Coming home...

After a nice vacation, we returned home to our animals and our place.  While out for a morning walk, I took some pictures of my incredible neighborhood. 

 This is the view from the back of my pasture, facing my neighbor's property.  They have horses and their property sits along the creek.  The colors are just beautiful on this day.

 Not as lush, here our back pasture.  We have a little over 4 acres.

 Down on the cul-de-sac, again the colors are so pretty.  This is a wonderful, little neighborhood.  We each have acreage, but still have a community atmosphere.

 We know all of our neighbors by name.  We've each lived here for quite a long time.  I can't believe it, but we have lived in our house now for 20 years!

 We've seen some families come and go, but most of us have been here for over 20 years.  Neighbors still work in their pasture and yards, take walks through the neighborhood, and stop to catch up on each other's lives.  It's as if we live in another country.  I hear about other friend's neighborhoods, where they don't even know their neighbors and sometimes never even see them.  I feel so very, very blessed.

 

Here is a random picture of my daughter feeding a little cria (baby alpaca) whose momma won't feed him.  We get to bottle feed every three hours.  This little guy has stolen my heart.  He gets so excited when he sees me coming with his meal!  :o)  Yep, count YOUR blessings today.  I bet you have a story to share, too.

Where to start?

Wow~  We had a blast on our Carnival Cruise line vacation!

My family took a 7 day cruise to Mahogany Bay, Belize, and Cozumel.  We had a fantastic time!  This was the first time we have ever taken a trip over the Thanksgiving holiday.  While we were gone, a few things happened.


The kind neighbor that was taking care of our animals for us found out his mother was very, very ill.  He needed to go and see her quickly.  He didn't know who to find to help out with the animals, so his wife stayed behind and did the job.  However, she is afraid of horses and cows.  That makes for quite a story!

While it was 34 degrees overnight here in Parker, one of the alpacas we decided to watch for another lady, gave birth.  There was a little bit of panic going on our property!  Mind you, we had no telephone or internet access while we were gone.

Hailey and Harrison's poultry projects arrived on our property only days before the entire PISD Ag barn burned to the ground.  Needless to say, my children's poultry projects will be representing all of PISD.  There is so much more that I won't even go into, but you get the idea.  It was CRAZY here!

So, while it was freakishly crazy here while we were gone, our animals are all fine and our house is still in place. 

We had an amazing time and enjoyed the time away.  I am blessed beyond measure with an amazing family!  Praising God for His goodness.