Visiting friends in Simpsonville

We are taking a rather round-about route as we return to Arizona from Virginia... the next "major" stop is in Lewisville, Texas for some "house maintenance" on Gracie, but the journey is allowing us to visit some friends and family along the way.

Sunday evening, we stopped in Simpsonville, SC to visit some Illinois friends who have moved to that town...

We got to visit with Joe and Carol and Ben and Doris -- we went out to a nice seafood restaurant (where our waitress took our picture) and then Ben and Doris invited us back to their beautiful home for dessert and coffee / hot chocolate.

It was good to reconnect with these folks -- I got to first meet them in 2020 when we were visiting the Chicagoland area. They had been part of the Home Bible Study that Carl and Sue had participated in with Riverside Church, and Doris and Ben had also served with Carl and Sue in AWANA. We enjoy visiting with friends!

Heading back on the road

After almost 6 weeks, Sunday was the day for us to leave the farm and start heading southwest. A few last pictures from the farm...

One chilly morning, Miss Kitty decided that the warm air blowing from the Oasis system onto the floor was better than a human's lap!

The chickens...

Carl had been trying to capture a video of the momma cows mooing for their weaned calves, but it seemed every time he turned the video on them, they hushed... so he got a video of the chickens with the cows mooing in the background:

Carl and I always forget to take pictures of Jimmy and Regina, so he determined to get a picture our last evening -- in preparation, he got out his selfie stick and tried it out...

He took a nice selfie of himself!

He found he could get a better picture of Miss Kitty than he had been able to otherwise as he could get the camera (phone) closer to her on the stick.

And... the selfie stick worked for a family shot too!!

It was so wonderful to be on the farm for so many weeks. We got a lot of tasks completed and enjoyed being with family!

Jeep work

We had planned to have Jimmy work on Gracie while we were at the farm... We had not really planned for him to work on the Jeep -- we weren't aware of how much work the Jeep needed... We had been thinking that we may need to plan to replace the Jeep soon - there have been some new issues that have come up on it - we asked Jimmy if he would do some diagnostics on it -- it turned out he was able to fix the problems, some of them requiring a number of parts and quite a bit of work on his part.

Jeep in the shop up on jacks for diagnostics...

The diagnostician (Jimmy) under the Jeep

Removing the front drive shaft -- it would vibrate at 50-60MPH which was one of the noises we had noticed.

Front drive shaft needs replacement -- it is not required except when we use 4 wheel drive in the Jeep (which is very infrequent). We had considered not replacing it, but we were able to find the replacement part at NAPA and figured it might be better to have the ability to use 4WD.

We also needed new rear brakes (they were in pretty bad shape - Jimmy didn't even want me to drive the Jeep to pick up the parts...

So... I drove their Envoy to the NAPA on Friday - I saw this Jeep at a stoplight with "I am the Black Jeep of the Family" on the back of a black Jeep.

New brake rotors going on. Jimmy replaced the rear rotors, calipers, and pads, as well as the front drive shaft.

After doing all that, the Jeep was so much quieter when we were driving it, but... it still made quite a noise when we were backing up, and particularly when we were turning and backing up. Jimmy diagnosed it as worn out control arm bushings - and found replacement ones at O'Reilly that we were able to pick up on Saturday morning. He replaced those on Saturday afternoon. 

We feel like we have a brand new Jeep -- and can delay considering a replacement vehicle for a while, we hope!

Moving day

Friday was the day to move cattle around... weaning some youngsters, moving some cows to the "old" bull (Duke) for breeding, others to the "new" bull, Bennett (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/11/a-new-bull.html), and others to be kept separate because they either are already bred for spring calving or they had late calves in the fall and will move to the spring cycle for the next season. Jimmy and Regina had it all figured out who should go where, and we just tried to help out where we could...

On Thursday, Carl got a picture of the cows with their calves behind the house -- he and Jimmy had just moved the temporary fencing to give them another strip of "fresh" grass.

