Ranch Wife's Slant

Cowboys, kids, and ranch life

Tag: ranch life

  • The Pringle Well

    You can’t get a beer at Pringle’s watering hole like you can at the Hitchrail Bar and Restaurant but the town well sees just as much activity as the Rail does. The Pringle well has become an unlikely hub for social activity. It started getting an influx of attention about the time the drought started…

  • The Barb That Snagged Me

    I’ve gotten used to blue jeans, shirts and coats getting torn open from catching on barb wire but it aggravates me every time it happens and I don’t accept it very well. I know I have to expect it to happen occasionally but sometimes it seems like it happens regularly. It makes me spew hot…

  • A Lifestyle of Infinite Variety

    Our lifestyle is one of infinite variety. Our daily summertime routine involves making a big morning loop to check on salt, Alberson Valley and the tanks at a location called Callon Spring. All of which takes about an hour to drive. Seeing that the floats haven’t stuck is vital in making sure the stock tanks…

  • Driving Lessons

    Kids that live on a ranch learn how to drive a stick shift. Driving lessons for ranch kids happen real early. It’s just a tradition, I guess. Our son was about five when he first learned on an old Dodge pickup. Once they learn, they help drive equipment back and forth or a pickup and…

  • Moving the Heifers

    Since my husband and I moved our heifer calves in the fall for the winter months, he’s been planning, worrying and wondering how we’re going to get them loaded to take to summer range. Without having been loaded much, everything we try to get them to do is difficult. Friday, my husband, son and I…

  • Moving Cows to Summer Range

    Sunday was a long day at our place. The whole family saddled up to move cows onto summer range. My husband and son rode off in one direction and my daughter and I headed in another to get cows gathered up and we all met with everything we gathered up at the pasture’s water tanks…

  • New Job, New Routine

     School gets out this week, but you’d have thought it’s been out for weeks around here. Our kids have already shifted into their summer routine. With the warmer weather, the kids have been spending every evening outside and when they have to go to school in the morning, Pepper is mopey all day until they…

  • Shakin’ Things Up

    Tuesday, May 19, 2009 I’ve always been the kind of person who enjoys new and exciting experiences now and then to shake things up with work; just not too overdone. Last Thursday and Friday I got my quota for new and exciting experiences among a mundane work routine. I went to dole out the last…

  • Glutton for Punishment

    I’m a glutton for self-induced punishment we took in another branding on Saturday and I thoroughly abused my body again wrestling calves. The next morning, I noticed which muscles I hadn’t used in a while, and felt sore from my shoulders to the grip of my hands, to my rear end. Although I’m not sure…

  • Rekindling Branding Day Romance

    The romance between my husband and me began in springtime. We’d only been dating a couple of months by branding season and he introduced me to his family on their branding day. We spent that day, and the rest of those May weekends helping neighbors gather cows to corrals horseback, and wrestling calves together. Our…