I Dropped Everything for My Dixie

The best laid plans go awry…when someone gets hurt.

Friday was starting out as a beautiful day. The sun was rising and I woke ready to seize the day. I had been struggling for a blog post idea all week, but I got a great idea in the shower and I was good to go.

I could bang out the essay and post it to my blog early, do a big ‘ol bunch of shout out tweets that needed posting, read and comment on a ton of blogs that I follow, and continue to work on my new picture book. (I know the priority should be in reverse order but I’m still grappling with the ‘platform thing.’) I was excited to get to work but first I had to get my ‘farm’ chores out of the way.

The dogs and hubby were fed inside and I was out in the yard feeding, haying and watering the goats and wild birds and suddenly I heard one of my dogs snarl and then a goat cried out! I dropped the hose and ran to the fence to see my goat Dixie scampering into the barn (It’s a dinky 8 x 10 shed but I have visions of grandeur) and two of my dogs, Bella and Star, checking each other over. So, I think no harm, no fowl and finish my front yard chores.

Thank goodness within a few minutes I got into the yard to tidy up the goat’s area to notice that Dixie was still in the barn. They only go in there when it rains or when one is not feeling well. So, I went in to check on her to find that her ear was literally ripped down the middle and dripping blood! Apparently, one of the dogs got spooked and must have caught a tooth on Dixie’s ear tag hole. Poor little Dix.

I sprang into the house, grabbed my first aid kit and called out to my husband for help. Although Dixie is extremely docile and sweet, she is a whopping 200 pounds and I need my hubby to hold her so I can administer care. I doused her wound with Betadine and slopped on Neosporin before running back into the house to call the vet.

From joining two goat groups on Yahoo Groups when I first got the itty-bitty kids three years ago, I learned early on that a goat owner basically has to be the vet because goats aren’t considered valuable and most vets don’t know much about their care. I’m lucky to have a vet who has a goat herd but wouldn’t you know it, he was out of the office and his vet tech knew nothing.

I called Ms. Robin Cotten, a member of ChevonTalk and the owner of Bending Tree Goat Ranch in Tennessee, and got good but strange advice. First, I gave Dix a tetanus shot and then we ‘Crazy Glued’ Dixie’s ear together. Yep, you heard that right. Supposedly they use similar glue on people during surgical procedures. We then kept her quiet at the picnic table and watched her. She appeared to be fine and her ear was together.

Handsome Cowboy’s mom showed up and we sat a while longer with Dix. She was then put back in with the fold with Dot and Daisy.

Look, she was back together in one piece! That was until those darn viper flies showed up, and soon after Dixie twitched her ears to the point where the glue was wrangled off and her ear parts were swaying in the breeze once more.

I had nightmares about my little Dix and although hours had passed I knew we had to try it one more time. This time we put our heads together to come up with a better plan for healing success.

Whala! We crazy glued the pieces of her ears together and then splinted her ear with cardboard panels held in place with rubber bands. She was a little curious about it at first and tried to bite at the cardboard but thank goodness she couldn’t quite reach it. It reminded me of that tendril of hair that I would always try to catch after coming out of the salty ocean. Darn, my mother kept my hair too short, and here I digress.

It seemed that Dixie got immediate relief probably because the flies couldn’t get at the wound and perhaps her ear felt more like her ear again and not open-wound fringed fragments colliding and causing her hurt in each breeze.

It’s Monday and the splint is intact but I won’t know whether the repair worked for a few more days. Her ear isn’t bothering her and I plan to leave it alone to allow her system to heal it as well. I hope to see her again intact soon. Please keep your fingers crossed for my baby girl. (I’m not going to say it out loud but between you and me, this sweet darling doll is my favorite.) So here’s hoping Dixie looks like this again…

By the way, we cut up a Domino’s pizza box for Dixie’s splint and Handsome Cowboy is now calling Dixie “Domino.”  He’s a James Bond freak. So am I but it’s Sean Connery and, if need be, Roger Moore only…okay the new guy’s alright too.  My “Domino Dix” is hopefully on the mend.

I apologize for dropping the ball on my blog, and not shouting out to my Twitter friends; nor did I read and comment on my fellow bloggers’ posts. Progress on my new story is, as they say in NY, fogettaboudit.

Thanks for bearing with me and checking in to read my albeit, late post. Has anyone else out there had a pet emergency where you had to address a problem with your pet on your own? I’d love to hear your stories and I bet everyone else would appreciate it as well. :0)

Club-Content Contest Winner of a Post About Mom!!- In The Valley With Mom

Hi Gang,

Last week on my blog you saw a contest post entry from a fellow member of Club-Content!, a group of bloggers helping bloggers improve and post quality content on their blogs. My entry was posted on another member’s blog,  for consideration in “A Contest About Your Mom.”

Guess what? I won it; I won my first writing contest as a new author and received a cash prize too-boot! It was a humbling experience as my mom came through for me again. Please read on…..

