August is over. What a month it was.

Extended family visited from Ontario for a week. They were the first to enjoy our lovely guest house.

We went to a parade then a stampede in Herbert. I was thinking it would be like a fall fair with lots of amusements. It was nothing but bleachers packed with people watching roping and barrel racking. There was a small concession stand which kept the little kids quiet with freezies and chips while the bigger kids enjoyed the events.

Cora turned five.

The alpacas continued escaping until we moved them to another location. Turns out they really love trees. We set them up under a few including a large grassy area. That put an end to the jumping of fences.

We picked and canned crab apples.

Three kittens joined us – Mr. Whiskers, Lady, and Gilbert.

One of the main reasons we got alpacas was to help protect the sheep we were planning on getting.

The day before the sheep were due to arrive, the unimaginable happened. After hanging out with the alpacas for a little while I went in to make lunch. Ten minutes later, 8yr old Branch comes casually in to announce, “There’s a baby alpaca.”

He’s like the boy who cried wolf, so I wasn’t inclined to believe him. After some discussion of the matter, I decided to go look for myself.

Imagine my surprise at finding a little cria (baby alpaca) in the field. The lady we bought them from said it wasn’t impossible but incredible unlikely that either of the alpacas we got – Spark and Rosation – were pregnant. But there was Spark, calm as can be, with a baby.

Now what?? We watched for a little bit then went inside because the children were famished. While they ate, I searched for videos on caring for baby alpacas. Not finding much information, I messaged the lady we got them from. She called and walked me through what to do and watch for.

The main thing was to keep the cria warm and dry. The weather said it would be warm and dry for the next week. Baby was feeding and mom was doing everything right. I sighed in relief.

Sadly, Raine and Athena missed the event because they were away at youth camp in Alberta. The birth took place on my niece’s birthday which made it extra memorable. I was elated and still in shock.

When the sun set, the temperature suddenly, dramatically dropped. It started to pour rain. Our cria was no longer warm and dry. I didn’t know what to do.

Maybe a tarp in the trees would provide some shelter? I ventured out to the garage to get a tarp. But there was something under it. Likely a mouse. I didn’t stick around to find out. There are many things I can manage but not small rodents. I dashed out and jumped into the car. Sitting there, I was at a loss as to what to do.

There is a lovely barn, but I didn’t think I’d be able to herd everyone over there – mom, baby, and auntie. I’d picked up the baby earlier, it was easy to do and Spark didn’t mind. But now it was dark and things I’m scared of are even scarier without light.

I drove over to the field. The van headlights didn’t provide much illumination. Would our baby cria survived the night? Unlikely. I tired to think of a solution but could not. I hardly slept that night. When I did, I dreamed that Raine was home. I sent her out to check on the baby’s fate in the morning. She quickly came back to tell me all was well.

When dawn came, I cautiously crept over. I wasn’t sure that dream would come true – the part about the cria being fine. It was certain the part about Raine being home wasn’t going to happen.

There was the baby, completely fine.

“You have to pick a name NOW!” Cora insisted.

“Sloane,” I decided. “It works for a boy or girl.” I wasn’t sure which the cria was. Turns out there aren’t too many videos discussing these things – at least none that I could find. Most talked about temperament or size of adult alpacas in determining gender. That wasn’t helpful.

Sloane means warrior and invader. The baby was just that. Surviving a night of cold thunderstorms and providing a joyous invasion, the name is fitting.

With that decided, there was the situation with the sheep. It seemed unwise to put them in with the alpacas given the caution of the new mother.

So I ran out to get more electric fencing to set up a spot for the sheep. That was done just as our local friends arrived to visit and, thankfully, before the sheep came.

The ram, Alexander Charles, and three ewes, Liberty, Josephine, and Eunice, came in the back of a minivan. The kids were so excited since we’d been expecting a truck.

The Icelandic sheep jumped into their new pasture and started devouring the long grass. The couple we got them from were very helpful with tips and techniques. Everything was going along wonderfully.

Then the next day, Alexander and Eunice jumped the fence. The three kids and I chased them back towards the fence. As they neared, I opened it. They took off in another direction. Josephine and Liberty decided to join them.  

We chased them and chased them. They went further and further away from where they were supposed to be until they were across the street in the neighbour’s fields. Beside the freshly harvested area, was a patch of very long grass. It was so long I lost the sheep and the children in it.

Josephine and Liberty, older than the other two, tired first. They gave up running and came to me for some treats. I grabbed them both by the horns. We had two sheep halters but could only find one. I put that on Josephine and used a dog leash on Liberty.

To say I dragged them home would be an accurate description. It wasn’t far but took forever. By the time I secured those two in the barn, the others were long gone.

We drove around for ages. We walked our property then drove around some more. There isn’t another house in sight of ours. There are hills with vast fields; some recently harvested, some waiting to be harvested, and some full of high grasses.

Our neighbours, who have been immensely helpful, said they’d watch for the runaway sheep while checking on their cattle out in the fields. But it wasn’t looking good.

The kids were tired and hungry. We stopped searching. That evening, Raine and Athena returned home. It was getting cold again. With the help of my teenagers, we managed to move all the alpacas into the barn for the night.

I sent out prayer requests for the safe return of our sheep. I was starting to feel like a failure as a farmer. The loss of investment wasn’t even my biggest concern. We have one more ewe coming at the end of September. How could I tell the couple, who were so reluctant to part with their sheep, that I’d lost two of them?

It was another hard night.

The next day, we looked around a little bit. Mostly watching for scavenger birds, we all faced the grim possibility. It seemed in poor taste to go to the Rodeo in town that day with our little sheep missing. So we stayed home. Thank goodness we did.

As we sat around the table after lunch trying to come up with a plan, someone pulled into the driveway.

“Have you lost some sheep?” the man asked when he got out of his pickup truck.

“Yes!”

“They’re down in the field I’m combining.”

His grown daughter explained from the passenger seat how they’d spotted them.

Raine and Athena jumped in the back of the truck with a couple of ropes they’d found in the barn that morning.

I loaded the other kids into the minivan – eventually. First they had to find shoes, get water bottles, go the bathroom, and pack snacks.

When I arrived, the sheep were out of the field being harvested. The spot they were in was a breathtaking small cliff covered in long grasses dancing in the wind. Raine, miraculously, managed to lasso Eunice. She’d been boasting all day about how she would but, in her practice, hadn’t managed to even rope a fence post. With one caught, the other sheep followed.

I have not managed many pictures in the midst of all these momentous moments, so I’m attempting to paint a picture with my words.

The two sheep were loaded into the back of the minivan. The children and I buckled up and headed home. It was all quite unbelievable. In all the vastness of our surroundings, the sheep survived the night and managed to wander into a field where someone spotted them. Then Raine roped one, an absolute miracle in itself. Unbelievable.

That sums up August – unbelievable. The sheep have joined the alpacas and are very happy in their new home. Little Sloane is growing rapidly. We’re settling in and figuring things out.