The pitter-patter of little feet...

Here at our house we are accustomed to the noise of little ones in the night. Our children tend to wander at night, starting out in their own beds and ending up in ours or one of their older sibling's. Last night was something else altogether. The noise was not as soft as it usually is, a staccato coming down the hall, closer and closer accompanied by the most distressed cries.

It wasn't until adrenalin jolted me awake, wondering what was wrong, and with whom that I realized what the footsteps and cries were. It was LaSalle's twins, "Navasota" and "Fifty-Dollars"* running down the hall, crying for middle of the night bottles. This was something that has never happened in now five years of raising baby goats! We have never had babies this early in the year, born by themselves and they were SO small and it has been SO cold (do you hear the pleas of my children here?) that they have been spending the days outside in their run and inside in a large rubbermaid tub. Apparently they missed the notice informing them that they are now down to three full bottles daily--breakfast lunch and dinner and managed to escape their bin and go running in search of Linnea and the sustenance that she had been providing.

I woke up Linnea, told her that her babies needed her and crawled back under the covers shaking my head--I think that they are old enough to move outside day and night. I know that my tender-hearted children will beg to be allowed to spend the first few nights outside with the babies in sleeping bags. I just might let them, after all that will ensure more than two less sets of pitter-patters in the night. For a few days at least.

*Fifty-Dollars is named for his price to keep us from getting attached to an adorable goat that we are NOT keeping. (Hear me kids, N*O*T keeping!) He really is very flashy and cute. Need a Nubian buckling, anyone?