IN THE VALLEY WITH MOM-

My brother called me in the middle of a sunny September day last year to tell me that my mother passed away. I was 1400 miles away but it felt like I was on the Moon.

It was a sudden thing; she wasn’t ill. It stopped my world; it didn’t spin. I blinked and my mother was gone.

We mobilized; got to Florida; experienced sorrow mixed with wonderful, laughable, tear-filled recollections of my mom with close family; then returned home. I was empty and lost.

Mom hadn’t wanted my husband and I and our pet-clan moving far away to Texas in 2008 but she respected our decision. The distance didn’t hurt our relationship; in fact it got better and we maintained our daily phone call ritual but usually spoke more than once because we had to tell each other everything!

There’s a valley behind our house where every morning I walk my dogs and goats down to get exercise and greens and I immerse myself in quiet nature. It’s beautiful and peaceful and quiet there, and this is when I’d give my mother a call. My mom was pretty much a control freak most of my life and had an opinion about everything I did; so what else was new. But in the valley we spoke in a way that was a lot kinder and equal and we became closer than we ever were.

We were finally friends and I actually looked forward to our ‘morning valley talks.’

Over the fall and winter since she passed, the trees became bare, cold skeletons and I didn’t take the animals down to the valley. I walked down alone. I had only one message of hers on my phone and I’d call it countless times to hear her voice. She didn’t close with her usual “Love you” but it was her voice just the same.

Imagine my malaise when I recently upgraded my phone to realize that her voice would be lost to me forever.

Spring has arrived and my world has slowly started to spin again. We’ve all begun walking down to the valley every morning. When we get to a spot I call ‘Serenity Circle’ I whisper, “Good Morning God. Good Morning Mom,” and with that, without fail, a full on energized, fabulous breeze hits each and every leaf on the trees and it fills me up and makes me smile.

God is with me. Mom is with me. I am not alone.

**On a Happier note: I realized that my mother’s voice is not lost to me because I have videos! Here’s one with her that makes me laugh…something I haven’t felt like doing while writing this post!

Making Grandma’s (Mom’s) Cassata Cake

**If your looking for insight into writing good content and attracting followers of your blog  why not visit Club-Content now!

The Liebster Award Encourages Discovery and Support of New Bloggers

Hi Gang!

Imagine my surprise when I received an email from Maria at Hummingbird and Heart saying that she nominated me for a Liebster Award! Whoopee an award was what I first thought to myself. My second thought was what the heck is a Liebster Award. So I popped over to Maria’s blog to find out, and lifted the following explanation:

“Liebster is a German word meaning ‘dearest’, ‘beloved’ or ‘favorite’ and the award is given to bloggers that you feel deserve it and have less than 200 followers. The idea is to help them find more followers by sharing our favorites.

Here are the steps that accompany the recognition:

1. Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog.
2. Link back to the blogger who presented the award to you.
3. Copy and paste the blog award on your blog.
4. Present the Liebster Blog Award to 5 blogs of 200 followers or less who you feel deserve to be noticed.
5. Let them know they have been chosen by leaving a comment at their blog”

I want to thank Maria for her nomination and I ask that you visit her blog to find great posts on baking, crafting and celebrations.

Quite frankly, I can’t tell how many followers a blog has if it is not published by the blog author so I don’t really know if my recommended blogs have under 200 followers but I’m already ripping my hair out of my head because my laptop is limping and freezing up every two seconds, so my nominations are of blogs that I consider to be tiny treasure posts that I enjoy finding in my email or on Facebook and know that I won’t be disappointed when I click on through.

One favorite blog of mine is Michelle Davis’ The Goat Granny, and that’s simply because I love photos of farm life, grandchildren and goats! You know I’ve got 3 princess goats of my own, so I’m a bit twisted when it comes to anything ‘goats’; however, Michelle also posts about all natural products you can make yourself and offers all sorts of little tidbits that are worthwhile to read and follow.

I already wrote a post on artist Ziggy Shortcrust (Cathy Brumby) but I just know that folks are going to be paying big money for her art very, very soon and I’m very happy to have been a subject of one of her Five-Minute Faces! Her work is unbelievably good and her art will make you happy.

Akers of Toons is a neat little blog by a hubby and wife team. They sell cartoon nostalgia goods and Jessie Akers is a master whittler. He carves all sorts of ‘shelf elfs,’ driftwood men, and now candle tiki dudes. I’m just happy to know that they’ve begun to sell their Toon-Folk on Ebay because I’ve got to get my hands on one little guy!

Well gang, hours into putting this post together, I can honestly say that when I went to the other 3 of my blog picks to grab photos, I was surprised to see that they already had won this award. The other blogs that I follow are large author-type or social networking blogs with thousands of followers. Sooo, I’m going with two of my very favorite blogs instead…even though they might not be teensy.

