Merry Soggy Christmas!

Merry Christmas from water-logged Zephyr Hill Farm!  Come along with us on our Christmas Day swim drive!  For the record, these photos were a lot darker, but I lightened them enough to show details.  It never got this light all day!

At 10 this morning, the creek through the lower part of our property was overflowing its banks after several days of rain followed by almost 3 inches of rain in the last 24 hours.

By 2:30, there was a lot more water.  No wonder, since the rain never let up all day!

We headed out to take a look at things.  Looking down at the Lower Pasture from above, we can see channels carved by runoff from the neighbors' adjoining hill that was deforested this year.

The Lower Pasture has a creek running through it where no creek should be.

Normally the "creek" is a dry bed that runs along the fence before it cuts across the Lower Pasture, but today it was a torrent.

Standing at the Back Pasture gate, we could see the water pouring out of the pond.  So far, the dam is holding . . .

We parked the Doodad and waded to the gate.  Misty is such a faithful companion, always ready to come with us and check on things, no matter the weather.

Ebby, Royal and Ebby's calf Seb are in the Back Pasture.  They're going to need a new hay bale soon, but at least we don't have to fill water troughs!  That tipped-over thing is a heavy wooden mineral feeder that was here when we bought the place.

Herb really likes his Muck boots and his LLBean rain coat and rain pants!

"This deep."

This photo shows the pond runoff on the left.  The drainage pipe discharges water coming in from the hunting preserve off to the right.  Those two streams of water join up here . . .

. . . and pour toward the front of our property, overwhelming the normally dry creek bed.

We headed back up toward the house, very thankful for hills!  Royal and his band have a hill and wooded shelter; Wellie and Remy are in the Home Pasture which is a hill with a shelter up top; Siobhan is in the barnyard, which may be soggy because it's flat, but she's got the barn.  The chicken coop is in the barnyard, too.

Just beyond Wellie and Remy's shelter, the horses are on the highest part of the farm.  They may be wet, but their hay is high and dry in their new Hay Hut.

A flood like this brings worries about whether fences will stand, whether trees might fall, and whether the dam will hold.  It brings slogging mud and damp and inconvenience, but up on our hills, we and the animals are safe.

I must admit that after days and days of rain, I've looked around and imagined how the people back in Noah's day must have felt as the water crept higher and higher.  Of course, they had no idea it was going to keep coming until it drowned them.  It makes me thankful for God's promise never to flood the earth again.  I'll be eagerly looking for some sun and a rainbow, but meanwhile, we have so much to be thankful for!

Christmas may feel different when it's soggy and muggy instead of cold and brisk, yet the reason we celebrate is still the same.  "Joy to the world, the Lord has come!"

Merry Christmas!

*We ended up getting 4.14" of rain in less than 24 hours on Christmas Day, about twice the all-time high.  We're still here, the only casualty being the overturned feeder you can see behind the cattle in the Back Pasture.  We got another torrential rainfall on the 28th with an even higher flood level, so we sure were ready for the sunshine we're getting today, Dec. 29!

A Walk in the Snow

This is a pretty banal title for such a rare event!  It all started this morning . . .

I woke up to this outside our back door . . .

... and this out front.

Herb was just coming in from feeding the animals.  When he went out, there was nothing at all on the driveway or road.

By the time he walked down to get the paper fourteen minutes later, the road was covered.

Two hours later the snow had stopped, and we decided to take a walk.  Everything was so silent with all sound muffled by the snow.

Ebony tasted the snow--maybe our meager amount made her homesick for the mountains of Kentucky.

The top of the Back Pasture was our objective.

With the snow highlighting the ground through the bare trees, you can actually see our eight acres of woods up the hill above the Lower Pasture.

A look back at the house on the other side of the Home Pasture.

We walked along the road at the bottom of Kara's Pasture with the Lower Pasture on our left.

The old log cabin is timeless decked out in snowy white.

Falling snow blurred my lens as I looked through the trees to see the creek running.

Our objective reached, we had a bird's-eye view of the whole farm.

The pond is completely full.  If only it held water!

I'm a sucker for upside-down reflections.

While I'm usually not a black-and-white kind of person, I love what it does to this photo.

Don't believe everything you see . . .

All was perfect peace and quiet with the snow muting color as well as sound.

Two weeks ago the dogs walked on this water!

It's easy to understand why someone once lived here.

