Jason Wiebe Dairy

We had the darling-est  little calf born on our farm yesterday!  It was born 25 days early. (In case you didn’t know, a cow’s gestation is normally 282 days.) Normally we move the pregnant heifers to another pen before they have their calves so they can be under a roof and in thick straw but this little gal was born before we had her mama moved.  She is doing very well.  We needed to borrow a goat nipple from a neighbor to feed it as our regular calf bottle nipple was too large. The normal birth weight for our calves is 70-90 pounds but this calf only weighs 27.6 pounds. It is dark brown and is very cute.

Well, she doesn’t like to be called Baby, but, she IS the baby of the family!  And the way 3 year olds are…sometimes they are BIG and can do it MYSELF and sometimes the are too small to do what you want them to do.  And they still like to be rocked and carried around on Mommy’s hip.

1 year ago we went to Miami and met our little Haitian baby for the first time.  We loved her but had almost no idea what she was really like.  We know alot more by now.  She loves to sing and has learned a dozen songs since she’s home.  She loves to talk but acts like she absolutely has forgotten every word of Creole. It’s totally amazing how many English words she has learned.  She loves to eat, especially what she calls “sandwiches” which is a piece of bread cut in half with butter in the middle. She’s sassy and bossy and noisy and… She’s a sweet heart.  One year has flown by and we look forward to another year with her with joy!

Today was a special day…one we have been awaiting for quite some time.  The Final Adoption of our little Julie from Haiti.  The court session was at 1:15 with quite a number of our faithful friends and relations attending.  We thank each one of them for sharing in our special time.  Even though Julie has been with us for 7 months there is something very special about knowing she is now a “Wiebe“!  Celebrated the occasion with stopping at The Scoop for ice cream before taking our other 3 children back to school.  Tomorrow for supper Grandpa and Grandma and some of the Uncles and Aunts and cousins will join us for supper in celebration.

August 23 our first born son had his 13th birthday.  He’s at that age where a bottle of cologne and a bunch of books makes him happy!

This post is a bit overdue.  A week ago Saturday morning at 2:00 A.M. Jason made a trip to the bathroom and on returning to the bedroom he noticed a rosy glow outside the window.  Upon open the curtains he exclaimed, “Oh, my goodness, the hay shed is on fire!!!”  And so it was. Totally engulfed in flames.  We called the fire department but just let the fire burn. Lost about 100 round bales, some alfalfa and some hay.  The hay is the greater loss as far as the bales and hay shed are concerned.  Many friends arrived to stand around in the night with us as we listened to the crackling of the fire.  Luckily there was almost no breeze that night so there was not much as far as embers blowing around.  It was really smoky in the house and worse in the milking parlor for a number of days.  That’s a little more excitement than most of us wish for!

Julie has been home from Haiti for 6 months now!  I can’t believe it…it just doesn’t seem that long! There has been lots of progress…lots of new things learned.  Her language skills are just exploding! We get our chuckles out of her sentences…”I love to wear barefoot” and ” I’m gonna need more ketchup”.  Some are still half English and half Creole.  She is riding her bike with training wheels.  6 months ago she had absolutely no concept of how to pedal.  Her favorite food is Ranch dressing! And in the order of her day a popsicle always needs to  follow a nap.  She still isn’t sitting very nice in Church. She loves jumping off the coffee table. The relationship she has with our 7 year old daughter is a beauty to behold!  We have another appointment scheduled with the adoption lawyer this week.  Hopefully the adoption process will soon be completed.  We managed to get a travel document and traveled to Canada to visit relatives for 10 days.  Julie did very good with the 14 hour drive.  We had brought ear plugs along in case she’d be screaming.  She really enjoyed playing with the earplugs and sticking them in her own ears.  Kept her busy quite a while until she started eating them…that’s when Mommy intervened.  She also made quite a few calls on her play cell phone.  We stopped for lunch in Nebraska at her little friend Conleigh’s house.  They were in the same Orphanage and came to Miami together on the plane.  They played nicely together.  3-year olds are FUN!

She’s three today!  Made a Sunshine Bear cake for her.  Grandpa and Grandma Wiebe and some of the aunts and uncles and cousins will come celebrate with us.  We bought her a new red wagon!  Julie’s taking her nap now so should be nice and cheerful for tonight.  When the nurse at the clinic today asked her how old she was she said, “Seven.”

Tonight we are hosting a picnic in the park for all our past and present cheese business employees and their families and our present dairy help.  The reason being that we have now made 500 batches of cheese since we began in the kitchen about 10 years ago! We’re expecting about 65 people all bringing food and lawn chairs! Should be a fun time!

Today is also 4 months ago that we met our little Julie for the first time in Miami, FL.  She is now very much at home with us and an interesting addition to our family.  The swimming pool (stock tank) in the back yard has been a favorite spot the last 2 weeks.  And yes, Julie loves the water!  She had a bit too much pop and candy at the Memorial Day activities at the Antique Engine Show in Lehigh, KS and we were not sure she would ever relax and go to sleep that night! Tomorrow is her first trip to a zoo so we’ll see how that goes. And next week is her 3rd birthday and we’re so glad she is home with us to celebrate!

Our little Julie has been home now 3 months.  Things are going really well.  She’s potty trained except for the night.  A great delight is running after the cats with a stick and yelling.  Or the sticks work well on a tree stump like a drum.  She was pounding that stump and singing loudly! Still loves her milk…good thing she landed up on a dairy farm. This week she was also rescued from a mud puddle.  Screaming like she was dying and the mud squishing up between her toes.  So Mama carried her in to the tub and did a clean up job…don’t believe she learned her lesson though.  Later in the day she was hauled in by big sister and this time it took a complete bath and change of clothes to take care of the mud. Julie is also doing a lot more talking.  Lots of words and quite a few short sentences.  A mixture of English and Creole.  She is quite a noisy, joyful child and the noise level has increased considerably around here since she arrived.  The first ten days of silence are now a distant memory! We are also working with a lawyer on trying to complete her adoption. Grandpa and Grandma from Canada are making plans to come this week to meet her for the first time!  That will be fun!

We have reached the milestone of having Julie home with us for one month.  She is  a totally different girl than the quiet, exhausted child we brought home.  Away from home she is still very quiet and clingy. At home she is a little Tigger.  She is talking, laughing and singing.  She goes skipping and hopping through the house…and our hearts!  She was helping her big brother put wash in the dryer and I said to her, “Julie, are you helping Benji?” She folded her hands in front, smiled a big smile and gave 3 hops! She loves to play with little dishes and dolls. Also going outside is something she wants to do every day but is still abit leary of the dog and cats.  Nothing is as much fun as jumping on the bed! There are still some tantrums but much shorter and less frequent.  All in all I would say there has been a lot of progress and she is making herself right at home!