Sorry y'all...

2008-03-04T20:54:00.002-06:00

I'm going to just post over here now. I know this can be a lot of trouble, but I need to learn how to use Wordpress for something else we're doing. This is a good way to do that.

Take a look at these!

2008-03-01T18:48:00.007-06:00

A picture is worth a thousand words, right?

The barn modifications are getting along! I can't say they're done, but they're definitely getting there!

Luke's joined the milking crew!

Also, I may eventually blog exclusively here, just so you know.

Weird

2008-02-29T13:34:00.004-06:00

What's with the glasses? They look like they're supposed to be in one of those movie theaters that's playing some 3D movie.

However....

... here they're rather funny!

Seed block pictures

2008-02-26T18:32:00.004-06:00

I realized that I haven't posted pictures of the seed blocks we did Thursday. Daddy and Kyle have also done a lot of work out at the barn. Hopefully I (or somebody) will get some pictures of that soon. Until then, here are the seed block pictures:

We planted the tomato seeds in large seed blocks which we made with one of those really big cans of pumpkin.

This week's menus

2008-02-25T12:05:00.003-06:00

Tonight we are having Honey and Apple Cider Glazed Pork Roast, with left-over onion-mushroom casserole.

Tomorrow we're having a light dinner night with salad (possibly with grilled chicken if I'll thing to do it), fruit, and maybe some fresh bread (if I'm not too lazy).

Wednesday I might fix ham and bean soup using some of yesterday's left-over ham.

Thursday: any ideas??? I can't get any help around here. Maybe sausage jambalaya (got that, Daddy. You might want to think of something if you don't want it.)

Friday: Grammy's night

Saturday: Grammy's night

Monday we might have a beef roast (I'll do 2, one for tomorrow) with potatoes, carrots, and bread (?).

Tuesday, if I do 2 roasts Monday, we'll probably have Blue Plate Special. Kyle's been requesting this, but I haven't been able to fit it in the schedule.

No grilled meat this week. :( Oh, well. If there's one thing I've learned by making out weekly menus, it's to be flexible... not the easiest thing for me to do, but I'm trying.

Quick thought

2008-02-21T06:41:00.007-06:00

Doesn't the hand that rocks the cradle rule the world? If it does, then why are the feminists so eager to gain power in the world outside their home?

A day in my life

2008-02-19T19:38:00.005-06:00

The morning started as usual: wake up, get ready, strip bed (that's something we don't do everyday, but it's sheets day), check email and blog feed, go downstairs to empty the dishwasher.

The morning continued as usual: empty dishwasher, wash dishes, make latte, wash more dishes, try to think of ways to use up excess milk.

The morning still continued fairly normally: Think of a couple of ways to use milk (custard and chicken feed), curdle milk for chickens, wash more dishes, finally sit down to eat breakfast, listen to Mama read Supper of the Lamb aloud.

The morning was still more or less normal: Clean up breakfast once Mama finished the chapter, wash dishes, get dinner going, wash more dishes, decide to make custard.

This part's a little abnormal: Make custard, wash those dishes, Claire and Kyle get back from milking, wash milking dishes, finally go back upstairs and make up bed.

Back to normal: Get to set down for a few moments to read blogs, lunch comes up to the big room, eat while watching the new "Mansfield Park" (Aunt Carol recorded it for us!).

Sorta kinda normal: Lunch lasted a long time (movies will do that), clean up lunch and check on dinner, sit down at the computer (for too long, but there's no need to go into that), get ready to pull dinner together.

Not quite normal: Daddy gets home, decide to put dinner off until 6:30pm, look through stash of books in the library (trying to figure out things to put on Paperback Swap), eventually make it downstairs to start getting dinner ready.

Pretty normal: Get rice going, grab a couple of boxes of butter peas out of the freezer and pressure cook them, somehow manage to get dinner ready by 6:30pm, eat and clean up dinner.

Now, I know the tenses are probably all messed up, but I don't feel like checking it right now. That's a pretty good synopsis of my day though! :)

How do you build a library???

2008-02-15T20:04:00.007-06:00

We went to the Nashville/Franklin/Murfreesboro area today, and while we were there we stopped at two Barnes and Noble and a Half-Price Book store. I love book stores. However, I didn't get anything. It's not like they didn't have anything I wanted (they had a lovely set of LOTR and Hobbit, and 1776, and the Iliad, and the Odyssey, and the Aeneid, and ... well, a lot of stuff), but everything was exorbitantly priced or they didn't have it in hardback (which is ideally how I will build my library) or they didn't have a set (I would love a set of the Iliad and Odyssey like this). Maybe I'm just too picky, but I'd sure like to have a library of nice books! I thought that it was very strange that both Barnes and Noble stores we went to only had Narnia in a single volume (that's something else I'd rather not have). I have a lot of things on my Amazon wish list right now because I am looking to replace some of my favorite paperback books with hardbacks, and I can't seem to find some of them anywhere but Amazon.

For the publishers:

Is anyone out there a publisher in need of a few ideas??? Probably not, but I'll give some anyway:

Daddy Longlegs and Dear Enemy, by Jean Webster, need to be published as a set or at least by the same company. Oh, and make them hardcover please!

Eight Cousins and Rose in Bloom, by Louisa May Alcott, need to have the same treatment.

Old-Fashioned Girl, by Louisa May Alcott, was published in '95, but if you could... I don't know, maybe make a box set with the above two books, this one, and the Inheritance, all in hardback of course. You'd have at least one buyer (if the set wasn't too expensive)!

Oh, and you know what would be really cool? An entire set, boxed (?), and hardcover of the ancient Greek mythology/plays. Perhaps you could sprinkle in a little of the Roman stuff too (the Aeneid?).

I'm not trying to completely overhaul my current meager "library," if you can call it that. I'm merely trying to replace, with more lasting books, some of my favorites, and to add some, mostly non-fiction (my current "library" is horribly deficient in that area), books that I have more recently found interesting and good. I have several sets of paperback books that I have no intention of replacing with hardcovers (either because those books are not really worth replacing or it would just be stupid to try). I have the entire Mandie series (we came from the regular world, you know), including the newest that's supposedly and entirely new series about her college days (I know, I know, sounds great doesn't it). I'm only interested in them now because I want to see who she ends up marrying. I have all the books in this series. I have this trilogy. I have this set, although not boxed, and I'm actually looking to complete the set with books by the same publisher. I have this book, but I'm thinking about looking for the novels in separate books. Hey, at least I'm not in the market to replace a certain hardback book I once received with a leather bound one!

So, if anyone can give me any pointers on library must-haves, or publishers to stay away from, or anything along those lines it would be much appreciated.

Also, if anyone happens to have a like new copy of this and just wants to get rid of it, I would be happy to take it off your hands! :)

It is finished!

