Early Autumn in the "Suburbs of Viola"

Early fall is probably my favorite time of year. I just love to run up the mountain and watch the leaves falling all around me. The only thing I am not particularly fond of is the endless raking. Last year we raked nearly every day, but by the next you couldn't tell we had done a thing!

I guess I am just going to have to get over that though, and do my best to enjoy raking the leaves day after day after day.



Good news! Kyle could have been heard playing his banjo this morning! The very fact that he thought his thumb was up to the task is a good sign, I think. I just hope he doesn't over do it.

Update on Kyle

Good thing! He only sprained his thumb; it's not broken. It took nearly a whole day in town to figure that out though. We are all very thankful, but, at the same time, rather disappointed that he won't be able to play his banjo for a while.

The Making of Christmas Jam

This stuff is good! We NEVER have enough to last the year, but then again, we've never made this much either. Yesterday we made four batches, and did that again this morning. I think that's all we're planning to do this year. Last year we only made four batches.

The berries and sugar, all combined, starting to cook down.








Claire was our dipper person. I love the sweet smell of this jam.

All finished........ with one batch!

Pretty and delicious! Great gifts or (my personal favorite) just to be selfish and eat all yourself!

Pictures of the Past Week

We got into a little fight. The boys had made themselves swords, shields, and axes, and Catherine and I ganged up on them with bean poles and foam noodles (a little one-sided you'd think). We even got Elizabeth to join in after a while; we're going to have to get another foam noodle for Claire, though.

Full armor.
















I think he's got a problem with the camera.
Great. Catherine! They're charging!











Well! He almost looks scared!
















Oooh, that's why.
















A vicious attacker.
The fight ended with both sides declaring victory, and we were about to eat a delicious dinner!

Great picture, Kyle.
One night we built a fire and ate ruebens while enjoying conversation.
We got the berry patch in order on day.
Trying to get more kinks worked out in another jam session.

Claire, Kyle, and I (and probably the chruch) are so thankful that y'all helped us last Monday night! We just couldn't have done it near so well without y'all.
Yesterday I got placed on the Poop Squad. Yep. The men went around with pitch forks picking up cow patties. I got the good job (thank you, Mr. Brothers!): I drove the Mule behind them. Once we got a good load we went back to the compost pile and they spread it on.
After doing this for a while they became real manure connoisseurs.
"I personally think the dried ones are best for this time of year."
"No!?! I believe you're saying that just because you don't want to pick up the heavy, wet ones."
"......Not at all *grunt* see?!"
"Whatever!" *all laugh*
Next we tackled the garden. We took down the tomato cages, t-posts, and stakes.
Mr. Brothers tilled our beds, and they look just superb! THANK YOU!!!










At lunch.
















After lunch, the boys went out to do more trench digging.















Benjamin helped too!
After dinner something very purple and smelly came out. A hand waxer thingy! Most everyone tried it out. The babies didn't; the heads-of-household didn't; Kyle didn't, and I didn't. Everyone else did.
I just couldn't do that to my hands. Besides, they're not dry!
Even Elijah joined in "Just to see how it felt."
Sorry, Elijah. I just had to do it.

Don't let it keep y'all from coming back as soon as possible! We got so much done, and we had great fun! You know, we need to practice on those songs too! Your pose here looks like you could reach the higher notes.

In Compliance with a Certain Request...

I will now record the happenings of this past Saturday. Well, we slaughtered our steer.

Going to watch Ribeye be shot.












He's Down!











Well, almost.











Dragging him to the barn.












On the gambrel.











Tractor operator.












Skinning.











Still skinning.

And here we ran out of memory. Really. We did have a disposable black and white camera that we started using, but even that didn't get us through to the end (Claire had control of the camera). Everything really went quite smoothly; it took us about 3 hours from the very start to the very end.

State Forestry

This had to be one of the hardest competitions I have ever been to! Still, Coffee County performed very well. The scores were very close! Our A team will go on to the national competition. Of course I am disappointed that I cannot go, but I am very proud of my brother team. I got 155 points, and that was only ½ point away from the fourth high individual! My score was also only 5 points away from the first high individual. I am already being pressed to come back next year, but I don't think I will. Still, when I get the call, I will probably be very tempted to go back.

More broilers!

We now have another batch of broilers! We got them this morning, and they are in the basement waiting for the next processing day when they will be moved out to the chicken tractor.

Some Things Just Make Me FEEL

Good. Like this!
I almost can't stand to think of how beautiful the cities were before they became big cities or even developed at all! I do not hate cities, but I sure do dislike them when there is the beautiful countryside to compare.





Or not so good. Like this.





Good.

















Not so good.













Good.















Not so good.












Good.

Good Tidings!

"For unto us is born this day in the 'city' of Viola a calf, which is number 30!"

Sorry, felt festive! No pictures yet.

This is good!

Signs that you have watched Pride and Prejudice too many times when...

