We wish you a Happy New Year from the Ranch!

We wish you a Happy New Year from the ranch! We have spent this autumn driving between family members' homes in Oklahoma City and Kansas City. But we have also spent a good amount of time at the ranch in the Oklahoma panhandle where Mark was raised. There's plenty of room to park the motor home here, and it is settled in right beside Mark's mother's house. Its windshield looks out over the horse pasture, where it gets some of the best sunset views anywhere.

We spent Thanksgiving here, joined by Mark's Mother, all of his brothers and sisters, many of our nieces and nephews, and all of our children and grandchildren. The big round hay bales will become feed for the cattle this winter. But for now they make a wonderful playground for climbing and leaping--and taking pictures of all the girls in our immediate family.

Our granddaughter wanted to see how many horses we could find, so we went out in the pasture for a horse hunt.

When we found one that she didn't recognize, she would introduce herself. It was pretty cute to hear a three-year-old explain to a horse, "You haven't met me yet, but my name is Carter."

Our nephew assured us that this horse was gentle enough for Carter to ride bareback.

He was right. Only real cowgirls ride bareback!

She was in horse heaven during her trip to the ranch.

During this trip to the ranch, the youngest member of the Engelman family got to spend time with the oldest member. One-year-old Eli spent good quality time taking a magnifying glass in and out of a kleenex box with 93-year-old Great Grandma Reta. Who needs toys when you have a kleenex box?

Carter isn't the only one that likes to ride horses. One day while enjoying ranch life, Denisa saddled up to ride that same gentle horse.

We took a stroll through the pasture, with the ranch dog accompanying us.

This was Mark's view from his horse today.

While we enjoy an occasional horseback ride, we leave the real riding to the real cowboys. Those were the ones roping on the day we worked calves in a couple different pastures on a beautiful autumn morning. The cowboy's job is to get a rope around the back legs of a single calf in that group. He then drags that calf out to the cow hands.

There are skilled and unskilled jobs among those cow hands. We did two of the unskilled jobs. Mark's job was "mugging" the calves. That involves throwing the calf onto its side and holding onto its two back legs for dear life. Then one niece gives two shots of medicine, while Denisa notches the right ear. Then another niece castrates the bulls. 

Since Mark was on the "business end" of the calf, it can be a messy place to be.

The trick comes when that calf is finished. Mark has to let go of those legs and get up fast enough to avoid getting kicked. He's pretty fast for an old guy!

We had a beautiful Saturday for this calf working day. With blue skies and temperatures near 70, they were saying that it was much nicer than the blizzard they had last fall when they were working calves.

On another pretty day, we watched as last year's colt got another lesson in becoming a ranch horse. She's still skittish, but Mark's brother is getting her used to having a saddle on her back.

The next step is threading a long rope through the bridle and saddle. Then walking behind, the trainer can give pressure on the neck to get the horse used to turning left and right. She will also get experience with a tshirt tied to the saddle horn and a stuffed dummy on the saddle, before a real cowboy will get on board for that first ride.

Even in the horse pen, she got spooked and bolted unexpectedly. Denisa missed the wreck, but she got the tail end of  a horse exiting right in a hurry.

Besides wrangling cattle and horses, we also did some guinea wrangling. These curious looking birds became permanent residents on the ranch when the grasshoppers invaded the ranch this summer. You couldn't take a step without scaring up a dozen hoppers, and they were eating up anything with a tinge of green. They found that a dozen guineas can completely eat up every grasshopper that tries to enter the yard.

So the guineas have earned their keep over the winter until the next grasshopper crop comes in the spring. To give them some protection from the north wind this winter, Mark helped his brother build a guinea roost. We're pretty sure that the ladder's weight limit is exceeded as both of them made their way to the top of the same ladder. After the sides were built, they added boards close to the top for the guineas to roost on overnight.

Once it was finished, we had to meet at dusk to herd the guineas toward their new roost. We've herded cattle many times, so we used similar tactics to get the birds settled in front of their new home.

A beautiful sunset was setting up, when the first of the birds took off in their near vertical flight path up to the roost. It takes some mad flapping to get that big bird body off the ground.

Because we are here longer than usual, we are trying to keep up our exercise routine. We've been takings hikes in the pasture on these beautiful autumn days.

One walk took us across the creek to the red hills where Mark often played as a child.

We also walked down to the lake, where the water level is lower than usual. The Oklahoma panhandle hasn't gotten any rain in well over two months. So while we are enjoying this beautiful blue sky weather, we sure wish for the clouds and the rain that they need so badly.

On another day, we made sand plum jelly. Sand plums grow wild on the ranch, and Mark's sister gave us a frozen bag of sand plum juice. This is one of our favorite jellies, and it is beautiful in the sunlight streaming through the windows.

As the shadows of the horses are growing long in the horse pasture, our motor home is still resting at the ranch.

But it (and we) are still enjoying the beautiful sunrises and sunsets that aren't hidden by the trees like in other parts of the country. We're enjoying the people and this place as we're experiencing a chunk of ranch life. We're now bracing for the coldest weather of the winter so far, as we have snow in our forecast for this New Year's Day. We wish you a Happy New Year from the ranch!