Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Getting ready for baby (some personal notes on baby stuff)

This one obviously isn't farm-y related, it's baby/parenting related.  I know, and you probably thought all I cared about were critters.

I'm starting to get really excited about this baby.  I'm nearly 30 weeks along, complete with all the discomforts and fetal movements that seem to dictate a lot of my life right now.  My body just doesn't feel much like my own right now.  I'm not trying to complain, but being pregnant is just weird.  I am though really grateful that we've had an easier go at it this time than in times past.  I'm still on my feet, which is amazing since I was on bedrest starting 23 weeks along with my son.  So far my worst complications have been deficiencies (iron and calcium mostly) and cellulitis from my injection sites so I'm hoping that things will stay pretty smooth for the duration.

We thought we had her named, but now we are having second thoughts on our chosen name.  So I have a couple of really good names and chances are we'll have to look at her to know what her name is.  That wasn't the case with my son but we found such a great name for him it made it easy....girl names are sooooo much harder if you ask me.

Speaking of my son, he has a lot of changes ahead too.  I'm so very aware of this right now.  Not just the baby coming but we still need to get him transitioned to a toddler bed and he's been kind of sort of potty training himself....I'm not pushing the potty training since I keep hearing that he'll regress when the new baby arrives.  We'll see.

Lately I've been seeing a lot of posts on Facebook about breastfeeding and vaccines and all the other hot topics when it comes to babies.  Geesh!  I'll just say I'm going to do what works for us, vaccinate (*gasp* on schedule) and nurse the baby and I don't expect anyone to give me grief about it, nor do I dole out grief to anyone else for their choices.  It just seems like no matter what you do, someone has something to say about how to raise kids.  The Time magazine article recently on attachment parenting was a good example of how fired up people get about this stuff.  I'm not an attachment parent, however I do love a good sling....talk about convenient!

So that's what was on my mind.  We have around 10 weeks remaining until we get to meet the new little one so it's very exciting.

Friday, May 18, 2012

Babies on the farm

My favorite baby, my now 3 year old son :)

Blue Slate turkey poults- just a few days old

a closer look at the turkey poult
3 week old mutt ducklings (pekin x crested mutt)

11 2 week old leghorn chicks + 1 mystery black chick = cute pile of sleepy fluff

a few days old African gosling with Rouen ducklings of the same age

Dinner time!  (they are all in the same brooder)


mingling around the water cooler

Sonny at 9 months old

Freya at 4 months old
The pictures tell the story right?  On May 4th we received a bunch of chicks from a local school; leghorns, a barred rock and a mystery black chick with black legs and puffed cheeks.  There were some rare breed bantams in the bunch too but we were able to pass those babies along to someone who really wanted them, rather than us who have no use for them.  Then this week the ducklings and goslings arrived as well as the turkey poults, so they are all less than a week old.  

My son turned 3 this month.  Where did the time go?  He's getting so big!