fair...

 Remember these 2 cute little calves?  Well, they grew up....

With all of the time our boys spent with their cows, they also grew into beloved, sweet, docile beasts who our boys absolutely LOVED!  

I love this picture!

Jayden with Beefy

So, you can imagine how we all felt going into fair week.  Here the kids are getting in one last walk around the pasture the night before load in day at the fair.

Spencer with Steaky

Anaya with Tornado

Look how nice Spencer got Steaky to 'set up!'  Well, remember this picture because at the fair, it didn't go quite so easily!

Cleaning every last bit of them before the fair in the morning...

Giving lots of love!

Anaya cleaning Tornado's hooves with an old toothbrush...

Luisa helped too...

Easton and Bullseye...

I am not a huge animal fan, but I will admit, I cried like a baby when they pulled out of our yard.  I knew they wouldn't ever be back and I knew how hard this was going to be on the boys.

The morning of the big boys show...

Before the show, Ryan took the boys and their steers into the ring for a trial run...Oh.my.stars...These sweet, docile creatures who are walked daily, freaked out when they got in the ring, even Ryan couldn't get them to behave.  That caused everyone to get a little nervous.  Poor Spencer had his toes stepped on by his 1390 lb. steer on several occasions and it didn't feel good!  It was so neat to see several of the adults in our 4H club come and talk to the boys and encourage them.  We have such a great club and they really take the time to invest in our kids. 

Thankfully, they did calm down some and the boys were able to walk them into the ring.  You can see Spencer leaning into Steaky as he was still being obstinate, he took a few little leaps but Spencer held on tight and kept a smile on his face!  Although he came in last for showmanship with his unruly steer, the judge did acknowledge the fact that he could tell Spencer put a lot of time in with his steer, which made us all happy.  They did very well and had a good time!

 Easton did so good in his show, we were told that a parent had to hold the lead rope for his age group so that is how we practiced.  I thought he would freak out when the judge had the parents just stand inside the ring, but not hold the rope.  But, instead he just did his thing and never even flinched!  So proud of him.

Anaya's show was on the following day as she had a dairy calf. 

She had to be dressed in black and white to show Tornado.

She came in 5th for showmanship and her calf placed 2nd in the Junior Bull category!

She was the most excited over the neon green lunch sack!

Anaya and her friend Hollis, too cute!

Barn duty!

The night of the auction the boys had to talk to potential buyers at the fair.  4H is so good for the kids, it teaches so much more than just caring for their animal, there is speaking, writing (lots of work in their fair notebooks,) marketing and many other practical skills being learned through the whole process.

Their steers did remarkably well the night of the sale...

We had prepped both boys for last years sale prices and warned them that they probably wouldn't make much money after all their expenses.  They would have done it for nothing, they loved it so much.  But, thankfully this year prices were up and they did very well!  So well, that their eyes bugged out of their heads when they found out, it was pretty funny.

More barn chores...

relaxing!

Having fun hanging out...

Cow and kid dress up competition, Jayden, Spencer and Anaya all got prizes.  I missed it because while they were out having fun, I was in the barn doing their barn duty!  Now that is love folks!

Dylan during the Ag Olympics.

Tug of war between the horse barn and the cattle barn, cattle won. "We always win," says our 4H leader, "cow kids have greater upper body strength." 

Easton before his auction.

a few last hugs the night before loading them out.

We did let the kids ride a couple rides one night, but mostly we stayed at the other side of the fairgrounds all week.

Finally the dreaded load out day came and it was pretty sad to see all of the kids load up their steers and walk away with the harness in hand and bury their heads into their parents arms and cry.  There have been tears, but they already have their calves for next year and want to do it all over again.

 Meet Stetson and Duke!

 And another adventure begins...

The newest addition...

to our little farm is Easton's calf Bullseye.

Not sure why he choose that name, but Bullseye it is!

Bullseye and I got acquainted fairly quickly after the boys brought him home from the auction.  He was in the back of Ryan's truck and Easton and his friend were looking at him when he decided to jump out of the truck!  I happened to be nearby and heard Easton yelling something about him getting out, so I ran over just in time to pretty much catch him mid air and tackle him to the ground!  He only weighs about 80lbs, but he is a fiesty little fella, and got up despite my best efforts to keep him down, so I held him around the neck and was trying to not let him go as help finally arrived in the form of my 15 year old son, who stood there and laughed at me and turned out to be no help at all!  I was out of breath as the little bugger was trying so hard to wriggle free from my grip.  I really wanted someone to put a halter on the dumb thing so I could stop fighting with it!  Finally the rest of the boys and Ryan came to my rescue and put the halter on it and I was able to limp in the house and catch my breath!  So, I guess I earned the badge of 'good farm wife' with my rodeo worthy calf wrestling skills!

Welcome to the farm Bullseye, and let's not do that again!

4H

If you read this post and this post, then you know that the boys have been raising feeder calves for 4H.  Well, today was the big day for these 2.  4H small Market show day.  Aren't they the cutest little farmers you ever did see?

Today was the day all of the time spent with their calves practicing was put on display for all to see!  Here are a few pictures of them with their calves over the last few months as they cared for them and learned all of the many things they needed to know for raising and showing their calves.

We learned about all sorts of things like, banding, dehorning, marketing, showmanship, clipping, trimming and yes, I say we because I was at like 98 percent of their meetings(because Ryan was working,no choice,) I too got quite the education!

At one of the clinics they had a bunch of calves for the kids to practice showing and the girls and Easton had a cow to 'hang on to' as well! I am sure there is much more of this is in our future!

Jayden and Spencer practicing 'setting up' their calves using their show sticks(who knew there was such a thing!)....

 Bath time!(once again, who knew? Oh I could go on and tell you about the blow drying, hair spraying, hair dying that goes on with these show cows, but this is getting long as it is, so I'll just stick to our cows...)

I love this picture because it shows the sweet smile on Jayden's face as he looks at Socks.  This kid LOVES his cows!  So much so, that he wants to be a beef farmer when he grows up, or actually now.  He asked for more cows for his birthday!

These boys have worked so hard between shoveling and hauling manure, stacking hay and straw,  to feeding and walking their cows and all without complaint.  This 4H project has been such a great experience for them.  (sometimes a pain for us with the meetings and expenses that we have yet to recoup...but totally worth it!)

I am not a huge fair fan, in fact I think I was at the fair once since we moved here. But, this week, we have made up for that, we have been at the fair every. single. day. and then some....

 There they are Socks and T-Bone.  They are tiny yet, they didn't make weight so we can not sell them at the auction as we had hoped, but we kinda figured that would happen, we had a late start due to some misinformation, but no biggie, they could potentially sell them in the barn on Saturday, however, neither of the boys want to sell them!

Jayden took 3rd place for showmanship in his division!  We were pretty happy with that for his first time ever.  Way to go Jayden!

 Spencer took 6th place out of 10 I believe, which was very good and we were so happy for that as well!  Great job Spencer!

They also both got A's on their project notebooks which detailed all of the costs and feed types and amounts, photos, marketing info, etc...lots of work!  So proud of you boys!!