Good Evening!

As I write you we have a beautiful Spring rain shower happening outside. The sun is shining and we can see blue sky, while pouring rain! We love it. The piggies were out foraging, so I just got back in from running them and their dinner back to their house so they could stay dry. We needed the rain so badly as we have had a pleasant, warm, sunny Spring, but it has been a bit too dry for this time of year. So we are very grateful for this shower!

Tulips all came back even after Chino after most of them last year….tee hee hee

I have been wanting to write an update for quite some time now and have a list of items I would like to share with you…but had an extra boost of encouragement to do it this evening because tomorrow we are practicing No Screen Sunday. (I just kind of made it up after getting some wise advice from a teacher of mine) It will be our first experience taking a full 24 hours off of screens/electronics purposefully, but I must say I am really looking forward to it. A full day with no screens or electronics…no TV, no phone, no computer, no radio or iPad. We invite you to join us tomorrow and every Sunday to practice No Screen Sunday with us. One day a week where we can all disconnect from electronics, social media, the news, and instead enjoy connecting with the world around us. Enjoy quality time with loved ones, or just being content being with ourselves, being in nature, perhaps hugging a tree, sitting in the grass, writing, reading, or doing a puzzle. Cooking, cleaning, weeding or gardening, focusing on our breath, practicing meditation and mindfulness, paying attention to how our body feels and maybe even enjoying a well-deserved nap. J I hope you will join us and find it as nourishing as I imagine it will be.

I want to thank everyone for the generous notes, emails, cards, and calls about Pacey. It truly means so much. We love that you all care for Pacey too. We had this remembrance stone made to mark where we laid her to rest

for different things. We found out that Morgan has an enlarged heart. It is a lot larger than it should be therefore it has impacted his breathing. We are so fortunate to have avian specialist available to us so the birds are able to receive top notch care. He is on a couple blood pressure medications right now that have helped immensely and we are waiting to hear back from the cardiologist. His organs are strong and healthy, so hopefully the medication won’t impact them too badly any time soon and he can continue to live a long happy life. Elen ripped off part of one of her spurs the morning before we were headed to the vet, luckily. It turned out that so much of it had been torn from her leg, that they needed to remove it. So, she is on an antibiotic and pain medication until it heals. Nan has had an infection on her two middle toes for a long time. We had been soaking her feet nightly and putting medicine on them, along with weekly laser therapy sessions. They were not getting worse, but also not improving. So, we had her looked at by the specialist as well and they found she had an e-coli infection. They have e-coli in their feces and if they have a cut on their foot and step in their poop (which is impossible NOT to have happen with ducks) they can get an e-coli infection, which Nan had. So, with a few weeks of wrapping her feet, keeping them dry, and anitbiotics, her feet are already healed up and looking great! What a relief! Veterinary school includes very little teaching about ducks and chickens. We’ve heard one day or less. So, we were lucky to have a vet that took the extra time for additional schooling for avians and we feel even more fortunate to have another vet that specializes in avians, which are hard to come by. The avian specialist are the same facility where we took Pacey. The vets continue to be extremely knowledgeable, compassionate, generous, and kind. We feel so incredibly fortunate to have them for our birds.

Our cat, Danger, had a large lump on her leg. She had surgery to have it removed which went quite well, but we found out that it was cancerous. They were able to remove the whole mass and it was external, so we are hoping it did not spread before the removal and that it will not come back. It is a very rare type in cats and not much is known about it. We estimate Danger is about 15 years old. We adopted her when we purchased the house and she was here for over 10 years before that. The previous owners let us know she was a feral cat that was born on property with a litter, the rest of them didn’t last but a less than a year, except Danger. She is a real sweetheart who loves to be cuddled and has a large purring motor on her! She is recovering well from her surgery about 10 days ago and we will keep a close eye on her, making sure to give her lots of loves in the meantime.

The other animals are doing well! The piggies are loving the warmer weather and even Squid has been out every day foraging and napping in the sunshine. The goats are enjoying their new pasture grass and napping in the sun as well. Goats in general really like warmer weather. Tulips had a bit of a traumatic time not too long ago. We noticed she was nursing herself and even getting milk out! We knew for a fact that she wasn’t pregnant or hadn’t had a baby recently, so we were quite confused. Apparently, it is not as rare as one might think. Is it because she came from a dairy and likely had many young ones in her past, that her hormones are all messed up and she is creating milk when she doesn’t need to??? We aren’t completely sure, but have a feeling this may have something to do with it. Poor Tulips, she had to wear a cone and a donut around her poor little neck for 3 weeks so her teets could dry up and she would stop milking herself. How embarrassing. It seemed to work like a charm and now she is donut and cone free!! We got her a nice soft dog cone with a device that gave off a lavender scent for calming, which she seemed to like. Now she is happy and healthy again!

We have now joined the world of social media. If you don’t follow us already, we’d like to invite you to and hope that you do! I am much better about giving small regular updates there. ;) We are on Facebook and Instagram. You can just click on the icons on the bottom of this page and it will link you to our sites or you can search for us on either one. We’d love to have your support there too

A couple friends of ours were kind enough to donate their professional expertise to this awesome video and the photos of the hats for our website! A huge thank you to Erin and Jeremiah!

There always seems to be more and I’d love to write to you for hours, but it is getting late and time for me to go tuck everyone in for bed. I will give them all hugs and kisses for you. They thank you for your love and support. We hope all of you are healthy and well, along with your family and friends. Sending you our best.

Until next time….

~ Namaste

Lots of Animal & Other Updates

We have a New Member of the Family

Our Sweet Pacey Girl