2008-02-14T21:31:00.002-06:00

Really, this time it is completely done! Binding and all! Sewing starts Saturday (?), hopefully!!! Oh, finishing that is like a breath of fresh air (well, I usually get that feeling when I finish something, but this thing has been going on for three years)! I don't know when, or if, I'll get pictures up. Right now it really needs washing.

That's my Granddaddy!!!

2008-02-14T17:06:00.005-06:00

Mama posted about his letter, so I don't need to repeat any of the details. I just had to link to it though! Granddaddy comes out with some pretty surprising things sometimes!

The real question now is: "Why are they requiring even the retirees who want to serve another year (good grief! The Methodist churches I've been to have been desperate for any kind of help/work/assistance/committee member they can get!), and who have served many years before this, to take this class???"

Perhaps I can see it for fresh seminary students, but even then I don't think this sort of thing should even be thought about for pastors! If the "pastor-finding committee" (or whoever) thinks that a prospective pastor might have a problem with this kind of thing, does that not immediately disqualify that prospective pastor as unfit for the role of leading a congregation? I certainly wouldn't want someone like that leading me, my family, or my friends! But now I'm just ranting, so I'll stop.

Long post with a few pictures

2008-02-12T06:48:00.000-06:00

Saga of the Rushed Dinner

Last night I had my menus fairly planned out. The meat was thawing, and the side dishes were more or less planned. I had read over the recipe for the main dish (a delicious, but very rich, cubed pork loin recipe) earlier, and knew that I had plenty of time. I made the mistake of not having my side dish recipe, scalloped potatoes, printed out. I spent nearly a half hour that should have been used in cubing the loin trying to print that recipe! Around 4:45 pm, I decided to just wing it, and hope it turned out okay. Of course, we had decided to have dinner around 5:30 pm, so I was doing my best to speed things up. Have you ever noticed how things all go wrong right when you really need them to go right? Well, it did last night. I knew a 5:30 pm dinner was out of the question, but I thought that if I hurried enough a 6:00 pm dinner might just be attainable. I dropped a potato in the compost bowl, which was full of kefir and whey, so that made a rather large mess. I try to be a clean cook. I don't always succeed, but I try anyway. Then I sliced a couple of fingers (not bad enough to bleed, just to frustrate) using the mandoline. Finally I somehow managed to use the chef's knife (don't ask me how, I don't know) where the blade caught another of my fingers. Really, I'm usually very good with knives! I've decided that I don't work well when I rush. I did manage to have everything on the table by 6:10 pm I believe (although the potatoes could've cooked a bit longer). And so ends just another day in paradise, or another cooking experience. I can only hope that it was a learning experience too!

Now for a little update:

I'm still working on the quilt binding. I'm still reading a theology book (Mother Kirk, by Doug Wilson). I'm finding it interesting, but one that I'm unable to read through quickly. It appears that we will be doing seed blocks inside this year. Daddy's set up our green house tables to be able to support a light. All the animals are doing fine. The cat disappears at will, but has been back that last few days. The dogs are still tremendously fat from pig left-overs (We had pig feet on our front porch for the longest time! I couldn't help hoping that those Jehovah's Witness people would show up again!). They also had rib bones from Saturday's dinner. Oh, Daddy fixes the best ribs! The cows are surviving as are the chickens. Clarabelle has been giving up to 2 gallons of milk a day, but the milkers have gone out rather late too. Chuck is so big now, but we can't think of weaning him yet! That would necessitate two milkings a day! Here's a few pictures:

What a greeting that would have been for the Jehovah's Witness!

That's probably 47, our best-looking and best-tempered cow.

The seed block table, newly rigged up with a light. Now, at least, we won't have to worry about bringing them inside when it gets too cold outside!

DONE!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-02-07T15:29:00.001-06:00

All the hand quilting is done!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm working on the binding now. That will take a little while, but the end is in sight! I now feel motivated to finish it completely.

Off to the binding...

I am learning a new language....

2008-02-06T09:22:00.000-06:00

.... or trying to anyway. Being the most "tech-savvy" person constantly at home (that's really not saying much, by the way), I got recruited to create various websites for the family. I can now read a tiny, little, itty-bitty amount of HTML code, which I guess is something. I am going to leap into style sheets soon, and hopefully I will conquer it. Maybe, in the next five or ten years, I will be able to put out a nice-looking, well-flowing website. By then there will be something much better. (You always have to close something computer/internet related with that statement. Nothing lasts very long in technology; at least, I haven't seen it if something has!)

It is only when they go wrong that machines remind you how powerful they are.
--- Clive James

Hardware: the parts of a computer that can be kicked.
--- Jeff Pesis

To err is human, but to really foul things up you need a computer.
--- Paul Ehrlich

Technology has the shelf life of a banana.
--- Scott McNealy

Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do doesn't mean it's useless. [I've got to remember this one]
--- Thomas Alva Edison

Our Old House

2008-02-02T20:34:00.000-06:00

This was an awesome house; we hated to leave it. We'll probably say the same thing about this one. We did so much work! I couldn't find good pictures of Kyle's room or our room.

Living room.

Totally nice deck.

Can you believe that Daddy designed this? The siding guy who came once it was all done was amazed with how square it was; they compared it to the Great Pyramids.

Wonderful playground.

Oldest Child Thought

2008-02-02T15:37:00.000-06:00

You know, it's rather difficult to live by the standards I have for my younger siblings. I've thought this before, but it just hit me hard as I was tempted to snitch candy from a bag of Claire's (I've gotten onto Kyle for doing that sort of thing before). So, I've decided not to tell them to do (or not to do) anything, and that way, when I feel like doing (or not doing) something, I won't feel like such a hypocrite. Right??? Wrong. Fine. I'll try to live by the same standards I have for them, and I'll try not to nag and boss them. In other words, I'll try to remember how hard a time I have upholding the standard, and not expect so much for them.

BTW, I'm going to try to get some pictures of our old house up soon. The back porch/deck, the playground, the living room, our room, and Kyle's room mainly. That's nearly the entire house, but those are the places that had the most improvements done to them. Daddy SO TOTALLY improved that place!!! Now, if I can only find them, and then figure out how to use the scanner on this printer thingy, and then figure out how to upload them onto this here blog, and then....... :)

Tim Hawkins on pig slaughtering

2008-01-30T10:12:00.000-06:00

I couldn't help posting this in the light of our latest slaughtering adventures!

A quick note

2008-01-30T10:04:00.000-06:00

I said I'd give my opinion of Nicholas Nickleby, so here it is. I thought that it was a rather tedious book. That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, but I have read other books that I enjoyed much more. Of the Dickens books I have read, this is probably my least favorite, but A Christmas Carol comes close. A Christmas Carol has the advantage of being short though.

Any suggestions for non-fiction books?

A little whine

2008-01-28T13:51:00.000-06:00

I can't quilt and read at the same time!!! It's too difficult to hold a needle and thread, the quilt, and a book, so I'm having to choose between finishing the endless quilt and the endless book! I have to choose the one that means the most to you... ummm... I mean.... that makes it appear that I'm doing something rather than just lazily sitting around. So, it's either quilt and watch a movie, or read classic literature. Neither look very good.