On Friday, Jimmy got additional temporary fencing set up and the cows and calves were moved over to the lot at the handling system.

I had a clipboard with the "plan" of which number cows went where.

We first separated out the ones going to Duke (the old bull) -- this was pre-separation...

After we got those pulled out (with their calves), we moved them down to the field where Duke is located -- both Duke and the cows seemed to be very happy with the move!

Then we separated out the ones that would be in the spring calving cycle. This was a heifer (she only had a tag in one ear) -- she got new tags in both ears signifying her "promotion" to one of the herd cows. She (and the late calving cows from this fall's cycle) will be bred later to produce spring '23 calves. That group as well as those already bred for spring '22 calves went back to the pasture that they had been in previously.

Mocha and Duracell (the two that we had bottle fed in 2020) were in a field that the cows would need to pass through to get to Bennett, so Jimmy and Carl moved them so they would not complicate things...

Hard to see, but there are 5 cows and their calves now moving across the field where Mocha and Duracell had been, on their way to the pasture where Bennett currently is located. One heifer had been moved into his pasture a week or so ago. He didn't come out to visit the new "ladies" but they seemed happy to be in a new pasture. I wonder if they feel like we sometimes did when we got a brand-new manager at IBM, "Great... a new manager to train..." or, in their case, "Great... a new bull to train!"

In the pasture behind the house, there are 3 momma cows (this is one of them) whose calves have been weaned in the process of the move... the calves are in the field with the dairy cows and Mocha and Duracell. Let's just say that none of the participants in the weaning process, including the humans who live in close proximity to the mommas or the calves, are very happy right now (there's a whole lotta' mooin' goin' on!). Regina said that the calves will get hoarse so the momma's can't hear them anymore, and the momma cows will dry up so they won't be in physical discomfort... but... that takes a few days! The weanlings are eating enough on their own to no longer need momma for "groceries", and, it is to the benefit of the momma cows to go ahead and wean their youngsters as they are already bred to deliver in the spring of 2022, but... logic doesn't seem to apply when mommas and babies are separated, at least for a few days!

Once again, we are amazed by the amount of management and planning that needs to go on to steward a farm! 

Thanksgiving

We have SO much to be thankful for, and one of the biggest is family!

We were grateful to join Regina and Jimmy for their Thanksgiving meal:

The spread on the table...

Carl managed to find room for everything on his plate!

We are so grateful to God for all His bounty to us - especially for each other and for family!

Wednesday tasks and a Miss Kitty video

Happy Thanksgiving!

On Wednesday, we got a few tasks around the rig completed, and in the afternoon, Carl and Jimmy went squirrel hunting:

Carl said that he went out hunting for Thanksgiving dinner, but since he got only one juvenile squirrel, we're going to have to use the back-up turkey. (Picture taken as it was starting to get dusky and wasn't terrifically clear.)

The sunset was really spectacular though!

When we returned on Tuesday from 5 nights away in Virginia Beach, we were wondering whether Miss Kitty would be standoffish or happy to see us:

I think she was happy to see us!

A brief Williamsburg visit

On Tuesday, on our way back from Virginia Beach, we stopped at Williamsburg for lunch and a walk around... Even though I went to the last two years of high school and 4 years of college in Williamsburg, I really don't know how the roads go around the city -- I don't know whether that's because new roads have been added (I know that some have) or whether it is because I pretty much stayed on the William and Mary campus and walking in the historic area, and didn't drive very much... at any rate, we found a place to park near Merchants Square and walked which was more in my comfort zone!

Looking toward W&M and the Wren Building from Merchants Square

We were going to The Cheese Shop for lunch

Merchants Square

Carl aptly described the atmosphere inside the Cheese Shop as slightly organized chaos. It was quite crowded, and there were multiple lines to get into: "Order Here", "Pickup Here", "Pay Here". We navigated each one and found two seats next to the front windows where we could people-watch as we enjoyed our sandwiches.

A new addition since I was in school at W&M -- a skating rink right in the middle of DoG (Duke of Gloucester) Street.

