This is our journal of what we pray is our sojourn of life (Hebrews 11:8-10) along the narrow way (Matthew 7:14), even the old paths (Jeremiah 6:16), submitting to the Bible as a light unto both (Psalms 119:105). It is our prayer that these documented moments in our earthly time benefit whom God might choose to edify, but ultimately that God glorifies Himself through them.

Category: dogs

A Switch in Mind Saves Nine

Back in September, with some recent truck transmission issues, I had put some “goop” in there to try to help with the shifting. And with that, I wanted to take the truck for a test drive to see if it was helping.

As I was heading to the front gate, I had pretty much decided to turn left and head that way. But, as I got to the gate, I thought, “No, actually I’ll just head to the right.” I had no reason to change my mind on that, but just did. Well…little did I know…….

As I proceeded down the road, I got down to the bridge that goes over a creek, and as I crossed over, lo and behold, off to the side just off the road were a whole pack of puppies, just sitting there. A bunch of them. 9 actually, in the end. Whaaaaatt? What was this? I thought, oh no, someone just dumped them, which happens out in the country a lot. (Opinion of those who do that: Jerks!)

Well, I kept going. And actually, shortly after that, the truck transmission started working nicely again, so I was thankful to the Lord for that.

But, when I got back home, I had that little surprise announcement for Sue as to what I found. 🙂 Neither of us could just leave them, so while I had to be on a work call or something, she ran out to see if she could gather them up in the car.

When she got back, she said she had been unable to get a hold of them, and so we packed up some cages in the truck, took some soft food, and headed back out there.

They were still all there, and here are some of them at that place:

Abandoned puppies on the road
More of abandoned puppies on the road

The food had the draw we hoped it would (we figured they were going to be pretty hungry), and one by one, we gathered them into the cages.

Lastly though, there was one that went down to the creek bed and just laid there in some shade, and I thought he was just going to end up running away once I got down there. So I went with some food to him, and he just ended up laying there, and I petted him and then just picked him up and took him to the truck. Interestingly, he ended up just being a really mellow dog…we nicknamed him “Chill”. 🙂

And, there was one more, a really scared one hiding in the woods. So, I took a plate of food and worked my way to him, and enticed him with the food close enough to where I could get him, and was able to, and then bring him to the truck as well.

So, at least we were able to get them all. But now, wow! We have 9 puppies to do something with. Thankfully we have a big dog kennel in the barn, so that was going to be their new home, while Brodey could hang out in the outdoor one, at least until the weather got colder (see the above pic too):

Abandoned puppies
More of abandoned puppies
Still more of abandoned puppies

We started trying online to find an owner, but when that wasn’t happening, it began the process of trying to find them all good homes. We tried online, and sitting with them in the back of the truck downtown, and even at the yearly street festival:

Puppies give-away

Amazingly, some times when we had them downtown in the back of the truck on a Saturday, people couldn’t take a dog with them, but offered finances to help in feed and taking care of the doggies. People were extraordinarily kind and gracious in those things, and we took it as help from God in paying for this unexpected added expense.

A few stories:

One of the girl puppies was popular, but twice God spun around her being taken by someone that was almost certainly going to take her, and actually we were thankful because those 2 households we thought probably just weren’t best. The first was at the festival above, with a lady and her husband, who were worried the dog was going to poop up their house, and if she did, we were going to take her back. Well, they were sitting next to the bandstand with the doggie, and when the drummer started kicking his base drum for sound check, it scared our little girl, and she pooped on the lady right then, and I asked the husband if he wanted me to take her back now, and said, yes, take her back now. 🙂

The second was when we were downtown in the back of the truck. Two ladies said they wanted her, but were going to grocery shop and then come get her. It didn’t seem like a great fit in our minds, but we left it in God’s hands, and when they came back, almost certainly to pick her up, they indicated they were worried their neighbors would end up killing her, because apparently that’s how their neighbors are potentially. So, once again, 180 degrees the other way as to what was going to happen.

One thing we have done with every taker is offer to take the puppy back if it didn’t work out. “Chill” was taken by a lady, but the stress of taking care of a puppy was causing health issues, so after us thinking we had lessened the load for us, he ended up back with us. 🙂 But, he has since found a new place.

