Saturday, August 30, 2014

Employee of the Day

Turns out *someone* in the family left the manure area gate open last night. I won't name names (Jonathan), but gate etiquette is very important on a farm. If you use a closed gate, close it behind you. If you go through an open gate, leave it open. Pretty easy to follow. Our manure area gates are supposed to be left closed to keep our animals out. It's not necessarily a 'Dangerous' or 'Destructive' reason. It's closer to a 'Disgusting' factor. Keep the animals away from the poop, plus it's somewhat overgrown and pretty much a huge snake nest and poison ivy field (although I am now terrified that every single 3 leaved plant is poison ivy, but that's a story for another day.) Anyway, I'm mucking the stalls in the barn and Jessie's barking away. Not unusual for Jessie, but she was barking enough for me to go figure out what's bothering her. And there it was. Cooper was in the manure area feasting on horse poop. Horses were in there, too, munching on weeds. However, my rule follower, my Jessie Girl, earns the 'Employee of the Day' today because she was yelling at them all from outside the forbidden area. Gold star for Jessie. And, Jessie, don't let Aisling, Meghan and Cooper call you a teacher's pet (!) or a brown-noser. You did the right thing. And even though your nose technically is a pinkish shade of brown, you can say to Cooper, "well, you're a brown-noser, too, only the brown on your nose is real poop!" And for today, Jessie, as your reward, it can be our little secret that I caught you trying to snack on horse poop in the stalls an hour earlier.


Just as a side note: Really, horse manure is basically just chewed up grass, so as gross as it is, it's not quite as bad as if they were eating dog poop. Carnivore poop falls into a different category. In my exhaustive online research (everything is true on the internet) it says all dogs will eat horse poop if given the opportunity. Oh, and try not to think about this post the next time my dogs try to kiss you. :)

Friday, August 29, 2014

Welcome to Glen Hill Farm's Blog

It's been almost a year to the day that we moved to Glen Hill Farm. Every day since then, I've been meaning to start this blog just to have a place for my family to look back and remember all the adventures we've experienced in our new home. Well 364 days later, here I am actually typing in my first entry! I was motivated to start it right now (finally!) because my kids just went back to school and my husband just took a job that requires him to commute into Boston everyday. (He's been working out of the house for 7 years, so to have him commute into the city everyday is a huge life-changer for our family.) So I want to share all my adventures on the farm with my kids and husband while they're at school/work, and I think this is a good way to do it. I am just going to jump in and post about today. It's too overwhelming to try to post about all that's happened this past year.... I'm sure I'll recount some of those memories at some point, but today, I'll just start with today! :)

Just a few basic farm facts. We currently have...

2 dogs: Jessie and Cooper.
7 chickens: Gertrude, Mayzie, Reese, Daffodil, Buttercup, Penelope, Minerva Louise.
2 large Connemara Ponies that are being boarded with us: Aisling and Meghan.

I love them all.


This morning's entertainment was provided by the chickens....

Click on the link below to see who was making all that noise?

Click on this Link to see video : Who Is Making All That Noise?

Thanks for visiting Glen Hill Farm!