Settling in

Well, we've been in our house for about a month now. Still have tons to do, most of which requires money that I don't have. So instead of buying irrelevant stuff like towels, rugs, pots and pans etc I've only been getting the important things like buying fencing and t-posts. My small working arena is finished. It's 60' X 60'. I still need to hang the gate properly, but I am able to work dogs in it. My older dogs, with the exception of Seth are a bit rusty. Mike hasn't worked in about 4 or 5 years. He's 9 now so I probably wont' do much with him. Reign is now 8 and was never finished anyway so he also probably wont' get much work.  Seth can be a butthead at times and even though he is a really good work dog, he has his moments. Like the other day when I separated the goats from the sheep and wanted to put the sheep in the arena for the first time. The sheep haven't been worked by a dog much at all and the goats are the leaders so they were pretty much at a loss of how to act. They ran around behind their pen and Seth was trying to get the one back but it was just running around by the dog kennels and Seth would not listen to me. Not really like Seth, but it was an intense situation for him and he's old. So I put Seth up and got Meg out. Meg is fully trained, but was never that great a work dog. She is a loose eyed and fairly upright in her working style. Perfect for these lost little lambs. They moved for her, but were not afraid of her at all. So we gathered them up and walked them down to the pen and I went in the pen and just let Meg figure out how to push them in. They tried hard to get away and not come in, but she blocked their every move and finally got them in. Then I went and got Seth and we had a beginning lesson. He got the message and has been back in focus ever since. I haven't put Crue in with them yet. I am going to get a long line before taking him in as the pen is a bit too large for me to prevent a wreck easily. I may make a smaller temporary pen to start, but we'll see how it goes with a long line first. When I started him at Vergil Holland's that is how we did it and it worked very well. My pen is about the same size so hopefully it will work out. With the sheep pen and chickens within view of the dogs in their kennels its been amping them up and they want to run around and obsess on them when they get out. I'm putting a stop to that and making them stay with me when I take them out in the morning and evening. I'm going to also put up some kind of privacy fence so they can't see them anymore. Like I said, still lots to do. It will be so nice when its all done!
 Last night we had a bad storm come through. Lots of wind, rain, thunder and lightning. A couple large branches fell off the trees. Fortunately none by the house.

My finished working, small pen

Learning to not obssess (note the sheep in the background)

I think the sheep prefer this view of the dogs instead of close up and personal.

My nice neighbor (my only neighbor. About 1/4 mile away on the hill) came over and bush hogged my field. He'd mentioned he'd do it but a friend and I were in the house watching tv and never even knew he'd come and done it. Not till he drove past my house and cut a nice pathway through the golf course. He goes running on the pathways in the closed golf course and the grass is about 3 feet tall now since its not maintained. Such a nice neighbor and all I could do for him was give him a dozen fresh eggs.

Here is what it looked like before my neighbor bush hogged it.

It's hard to tell from that picture, but the field goes down a hill and ends at the road.

Here's what it looks like looking back up at the house.

I've decided to call my little farm, Little Hill Farm. It is a small hill and Little is my clan.

And just because I usually always post pics of the outside, which is my favorite part, here are some of the inside.

Still need to finish up some stuff in the house, like painting and baseboards and such, but it will all get done in time. Oh, and btw, that bathroom is HUGE! When I bought the house it had a small hallway that went to the bedrooms and bathroom. Total waste of space so we opened up doorways off the livingroom and kitchen and made the bathroom larger. That's why my washer/dryer are in there. The previous owners had the washer in the kitchen and the dryer outside on the porch.

So that's about all for now.