It's a Guessing Game

No lambs yet, but Phoebe is a little more "dropped" than she was yesterday. At this stage, it's really hard to predict exactly how many more days she'll be. The lamb could fully drop in a few hours and be born tonight, or she could hang on like this for another several days.

One indicator I do have: I've felt her udder, and I've felt the udders of some of the ewes whose due dates are about a week from now, and Phoebe's udder is WAY more full. So it's pretty safe to say that she'll lamb in less than a week.

My husband, Ken, using the Murphy's Law theory of lamb predicting, thinks that she will lamb tonight because it's cold, rainy, and he's going to be gone all evening, so I'll be here by myself.

It's pretty consistent that Ken always somehow manages to miss the births of our first lambs of the year. Last year when our first lambs came a little earlier than expected, he was also away, and I ended up having to hurriedly drag a bunch of metal fence panels around the yard by myself during a raging thunderstorm, trying to get an indoor lambing area set up for the ewe that was going into labor. Of course I got drenched to the skin, but I thought I was lucky the sheep and I didn't get struck by lightning!

I'm debating whether Phoebe looks close enough that I want to sleep in the barn for the first time tonight. It's pretty cold and damp tonight, so I don't want to give up my warm indoor bed unless it looks like there's a pretty good chance she'll lamb soon.

It's all a guessing game, really. The lambs will come when they come. But I have a good time trying to guess the exact date anyhow.