Observations

2008-01-25T21:16:00.000-06:00

Flan is better served warm.

A little coffee enhances the flavor of chocolate.

If your an author, you somehow have full authority to make up, misspell, and twist words.

Microsoft Word is sometimes just plain ornery.

Milking is no fun when it's freezing outside.

It just doesn't seem right that it's snowing way south of us.

Slivered almonds burn very easily in attempts to toast them.

Chicken spaghetti made with yellow rubber (a.k.a. Velveeta, processed cheese product, etc.) is not good at all.

My last few months in the kitchen seems to have changed my views a bit. :)

Ugh!

2008-01-24T20:51:00.000-06:00

I think I'm going to have to read some sort of book on literary analysis next. You just wouldn't believe how that prospect enthralls me.......... or not! Still, I'm absolutely sick of reading books and not being able to ascertain whether or not they were actually good! I don't think even a book like that would help me very much to reveal how to figure out the world view or slant of any particular book. How could it? It has to have a slant too! I have finished reading The Wars of the Roses, but all I came away from it with was the desire for more! It seemed to ask for a sequel, but I don't know if the history in it was very good or not. I certainly don't know if the world view was good! That sort of bothers me, but.......

I'm in the middle of Nicholas Nickleby, but I'm finding it quite a bit more tedious than the other Dickens books I have read. Somehow, my opinion of Dickens books improves one I am done with them, so I defer final judgment of it until I am through, and, even then, just to say whether I liked it or not.

Friday and Saturday

2008-01-21T12:44:00.000-06:00

This past Friday and Saturday some of the wonderful folks from our church (plus a family from GA who are working on getting up here) came to our place and helped us slaughter and butcher the rest of our pigs. We could not have done it without them!!!! Thank y'all so much!!!

Friday afternoon Daddy, Kyle, Luke, Lingo men, and various members of the Fish family slaughtered the three pigs, and hung them in the smoke house. The walk-in cooler is currently out-of-commission, but it was cold enough to leave the halves outside overnight.

Little Smoky was the first to go (Daddy thought he might be smarter than the others and runaway after the first shot).

They had all three done by 4:30pm, at the latest!

Friday evening Mr. Draper, and the Evans' pulled in. After everyone had eaten, there was some conversation, and refreshed our butchering memories with the Meat Man (he could not only use someone to redo the videos, but the website too!) video.

Saturday morning Mama, Mrs. Evans, and Mrs. Fish started making a batch of soap, but I am not allowed to post any of the pictures Claire got of that process.

The men went out around 10:00am or so and started butchering.

A few of us were happily occupied inside, where it was warm!

Sausage-maker extraordinaires!

The packaging table was kept pretty busy most of the time.

Cuties!!!

I've got it

2008-01-16T15:21:00.000-06:00

Mama took me to get my driver's license permit this morning. We were only there an hour, and everything seemed to go smoothly. I've kind of got a Hitchcockian "that was way too easy, what's going to happen next" feeling. I filled out a form, answered every question on the test correctly, passed the eye test, and had my picture taken. Really the only problems we encountered were: the computer wouldn't accept a Morrison address with Grundy County (Easy enough to fix. The mailbox is in Warren County anyway), and one of the ladies there couldn't read the school name on the diploma because of the fancy font. They also wouldn't let me keep my head covering on, but that was no big deal.

We also cleared up the stuff about the graduated driver's license: because I'm getting my permit when I'm 17, I'll just hold that until I'm 18, and then go directly to the regular, unrestricted driver's license. If I'd gotten my permit when I was 15 (holding it a minimum of 180 days), I would have had to apply for an Intermediate Restricted driver's license when I was 16, then, when I turned 17, I would be allowed to go to an Intermediate Unrestricted driver's license, and by the time I turned 18 the state would have decided I was ready for a full-blown driver's license. Thankfully, I get to skip all that in the middle now.

This is all that was necessary to obtain the permit:

My diploma
Mama's driver's license (as long as it had the correct address on it, which it did)
A certified birth certificate (I guess to prove that I was actually born???), and
My social security number

Now I'm going to have to find some way to get 50 hours of driving time, including 10 hours of night driving before 10:00 pm, this year!

General update

2008-01-09T16:46:00.000-06:00

Okay, then, since my last post I have finished Our Mutual Friend, and started The Wars of the Roses by Allison Weir (it was just one we had, don't know if it's good or bad.). I ended up enjoying the book Our Mutual Friend better than the movie. The movie was fairly close to the book (besides leaving out a great deal of the "Society" scenes, and making Eugene less bored than he seemed in the book), but it was more graphic. It had a few more disgusting parts in it that weren't in the book too.

Anyway, I am only at the beginning of this Allison Weir book, but so far, though sort of interesting, I'm not too crazy about it. For some reason, I tend to stray away from women authors when it comes to nonfiction. I don't particularly know why. It may be I don't like this book because of the first chapter where the authoress kept referring to the fourteenth and fifteenth century women as having been regarded as chattels and heir-bearing machines. She said this or things similar to this several times, and I just got tired of reading about how "poorly the women were treated" and so on. The parts about how the kings had to go to war with France just to keep the people and Parliament behind them are fairly interesting.

I have also done a great deal of quilting. See! I haven't quite forgotten my goals for this year! With quilting comes hours of stitching monotony unless, of course, you get to watch a movie! Which I have been doing (too much, judging by the way my head feels this afternoon). We watched the 2005 "Pride and Prejudice" and "National Treasure" yesterday; Kyle, Luke, and I watched "How the West was Won" this afternoon.

We've been making Claire practice the Psalms and hymns that we've learned in parts at church. Once she can play them, the rest of us can practice our parts.

I bought a planner a while back to use for the organization of my menus. I recently looked through the front pages that are used by students to write down stuff about where their classes are and who is teaching that class and so on. It also had a page for Morse code, Braille, and sign language alphabets; along with these however, was a section entirely devoted for emoticons!!! Mama, Claire, and I looked over some of them; these were some of our "favorites" (to laugh at):

O:-) meaning angel (if y'all already knew all this, please pardon me. This is completely new to me, except for the smiley :) or ;) or :( frown)

%-( meaning confused

:-& meaning tongue-tied

|-O meaning yawn

Looking these things up on Wikipedia brings up a few more than my little planner. I like these too:

',:Y meaning concerned duck

~:> meaning chicken

Just thought that was weird.

That's all for now. Maybe I'll get a post up soon that has a lot of pictures for those of my "readers" who don't look at this blog unless there are photos.

