05/05/2026
I’ve been putting this off.
Four weeks ago, our doe barn burned to the ground. The thing that I thought would never happen.
I got a frantic phone call from my mother while I was a half hour away from home. All I heard was “barn is on fire” and after quickly verifying which barn, I loaded up the two younger siblings I had with me and raced home. I was hopeful. That particular barn was always open, animals should’ve been out of it. By the time I hit our road, I could see the smoke. Pulling up to our house I had to park at the edge of the property; there were so many vehicles of all sorts parked along the road.
The barn was gone. And 11 out of 13 adult does with it. My babies. Faithful to the end, Emma, half of our LGD team, was found curled up with three of her does.
How did it start?
About 24hr prior, my brother was burning a few cardboard boxes in a fire pit. The fire was seemingly out by that evening. I went out the next morning for chores and it was most definitely “out”. We didn’t know that an inch underground it was still smoldering. The winds kicked up midday, hitting 45mph that afternoon and it rekindled the fire, blew embers to the fence, which was at the corner of their pen. I’m sure they all ran into the barn to get away from it. The fire then followed the fence to the barn. The side with the door caught first, trapping the animals inside. Once it caught, the barn burned totally to the ground in 7 minutes. With wind, the dryness of the 80 year-old barn, and the heat of the fire… there was nothing anybody could do.
I am so thankful. Thankful that it was quick, that no people were seriously hurt, and for the firefighters that showed up to prevent it from spreading. I’m thankful it didn’t catch the house, thankful for the stranger that stopped and let three burned does out of the pen before my mom made it there, for the neighbor that helped my panicked mother drag/carry the other LGD out of the pen to make sure he didn’t run into the fire. Thankful for the two surviving does, that it happened after kidding season, and so incredibly thankful for our community. Small towns have their quirks, but at the end of the day, the town empties out to help a neighbor in need. I don’t even know who all was here, how long they stayed, or even many of their names. But they saw smoke and came to help. And they know that we would do the same for them. Because that’s what small-town communities do.
Hearts are still mending around here, and I greatly miss all of the familiar faces that have greeted me every morning and every night for years. But God has been so good and I feel at peace with the situation.
We said goodbye to the following does:
Sabbath Acres DY Lace Me Tight “Collette”
Sabbath Acres DY Hollywood “Estelle”
Sabbath Acres Western Romance “Abilene”
Sabbath Acres SH Fancy Pants “Nika”
Peoh Point USA Republic “Shania”
Trinity Valley Tabitha
Tamarack Mountain Miss Marley
BrokenHeart’s R French Kiss “Paris”
Capricana Spring Fling “Shakira”
Capricana Spring Fever “Chicago”
Capricana Petite Duchesse “Eclair”
And my beautiful Great Pyrenees Emma ❤️
Attached are some candid photos of my girls enjoying day to day life here at Sabbath Acres 💔