Kathy Radigan’s, blog is My Dishwasher’s Possessed and her posts contain sweet stories of her hubby, 3 children and life happenings. Kathy was one of my blog’s first followers and she’s never missed a chance to help my blog along, as well as countless others’ blogs, and now would be a good time for me to SHOUT OUT- FOLLOW MY DISHWASHER’S POSSED! Thanks for all your kind help Kathy (Smoochies!)

I’ve already posted about this kind gal that I truly admire and although I am sure that Penny Watson’s blog Penelope’s Romance Reviews has got to have a large following her blog is downright hysterical and if you like to laugh, and who doesn’t really, you’d be doing yourself a favor in following her posts.

Please take a minute this weekend to stop by my favorite blogs and give ‘em a follow. Thanks gang!

Oh, my children’s story LUCCI THE NO SMOOCHIE POOCHIE is on sale for only $1.99. Download it or gift it to the kids in your life!

The Getting to Know Me Post #3- Star aka Goat #4

This one was brought into the house as a 6-month old pup by the Handsome Cowboy. He held her out to me and all I could say was, “What’s that?” I said it with disdain in my voice no less. You see my 14-year old Basset Boy Dillon had just passed away the day before. I was heart-broken and a mess to say the least.

Handsome Cowboy had heard that I had lost another basset hound (Dex) in surgery years before. At the time I was living with my mother and she was told that one of the best ways to heal a mourning heart was to get another dog as soon as possible. My mother surprised me by taking a drive out to a basset hound breeder where I chose my pup Dillon. (He was twice the size of his siblings and was bopping one on the head with his big ‘ol paw when my heart first melted.) Dillon is also a character in my children’s book LUCCI THE NO SMOOCHIE POOCHIE.

I know Handsome Cowboy meant to help me but I was given absolutely no time to mourn the loss of my beloved boy. I looked at her and said, “You found a 6-month old at a puppy place. What the heck is wrong with her?”

“Well, she had a bad case of worms,” H.C. replied. Oh great, not only was I not given a chance to mourn, I was not given a chance to pick my own dog, and I was not given the chance that every basset owner dies for…to have a teeny-weeny droopy-eared spotted pup trip over her ears every time she runs! (Just think Elizabethan-collared dog who gets caught in the grass when it runs but with a basset pup it’s the ears that get ’em every time.)

(A shot of Star? Nope, I got a wormy 6-month old but I couldn’t resist showing you a basset hound puppy.)

“Donna, she had the same markings as Dillon and acted so sweet that my eyes watered up. I couldn’t leave her then because it was as if she was meant for us.”

A few hours later, after watching her play and appreciating that she did indeed look an awful lot like Dillon, I realized that Handsome Cowboy was right. Star was meant for us, and soon she would fit right in…and I mean right in.

For instance, Star chose to share the bed right away. She does this thing I call ‘The Steamroller,’ where she climbs the steps to the bed and proceeds to march up my body and plop herself down on my chest. This is a pre-sleep move; she gets lulled with ear rubs, plows under the covers next to me, drops her head on the pillow, lights out. She does this while watching TV too (Please excuse the goofy pj’s. I’m *clears throat* years old and I still wear Winnie the Pooh!)

We lived in South Florida when we first got Star but fast-forward to now to meet the Texas country girl. We all love it out here; however, Star is really in her element and has blossomed. She rolls in the hay, digs in the dirt, and sleeps in the sunshine.

My whole purpose for moving out to Texas was the possibility that I could have ‘livestock.’ Correction, livestock sounds business-like; my purpose was to have bigger critters on which to dote. So, we got our three little Boer goat kids, Daisy, Dixie and Dot three years ago this month. Well, soon after Star began acting like a goat. If the goats ate leaves Star would try to eat leaves. If the goats got grapes and carrots, Star only got carrots once I realized that she’d take the grapes and hide them all over the house.

Star really bonded with the kids.

Now, a few years later, you’ll still find Star wherever the goats are…unless she’s in the house.

Then, you’re more likely to find Star flopping out cold somewhere. I’ve got a bad back so I use a heating pad a lot, and I’ve got to fight the dogs off to get at it. Here’s Star with our little dapple doxi Luca…he is such a Mommy’s Boy!

See those things all over the floor? (I swear that’s not dirt; the lighting’s weird!) Yes, my house is lined with dogs beds all over the place but when I tell star to get on her dog bed, she’ll look at me as if to say,”Dog bed? What dog bed?” Go figure they’ve all got me wrapped around their paws and hoovies!

Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your weekend and give the little and big loves in your life tons of SMOOCHIES!

Oh nuts; I left something important out and that is to ask you all what stories do you have about a pet who might think he or she is something else or at least really relates to another species?  I know you’ve got ’em and this newbie blogger apologizes for not including this question in the first place. Go ‘head; you know you want to!