It was a bit chilly fall day so folks were enjoying the ice skating!

A view of the Governor's Palace down Palace Green from DoG Street

Some of the colonial houses along DoG Street

We walked from the Wren Building to the Capitol on DoG Street and then crossed over to Nicholson Street and walked back to where we had parked. On the way, we saw a few of the colonial interpreters walking a couple of the carriage horses... I guess back to their pasture...

A picture as the horses got closer to us... just to the left side of the street was a huge oak tree - you can see the branches hanging down over the horses -- a sign on it indicated it to be a "Compton Oak" which I had not heard of - it was a beautiful tree. We didn't get a picture of it, but I found some information about it online: https://www.colonialwilliamsburg.org/trend-tradition-magazine/trend-tradition-spring-2019/tall-treasure/

It was nice to re-trace some of my memories in and around Williamsburg.

Some more cow stories...

I have some cow pictures from the farm that we've taken over the past few weeks that I haven't posted yet... so this will be a collection of various cow pictures...

This is a recent picture of Mocha -- I still want to get one with her next to one of us to show you how big she is, but... you can see her next to that waterer...

This is a picture from last May of me "encouraging" her to go into the dairy yard -- and you can see how her size compares to the same waterer! She wasn't any larger than a medium-large dog. She has spent the last 18 months doing a lot of growing!

 

Some pictures of the "beasties" from across the road.

They tend to gather all at one trough, with only a few choosing to go to one of the other two troughs... I guess they all eventually go to one of the other two troughs until all the feed is gone. When we first started feeding them this fall, they were *very suspicious* of us, but they seem to accept us now.

Carl has learned by experience that it is good to avoid naming any of the feeder calves.... last year, the leader of the feeder calves, always first to the trough was a dairy steer:

We called him "Jersey", which I just used as a descriptive name (because he was a Jersey steer), but... this year, Carl commented on how much he enjoyed the meat at supper one evening, and he found out that it was "Jersey" - thankfully after he had already eaten!

The mama cows and this year's crop of calves are currently in the pasture that is up behind the house, so once or twice a day, we will see them up near the fence and get to enjoy the antics of the young ones.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about a new calf being born and Jimmy catching it, measuring its birth weight, banding, and putting in an ear tag (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/10/a-new-calf.html). There was only one cow yet to deliver (ear tag number 17), and Jimmy had mentioned that it appeared that she may be getting close. One day last week when Gracie was in the shop, Carl and I were near the fence and looking for #17 amongst the cows up at the back of the house, and didn't see her. Additionally, we heard a cow mooing from down in the pasture, and by a count of mama cows, it appeared that only #17 was missing. Jimmy had said that the mama cows often go off on their own when they are ready to deliver, so we followed as Jimmy took a walk to find her and see what was going on...

Sure enough, #17 had had her calf, and he was a big fellow. Jimmy caught him, estimated his weight, banded, and put his ear tag on.

While we were down in the pasture, Jimmy moved the "ribbon tape fence" that he uses as temporary fencing to give the cows a strip of additional grass. They get very vocal about their disappointment that they don't have fresh spring grass for grazing, but at least every few days they get a strip of "new" grass that they haven't trampled down or pooped on.

Back up behind the house... they haven't gone to discover that they have a new grazing area yet, but soon one will decide to head out to see what she can find in the pasture and will discover that there's a new strip of grass available.

This past Thursday, Carl and Jimmy made the trip back to Micro, NC (my understanding is that the town is aptly named) to deliver the last two feeder calves for this year to the processor.

The two feeder calves after being unloaded at the processor.

Carl had told me that the processor location was pretty non-descript with no obvious name displayed - this time, he took a picture of the front of the building, and I can see what he meant.

While there, they also picked up the beef from the two feeder calves that they delivered 3 weeks ago and brought it back.

Sometimes Carl texts me to know their progress; on Thursday, he didn't, but I checked Google Maps...

Since we share our locations with each other on Google Maps, I could see where his phone was reporting him to be and knew that they had arrived at the processor!

