K is for Kids

     Martha and I are what you might call extreme animal lovers. We spend a ludicrous amount of our lunch break talking and laughed about the shenanigans our pets get into. Several years ago my neighbor bought a gorgeous ranch up in Oregon, and she had room for our two horses. So I sent them off to the cushiest retirement any two horses could wish for. But my empty barn looked sad and lonely without any creatures in it and since my own kids(the human ones) were grown, I decided I needed some new kids.

     I've had Janie the caramel colored African Pygmy  since she was two days old. She and her sister Emmie, the black doe, lived their first two months in a playpen in my laundry room. We all took turns filling baby bottles and feeding them.  They were nothing short of adorable and to see my six-foot-two twenty-one year old son asleep on the couch with a baby goat tucked beneath his chin was beyond awesome.

     There is a third doe too and her name is Trixie but because she is a third kid, there are considerably less pictures of her. I can relate. My parents snapped a picture of every breath, yawn and burp uttered by my oldest sister. My second oldest sister only had her picture taken when she was lucky enough to be sitting next to our big sister. I'm still not quite sure if I ever was an infant because there is no photographic proof of it and even though I promised not to do the same with my kids, poor little Trixie lacks a photo history. But she is just as adorable.

     Just like real kids, these kids play rough with their siblings, get cranky when they're tired and fight for Mom's attention. And they are quite noisy too. Emmie and Trixie make unique little sheep sounds but Janie screams when she's hungry. I'm not sure what a banshee sounds like but if they really did exist, they would sound just like Janie. They are a great bunch of kids and I love them.