Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch

 The days are moving too fast for this old gal and I feel like I'm falling behind. I keep taking pictures and I intend to post about the things that fill up our days and then days pile up and things begin to run together. So today you get a quick peek into some of the things that keep me away from the computer. 😉 

Before I left for Texas last month, DH and I spent time one morning building a ramp at one of the waters on the north side. We gathered rocks along the way, unloaded them, and DH made an impromptu watering can:

 DH builds a base and then adds bags of Quikcrete:

These bags weigh 80# and just last year I was able to lug them to DH from the rig, but my Quikcrete lugging days are over. My 57-yr old body just won't cooperate, no matter how hard I grunt. 

Grunting also leads to laughing. And laughing leads to crossing legs. Poor DH really does deserve better help.

Mission accomplished. Now the baby calves can reach fresh, cool water:

Skeet wasn't too happy the morning I left. He looks pretty pitiful:

While I was away, DH took over my baby calf chores 

I missed these sweet faces:

 One day he sent me this video and I thought I'd share it with all of you Skeet fans:

DH also sent me this photo:

With this caption: There are 3 baby kittens under there somewhere.

LOL. 128,000 acres and a mama cat, 3 kittens, AND a chicken must take up residence in a single 12" nesting box. 😂

And then that dear man improvised and nailed up this setup to keep the babies safe and the chickens out:

We're still spending every 3rd day hauling hay up to cows on the north side of the ranch

But the good news is that we put these to use a few times last week (they usually dry rot between rains around here):

And we're praising God for every drop. About 1/2 of the ranch had 1" of rain in 3 showers. And now we walk around and stare hard at the ground, looking for any signs of green. We try not to tear up roads,

 but it's really nice to get a little mud on the tires:

                                             

Then our girl, who lives in OK called on Friday night at 7 and said we had cows out on the highway. Someone from here had messaged her so we jumped in the rig and headed out. Within 5 minutes, DH's phone rang 4 more times. 

The neighbor called and said someone had called him. 

A friend who often helps us, called from Arizona where he was working cattle to tell us he heard we had cows out. 

The brand inspector called. 

And the wife who's husband used to work for us at North Camp called - her daughter who lives 150 miles away heard we had cows out too and called her. 😂😂😂

So after a wild ride through the bar ditches, the rogue heifer was rounded up:

 and fence was mended:

DH said he was checking a water on the highway the other day and the heifers were close by when a police car went screaming past on the highway (not really a highway - just a 2-lane blacktop) with sirens whaling and the heifers took off  running after the police car. 

The siren sounds a little like the feed truck siren that we run when we feed cake. He got tickled.

I've got more to share, but I think this post has dragged on long enough and I've got to jump in with DH and run some cows through the chute so I'll leave you with this closing shot I snapped a few weeks ago when I was driving down Ponderosa Rd and crossed the railroad tracks at sunrise: