This past week has been just plain awful. It did start with a wonderfully pleasant Sunday. I had let the goats out of their pens, first the 3 boys and Jade on long ropes so they could munch to their hearts content, but I could still keep track of them and keep them contained. Then I let the 3 girls out and I just watched them as I did the evening chores. During the midst of all this, Luke started to get sick. Luke is our German shepherd. He's eleven years old, skinny as a rail and his hips have been disintegrating for some time now. He started vomiting foamy water, so I put him out in the backyard for awhile. As I monitered the goats, he remained in the backyard and the vomiting continued. Chris came home and we fed the dogs, but Luke wouldn't eat. He couldn't even keep water down. We started to wonder if this was the beginning of the end.
Wednesday brought more trouble as one of our calves came down with scours and stopped drinking anything. We were afraid we would have to force fluid down him with a tube. Chris was home from work that day, and I was at work and called the vet who told us to tube him. I was so worried. I had so much work to do, and I was freaking out just a little. It wasn't pretty. Finally, Chris called me around 3pm and said he went into the pen to work on some of the wiring by the light fixture that's overhead and Chuck (the sick one) came up to him and starting to suck on his jeans. Chris tried the bottle and Chuck drank it right down. That made my day. I had been planning on stopping by TSC, purchasing the appropriate tubing kit and some medicated powder to ease the calf from scours, but Kellie and I were able to continue to church instead.
Kellie went to youth and had dinner, and I went to the sanctuary to practice the piano. I was going to play for the prayer meeting later on, and I wanted to be able to play and sing at the same time so I really needed to practice. We also have our Art Night happening on Saturday so I needed to go over the classical music I was going to start the night with. Around 7pm, Chris comes into the sanctuary with Kellie balling her eyes out following behind him. She had tripped backward over her own feet and landed full force on her left hand. We were afraid of a fracture so I took her to the hospital. Sure enough. After two hours, we found out that she did fracture her wrist in two places. After another half hour, she was fitted with a splint, and another half hour we left with instructions to see a specialist. Oh, what a fun week this has been.
Now that it is Friday, I'm happy to report that Chuck, the calf, is doing much better. He's not scouring and tonight he'll have his milk replacer. I have started all three calves on calf starter pellets as well. They LOVE the bottle, but they have to actually start eating solid food. I can't help but think of how we can be as new Christians, or young Christians. It's nice to get caught up with being fed a sermon and lessons (the calves' milk in a bottle), but we have to grow up and start making decisions about our lives and doing to help others as well. We have to learn to teach others. We have to latch on to the new, solid food and start eating that. It might not be as nice or as easy as the bottle that we eagerly suck down. It might be a little difficult to swallow, but we need to grow and move on to better food. The sweet alfafa and clover is next, and we don't want to miss out, but we will if we only have our eyes on that bottle.
Luke, also is rallying. I thought for sure he wouldn't make it through last night. I'm not saying he'll recover, but he was looking better. I'd really prefer he just die at peace at home rather than bring him to the vet to be put down. As long as he wants to live, I will not have him euthanized.
I'm still waiting for the scheduler to make the appointment for Kellie's wrist, but that, too will come.
Art Night is going to be a BLAST!!!
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