Hoping for Rain

Back on the weekend, we were hoping for rain-

 and good internet- ours went down for half an hour Sunday afternoon while we were in the middle of a zoom meeting (close to the end of Garry's Bible story) with one of the schools in Dnepro we normally visit once a month! The teacher, Lena, solved the problem by phoning and putting him on speaker phone next to her computer! Quarantine has made everyone into problem solvers. The quarantine has been relaxed some, restaurants are open for patio dining now. Mc Donald's stuck stickers on the outdoor tables and chairs you shouldn't sit in for social distancing rules. The internet returned before Garry's next zoom call and the one with his brothers, sisters and father.

Angelina meets Box Tuesday morning

Monday night I was wondering if the baby crying would wake me up as I wrote the previous post. I have not heard her so far, unless I am somewhat awake. She does wake up her mother, though, she seems to take her longest sleep time in the morning. Right now I am hoping she sleeps a while longer, since I am watching her while Max takes Valentina and Oksana to Zaporosia to register for baby benefit payments (somehow no one has gotten Oksana signed up since September).

Opps, I hear Angelina now. After a diaper change and some formula, she's sitting in the vibrating chair Garry bought her last night, although I had to put some hand towels beside her to keep her upright. See seems happy, although she has the hiccups.

Anyway what woke me up at three am (early Tuesday morning) was a big crack of thunder. We got a half inch of rain from that storm. Max said he woke up at the same time and went out the hayfield to turn off the irrigation they had started on Sunday when they finished chopping haylage.

 Tuesday morning the DHI test lady came and spent most of the day enrolling all the cow information into her computer with Yana's help and the book they write the calvings and breeding in, now all the information will be up to date when they do monthly milk testing and Garry will know how many cows need to be bred or are pregnant and how much milk they give in a lactation, too. Monday afternoon they took samples and wrote down milk amounts for the second time.

Garry kept looking for more free water for his crops, because there was rain all around us on Wednesday, but it only sprinkled in the village. We drove through some rain going to Dnepro in the late afternoon, and there were puddles in the road there. Garry was disappointed when we arrived back in Nikolaipolia, as it was dry. Max had even turned the water back on the alfalfa field.

However, last night Garry was the one awake and listening to the rain fall at three am,  this morning there was an inch in the rain gauge when he checked. It will be a while before they will need to irrigate now, saving money. It costs about 400 dollars an acre for water to grow corn plus 300 more for the fuel to pump it. They need about 14 inches of water for the season. The cost for alfalfa is similar, it's a bit more for the fuel, since it is not dripline there, but put on with the "gun."  An inch of rain saves us three thousand dollars, Garry tells me.