inside a SD Blizzard

on the Last day of 2010...snow.
A couple scenes from inside a Blizzard during New Years Eve, that I am sharing today.
Seems the weather relates to a mood. Two days of blizzard wore heavy and "Huge Thanks" to Skid Steer starting and Son helping with snow dozing...it doesn't seem so overwhelming. At least I didn't have any cows calving during the worst of this storm. Keeping an eye on one....make that two, correction....three...and they appear to be closing in on a day midway in January! (Yup I know...its almost mid January!) So it's time to start the fretting! Wind chill last night dipped to -40 last night and temperature bottomed out at -14. I (by hand and brute strength) rolled a partial round bale down to the entrance of the barn and pitched fork by fork into the back of the barn. All the while the 13 cows crowding around me wondering what fun I was having... Mark my words though...those Bulls are keeping company with the horses and they will weather JUST FINE!! ( I made the barn area bigger and invented a walkthru gate for the Bulls for their own haven). I wasn't thinking about consequences last year about now and put them with my girls. Needless to say, my Bull heated up things a tad and calves are coming fast and EARLY!! Last year we were having one of the worst blizzards in years at Christmas and the bull was not holding up well with the horses (who wouldn't let him into the barn...at all). Now I am punished with "much to cold to be calving!" This year WILL be different and the Bull/Bulls won't be in with my cows until June! So now, I foresee warming a calf or two before the pellet stove. Now my goats were warm and comfy and I had forethought to put extra hay inside their housing for feeding when the weather cranked up outside! I locked them in and they stayed toasty....but the boys...another story. I had to shovel and scoop to even get to them and then I found them bellys deep inside their building full of snow. Seems the snow whirled and swirled and found any spot INSIDE to drop. I padded the building with hay and then checked again that evening..scooping out what I could. I don't have a door on that one, and next year ......again....I will revise!! Always something...