general conference!

Posted on April 2, 2012 by tara

This weekend was The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints‘ General Conference! It only comes twice a year, so I really look forward to it. Conference can be an inspiring and uplifting experience for anyone, whether you’re a member of the church or not!

There were definitely a lot of talks about devoting time to strengthening the family. President Boyd K. Packer said, “Family time is sacred time, and should be protected and respected. We urge our members to show devotion to their families.” I think his talk may have been my favorite. I’ve made a goal for Michael and I to do better at holding family home evenings and regular family scripture study.

I also really wanted to take a family photo (including the piggies!), so Michael humored me and dragged the tripod, chair and pigs outside. I think this might be a nice tradition to hold every conference!

a piggy christmas

Posted on January 12, 2012 by tara

I really wanted to do something cute with my pigs for Christmas, and I had an extra string of lights this year, so why not ~~ruin their happiness~~ have some fun with that? You can’t go wrong with a pig in a Christmas basket!

Until someone tries to use the basket as her daily intake of fiber…

And, another type of “pig” that comes with the holidays would be all of us human pigs, eating sweets! I made these cupcakes for our Church Christmas party! Credit for the holly berry idea goes to Lelia!

how can you have a bad day?

Posted on February 22, 2011 by tara

When you've got this crazy piggy to make you laugh?

This was right after "Guinea Pig Spa Night" (as if that explains anything), so that's why Maggie and Juni look wet. At least they're clean!

happy piggentine day!

Posted on February 14, 2011 by tara

I mean… Valentine's day. Oops. Since this is the "day of love", here are some pictures of the little girls who have absolutely unconditional love for me everyday!

my kids

Posted on January 13, 2011 by tara

Everyone likes to spoil their kids, right? Well, I do too! Of course, my kids just happen to be guinea pigs. I bet you saw that one coming, didn't you?

Anyway, being the guinea pig enthusiast I am, I frequent a certain website where a bunch of other piggy-lovers put pictures and stories of their furry kids. Someone posted a picture of their pig adorably snuggling with a caterpillar stuffed animal, and after seeing that I just knew that Maggie and Juni needed to have one. Out to the dollar store we went, and luckily for my poor deprived little piggies, there were still plenty of caterpillars left to choose from.

Maggie's fallen head over ~~heels~~ caterpillar.

major award

Posted on December 16, 2010 by tara

Remember when Maggie won the photo contest back in September? Well, her handmade, custom prize came in the mail a few days ago! I love it… but who wouldn't love hot pink tiger stripes?

As the dad on A Christmas Story says, it's a "major award"!

In other news, school is OVER! My last exam was on Tuesday, and Michael's was yesterday. Now I just need to finish making all my Christmas presents and get ready for a million photoshoots!

P.S.- We are having a blizzard here!

one of these pigs is not like the other

Posted on November 20, 2010 by tara

Whose circles do you like better?

I haven't posted many photos of my girls on here lately, so here are a few recent ones for your viewing pleasure =)

higher learnin’

Posted on October 23, 2010 by tara

As usual, life has been so crazy!! Michael has been working even more hours at work, and I've started working at the horse barn! I've had some pretty great experiences out there, but I think I'll save that for another post.

So, since you're already here, I'm sure you're just dying to hear about all the other cool stuff I've been doing instead of blogging, hmm?

Well, I've learned about carcass grading for both cattle and sheep. If you're normal, you are probably mentally screaming "ewwww!" right now. We first looked at the live animals and estimated what we thought the carcass values would be, and then we evaluated the actual carcasses. It isn't my favorite thing to do, but it does help you understand what a good animal should be and what you're actually eating.

Last week I practiced (under vet supervision of course) giving injections to horses. They were all intramuscular, so it wasn't very difficult, and all the horses behaved well. Afterward, my class got to watch a horse have his teeth floated, which is something I've never seen before! Nowadays they have an electric floater that looks a lot like a drill, so there's less pain and damage to the horse's mouth afterward.

My pigs are so excited for Halloween… can't you tell?

if you feel stressed…

Posted on September 29, 2010 by tara

Try some cardboard therapy. Just gnaw, chew, rip!

This week has been crazy… I had 3 exams! At least those are over, but now I have to start thinking about writing papers and my lab practical next week. Ahhh!

I'm so grateful for my wonderful husband, who helps take care of me when I don't always know what's best for myself. He makes so many sacrifices for me, like giving up his lunch hour last week just so he could drive me out to the barn to process my calf. I love him so much.

Speaking of processing my calf… I was assigned a cow, and once she gave birth I got to go out to help "process" it, which basically means just hold it while it gets an eartag, ear tattoos, nasalgen, and is weighed. My sweet little Angus heifer calf was just 62 pounds! Newborn calves are the best, because you can just pick them up and go where you want, without worrying about getting hurt…unless you're in the pen with the mama cow!

winner

Posted on September 22, 2010 by tara

So many people voted for Maggie in the photo contest I entered her in! The theme was "Back to School", and we won for "Best Overall Photo" ! Thank you so much to everyone who voted!

Here's the winning photo:

I've still been at the barn a lot this semester. On Monday night, I did "Ewe Watch", which was basically just watching for and helping with delivering lambs. We had a couple ewes in Stage 1 of labor, but we didn't see any progression into Stage 2, so it was a very calm night. It was fun watching all the other little lambs though. I didn't have my camera, so these are from my cell phone… but isn't that lamb so cute, standing on her mama?

We were watching them, and they were watching us too!