This was Miss Magoo’s first year doing 4-H. She raised two market lambs, which she bought in April and sold at the county fair last week.
Raising lambs was a whole new experience for our entire family. While we have raised beef cows, layer hens, and a turkey, show lambs were a whole different ball game. Rather than putting the animals out to pasture, market lambs are much more hands on.
We learned so much through the experience (even though it was Miss Magoo’s project, we all ended up involved!), and we are looking forward to doing even better next year.
Miss Magoo learned the responsibility of caring for an animal. She fed the sheep twice a day, checked their water many times throughout the day, exercised them, and practiced with them regularly.
I learned how to trim the lambs’ hooves, and Dan and I both learned about sheering sheep.
Little Man and Bug Bug helped out with the sheep, and they also each took a chicken to the fair for the Cloverbuds program.
While one of the lambs didn’t end up making weight, it was a good learning experience. Next year we will make sure to do regular weighing of the sheep, and we will also be better overseeing the feeding, to make sure that no sheep is stealing food from another.
For the sheep that made weight, Miss Magoo got a red ribbon in quality, and a blue ribbon in showmanship. There was definitely room for improvement, but overall I am quite satisfied with the way things went for our first year.
Right before the fair, Bug Bug celebrated her 6th birthday. It was probably her most fun birthday so far. She was so excited about everything leading up to her party. She had lists of what she wanted (she included hugs from everyone on the list), and she asked for a ladybug birthday cake. I didn’t get a good picture of it, but it turned out cute.
Right after the fair, the kids (and Dan) got baptized. Several months ago, the kids talked about baptism in Sunday School, and all 3 decided that they wanted to be baptized. So we had our church family out for a potluck and baptism.
After everyone had gone home that night, we went to meet a puppy, and ended up bringing her home.
The newest member of our family is sweet little Gracie. Her mom is a mixed breed dog, and who knows who her dad is, so she’s definitely a mutt, but she’s the cutest mutt ever!
So far Gracie has won over the friendship of one of the cats, but the others aren’t so certain they want to hang out with her.
That’s the story of the last couple of weeks in our life. If you would like to keep up with more of our day-to-day life, I share on Instagram. How has your August been so far?
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