Feelin' a bit sheepish...

[Beekissed]

We all want to help others, but feel reluctant to ask for help ourselves. A man at church had a heart attack and surgery. It laid him out, helpless. He and his wife depended upon their church family for practically everything for awhile. It was a hard lesson for him.

He put it like this; he always helped others, receiving his blessings from the Lord. Suddenly he was on the receiving end of “help” and struggled with it. Pride. He realized that for others to receive their blessings, he had to accept help. Who was he to deny others their blessings and the good feeling of helping someone else.

That's exactly the point I came to about 10 yrs ago, where I was no longer holding down a job for the first time since I was 14....depending on someone else for your living after that is a hard, hard thing to do. I had to trust the Lord that it was where He wanted me to be in life, despite ridicule from friends...well...no longer friends of mine....and I still get the look when I say I'm not working, just taking care of my Mom. They all look at me like "riiiiiiiiggggghhhhtttttt.....so, how can you afford to do that???" My only explanation is that God took over and I've not wanted for anything at all, all my needs are provided for, pressed down, shaken together and running over.

I agree, Bay...it's hard to accept help when I was always the one helping others. Then, when I did accept help, I realized I had been hogging a lot of blessings all those years and it truly IS more blessed to give than to receive....others need a chance to give too. My neighbor is out there right now, smoothing gravel......I feel blessed on this end of the giving too!!!

 

[Beekissed]

Gravel is smoothed!!!!! Hallelujah!!!! God is good!!! I pray a blessing on the neighbor for this help.

 

[farmerjan]

The thing is, with being thankful, you can also use your time for things more productive. And it is done now which will be great if it does rain. And he feels good for doing something for a neighbor. So glad for you.

 

[Baymule]

That is awesome that the gravel is spread! And your neighbor knows he did a good deed for his neighbors.

We live in a great neighborhood. Robert just came to get our tractor. He has a sawmill now, his next door neighbor wants the pines cut off his place and Robert can have the lumber. Robert needs the tractor to drag the tree trunk to his sawmill.

 

[henless]

It's so nice to get a big job finished! It's nice when you have friends/neighbors that can help when needed.

 

[Beekissed]

Been getting pretty steady rain these past few days, which is a huge blessing!!!, and that gravel is giving us our money's worth. Nice to be driving the 4Ws back and forth into and out of the shed area, working under there and walking about without encountering mud.

Still working on turning big pallets into a sorting pen...it's like trying to put together a big puzzle, but all the pieces are 10-12 ft long and 4-5 ft wide~no two with the same dimensions, so cutting to fit, tearing them apart to build a different pallet, etc., is in order. Now we are even using regular pallets, slotting them into spaces where they fit as well. It's all a hodgepodge of construction and the pallet wood is hard as iron, so it's all done with maximum effort....makes the tools hot~some even smoking hot~and muscles sore.

Just trying to get this all done~at least good enough to do a sorting...will have to do the detailed items later~to get the big boy in with the girls by or near June 1st and also take advantage of this cooler weather these next few days. They've been sharing a fence line for the last 4 days in hopes of someone feeling frisky enough to start cycling by the time they are joined in one paddock.

 

[Baymule]

Yes it is hard work, yes pallets are some sort of alien wood composite mixed with iron filings and concrete. They should build cars and trucks out of that stuff, it would end wrecks and put body shops out of business. LOL LOL

A lot of hard work now, but you never back down just because something is hard. Just look at what you’ll have when you are done. It sure will make working your sheep a lot easier.

 

[Beekissed]

The new sorting system needs some tweaking, which we knew would happen, but it's still discouraging. The alley was too wide and also too tall for me to work it, even with me standing on a railroad tie. The catch pen will have to be expanded by the time we have lambs, as it's just too small for our purposes, though our flock fit in it, it's a bit snug.

The slats on the lamb pen were just wide enough for the more slender lambs to squirt through, so that had to be rectified. We also want to have some halters and clips along the alley for keeping heads up if I need them to be....got tired of pulling heads up out of the depths of the alley to check sheep over.

We need to get my sheep chair tweaked so we can use it to trim hooves when needed...we'll be ditching all the ewes that need that a lot, except for Rose, who has an honorary place in the flock no matter what. So, the chair will still come in handy and I'll hang it up down here when not in use.

Our $250 set of sheep shears are nigh worthless and the blades dull within a few swipes of the clippers, gumming up with lanolin. I can't imagine what it would be like to shear truly wool breeds but these clippers won't even cut the lamb coats off these first year ewes. They desperately NEED to get those soggy, dirty, nasty coats off before it gets really hot and they don't seem able to shed them(these are not full hair lambs but have some measure of Texel and/or Dorper in the mix).

Anyone who shears their own have any tips as to why a brand new blade in brand new shears are so ineffectual?

 

[Baymule]

You have to oil them frequently and wash them off n some sort of solution to cut the grease. I only know that from @Ridgetop bringing her shears and showing me what to do.

When we took 6 of my ewes to auction, 4 of them were poor shedders and kept a Mohawk of matted mess. I still have 3 like that, but they consistently have twins or even triplets that are real nice lambs. So I just got a set of hand shears to trim them up. Looks like I’ll have another one, Frimplepants is a woolly puff ball.

I’ll take before, during and after pictures. I got a feeling that the after pictures are going to look like my girls were attacked by a phycho squirrel with broken teeth.

 

[Beekissed]

You have to oil them frequently and wash them off n some sort of solution to cut the grease. I only know that from @Ridgetop bringing her shears and showing me what to do.

When we took 6 of my ewes to auction, 4 of them were poor shedders and kept a Mohawk of matted mess. I still have 3 like that, but they consistently have twins or even triplets that are real nice lambs. So I just got a set of hand shears to trim them up. Looks like I’ll have another one, Frimplepants is a woolly puff ball.

I’ll take before, during and after pictures. I got a feeling that the after pictures are going to look like my girls were attacked by a phycho squirrel with broken teeth.

How often, say....after every 4 strokes down the body? Because that's about all we get is four strikes down and then they start to snag in the hide and no longer cut. The solution....is it a degreaser solution? Does the clippers have to sit in them for awhile or is it just a dip and swish? How often do the blades have to be changed out on these shearers?