New Year's Resolutions

2008-01-04T07:47:00.000-06:00

Usually I'm against things like that (on no other basis except that I can never seem to keep them), but this year I decided to test myself again. I have a couple of goals for the year 2008:

I am (hopefully) going to finish a quilt that's been in the works for about three years. To try to make it more certain that I accomplish this I am not going to sew anything else until that's done. :(

Also, I hope to become better read this year. I intent to expand my knowledge of certain authors in fiction (C.S. Lewis, Charles Dickens, etc.) , read up on some of the more "modern" history, and perhaps add a little theology. I'm going to try anyway. I'm working on Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens right now. I've never been too much of a Dickens fan, but this one seems to be alright as did A Tale of Two Cities. They're still nothing I'd put top of my list though.

There. Hopefully I will be able to accomplish these things this year, especially now that I've declared them to the entire world. Then of course there's all those things that are normally on people's lists of resolutions:

Eat better

Be nicer to everyone

Go through all the junk everywhere

... to name a few. Unfortunately, I have no desire to eat better than I do. I hope I am nice to everyone, but I know I'm not. I've been labeled, and labeled myself, "mean" too often to not know it! I am continually striving to overcome that, whatever it may look like. A desire to get rid of junk? Of course! I'm all for it! Having to go through it all before it goes to the appropriate place (trash, Goodwill, Ebay, etc.)? "Ummmmmmm......... weeeelllll........... you see........ I... uhhh.... ummmm......... I.... uh.... think.... I'm busy. Yeah, that's it! I'm busy!" Not much desire to do that either. It's got to be done sometime though, and better now than when crunch time comes!

Merry Christmas, Y'all!

2007-12-24T10:19:00.000-06:00

I meant to post this quote from Luke last week, but I forgot.

"Those bad guys can't get me because I'm behind here [a cardboard box full of wheat bran], but I can get them because I have my WD 40!"

He was explaining his war plan to me and Mama while we were cooking. He later explained that a WD 40 is similar to an AK 47.

Merry Christmas, y'all!

My attempt at salesmanship

2007-12-19T11:56:00.000-06:00

The Heritage trebuchet is now for sale! Price may vary, depending on how eager we are to get rid of it. It can come with the trailer, or we can possibly help unload it. Flag and pumpkins not included.

Includes:

12' maple throwing arm laminated with oak boards for stability.
1500lb counterbalance
9' sling
Main structure made out of oak beams
Pivot point is 9' from the trailer

All beams milled on location. More pictures and information available on request.

Link to Craigslist post with videos.

Now announcing the custom, hardy, country-style, large family table! What could be better than sitting down to a hot, home-cooked meal of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green peas, and chocolate pie at your very own farm-house table?

Made out of pine boards, and polyurethane-d to allow the natural beauty of the wood to shine through to it's fullest potential, this is one table you don't have to worry about; it looks all the better for the wear.

Comment here for details.

Also for sale: Unwanted videos (mostly VHS, but there might be a few DVDs in there), CDs, books, games, and junk.

If you're looking for something you can find pretty much anywhere else, HERE IT IS!!!!!!!!

Please leave a comment with your name and whatever you're looking for (we probably have it). We will see if we can negotiate something via email once it is confirmed that we do have it.

I think most any price will be accepted seeing as that would be something more than we would get from Goodwill.

Last night

2007-12-19T11:20:00.000-06:00

Last night was out traditional tree-decorating family night. Mama spent most of the day preparing the finger foods that was to be our dinner. We had thin strips of steak, rosemary cheese croquet things served with marinara sauce, sweet and spicy nuts, pitted dates filled with feta cheese and smoked almonds, calzone pinwheels, mini spinach and feta quiches, Cabot cheese and crackers, roasted garlic, apples and dulce de leche, fudge, peanut brittle, gingerbread lattes, and mulled apple cider!!! Abundance! Elvis, Amy Grant, and Twila Paris were singing Christmas songs. There was a fire in the fire place; the stockings were hung. To top it all off, we had Luke to keep us excited (if a little frustrated occasionally)! The setting was perfect. Luke hung nearly every ornament on the tree, and, for once, we managed to have a tree that doesn't necessarily look overloaded! The size and stability of the tree itself prevented many of the ornaments from being hung up. According to another tradition, and upon Luke's insistence, we four kids slept in the living room with the newly-decorated tree.

Christmas preparations

2007-12-18T13:15:00.000-06:00

Yesterday we all went hiking through our woods searching for just the right "Charlie Brown Christmas Tree" for our living room.

I think we did pretty well!

Daddy and Kyle got it up and put the lights on it last night. We'll do our traditional finger-food-dinner, tree decorating tonight. There's quite a bit more prep work put into a finger food meal than I realized! Mama's been working on that most of the morning. Kyle and Luke built a fire, and Claire's been playing Christmas music on the piano. I think we're getting into the whole spirit of things again.

Pictures from Thanksgiving week

2007-12-12T10:37:00.001-06:00

Our last turkeys.

Now, I don't know about any of y'all, but I think dessert is almost the most important aspect of Thanksgiving Day! Uncle Craig brought this cake.

Aunt Lou brought a caramel pie!!! Homemade crust and everything!

Pecan pie.

CUSTARD!!!!!

Can you believe they still had energy to wrestle?!!

Finishing one side!

Continuing another.

The view from inside.

A few things

2007-12-11T10:41:00.000-06:00

This morning the pastures in front of our house were black! I stepped out on the front porch to check it out, and could hardly hear myself think. Apparently, a flock birds had chosen our area as a migratory "rest area." I love being outside when so many birds are here; it's so amazing! When they would all start up to move to the next spot their take-off sounded like a turkey drumming. It's a powerful sound. Watching that sort of thing always brings the greatness of the Lord to the very front of my mind.

I tried playing my mandolin again recently, hoping it wouldn't bother my wrists. It did. After playing it again, though, I am continually longing to pick it up! I can think of so many excuses to play it: it needs playing so that the it will keep a tune! My fingers will completely forget everything I worked so hard on! I think it's probably best that I don't play it though. :(

Is it really December? It's over 70° outside! What's with that?!? It looks like it'll get colder as the week progresses though. I think Kyle and Luke are going to go up on the mountain to find us a cedar tree that we'll cut down next week. We usually have live Christmas trees, but it should be fun having a tree that we harvested off our own land. According to our long-standing tradition, we'll have tons of finger foods and have Christmas music playing the evening we decorate it.

Wow

2007-12-05T09:56:00.001-06:00

We just got our copy of "Return of the Daughters" yesterday, so last night we watched it. It was very encouraging to see daughters (and fathers) with a vision! I think having a vision, and a well-defined, if still flexible, one, makes all the difference in the world. It's amazing how much I can do when I know what the goal is. That ends up being a problem sometimes because I get stuck thinking that the goal must be well defined or I'm lost! I'm working on it though.

In the mood

2007-12-04T11:22:00.000-06:00

Trans-Siberian Orchestra! I love instrumental Carol of the Bells!

Is it weird that, last night at dinner, we discussed what desserts we absolutely have to have this Christmas season?

