Mom told me to write a book. I think she honestly believes I make most of the stuff that happens on a day-to-day basis up. I'm so not that creative... So, today in the barn, I decided I would tackle a blog. My husband thinks (correctly so) that I'm techno illiterate, so this should be interesting.
Tonight, I think I'll start from the beginning of my farming career, then we'll see where that takes us.
I (Sandi) am the middle child of 3 darling girls my mom Nancy and dad Harry procreated. (Gross...) Anyhow, they assured me it only happened 3 times, so I'm good. Anyhow, we are the proud decendants of a string of dairy farmers. Both my mom and dad grew up on a dairy farm. They fell in love (I think) and blah blah blah, we happened.
My siblings are Peg (older) and Lisa (younger) and they happen to be my idols and my best friends... ahhh, sigh... We grew up as the 'hired men' of the farmstead as we were the cheapest... (gotta love child labour). Mom and dad built our 48 tie stall barn in 1980, which I believe, was the absolute worst time to take on debt... Hence, the cheap labour!! We housed mostly holsteins (which came from the Emmott line - dad) and some Guernseys (mom's Maus side). Our farm was and still is on Paris Plains Church Road in Paris, Ontario. Most of dad's friends and neighbours figured dad was disappointed that he had only girls, but in our defence, dad would reply "the boys will come"... They did. We'll get at that later.
My sisters and I worked before and after school in the barn. A bit more hard-core when we hit high school. Saturdays were reserved for pitchin' out pens (sucked...) Sundays were church then Grandma's... I actually miss that thinking back... The year we really became the main labour at Mauslea Farms was the year of 1990. We hosted the International Plowing Match and dad decided to do some acrobatics putting up some blower pipes, broke his ankle. Side note: My father and I are the MOST accident prone people EVER!! We quickly learned that you have to dump an entire tank of milk if you milk a treated cow (never understood why dad got so mad... do now.) Learned that if you skip some steps when milking, you get more of these treated cows (hence, more chance of the wrath of Harry).
ok, I'm tired. I'm far too long winded...
Cheers,
SB
