3 Little Stories :)

A Sand Story:  Papa took the truck to the 'city' the other day and picked up about a ton of sand for our plastering. Too bad our new skid steer could not pick it up out of the trailer as the sand was too heavy for it to lift over the side of the trailer!! So Papa shoveled a bunch of sand into a second feed bag and tried to take the smaller bag out with the skid steer!! Well.. the bag ripped right open and all the sand landed in the bottom of the trailer!! When Papa tried to take the larger bag out it slipped to the back of the trailer and this 

was the result!! In the picture Papa is already shoveling sand to the front of the trailer to try and get it to level out.. it never did he just emptied more sand from the bag to the trailer and took the bag out. Chip is never far from Papa when he's home. See him laying beside the trailer?

J was a great helper.. holding out the straps so Papa could put the forks in them. 

Ready for lift off!! 

Bringing it to the 'mixing area' :) J looking on, feeling a bit cocky I think :) 

A Note About The Skid Steer: This is the same skid steer, or bobcat, that Papa used to borrow from work.  We recently bought it from his bosses for our farm workhorse. Papa's work got a newer one!  We needed something to move bags of feed, bales, what have you around on the farm. We're also really looking forward to using on steer butchering day to hang and move our dead steers!! No more cutting into quarters and wrestling the chunks of meat into the back of the travelall. Now we'll be able to hang it right up to skin etc and then place it right into a plastic lined trailer to take to the butcher or to hang in the yard to cure before we cut and wrap it ourselves. I have to admit I really wasn't super keen on buying it, even thought we got it at a GREAT price, but Papa was quite insistent and so far it's making BOTH our lives easier. I can't wait to do forest clearing next spring as the skid steer will make moving cut logs so much easier without having to cut every log into firewood sized chunks. It also makes moving bags of feed SUPER easy and it's so much nicer to have the feed close to the animals that are eating it :) I have to admit though that we'd probably still be talking it over if it hadn't been for my brother Danny.. we had them over for supper one night and he told us he'd give his left arm for a skid steer (and his right for an airplane:) as it would be so helpful with his business. I knew some day we'd need something to help with the lifting work on the farm but I'd hope to put it off for a few more years.. and quite honestly.. I was hoping to have a bit more house built and paid for first. Papa got a nice $$ bonus for competing his IP test, the final of all 4 apprentice years, and it paid for most of the skid steer. 

A Cow Story: Maggie LOVES the skid steer!! You can see her in a couple of the pictures. They must have fed her with one at the dairy and she RUNS over to see what it's up to every time Papa drives it! Often MOOOOOing and looking impatient!