Spritz cookies
Pecan pie
Peanut brittle
Fudge
Half-moon cookies

"These are a few of my favorite things..."

That's just what we immediately came up with; I'm sure we'll find some others to add to that list.

"It's just a family tradition!"

2007-12-03T11:27:00.000-06:00

Last night was the Hanging of the Greens service at Centertown United Methodist Church. As I mentioned in the previous post, Claire and I were a part of it. I think we performed okay, better than I expected really. Just a couple of days ago we had almost no voice!

Many churches hold a service of preparation for Christ's coming, which includes hanging greenery traditionally associated with everlasting life. Greens such as cedar for royalty, fir and pine boughs for everlasting life, holly symbolizing Jesus' death and ivy representing the resurrection are used.
--- UMC "What is Hanging of the Greens?"

What's new

2007-11-29T18:51:00.000-06:00

We watched Ratatouille the other night. I liked it.

Yesterday, as many of y'all know, Claire and Kyle had music lessons. I stayed home with Luke (got to make cookie dough!). Anyway, "on their way" home, they had to stop by Wal-mart. Kyle stumbled across a double feature DVD set of Gettysburg and Gods and Generals.

The house is a wreck, but that's not really new. The fact that we're more or less trying to deal with it while at the same time trying to cull some of our enormous amount of stuff, that might be new. We've got a large-ish box full of culled videos, several boxes of games and puzzles, several boxes of books, and I think we've got a box of miscellaneous stuff as well (hospital pillows, candle holders, vases, etc.). Our next area, now that we're coming up on that time, probably needs to be Christmas decorations; there's also toys (LOTS of toys), baby and toddler clothes, Cd's, pictures, school stuff, books again, movies again, etc.

Our dishwasher is behaving very badly lately. This is close to the one we have. Even though it is the "Quiet Series," it is quite loud; it has never dried the dishes very well; even the heavy wash (2 hour) cycle leaves the cups and glasses dirtier than when they went in, and now the handle's broken! We have to fiddle with it just to get it to open!

Clarabelle learned how to push her feed bowl through the opening it sits in, so last night Daddy fixed it to where she couldn't do that. Mama and Kyle report that she tried hard to push it though this morning. She's a smart cow, but sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't be easier to deal with a stupid one.

Practice for the Hanging of the Greens service Claire and I are singing in Sunday continues to progress. We are on a shaky line between pretty much well and getting worse as far as our colds go; that's not making practice any easier. Claire's singing "Sweet Little Jesus Boy" and we're both doing "O Holy Night" and "Beautiful Star of Bethlehem."

Ummmmm........ I think that's pretty much it, for now at least.

Civics Quiz

2007-11-27T21:44:00.000-06:00

This was linked to on a blog that Mama and Daddy read. We took it as a family this evening and got a 91.6. Pretty good considering. I knew quite a few more answers than I thought I would, but I could still stand to read up on some of the more "recent" history.

Disturbing?

2007-11-26T18:39:00.000-06:00

Randomness

2007-11-20T15:01:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was portrait day. Here's my favorite picture of the day:

He's so funny! We had such a hard time getting him to cooperate!

Claire, our sharpshooter, got some pictures of this weekend.

Anna and Luke making breadsticks.

Two stooges.

Making salsa.

There's one of these Fallow Deer (Dama dama) near us. It looks very odd! The antlers are palmate, like a moose, and they keep their spots. They are very small, between 100 and 150 pounds in the wild (up to 200 pounds domesticated). They're only three feet or so tall! Originally from the Middle East, Fallow Deer are common in much of Europe and are slowly being introduced by deer farmers to the United States. They are raised mainly for sport (they make unusual trophies, obviously.), and velvet antler which is sold to Asian cultures who use it in medicines.

Well, tonight's the night! So it's not the night before Thanksgiving, but it's close enough. Our turkeys two remaining live turkeys are going to fulfill their purpose tonight, and one (at least) will go into the brine! We'll enjoy it Thursday. I will miss hearing their noise though; it's been pretty neat. There's always next year!

A couple of quotes

2007-11-15T09:15:00.000-06:00

"If there is no rush, you can't piddle." --- Claire on piddling.

"I obey frequently." --- Luke after he said that he already knew everything we were going to teach him... except reading.

Chicken conversations

2007-11-13T15:37:00.000-06:00

I just couldn't resist!

"Hmmm... What's that you say, dahling?"

"Hold on, dear, I can't hear you."

"What are those two gossiping about this time!?!"

"Hey there, gals!"

"Would you please get that thing out of my face!"

Picture update

2007-11-13T15:00:00.000-06:00

A few evenings ago we butchered a half a steer for a friend. I got the grinding job again. I've decided that they put me there on purpose; I'm not very good at wrapping the meat. :)

We went through our game/puzzle closet the other day. We have boxes and boxes of things to get rid of now!

Everything fits in there so nicely now! We don't have to close the doors quickly so nothing falls out!

Chuck.

Clarabelle.

Daddy, Kyle, and Luke put up some metal siding on the barn as a sort of wind break. That's going to be very nice this winter.

The two turkeys left.

"Little" Smokie

And the other two pigs.

The cool weather is here... again

2007-11-13T06:46:00.000-06:00

Why does cool weather bring something unpleasant (other than the bundling up and feeling like your in the 1800's because you've got so many layers on)? Will we ever have another fall/winter where we don't get sick?

We're all a bit down with something. It seems to be different for each person, but we're assuming it's all just a cold. Mama's drippy and tired; I'm barely able to talk (that's a slight exaggeration, but my throat is what's bothering me) and tired; Claire's stuffy, headache-y, and tired; I'm not sure about Kyle; Luke's stuffy and not as tired as the rest of us (that seems unfortunate, but I suppose it's really a good thing); and I don't know about Daddy either. We're all hoping it will end quickly. Claire and I need to start practicing for the Hanging of the Greens service that we're supposed to sing at (in Centertown), and this, just like something did last year, is going to put us behind. Okay, enough complaining. We're doing our best to think positive, and we're enjoying, probably too much, just sitting around.

Guess what I've been doing!

2007-11-09T19:51:00.001-06:00

Yep. I looked through our barn raising pictures!

Here it is!!!

2007-11-09T06:28:00.000-06:00

A very rough slide show of our weekend! I found Brad Paisley doing this song first, but Daddy put the original group doing it. I don't know if we could have found Brad Paisley's version anyway.

I don't think it's too bad for a first try. Sorry about the little bump in the music.

Guess What! Another post titled "Reformation Day/Weekend!"

2007-11-06T11:05:00.000-06:00

Where to start?!!! That's always the problem!

The setting: a few days before the big event.

The men and boys smoothing out last minute problems on the trebuchet.

Inserting a solid metal bar though the arm's axle (it was bending really bad without that).

One of the launches!

Raising the standard.

This is what we girls and ladies left every time the men launched the siege machine!

Scene 2: The big day.

The gathering crowd.

The Heritage Quintet?

