October already!

We had to go to a funeral last Thursday, we were gone all day and got home to milk a little later than usual. I took the shopping into the house while Anita went to the barn. I heard her raising her voice at something, or someone, and instinctively knew that Randy had taken advantage of our absence and broken in to be with the girls. He had! Hard to tell how long he had been in there or whether the girls had responded to his 'aftershave', so we left him in there and accepted the fact that we will be kidding in March. Comforted ourselves with the thought that we would rather have 4 kids in March than 70 lambs in March and that the buck lambs do not seem as persistent as Randy..... yet!

This has been the driest September on record since 1900 and temperatures have been high, too. We had to stop cutting wood one day last week, feeling light-headed, we came home to discover the temperature was 90F in the shade.... at the end of September! In fact, at the start of October, we are still wearing shorts. The leaves are changing colour, the race to get ready for winter is on, yet we still have days where the heat of the day forces us to stop certain tasks. The wood pile is looking very good, though, and we will be snug all winter. The chimney is swept and we added extra height to it to try and eliminate the downdraught that we usually get with a NNE wind. The old chimney was just under the height of the rooftop and we think that was the main cause of the problem. It has withstood the power of the wind this weekend but we will add one more brace.... better to be over the top than wish we had when it succumbs to a South Dakota wind.

Just look at that sky! While autumn may not be my favourite season, it sure is pretty, so I have to share some photos taken from just outside the door. I feel so very privileged to live with these views on a daily basis and I still feel the same way as that first morning I woke up to this view. It is a lot of sky and I love it!