summer of the goat

As I'm sitting here typing, my back door is open and I can hear my son directing his friend that lives two doors over where to launch an egg into our backyard.  Ahh, summer.  Summer (and Instagram) have swallowed this blog whole.  But today felt like a good day to yarn a story.

 I think I've mentioned here a time or two over the years that I have wanted goats. This summer we decided that the time was right, and we added two goats to the backyard mini-farm!  They are elf eared, mini La Manchas. One is in milk right now and one is pregnant.  They are sisters that have never been separated, and they are sweet, sweet!

La Manchas are a dairy breed that have pretty high butter fat content as far as goat milk goes.  And even though they are minis, we are getting about three quarts a day from our little milker!

I think we have finally blossomed under the responsibility of being goat owners.  Milking is a lot of commitment!  And I knew this going in.  I really did!  But I am slow to warm up to change, and I spent the first two weeks of them being here feeling a little resentful.  Because all of the sudden, we couldn't hit the road at a moments notice and run to Austin for the night.  We can't even go to dinner out of town!  Being the kind of person I am, the "don'ttellmewhattodo" kind of person that I am, I struggled with this.  I felt like the goats were being really bossy, forcing me to be home at 7 to milk!  All the while, knowing that I was being ridiculous!  

We are over that hump now (or I am over it, no one else in the family really struggled with that!).  Now I am just enjoying them!  I love milking and having all the milk on hand I could ever need for cheese experiments, yogurt, etc.  (speaking of which, next on the list is goat cheese cake-yum!!!). 

Goats are a lot more work than we have experienced animal wise.  They like interaction.  They like to eat...a lot.  They get weird illnesses.
They offer us sustenance and companionship.
We're all a little crazy about them!