Traveling Germans.

You can just barely see our trolley set-up behind the tables.

The competition.

Changing frenzy. Plaid, plaid, everywhere plaid!

Kilted father and son.

Clan leader.

Everyone trying to find a spot on the trebuchet or in the truck bed for our grand entrance!

"For the Lord is our defense...."

My handsome bro. in his Scottish attire.

My other handsome brother in his Scottish garb.

Our men standing around preparing for the first launch.

Impromptu concert!

All in all, the day went very well!

It's a.... convertible!

2007-10-26T14:00:00.001-05:00

:) Right, Chris?

Daddy said...

2007-10-23T21:09:00.000-05:00

"Even though we, as individuals, are so ignorant, when we pull together.... our ignorance is even greater."

Another calf

2007-10-20T18:48:00.000-05:00

31 calved today!!! She seems to be doing much better; for a while there she was barely getting around. Of course it's a little heifer calf; we don't seem to be able to get any bulls that we can turn into future meat. Oh well, we still have a couple or three more calves on the way.

Now, per request of a certain someone (Don't worry, Caleb, I won't mention any names.) I am going to post an entire paragraph of a couple of week ago when the Lovetts spent a couple of days here. I warned you, sir!!!

Well, where to start... I guess it's always easiest to start at the beginning. So, the Lovett family arrived around 4:00 pm on Wednesday, October 3, 2007. The day before Daddy and Kyle had processed one of our turkeys; I had been nursing it all day. We had dinner around 5:30 pm or 6:00 pm. After dinner Kyle and the certain someone got up a game of Cranium. We played two games of that Wednesday night. For those of you who know (roughly) how to play the game, you know that there are certain parts of the game where you have to silently act out things. Well, the word was "mermaid," and the certain someone had to act it out. He did a very good job! His partner guessed it almost right off. The other word that he acted out later was "nun." Again he did a wonderful job. We learned (if we didn't already know it) that that certain someone can't hardly spell, but he can spell "aqueduct." That's enough Cranium talk, I think. On to Thursday. The men worked very hard on I'm not sure what all. They did electrical work and drywall work, but other than that, I'm not sure. We ladies went to Sir's Fabrics. Kaliste and I discovered how good a Twix Ice Cream bar tastes. ;) We had turkey-pot-pie around 7:00 pm for dinner Thursday evening, and we again played a couple of games of Cranium afterwards. They left the next morning. Well, is that enough? Is that enough information on y'all's visit? Sorry, but we don't have any more pictures of that visit that I can post.

Really, I will post soon!

2007-10-17T12:22:00.000-05:00

I just looked at the date of my last short post; I am astonished and ashamed of myself. Still, we are very busy around here now. Perhaps things will start to slow down soon, and I will be able to post something more interesting. I don't have any idea what that will be though; perhaps y'all could give me ideas of what you want to know more about (please, something I might actually be able to do!). Sorry! No time right now for more.

It has started...

2007-10-12T15:46:00.000-05:00

Yes, "It's that time again!" We watched "Charlie Brown Christmas" during lunch this afternoon. Did you know that he says "y'all"? That's this year's CBC observation.

Claire has started playing Christmas music almost more than any other genre; she did figure out a couple of chords from "Gone" (Montgomery Gentry) this afternoon though.

Recent goings on

2007-10-11T20:56:00.000-05:00

Claire's finally picked up the camera again!!! That means I have a few pictures to post!!! I am so glad because if she hadn't done this I was going to actually touch the camera and grab a few pics of the farm. Since these aren't of the farm I may still do that; I've been thinking that I ought to get an updated picture of Chuck on here.

Daddy and Mr. Lovett enjoying the new latte machine while the Lovetts visited the other day! We greatly enjoyed their fellowship.

This past Lord's Day the Stouffers and Rachel and Allen Draper followed us home. It is such a blessing to finally host fellowship at our place!

I believe Kyle especially enjoyed having some manly fellowship here at home.

Here's what we (well, Claire, Kyle, and Daddy) did this evening.

The final product... before smoking at least! Pig meat in pig guts!

Silly Sayings

2007-10-10T15:53:00.001-05:00

Our radar is acting up right now; that's the only way I can explain this one:

Global warming conference canceled by sudden snow storm.

We passed a church on the way home the other day, and this was on the sign:

Need a new look? Come inside for a faith lift.

Here's a few other ridiculous church slogan thingys (I goin' technical on you again!):

Church shopping? We're open Sundays.

ATM inside: Atonement, Truth, and Mercy

Free tickets to Heaven. Details inside.

The best vitamin for a Christian is to B1.

I don't like corny, "witty", irreverent church signs; I promise I have seen all of these and more! These things drive me crazy! "I can't stand 'em; I just can't stand 'em!"

I'm finally getting around to this

2007-10-10T12:17:00.000-05:00

Kaliste tagged me several days (weeks???) ago, and I have finally found a bit of time to do it.

You are riding in an air-plane when you happen to look out your window and see a dragon flying alongside the plane. You...

A. scream.

B. remain perfectly still, too scared to make any noise or even move.

C. jam your fist through the window and leap on the dragon's back.

D. faint.

E. say, "Hey it's a dragon!

Well, I really couldn't say, but maybe…… B.

You are sleeping over your friend's house, it's late at night, but you can't fall asleep. Lying in bed, you hear their front door creep open, and the sound of someone coming in and sneaking around the house. You...

A. grab a baseball bat, or anything on hand that looks in any way like a weapon, and peek past the door to see what’s going on.

B. hide under your covers and remain very still, hoping the burglar or whoever it is would just go away and leave poor you alone.

C. wake up your friend or whoever is closest at hand to tell them what you hear.

D. make scary ghost-like noises, knowing that trying to scare the burglar out of the house is the best option.

E. awake the parents and hide in the closet, hoping he doesn't look in there.

I don't think I'd do any of these, but, since I have to choose, I'll say A. because it's most likely just certain someones tasting homemade sweet rolls ready for breakfast the next day.

One of your friends challenges you to do the chicken dance in the middle of Wall-Mart. You....

A. do it! Who cares what people think!

B. gasp! Who would do such a thing?

C. only if he/she does it first!

D. try on some sunglasses and pretend you don't know this person.

E. make them pay you first

E. but they'd have to pay me a lot!

You find a million dollars on the floor. You...

A. try to find its owner (if not keep it)

B. start dancing and shouting "I got a million dollars!"

C. leave it alone...let someone else get it.

D. go shopping

I'd be rather frightened if I found a million dollars. Most likely I'd be thinking that it's fake or looking around for the candid camera people. So, after all that I'd have to say C. Of course I'd probably regret it after a while.

Some stranger walks up to you and says "want to go for a ride"? You...

A. stare at em' and say "are you kidding me?!"

B. say " yeah sure!"

C. step on their toe and run away

D. say "FREAK" and run away.

E. say "No"

A. then E.

Your best friend since kindergarten is acting weird. You...