And then, one we call “RC” right now (Red Collar, which was actually the one I had to dig out of the woods when we first found them), went to a home, and he apparently snapped at the husband a few times one day, and because they have smaller children, they got worried, so we took him back too. We had not nor since have we seen that kind of behavior from him, so we don’t really know what that was all about. When I come up to him, he just rolls on his back and lays there. 🙂

Now, fast forward, over time, either with someone we knew, or from the back of the truck, we’ve been able to re-home 5 of them, and we still have 4 left. We let them run in one of our gardens. They do a great job with knocking down all the weeds, although they’ve also dug down deep enough to get to one of the goats we buried there, and have snacked on her bones. :/

Here they are, left to right Mollie (named after molasses for the color and being so sweet! 🙂 she was the one kept from going to those two households above; she rolls on her back a lot too 🙂 ), RC (in front), Oliver, and Yapper Dan (he was yappy early on; he rolls on his back a lot too 🙂 ). We’re still trying to come up with better names for RC and Yapper Dan 🙂 :

Last of the puppies

The only other issue has been them getting free. We were hoping they wouldn’t chase chickens or the like, but sadly we’ve had some casualties already, so we have to be diligent in controlling them.

Anyway, that’s been our adventure these last several months. We don’t know what God’s purpose is in any of this, and we really can’t keep 4 dogs for ourselves, we don’t believe, but with colder weather now and them getting bigger, we’re not sure what to do. So, we’ve been continuing to pray for guidance and have started to put their pictures up at some places downtown, although, we’re also growing more attached to them all the time, and they’re all very sweet doggies. 🙂 Hopefully the Lord will grant them good homes at some point, and guide us if we are to keep any ourselves or not. 🙂

— David

Texas 2021 Arctic Blast: Our Homestead’s Version

Here’s a little around our homestead at the beginning and end of Texas’ 2021 arctic blast!

This was after the first main night — snow and cold, with forecasted windchills down to -18F. These were I believe our worst temperatures we’ve experienced here, even after the 2011 freeze. The thermometer says about 4F:

4F on the Thermometer

Here’s the homestead:

Frozen Homestead
More Frozen Homestead

I was a little worried about the cattle, given there are some young ones, but thanks to the Lord, they all made it through ok!

Cattle After Freezing Snow Storm
More Cattle After Freezing Snow Storm
Another of Cattle After Freezing Snow Storm

During the week, Sue’s “onesy” (coveralls) in front of the wood burning stove was the favorite for the domestics:

Mimi in the Onesy
William in the Onesy
Tuscan & Leila on the Onesy

On the first day after a week of these freezing temperatures, things started getting back to normal. Here’s our resident stray hanging out on the cistern spigot, which we had double wrapped with blankets the whole time, allowing us to use it too whenever we needed:

Mimi-Dude on the Cistern Spigot

And here are all the goat accoutrements hanging on the fence after Sue took them off:

Goat Coats on the Fence

Those were just a few pictures, but we show a lot more in this video, which has the day after the first main night as above, and then after coming out of it 5 days later (including a surpise from a momma cow!):

All throughout, the Lord was merciful in granting all the animals come through (yes, that missing rooster from the video showed up!), and helping Sue and me with strength to do all the care-taking!

We have no grid electric or water, which actually worked to our advantage, as we always had electric and good water as needed. We pray for those still suffering from the effects, but also hope people might consider their situation and on whom or what they depend for life sustenance.

We also saw how we believe God pre-set up provision before we really knew what was coming, even though they seemed a little “cross” to us at the time: the boy goats had knocked off the top of their hay bale, but Sue just took that hay into the barn, and it ended up being their main food for the week; and I had pre-put out hay bales for the cows, and one had been eaten down a lot and spread out by the time the cold hit, and another spread around some, but those also afforded bedding for the cattle. Also, both the tractor and truck starters went out at the same time a few weeks ago, we needed both for this cold front, and so they were ready to go.

Once again, we are very thankful for God’s help through 2021’s arctic blast, and for the gift of the new little heifer calf!

