging once again. For all those who are still hanging in there and all the new people who've stopped in over the last few years, I'd like to say Thank you and looking forward I pray we can all become friends.
I will work to post at least once a week, some may just be picture blogs of our farm, family and animals just to catch you all up to speed. Until we meet again have a blessed and productive weekend.