A. ask her/him what's bothering them.

B. start acting weird, too.

C. become increasingly depressed.

D. say 'You're not my friend anymore, you never want to hang out.'

E. say "what's YOUR problem?"

I don't have any friends from kindergarten except family, and I'm just as weird as they are. I guess I'd have to say B. then.

You’re stranded on a deserted island. You…

A. run around screaming for help

B. start gathering fire wood and figuring out some sort of shelter.

C. begin to explore, you might as well know your surroundings.

D. you build a huge fire in hopes that someone will see it and rescue you.

E. sit on a rock and write your dying wish

I guess C. and might as well do B. while I'm at it. Why is it a deserted island anyway? What made all the inhabitants leave?

The neighborhood bully walks up behind you and pushes you over on your way home from your walk. You...

A. get up and keep walking, ignoring the bully.

B. you get up and yell in his/her face.

C. you get up and scarcasticly say that you love him/her and walk away.

D. you run and get your mom.

E. cry and run away

F. get into a fist fight

Knowing that it would be improper to do B. or C. and impossible to do F. with any chance of winning and degrading to do D. and E. I guess I have to go with A.

You go out to get the mail and your neighbors 500 pound rottweiler comes streaking straight at you and and barks up a storm, frothing at the mouth and growling. You....

A. start throwing anything handy at him.

B. run away screaming

C. yell that your dad's a lawyer, (even if he isn't one) and that you're going to sue

D. cry like a little girl and cover head with your arms

E. say "Niiice doggie" and attempt to pet him.

F. climb a tree.

First of all, my neighbors don't have 500 pound rottweilers (who does??? That's about 400 pounds overweight!). Still, if it ever happens that I do meet some 500 pound rottweiler that is still able to streak, after assessing the situation and determining that it would be impossible to do E. and, having wasted too much time assessing the situation to B., knowing that it would be entirely useless to do C. and D., I'd have to do F.

Quick update

2007-09-28T13:52:00.000-05:00

Well, I had thought to post some newer pictures of the farm, but I don't particularly care to walk around with a camera. So, instead of a nice post with pictures, I have to do a short, boring :) post.

Claire and Kyle are working on fitting school in the rather hectic schedule we have now. I'm trying to do what's expected of me, and finish Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. For the record, I still don't like it, but I've got to finish it. Mama calls that quality in me "obsessive-compulsive" adding that "that isn't always bad." I'm quite sick of novels at the moment though. I long to read a good history book about something I don't know a lot about (pretty much any part of history except Columbus and Colonial America). Any suggestions? Mama's either got a poetry course for me to take or she's working on it, but that seems almost as bad as a novel right now (probably because it's an assignment).

Anyway, the farm somehow continues to operate, most likely by Kyle and Daddy's most-capable hands. Grammy and Granddaddy worked in the garden with Luke this morning. Clarabelle's not doing as well in the stanchion as she was before. She's figured out how to get her hoof into the milking bucket, so, because of that, we haven't been getting as much milk lately. Chuck is getting bigger and darker. We're still expecting four Angus calves (I think it's four). The bits of rain we've occasionally been getting has done the pastures a world of good. I think we're getting four eggs a day now, but they're still tiny.

Well, I need to go wash the milking stuff now.

Pig Slaughtering: Start to Finish

2007-09-19T16:36:00.000-05:00

Okay, here it is. The pictures aren't very good, but I think they are good enough. I'm not going to comment on them much though; I usually wasn't actually in the process.

I don't what we'd do without the mule!

Luke got in there and helped a bit. You can just barely see him in this picture.

Again, the mule! This was way better than using the tractor. However, this made it necessary for them to skin and gut right behind the driveway!

Once Daddy and Kyle had skinned the underside of the pig, they pulled him up and skinned his backside.

Then they cut him open...

and dumped out the insides.

The pulley system.

Product #1. Quite good. Mild, though.

Pig Slaughtering

2007-09-17T19:04:00.000-05:00

Well, I will post about it soon, but we haven't downloaded the pictures yet, and I'd rather do it all in one post. Kyle and Daddy are butchering it this evening, and Mama and Claire are cutting up bits of meat and fat to freeze for sausage. I am trying to keep Luke occupied! :) So far, that's not been too difficult; he's watching Tom and Jerry right now.

Theological Debate

2007-09-13T20:47:00.000-05:00

Ahasuerus or Xerxes?

This is just for me

2007-09-10T12:40:00.000-05:00

I don't want to have to search for this whenever I want to watch it.

YouTube Fun

2007-09-07T15:48:00.001-05:00

Josh Turner is awesome!!!

I love this song! The harmonies are great!

Another group with outstanding harmonies. For some reason, I remember listening to this song for years! We've always had great fun with it as a family.

Yesterday

2007-09-06T18:23:00.000-05:00

What a day we had yesterday!!! We took a couple of little steers from our neighbor to the Carpenters, but along the way we had quite the adventure!

Everything went wrong from the beginning (thankfully not all the way to the end!). Daddy didn't hardly sleep the night before, so he went into work around 3:00 am! Then, when he came home to get some sleep before we had to go to the Franklin/Leiper's Fork area, the phone rang more times! I think we got more calls that morning than we have all day today! After lunch Daddy, Kyle, Luke, and I went to load the steers into our neighbor's trailer. That was much harder and way longer than Daddy was expecting, but we did get them loaded! Once we went back to the house to pick up Mama and Claire we were off! Well, after a few more bathroom breaks.

We made it, without any stops, all the way onto the interstate. Luke was finally asleep, Mama and Daddy were conversing, Claire was working on math, and Kyle was reading. Suddenly a truck pulled up along side us and motioned for us to get over (he was quite panicked). He pulled over to tell us what happened. One of those little steers had leaped out of the trailer!!! We quickly scanned the area for something to block the other steer from getting out. We didn't find anything, so we had to use some straps that happened to be in the back of the suburban. Someone else also pulled over to tell us that he had "seen it all, and the cow was back at that T-Rex place."

Once we got the straps on as well as we could quickly we turned around. We made our first stop at the co-op, which happened to be at that exit. We switched trailers to one of the co-op's that happened to have a flat tire, so we switched to a different one. We left the remaining steer in the other trailer, and went to the T-Rex place.

When we got to that place we pulled out the camera a got a few shots of the community coming together in an emergency. A policeman and a constable were already there kind of guarding the little fella. The man who originally pulled us over came along and helped us; I don't think they could have done it without him. Anyway, after a while of chasing that steer through the field across the road, that man decided they needed a 4-wheeler! The constable took him to his house, and he brought the tool that quickly finished the job. That man was great!

There were no more problems for the rest of the way to the Carpenters! They were all very excited to get the little guys, although Kyle, Cole, and Logan had to lower a pile of dirt so the steers didn't jump over the fence! Mrs. Carpenter and Peyton fixed an excellent dinner, and we got a tour of their house. They have a lovely place! I believe we left around 9:00 pm.