• Six hours no longer seems like a long time.
• You begin to wonder why all movies are not six episodes long.
• You have memorized where the commercial breaks come as well as the order of the commercials in each break.
• You watch the movie all the way through non-stop - then rewind it and start all over again.
• The movie just keeps on getting better every time you watch it.
• On a recent visit to a local lake, you were inspired to dive in and go swimming fully clothed.
• Your relatives and friends no longer think that you are strange for asking them to call you "Lizzy".
• You sing along with the background music.
• You find ways to quote Pride and Prejudice in daily life: "That shirt is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me."
• After hours of studying the dance scenes, you held a party and forced all your friends to learn the dance steps so that you could pretend to be Lizzy at the Netherfield Ball.
• You are saving up money to go to England to visit the filming locations.
• You made a special trip to England last year just to visit the filming locations.
• Your itinerary includes a special trip to Pemberley where you plan to stand at the window and say, "Of all this I might have been mistress" - and you are devasted when you find out that this is not possible since the Pemberley interiors and exteriors were filmed in separate locations.
• You think of time in terms of the number of Pride and Prejudice episodes you could watch in that amount of time. For example: "I’ll see you in four episodes" = "I’ll see you in four hours."
• You have pets and stuffed toys named Lizzy and Darcy.
• You name your first two children Lizzy and Darcy.
• Right after you splurged and bought the P&P video boxed set, you made two copies of it. The original videotapes are now in your display case (along with all your other precious objects and silverware), one copy is at your relative's house in case of a fire, and the third copy is for your daily viewing.
• Others refuse to watch P&P with you because they find your habit of reciting the whole movie in unison with the actors annoying.
• Even though you have never lived in Britain, you now regularly speak with a British accent.
• You find yourself often saying that you are "excessively diverted", "quite put out" or "most seriously displeased".
• You dance along with Lizzy and Darcy every time you watch the Netherfield Ball scene.
• You have played the whole movie in slow motion to prolong the ecstasy of watching the movie. (Unfortunately, the music and the sound doesn't work on slow motion so you don't do this very often.)
• You commonly use the "frame-by-frame" advance function on your VCR so that you don't miss any miniscule detail of your favourite scenes.
• Upon discovering that some characters wear their costumes more than once in different parts of the movie, you were inspired to draw up a large table in order to search for possible correlations between the costume worn and the mood of the character.
• You have drawn maps and layout plans of the rooms and the buildings in the movie.
• You special ordered a CD so you can listen to "Mr. Beveridge's Maggot" (over and over again) even when not watching the Netherfield Ball scene (eg. in the car, on the bus, while washing dishes, on the airplane, while taking a walk, while going for a jog, while vacuuming the house, while painting a fence....)
• You own two copies of Pride and Prejudice - one for the bedside, and one for downstairs reading.
• You own three copies of The Making of Pride and Prejudice - one for the bedside, one for downstairs reading, and an extra copy in case either of them gets lost.
• You giggle whenever you see Mrs. Bennet or Mr. Collins, before they even open their mouths.
• You find yourself constantly quoting your favorite lines from P&P and you feel sorry for your family and friends when they give you confused looks since they have only watched P&P once (horrors!) and can't recall the lines.
• You start thinking of excuses to wear muslin dresses in the Regency style so you can look like Lizzy and Jane.
• You spent the past five months researching Regency fashions so that the "Netherfield Ball" dress that you will be wearing to the next formal occasion is historically accurate.
• You no longer need an excuse to wear Regency style clothing - you now wear it everyday as your own personal fashion statement and as a indication of your progressive sense of style!
• Your family and friends put a limit on when and where you can talk about P&P because, unbelievably, they are just so sick of it. (For example, Tuesdays and Thursdays are designated P&P-free days.)
• The above happens and you resort to saying lines that you hope they won't notice are from the movie (such as: "no, no, the green one.")
• You searched everywhere for a script of the movie and finally wrote your own (by studying each scene in detail) when you couldn't find one. With your new script in hand, you often recruit all your friends and force them to be a part of your P&P play while you simultaneously star as Lizzy (or Darcy) and direct it so that it matches the movie exactly.
• You have a complete list of all the differences between the book and the movie.
• Your list of differences is cross-referenced to the script of the movie that you wrote earlier.
• Every time you open "The Making of P&P" book, you immediately have to start watching the videos all over again!
• Saturday night finds you and your best friend putting your hair in buns and curling your bangs into ringlets in an attempt to imitate Regency hairstyles.
• You start referring to your ex and his new ditzy girlfriend as Wickham and Lydia.
• You realize everyone in your life fits a character in P&P, and you start desperately asking your "Colonel Fitzwilliam" if he has any cousins.
• When your friend declares a dislike for P&P, you seriously consider and re-evaluate the basis of your friendship.
• You have written your own stories to conclude the lives of the other characters in the movie.
• You are very proud of your most recent story, called P&P: The Next Generation.
• You tape a picture of Lizzy (or Darcy) to your ceiling so it's the first thing you see when you wake up in the morning.
• You download pictures of the movie from the internet to put in picture frames in your living room.
• As an excuse to watch P&P more often, you contact every friend and acquaintance you can think of and offer to loan them the P&P tapes (the backup ones, of course) with the understanding that you need to be there for the viewing.
• You can relate to most or all of the signs mentioned above!

No, I am not so obsessed!

Forestry Competition

As a member of the Coffee County Home-School 4-H club, I was invited to participate in Coffee County's forestry program about two years ago. I have since then tried to develop a thorough knowledge of every aspect needed to go to the national competition. I have been now, to three regional and two state competitions. At my last state competition we were beat by merely 5.5 points, but my team and I are going back one last time (for me) to try for the first-in-state position on October 14. We placed second in the regionals yesterday, the first place going to our friends in the Coffee County A team. We knew they would be our toughest competition because we have practiced together all along.

Being in forestry has taught me more valuble skills than just leaf I.D. and tree measurement, it has taught me how to deal with many types of people, has been a huge help in getting me over some of my painful shyness, but has also taught the necessity of holding my tongue even, or I should say especially, in the most trying situations. It has taught me the necessity of working as a team, and oh how I hope we will be able to do that come state! I will write about how state went as soon as I get over my disapointment in loosing or get over my ecstacy of winning it.

I guess I ought to give a farm update: we no longer have any laying hens, and we have still got some broilers though I don't know the exact number.