Summer has arrived and is flying by much too fast!  We have been busy irrigating the fields, building fence, planting the garden, and working on the hydroponics.  The kids are out of school and enjoying the time to play and work with the animals.  Winnie was thrilled when Annabelle's baby was born on March 31st, and even more excited that it is a heifer.  She named her Isabelle, and has been working with her on a halter already.  We had a second calf, a bull, out of another one of our cows, Starlette, in the middle of April.  Two more are due any day now.  The kids have been training the alpacas for the county fair in August, and even Gus is planning to go to the show this year!  The cherry trees are heavy with fruit, having survived the nail-biting frost season.  The apricots weren't so lucky this year.  The garden plants are planted, and the hydroponics set up is just about ready.  I'll have to have Jeff fill you in on that one!  We got two new yaks to add to our herd, a big royal(black and white) bull named Ogie, and a fuzzy black heifer named Lucy.  They came from the little town of Norwood, about 2 hours away.  We are really going to try to get the yak meat market going over here, and hope to have a couple outlets to sell the meat in the Aspen area.  We will be going to the Cedaredge Farmer's Market with it as time permits also.  It has been busy around here as usual, but always fun!

This past weekend was Applefest, the big event of the year here in Cedaredge.  It is a fun time with lots of vendors, good music, and of course, APPLES!  The whole downtown is blocked off, and about 10,000 people come to participate in the festivities.  We have a great climate for growing apples(and other fruit) hence the celebration towards the end of the picking season.  We also had company, our good friends Kent and Anna Chavet from Phoenix came up for the weekend.  We went to the Applefest Gala Friday night and enjoyed good food, dancing, and great company. 
    Saturday morning Winnie participated in her first triathlon- which she thoroughly enjoyed and did very well in.  Next year I will do it again(skipped this year) and Winnie, and maybe Tori and Alex.  It is a shorter one, and the kid distances are perfect.
    We also sold  our younger Pinzgauer bull and a steer to Rocky Mountain Pinzgauers in Elizabeth, CO, and they left on Saturday as well.  The day before we had loaded up a yak steer for a buyer, so our animal numbers are shrinking!  We do have a few more yaks for sale that I hope to move before the winter.
    All in all a fun and productive weekend,

This morning when I was out moving sprinklers, Buck found something in the field that he kept sniffing and going back to.  I went over to check it out and found a new baby fawn.  It was unbelievably small, smaller than Brother, the cat that was out there with me.  I got the kids, and they came out and loved it.  While we were looking at the fawn, Buck found a second one about 20 feet away.  The grass wasn't even that tall, and you almost had to stumble over them to see them.  They are so well camouflaged!  Tori wants a pet fawn now.  After swimming, we went out to see if they were still there, but mom had come back and moved them.  Maybe we'll find them again tomorrow!