It is a new bright shiny morning in southern Arizona. I love mornings because it is cool and calm. The wind hasn't started blasting and it isn't hot. I like to sit on the front patio and watch the swallows dive and swoop catching bugs. I think they fly just for the fun of it. They are amazing little flyers.

Yesterday we accomplished some big changes. Steve spent most of the morning building another goat shelter. It is the third one he has built and the best so far. I was very pleased. The new shelter allowed us to move the 3 yearling kids out of the goat barn and into the big pasture at the northwest corner of our property. They will have more space to run around and play. They were not happy about the move yesterday. Goats don't like change, like a lot of people. They tried to push through the gates and climb over the fence, hollering all the while. I suppose goats "bleat" but when I am outside and they can see me, it feels like they are yelling at me. I don't think I've ever heard a sound quite like goats hollering! The 3 yearlings are the first babies we had on our farm. They were born in the middle of a rare blizzard we had last March. Silverado and Valentino are brothers, grey and black respectively. The other one is a gray doe named Butterfly by the grandkids. They are all friendly and easy to handle. I cannot decide if I will sell them or not. They have all been disbudded so I do not want them put with goats that have horns. Horned goats would beat them up.

Little Bones and her brother are doing very well. I thought Caramel was nursing the male yesterday but I could not be certain. I skipped a bottle feeding with him to see. He was ravenous at the next feeding so I don't think he was getting much from her. I found a new source for goat milk just across the highway from us. A really nice lady raises dairy goats and has lots of milk. I got 2 gallons from her for $3 each, a good price.

We also separated Lucy, my still pregnant doe, from the other moms yesterday. Boy, was that a struggle. If you ever buy goats, make sure they are tame and will follow you and not be afraid of you. Catching skiddish wild goats is frustrating and dangerous. We enlisted the help of our son-in-law, Jeff. He and Steve got in the pasture with 3 adult does, 3 kids and one bottle fed kid. The plan was to chase Lucy out of the pasture and encourage her to move to the goat barn. The goats all stayed in a herd and Mouth, the bottle baby, kept running toward whatever human was the closest, hindering any effort to separate Lucy out. Finally, after a couple of unsuccessful races around the feild, Steve got his lasso out. Now, Steve is no cowboy. His roping efforts are very amateurish. Jeff and I cornered the whole herd, 7 goats. Steve got as close as he could without making them run again and started tossing his noose toward Lucy. On the third try, he managed to get a pretty good hold on her over her horns and side of her head. Jeff and I ran in to grab her collar because we didn't want to straggle her. Jeff got wrapped up in the rope and she was fighting as hard as she could to get away. I got there in time to keep Jeff from going down. Steve also got there and got a grip in her horns. Jeff got untangled but did get a scape on his shin. No blood, thank the Lord! Steve then straddled Lucy and kept a hold on her horns. I pulled on her collar and we walked her to her new stall in the goat barn. She will spend the rest of her pregnancy there, unmolested by the other moms, and hopefully, she'll have healthy cute kids at the end of the month.

I hear Mouth hollering at me so I guess it is time to get dressed and feed everybody. Later y'all!