It is always interesting to see the cattle and discover their unique characteristics.

Visiting in a house

I wrote that we are staying in a home in Virginia Beach(https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/11/vacationing-in-virginia-beach.html). It is a LOT larger than Gracie -- 5 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, kitchen, dining room, living room and den located on 2 stories and a nice sized lot.

We were talking about things that we like about being in a house... and things that being in a house makes us appreciate about Gracie!

Pros of being in a house:

• Space!
• No need to be concerned about how much water we use -- showering, washing dishes, brushing teeth, anything!
• Full sized washer and dryer -- and the dryer is an LG like I had in our house in Coppell that "sings" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clHpyRzb1PI) when I turn it on or off and when it finishes a cycle - it makes me smile!
  
• We can have a place to do each activity and not have the same space shared for multiple tasks (i.e. we don't need to put our laptops away to eat a meal).
  
• We get exercise going up and down stairs. 
• There is a dishwasher (other than me!).
• Wired (really fast) high speed internet (we have "high speed" internet in Gracie via a MiFi device, but nothing like a cable modem).
• (If we were permanent in a house) Can have a sense of community by being involved in a home church and serving with Christians there.
• (If we were permanent in a house) Develop a knowledge of where our favorite businesses/stores are.
  

Pros of being in Gracie:

• We are never very far away from each other - it is easy to call to the other and get their attention.
• The bathroom is never far away! (in the house the bathrooms are both upstairs! did I mention we're getting exercise) 
• If your neighbors are noisy, either they or you will be moving soon.
  
• The view out the front window can change frequently.
• We can "chase 72 degrees" (temperature in Fahrenheit), and therefore our heating and air conditioning costs can be more reasonable.
  
• Our church community is all over the country and we encounter our church family at various places in our travels.
• We get to try new places to eat and patronize new businesses. We develop favorite places that we can re-visit the next time we're in the area.
  
• No property taxes or HOA fees.
• For us, it's home!
  

Vacationing in Virginia Beach

A couple of months ago, Carl had said that he would like to take a vacation from the motorhome, "When you live in an RV, people think you're on vacation all the time, but it is also our home and there are always a lot of chores, so it would be nice to get away." I think he also wanted, to a small extent, to get away from the demands of Miss Kitty (he is *her* human and she expects him to be at her beck and call!).

So... a few weeks ago when I was at the reunion of the school that I attended in grade school, I talked with one of the folks there and she mentioned that they had a home in Virginia Beach that they rented out. I checked with Carl to see if this was a something he might want to do, we checked with her and she was so gracious towards us, and so we're staying in her home in Virginia Beach. It is just 1/2 block from the beach (though this week is unfortunately not "beach" weather). The home was built in 1930, and has beautiful heart pine floors; the interior of the home is lovely and so welcoming. It is huge for just the two of us -- especially compared to Gracie! We are enjoying resting and relaxing here in Virginia Beach for a few days.

The front of the house

Kendall rents it on airbnb: https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/31435729/

We arrived on Thursday, and it was relatively warm on that day - we walked down to the beach and enjoyed the view of the moonrise (with sunset colors being reflected back to the east).

Looking south down Virginia Beach. We are north of the "touristy" area in a more residential neighborhood, though there is a Marriott in that group of tall buildings about 6 blocks away.

We walked a little ways down the "main drag" for dinner at a Mexican restaurant.

On our way back to the house, we saw a sign advertising a "Holiday Shopping Gala" at the Princess Anne Country Club on Friday... which we visited on Friday.

Full moon when we got back from supper -- there was a lunar eclipse on Thursday night/Friday morning, but... we didn't wake up to see it!

The beautiful room where we're sleeping - but we have the whole home for our use!

Carl in the living room checking out what he can find on TV.

Just a note: even though I said that I thought Carl might have wanted to be away from Miss Kitty for a few days... I think he may be missing her...

😉

We are so thankful to Regina for feeding Miss Kitty while we're away.