Sheep shearing

Now THAT was an experience! I think that this summer is going to be full of "firsts", but that's quite all right. I love learning new things and having new experiences. Friday morning I came into the house at 8:30 like I always do and Alice told me right off the bat that my job for that day was going to be to go out to another farm and help with the sheep shearing. I was thinking "Great! I get to meet some new people and learn how to do something I've never done before!" It was definitely interesting. =) We got there at about 10 o'clock and I was put right to work. There were two men shearing the sheep, and the set up that they had was incredible. I'll post some pictures once I get them off of the camera. Anyways, these two guys were shearing, and after a sheep was sheared they sent it off into a small holding pen where they would get their immunizations. Someone would take the fleece and throw it onto this "table", which was more of a wire mesh. The idea was that you throw the fleece out flat and then pat it down and the manure is supposed to fall through. Yeah, doesn't work very often. My first job was to go through all of that fleece and pick out the manure. Not the first thing I would have chosen to do, but hey, I'm tough, I can deal with touching that crap. ;) After the fleece is "clean" they roll it up and throw it into these huge bags, and then someone jumps into the bag and stomps it down till it's quite solid. That was what I ended up doing for most of the rest of the day and for the couple hours that I was there Saturday morning. It may sound like a boring job, but I had SO much fun!!! It made a big difference that the people I was working with were awesome. I think the that the company you're around makes or breaks the job. =)

We were almost done the 250 sheep when I left at about 10:30 Saturday morning (I'd been there since 8) to go to Edmonton for a wedding. Well, Calgary and then to Three Hills on Saturday and then on to Westlock (which is north of Edmonton) on Sunday. We got there just as the wedding party was about to go in, and it was an absolutely beautiful wedding!!! Sara looked incredible. =) We stayed for the reception which started at 5, and then headed down to Justin's parents place for the night (they live about an hour and a bit away from Westlock). I had to be in Calgary at 2 on Monday, so we were up and off at 9:30 Monday morning. I was in Calgary just before 2 and then we were off to Burdett soon afterwards. We got back at about 6:30ish, and boy was I ready to be out of the car!!! That was a lot of driving for just a few days. And I'm off to Edmonton again tomorrow! Mark has a speech contest on Saturday, and I'm going to be going to YC, so it's going to be a super sweet weekend. =D I'm pretty sure that we're going to hit the water park at the West Ed on Friday before YC starts. That'll be another first for me, and I'm SO excited!!! =D I'm sure I'll have a lot more to write about when I get back. ;)