— David

Goodbye Nessa

We had to say bye to our border collie Nessa this week. Earlier in the year, we had tumors removed from her mammaries, but a tumor started growing back. The vet wouldn’t operate again, so we tried some natural things for her, and the tumor seemed to start to dissipate, but she ended up with 3 swollen legs, and a fairly large swelling on her inside back leg. She recently seemed to turn a corner in a positive way, but a few days ago, she couldn’t lay down or sit anymore, and it seemed because of that she hadn’t slept in at least a couple of days, and she was falling asleep standing while we would hold her. She just seemed to take a turn for the worse, and seemed to be suffering, and it seemed basically an impossible quality of life. So, we made the difficult decision.

She had been a real trooper through it all, and it was crushing to have to put her down.

We will always have fond memories of her. In fact, she will always be remembered as having been part of the initial inspiration for the little song I put together, Jehovah Is His Name.

And then there are the memories of her with Brodey, who thankfully seems to be ok as of right now with Nessa missing, even though they had been together with each other for their entire lives…

Here’s when we got them back in 2009:

Brodey & Nessa, 2009

 

More Brodey & Nessa, 2009

In this video from 2010 from this blog post, she seemed to prove what I thought, which was Nessa kinda had a screw loose: 🙂 (The video has no thumbnail, but you should still be able to play it; or you can go to the blog post link.)

 




 

Here are brother and sister again, 2013 and 2017:

Brodey & Nessa, 2013

 

Brodey & Nessa, 2017

And here’s a final video from back in January, soon after Nessa’s surgery. We had a double cone on her to try to keep her from the stitches, and a “diaper” wrap to try to keep her from the open wound:


Goodbye Nessa bo-bessa….we’ll miss you lots….

Nessa Grave

 

Nessa Headstone

….and we thank the Lord for the gift that you were, and for the time He allowed us to have you!

Nessa, 2013

— David

Nessa Makes a Mess-a

We still haven’t been able to figure out what she’s trying to get at here; but Nessa, one of our Border Collies, loves mud puddles:


We’ve been trying to think of ways to harness this to our advantage here in agrarian-land. Maybe she’s a new kind of post hole digger. Or maybe we could put her over a bucket of dirty clothes that are soaking; and she could be a fancy, automated laundry agitator.

Anyone out there have any other suggestions? 🙂

— David

 

Animal Update

We thought it might be nice to post an animal update from around here at our homestead.

And so, here we go…..!

Brodey and Nessa

If you haven’t seen the introductory post on Brodey and Nessa, it might be nice to take a look at it before watching the following video so you can get some perspective on their growth:

Cattle

This was taken before the birth of the latest calves:

Chickens

Gary and Gigi

Goats

Pigs

We are grateful to the Lord for the provisions of these animals, and may we use them for His glory.

— David

 

A Tail of Two Puppies


When we attended the Homestead Heritage Craft Fair this last November, I had the opportunity to observe their sheepdog demonstration. Needless to say, I was impressed with their ability to round up animals. With our attempts at rounding up animals either gruelingly on foot or industrially with trucks, I thought that having sheepdog capabilities around the land would be of great benefit to all involved for all of the various animals we have to sometimes corral and/or separate. The Homestead Heritage folks had decided on Border Collies for their herding breed, and so I figured I would follow suit at some point.

Well, that some point came quicker than I had expected. Recently, an ad was placed in the local classifieds paper for registered border collie puppies. Even though they were pricey as registered dogs, I called, in case the owner had or could recommend non-registered ones which would cost less. When I talked with the owner and explained what I was looking for, it so happened she was moving and was willing to sell one or both of the remaining registered pups from the latest litter for 40% off. We thought that was just too good to pass up. At first I thought we’d only get one, but then reconsidered, given the deal she was offering, that the two dogs would have each other, and to allow us to potentially breed them; and so, we decided to get both the male and female she had left.

And here they are. We decided to give them Scottish names because Border Collies originate from the border area of England and Scotland, and we named them different sounding names to help them differentiate between themselves when being commanded. Please meet Brodey (pictured to the right above) and Nessa (pictured to the left above). They’re quite playful and friendly, and we look forward to being able to train them to be functional animal members of the community:



Here is a video of them just after arriving here on the land:


The Lord is gracious in granting us these animals, especially in the way He did; and we pray for guidance in training them.

— David