A Broken Arm and A Broken Leg all in the Same Day!

This little boy is going to be the death of his father and me! I know there are a few of you out their who have all your children raised and gone that are thinking "We told you that some day you would have one just like YOU!" and boy are you right. This little trip to the E.R. sent Brad and I down memory lane thinking of all the times we personally had to go into the doctor for one ailment or another. Brad and I could each come up with quite a few expensive trips to the doctor. This all happened last Friday, leap day. A day that technically never should have existed in a normal year...boy do I wish this was one of those years!

Brad and I were out sorting the heifers in our ever existent "mud" covered corrals (I know they use to be ice skating rinks but now that the sun has started to shine we have moved on from ice to "mud") We were actually getting along quite well, Brad in fact had made the comment "we are having a good productive day". That was the kiss of death right there! We came into the house covered in "mud" and I do mean covered. I had it all over my face including a little in my mouth...hense why I am still calling it "mud". Jayla met us at the door and told us that Jake's arm was hurting like no tomorrow. Brad had his boots off first so he ran in and checked him and yelled back at me that he had broke his arm. So I called the local hospital to see if they could do x-rays (real small hospital...I think there are 11 or 17 rooms so I was not too sure they had one) They advised that we should just take him to the local Dr. So I called them and told them we would be coming and away we went. We never made it out of the waiting room. The Dr. came out and told us that it would need to be reset and sent us to Yankton, SD which is about 75 miles away. Boy let me tell you all we looked so classy when we arrived at the E.R. in Yankton. We left a trail of "mud" everywhere we went, we were covered in that same "mud" and our son was in his pants and nothing else. We screamed "REDNECK". I promise you there is a housekeeping crew in that hospital that was cussing us up one side and down the other. On the good side though Jake did really well and only cried for about a minute when they reset his arm. They had given him some laughing gas to try and relax him. I had to laugh at the Orthopedic Dr because he obviously does not have children or if he does his wife raised them. He kept talking to Jake like he was a 30 year old man. Using the proper names for things and asking him to do things that four year olds are not known for. He kept telling Jake about the mask that he was going to need him to hold and how it was going to start releasing a gas that would go into his lungs and send him into a dream like state. I told Jake that some smelly air was going to come out of the mask and he needed to smell it. He wanted Jake to tell him when he got into a "Dream-like state". Four year olds are not very aware of dream like states, they are aware of "feeling funny". He told Jake to take 10 deep breaths, then asked me if he could count to ten. I told him he could but he skipped numbers on occasion, the Dr. said that he needed to hear him count so would he count along with someone? I said usually, but I am not sure about now (being as he was a little freaked out and had no idea who this Dr. was) so the Dr got right next to Jake and starts counting and Jake just stares at him. Another Dr. in the room looked over at me and smiled and kind of shook his head...THAT Dr. has kids! All in all the hospital was wonderful. We have never met more friendly people. Jake left with a whole collection of stickers and new stuffed friend named "Sucky". I have NO idea why he picked THAT name.

While all of this was going on Brad was desperately trying to call Dustin to ask him if he would go and turn out the heifers. We still had them in the little pen that they had been sorted into and we just knew that one or two were going to calve and then they were going to get stepped on and that would just put a cherry on our already wonderful day. We finally get a hold of Dustin and he comes over to turn them out and he finds one working. Dustin called Brad to see what he wanted him to do but Brad said we were on our way home so that she should be ok until we get there. We get home at about 9:30 or so and Brad heads out to pull this calf. After 30 minutes of pushing and straining Brad can not get the calf's head to come up. So he calls the Vet and makes arrangements to take the cow over to Spencer. They end up doing a C-Section on the cow and Brad ends up getting home at 2:45 am. Over all Feburary 29th was a very long day.

This is the calf that was born via C-Section that night. He ended up with a broken leg and Jake ended up with a broken arm...I bet both of these two wish that there was no such thing as Leap Year :o)

As far as the rest of our days we are not doing too badly. Jake is already tired of his cast and he still has another 7 weeks worth of wearing it to go! The girls are busy delivering Girl Scout cookies and I am busy being Brad's hired man. I don't know if I am actually getting to be a pretty descent hand or if I am just someone to pawn off the dirty work too but either way I fill a space and seem to help Brad out a little. If nothing else I am some one to swing the "beating stick" to help keep the cows off my husband. Funny how I picture a whole other scene when I hear the phrase "Mad Cow" Most people picture bad meat...I picture Blue tag #910!!!

The kids have been enjoying bottle feeding Tri Pod as you can see. We have decided that he is to be the Ranch Mascot.