Cow Hauling

A few pictures of Dana's recent cow hauling trips.



Donner Pass, CA


Busted for speeding-

SusanVille, CA

again-

Frozen river in Oregon

SusanVille, Ca again-

Verburg Transport-

Verburg Transport

somewhere in Nevada

Unloading at the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas

Whew... more then 1 today!

The Friday before Thanksgiving, Dana was laid off from his Coffman Construction job. He didn't see it coming at all. He thought he was safe from the layoffs. I thought he was joking when he called me and told me he had been laid off.

He's called everyone he knows at other companies, and they are not hiring either. They are all laying off too..

For now, he is hauling cows for Ty (Richmond Transport) and Luke (Verburg Transport) full time. Which means he's in the cow truck alot, and barely at home.

I am thankful that Dana worked hard and got his Class A CDL in July so he is legal to drive the big semi's to haul cows. I am thankful that the cow hauling business is booming still. I am thankful that Dana has something to fall back on, when so many others that are losing their jobs do not.

It's been awhile...

This is going to be one long post....

On Saturday August 15th, bright and early in the morning I woke up to my puppies being born! Mom dog is a French Bulldog (25 lbs) and dad is an English Bulldog (50lbs). We had a c-section scheduled for Monday morning (Bulldogs can't deliver naturally). But Izzie had other plans. I had babysat on Friday night until 2am. When I got home I checked Izzie's temp and it was still over a 100 degrees. She wasn't acting strange, she was her normal, huge, hungry self. I went to bed and at 5:30 am woke up to a puppy crying! I jumped out of bed, and there were 2 puppies already born. I thought for sure that she was done. She is just a tiny little girl. She wasn't interested in feeding them, so I woke Jayden up, and started to get dressed to run to the 24hour Walmart to get puppy milk and bottles. While I was getting dressed, Jay screams to me that Izzie just had another puppy! Izzie seemed to settle down and try and feed the 3 babies. I was sure she was done and ran out the door to Walmart. While driving home from Walmart, Jayden calls me and says "Izzie just had another one and it is VERY small. It isn't crying either. What do I do?!?" I talked her thru how to get the baby breathing, and pretty soon I could hear the little puppy cries. After I got home and made up some bottles, showed Jay how to bottlefeed without drowning the babies. We all settled down to feed the pups and get Izzie to clean them up. Izzie was exhausted. About 2 hours after the 4 puppies were born, Izzie started having more contractions and sure enough... puppy number 5 was born. I could *not* believe that little Izzie had 5 puppies in her belly. We gave Izzie and the puppies some time to rest and then weighed each puppy.

1st puppy was all white, female and weighed 7oz.

2nd puppy was an all black male and he was 6.5 oz.

3rd pup was a brindal female, she weighed 7oz.

4th was the tiny little runt male, all white. He was 4 oz!

5th was a girl, split in half colored. Half white, half black. She was 7 oz.

The next 8 weeks were quite an adventure! The puppies were all good puppies and grew like crazy. We found awesome homes for 4 of them, and kept 1 of them.

#1 puppy (Reilly) lives with the people I babysit for. I see her all the time. Shes a doll!

#2 puppy (Elliott) lives with the vet in Benson. He's a pretty brindal boy!

#3 lives (Darla) in St. David with my Aunt Jan and she is spoiled rotten!

#4 lives in a cow truck and travels all over the US! His name is Wilson and he is not a little runt anymore!! He's a big boy!

#5 lives with us. Thor is a beautiful girl, and the only one that got the Frenchie, stand up ears! She isn't black and white anymore. She is brindal and white. Very pretty colors!

About 2 weeks old:

4 weeks old: In birth order. Reilly, Elliott, Darla, Wilson, Thor

I'm sure I'll post some more pictures of the puppies sometime. I get pictures and updates on all of them.