Wow! It's been over 20 days since my last post. Where have I been and what have I been doing!

I've been here at the ranch dealing with thunder, lightening, hail, rain, and mud and more mud! And I've been taking care of all my "babies". It has been a constant struggle with the rains. It's only this past week that the rains have finally slowed down and I can actually see some dry ground and dust. Yes dust - the thing I thought I hated the most until the rains came and turned it all into mud. Now I hate the mud and am looking forward to some dust. Life sure has it's twists and turns.

Now for the "babies" I've been taking care of. We have a whole new bunch of baby chicks and some geese! Here they are.


These are are two new geese enjoying a nice swim in their new pool. And they get to nibble on their alfalfa. The geese are fun to watch as they waddle around together eating weeds. After their waddling they both nestle into the loose hay and take a nap!
What a life!


And these are some of my new "chicks". I have three Polish - their the little white chicks. The dark colored chicks are Langshan. At the moment they don't look too impressive but as they get older the Polish will have feathery crests on their heads and the Langshan will have feathery legs. I'll be taking more images as they get older so you can see how they mature. I also have another seven Araucana "peeps" or tiny little chicks that I have to watch very closely and keep them warm at a certain temperature until they can tolerate the outside temperature and weather.

In the mean while my little Bantam hen is dutifully sitting on her eggs and hopefully within the next two weeks we'll see some little Bantam peeps peck their way out of their shells. My Guinea fowl hen is also sitting on her eggs. She doesn't seem as dutiful about sitting on her eggs but she is trying. We'll have to wait to see what happens with her eggs, hopefully some little guineas.

The sheep and goats are all doing fine and for the most part staying out of trouble.

The dogs are all fine but they don't like the thunder and lightening. For several days the lightening was striking so much around here that we had all three dogs lying on the bedroom floor. They were so scared they didn't want to move.

The rain has continued to wash away the driveway around the house. We had to haul rock to fill in the eroded portions. So far we have hauled 4 loads of rock and we still have more to do. Here is some of the rock we have hauled to fill in the eroded driveway.

This is what it looks like with the rock unloaded.


As for my art - oh yes that is what this blog is suppose to be about. Well.... I guess I've been busy with other things at the moment. Since it has been raining so much I was beginning to think that maybe, just maybe I should spend some time and build myself an ark to save myself and all my critters - Hubby is on his own - he's insured!

Anyway, while Hubby is busy trying to save the ranch I spent my time working on my own ark. Well really my ship - my very own pirate ship! Just in case the waters start rising. I built it on as part of my studio porch. This is what I've got done so far. I will be adding some more clothes onto my pirate skeleton as he looks just a bit too "bare" from the waist down.


Here is Pepper, our pack leader as she takes one of her many daily dips in her own private bath tub after her running around. Enjoy!


Now, before I go I must tell you that I did do some art - yes I really did. I made a Gypsy doll. The pattern is my own and I used some extremely luxurious fabric that I got from Pamela of Treasures of the Gypsy Fabric Club, and of course I used my own Art Fibers. Here she is -



FYI if your interested in knowing more about Pam's Treasure's of the Gypsy Fabric Club you can contact her at gypsytreasures@cs.com