Okay Robin

Robin, my trusty sidekick in the classroom at BOCES, says she gets frustrated  when she logs on and there is no new post for her to read.  Hi, Robin, I know your face is turning red right now.  It's Saturday morning and I have so much to do I don't want to think about it, but I had a good start.  I goofed off last night and laid on the sofa a while, playing with the puppies and watching silly TV.  I pay for all these movie channels and sometimes it's "57 Channels and Nothing's On," (Bruce tells it like it is).  I drifted off at 10 or so after bringing it what I thought would be enough firewood.  The big log I dragged in here to get me through the night wouldn't fit in the stove.  Have to learn to split wood, but my old joints shudder at the thought.  I haven't turned the heat on yet and have a bet with myself as to how long I can go without turning the expensive electric baseboards on.  I filled a giant dye pot up with water in the milk room and brought it to boil before turning it down to simmer.  Figured it would give the leaky room enough warmth to keep the pipes from freezing in there.  We'll see.  I woke up three times in the night to stoke the stove and check the barn.  Everybody doing fine and no new lambs.  Shooting for negative population growth this year, with some severe culling.  Just can't winter over this many any more.  Thor, Finn and Knut will be very happy doggies.  If I have sheep in the freezer I just throw a quarter in their igloos and they chow down for days.  I was creeping around the great wooly bodies in the wee hours this morning, with my headlight making an eerie glow in the dark.  It's one of my favorite times in the barn.  T.J. and Robin, the new lambs, are doing great.  Their sweaters keep them toasty warm.  I love to slip my hand under the knitted wool and feel the warmth.  I named them after the two people who make my very challenging job workable.  My classroom aides back me up, watch my back, help me teach and keep me safe.  They are the ultimate professionals who, I hope, will someday think as highly of me as I do of them.  There is no way to adequately thank them for what they do for me every day.    I have to hustle here and get some orders ready to take to our little post office in Brookfield.    Have a lovely day everyone, and enjoy your holiday rush.   My Christmases on the farm are very quiet and reflective, a mere pittance of what I used to enjoy in the old days, when the kids were home and I was living in my center hall Dutch colonial with five bedrooms and four bathrooms.    I would decorate to the hilt and drive up and down in front of the house to check out how the tree and mantle looked from the road.  Now we tie a branch to the support pole in the barn and hang some balls on it.  How life has changed....but now we have the magnificent hillside and land all around us to be our Christmas decorations, with sheep in the barn - our symbolic manger.  Can't get more Christmasy than that.