The Babies are here, the Babies are here!

Thinking that 3 babies were keeping us busy was child's play after this past busy weekend. 3 more lovely little crias were born, all under the watch of Neal. I had left for the NY Sheep & Wool festival on Friday morning. Sometime in the late afternoon, Neal called to say there had been a baby born. It was a pretty little girl out of Gina. He told me she was brown with white on her forehead and nose. That was fine, even if we weren't expecting another one for about 2 weeks. I asked for him to send pictures.

A few hours later, we were done setting up our booth and sitting down to a nice warm dinner and he called and asked if I had checked for the pictures. I looked and this is what I received. I couldn't believe that he couldn't tell the difference between black and brown with white spots! Then I saw that I had another email with a picture. It was the little brown girl. So what in the world was this little black bundle? I called him and he told me that after the brown baby was born and taken care of, he ran an errand. When he got home the little black one was there too! Unbelievably, it was a girl too!


Saturday afternoon at the Festival, I was so busy I couldn't take any phone calls. When I called Neal back, he just said, "Here we go again - check your email". And he had this picture for me. This little girl was from our Maiden (first time mom) Enchanted. She was about 3 weeks early as the dates were calculated, but she's up and doing well despite her small birth weigh of just over 12 pounds.

Neal handled it all very well. We joke that he's been around for more of the births than I have, and I think he's correct.

Here's a little video of the babies playing on Monday morning after being penned in for the evening on Sunday. Enjoy!

And for everyone who's been concerned about the little white boy who was born on the morning of our open house - he's doing well. He's stopped taking bottles and has a very unique way of nursing from his mom. I guess since he's so tall, it's just easier to do it this way. I don't expect he's going to have spectacular fiber on his legs since he's always on his knees, but that's a small sacrifice since he's being taken care of by his mom instead of us.

All is well in alpaca land.

The Babies are coming the Babies are coming. . .

We knew that 7 babies in one season would keep us hopping and we are only about half the way there. On Sept 30, we had our first girl in over a year. We named her Ayla, but have been calling her Fine a Leigh. She has a beautiful face and would most likely be considered medium brown. She's not as dark as her mama, but her daddy was white, so we are very pleased with her color. Alya is quite a pistol. She loves to play with the other crias and has been gaining almost a pound EVERY DAY! At 2 weeks, she's getting pretty darn heavy!

Then on the day of our open house, Sugar gave us her almost 3 week overdue baby. This little fella still doesn't have a name but he's as sweet as can be! We don't know if it was all the activity at the open house or if nature was just taking it's course, but he never did nurse correctly. We had our suspicions that he would need a plasma transfusion and indeed he did. He had the fairly simple procedure in the vet's office on Monday night and this is him in the back of the van on the way home. He's doing well, but still is taking a bottle which tells us that he's not getting all he needs from his mom.

Then just 3 days later, Charm had her baby. This one was just a few days before we expected him and was under 15 pounds, but he was up and nursing before we came home from work. Both mom and baby are doing very well. Sometimes the names just come to you and we think he will be Prince Charming. Though it may be hard to see in the picture, he is brown with smokey gray tones which promises to be a very interesting fleece.

Both Ayla and Prince have the same daddy, Eldorado and these are our first 2 cria from him. Needless to say, we are very pleased.

Check back in the next week or so and I'm sure we will have some new baby pictures for you to see!