Winter in Kansas

 Our farm still looks like a winter wonderland - well, sort of.

By now, we have trudged over most of the snow and have left footprints.  We have had some melting and a few patches of grass are starting to show through.  It is nowhere near as magical as the first moment when you step out the door and everything is covered in a blanket of pristine snow.  I think it seems so magical because you know that the landscape will never be that perfect again, once you blaze a trail across the yard...at least until the next snow.

Last week, I helped with chores in the morning and was the first to mar up the snowfall.  My husband had sidewalk snow removal duty.

I remembered to tuck my camera into my chore coat pocket and say a silent prayer that the dogs wouldn't knock it out or I wouldn't spill it out bending over to pick up something.

It was cold and quiet and beautiful. The chicken coop door even looked kind of lovely with a little snow resting on the window.

 People often ask how the alpacas handle the cold.  They are much better in the cold than the heat as they have a warm blanket of fiber.  We still take extra care to make sure they have hay and fresh water in the winter.

This year, they didn't like the snow drifts near the barn, so my husband shoveled paths for them from the barn to the hay bunk.  The first morning when the drifts blew high against the fence, the alpacas put on a funny show of first hesitation and then some crazy jumps over and around the drifts.

Just before feeding, we run all of the alpacas out of the barn to set out their food buckets.  They keep watch and jockey for position to be the first through the gate for feeding.  This particular morning, Scout had snow on his face and a lot of hay jammed into his fiber.  What a clown.