Sure that we must have treats in our pockets, the horses followed us all along their fence.

We could already see that this snow would be short-lived as it sagged in garlands from the gate.

The last snowy lane leading to the front gate . . .

And we were back home.  What a nice way to spend a snowy morning!

A Beautiful Sunday Afternoon in April

We had the horses grazing around the garden in a temporary electric fence this afternoon. About 7:30 p.m. we went out to put them back in Kara's Pasture with the cattle.  I glanced down the hill and saw a flash of water around a cow's knees as one of the girls waded the wet-weather stream to munch on some brush along the fence line.

"Look!" I exclaimed.  "There's water in the stream.  Let's go take a look."  So we shut the pasture gate behind us and set off down the hill to explore.

The horses and cattle all followed us.  After all, we're the Food People!

We left them behind as we went into the Back Pasture and over to the pond.  With all the rain we've had, it was full, and to my delight the wild azaleas were beginning to bloom on the far bank.

Thick moss along the edge of the pond glowed golden green in the afternoon sunlight.

The azaleas made a splash of bright pink among a bunch of young pines that have sprung up on the bank.

Halfway along the far side of the pond, I turned around and looked back.  Kara's house is hidden behind the two light green Bradford pears in the distance.  The barns and our house are hidden by the bright green Valentine Tree at the right of the photo.

I meandered along toward the head of the pond, still on the far side.  I haven't been back here in over a year, and I'm making a mental note to come more often.  I love this view of the farm!

Here I'm standing almost at the fence line where a tiny stream flows from the hunting preserve onto our property and widens into the pond.  I'll have to look up a photo taken from this angle a few years ago to show how things have changed.

We came back into Kara's Pasture and walked along the stream, surprised that it was still flowing so full after the big rain four days ago.  This is a wet-weather stream that only flows when we've had plenty of rain.

Who knows where these jonquils came from?  I'm guessing a squirrel stole a bulb from somewhere, buried it here--and forgot where he put it!

We decided to let the animals into half of the Lower Pasture.  The horses had followed us hopefully so we let them through the gate.  As soon as Sara and Siobhan saw the gate swing open, they both burst into a bucking gallop as fast as they could come!

I just caught the tail end of Siobhan kicking up her heels and stretching her nose toward the finish line.

Hero heard the pounding hooves and came running.  He never passes up a chance to join a race!

This is one of my favorite photos I've taken in a long time.  Look at Siobhan with only one foot on the ground and that grin on Hero's face; Sara has only one thought in mind:  "The grass is greener on the other side of the fence!"  When it comes to food, no one can say about this gal:  "Always behind, just like the old cow's tail!"

The minute everyone got through the gate, their heads dropped to the ground like they were pulled by giant magnets.  Who knew grass was magnetic?!  They're all like kids getting turned loose in a candy factory!

Up on the hill in the Home Pasture, the sheep got excited by the running down below and went bounding across their pasture in a parallel race.  The front runner was already into the wooded copse before I realized what was happening.

It only took a few bounds for this guy to join his buddy.

As the Alpha Animal, beautiful Brandy gets to go graze in someone else's spot if she decides it looks better than hers.

I think I'll entitle this photo:  "Does this pasture make my butt look big?"  Butts is all you see of anyone with their heads buried in the new grass.  This is one thing I love about spring:  The animals' glee the first time they get into a fresh pasture that hasn't been grazed since last year!

By this time it was 8:15 p.m. and someone else was clamoring for his supper, so I had to grab my last few photos in a hurry.  I could have happily stayed and soaked up this beautiful sight for quite awhile if I hadn't had a hungry hubby champing at the bit!

Even the sight of his orchard in bloom barely slowed him down!

While Herb fed the dogs inside, I went out to tuck up my baby birds for the night (that's another post).  Rambo and Obaama heard me and came leaping up the hill.  They were kicking up their heels, not for the grass they've been enjoying for several weeks, but for the bit of laying crumble I give to their avian pasture mates, Ping and Grace.

Grace had already put herself to bed in the coop, so I poured a bit of crumble underneath for her breakfast . . . or not!  Here are two more busy butts--attached to two heads reaching under the coop to eat Grace's crumble.

By 8:40 p.m. all the animals were fed and tucked in, so I headed back to the house.  I'd dawdled as long as I could in the beautiful spring evening, and there was one last mouth to feed before everybody would be a happy camper!  After all, if Papa ain't happy, ain't nobody happy!