:-)

I am so proud of my son! I haven't paid as much attention to his sheep project as I probably should have. It's been a hard year and I've been dealing with other things (and being lazy) so for the most part I just ask him if he's fed them and checked their water, but I haven't been out there working WITH him and the sheep.

Today he wanted to wash his market lamb for the upcoming fair. It's just a first bath sort of thing. The lamb still needs sheared and then he'll have to be washed before fair (which starts next week) and again right before the show starts. We've discovered over the years that you can never start too soon trying to wash a sheep and get it clean. Plus it helps tame them down if you tie them to the fence and wash them.

As we went outside and he caught the largest lamb I was remembering washing my own 4-H and FFA market lambs. I remember having to be careful about how I tied them so that they wouldn't get loose- and they wouldn't kill themselves when they went wild as the water hit them and then again when I started scrubbing. Those lambs would leap up into the air! They'd spin, twist, shake, if you tied their heads too low they'd even flip over and try to break their own necks. It was a sheep rodeo!

That's what I was expecting. I tied Chris's lamb for him so that it would be very secure and high enough. Then I turned on the water and warned him to stand close to his lamb when the water went over it's back (you know, so the lamb wouldn't end up hurting him when it went crazy).

Silly Mom. That lamb didn't even blink. He just stood there... Chris washed his back, legs, belly, neck, squirted cold water up between his hind legs... and the lamb just stood there.

Chris has obviously been working with his lambs. You don't even have to try to catch them. Just put your hand out and a sheep head appears in your palm. I have no idea why I was worried. He's been spending hours outside and I knew he'd been in the sheep pen every day. I just didn't know how much actual work he'd been doing with the lambs.

The kid is good. He's going to be fine. Maybe he'll forget to switch sides when the judge walks around his lamb. Maybe he'll miss a couple cues to move around the arena because he's not actually looking at the judge... but overall, that kid will be just fine :-) He's amazing! This has been a good learning experience for him- and for me.