Here are some pictures of our day:

Then there was today's experience. I don't particularly feel like going over it at the moment, but Mama posted about it fairly accurately and eloquently. Just ignore the "boring" part of it; I haven't said that in quite a while!

A WEEKEND TO REMEMBER by Claire B.

2007-09-06T14:25:00.001-05:00

Saturday Afternoon, September 1st, 2007
Drove to Coble, hauling Daddy's handiwork - the Lovetts' new table.

Saturday Night, September 1st, 2007
Walked to our weekend home - okay, Mr. and Mrs. Stouffer, Sr. were in Florida and kindly let us stay in their house. Thank you, Stouffers! There we enjoyed a bit of Alton Brown and Iron Chef America. After we went to bed (quite late) Laura and I enjoyed the almost forgotten game of hogging covers. I hear I'm good at that.
Note by Laura: She definitely won!

Sunday Morning, September 2nd, 2007
Drove a mere 20 minutes to church. We enjoyed the service, as always. We were also very glad to see the Logan family walk in as well as, with them, a couple of men from the Williams family.

Sunday Afternoon, September 2nd, 2007
Enjoyed some fellowship with our extended community at their meeting place. We had a fun and interesting Psalm/Hymn Sing. I've decided not to sing tenor except at church - there we only have two other tenors.

Sunday Afternoon, Evening and Night, September 2nd, 2007
We went back to The Holler (or whatever we call the Stouffers' and Lovetts' place), this time with a couple of other families, and enjoyed more fellowship and more great food. The 4-wheelers came out too. Oh, yes, we also enjoyed the privilege of getting to help get a few goats back into their appointed area.

Monday Morning, September 3rd, 2007
Woke up late (Luke kept falling off the couch onto me during the night) and enjoyed a pleasant drive to Cane Creek with Mrs. Stouffer, just the two of us. What a great way to begin the day! Mrs. Stouffer is so nice to be with.

Monday Afternoon, September 3rd, 2007
Enjoyed an interesting ride to Centerville with Mrs. Lovett, Kaliste, Jonathan, Mama and Luke.

(Details only available through visits)

Picked up tables and chairs from church for that evening. Yes, we would need all of them.

Monday Evening and Night, September 3rd, 2007
Logans, Keens, Boyds, and Carpenters all came out to The Holler. That made for a fun evening! We got to drive 4-wheelers (some of us for the first time); we played Bluegrass with a couple of Boyds and a couple of other friends every now and then; Daddy enjoyed conversation with Mr. Keen and Mr. Boyd while I believe Mama was talking to their wives. That made me remember the time, just over 2 years ago when we all laughed at Daddy for saying that he wouldn't be surprised if we ended up dining with families like these and those who are now our church family. And here we are!

So, late Monday night we returned to our home, covered in chert from head to toe.

Just a quick update

2007-09-05T11:13:00.000-05:00

One hen started laying this weekend while we were gone. We've got a refrigerator full of milk, but letting Chuck stay on Clarabelle has been very nice. It enables us to go away for a couple of days without having to worry about milking her. Chuck is growing fast, but he's not the nicest calf. He's not mean yet; he's just stubborn and skiddish.

Claire said she'd write about this past weekend and post it here or on Mama and Daddy's blog. If she hasn't done it by the end of this week I'll try to post something about it.

Self-explanatory

2007-08-30T18:41:00.000-05:00

Family worship

2007-08-28T21:20:00.001-05:00

Kyle acted Agabus for us this evening.

¹⁰ And as we tarried there many days, there came down from Judaea a certain prophet, named Agabus.
¹¹ And when he was come unto us, he took Paul's girdle, and bound his own hands and feet, and said, Thus saith the Holy Ghost, So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man that owneth this girdle, and shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.

This is kind of neat

2007-08-27T20:04:00.000-05:00

http://www.hickmanco.com/history_communities.htm

Processing Day

2007-08-25T15:28:00.001-05:00

It wasn't too bad really. The birds were big, but we were done by lunch! Kyle caught and killed, I mean, processed. Claire ran the plucker. Mama, this being her first real experience, bagged and labeled. Daddy eviscerated. Luke wasn't much help this time, but he was there. I scalded. Everybody knew their parts, and everything went smoothly.

A Feast for the Pigs

2007-08-24T17:16:00.000-05:00

We cleaned out the refrigerator.

Shakespeare

2007-08-21T19:49:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to get through all of Shakespeare's plays. Perhaps I wouldn't feel like doing this had not the plays all been in one large book. For some reason I cannot make myself only partially read a book, whether it be a book of other books or not. So far, I've read over half of these famous plays, and I've understood them well enough (surprisingly!). However, lugging this book around the house with me is becoming tedious, and I will rejoice when I am through.

I found a quote I wanted to post on here, although I am not entirely sure what they are talking about in the context of the play. It can be applied to today's world though:

Sands: New customs, though they be never so ridiculous, nay, let 'em be unmanly, yet are followed.

That's from King Henry VIII, Act I, Scene III.

I think it's messed up

2007-08-18T18:43:00.000-05:00

This has snow in the forecast for tomorrow! However, the low is in the 70's!

I want to go to...

2007-08-17T18:42:00.000-05:00

Italy.

France.

Spain.

Greece.

Portugal.

Croatia.

Ireland.

Scotland.

In no specific order, of course. This is if I were to travel abroad. Perhaps I'll post about where I'd like to go on this continent later.

Link. Another Link. Those men are Greek. I think I like the Scottish kilt a good bit better!

Something I found in a magazine

2007-08-17T18:28:00.000-05:00

Those promotional tactics- and hundreds like them- are funded by the Beef Checkoff Program. It starts at the state level, where $1 is collected on each head of cattle sold. The state beef council then sends 50 cents of every dollar to the Cattlemen's Beef Board for national beef promotion, research, and consumer education, and the other 50 cents is retained by the state. In Tennessee, that money is used in several ways.

"We work with local retailers like Kroger and Publix to provide them with beef signs, point-of-purchase promotional material, recipe racks, in-store demonstrations for new products, and sometimes even drawings for consumers to win steak knife sets or beef cookbooks," Bass says. "We also provide educational kits to teachers across the state free of charge, and we work with doctors and dietitians so they can provide nutritional information to their clients."

I have a bad feeling about this, although I don't particularly know why.

Stanchion Pics

2007-08-15T20:21:00.001-05:00

Here's some pictures of our milking stall. It's fairly straightforward, I think. We have made a few improvements as we've used it, and we will probably continue to do so.

On the right Daddy built a shelf into the side of the stall so we would have a place to set our buckets and anything else that we may need it for. Right now it's holding a great deal of junk. We'll have to change that before too long. We have a roll of paper towels, a bag of plastic cups, and more junk in the plastic box. The trash can holds oats that we let Clarabelle snack on while we're milking.

A close-up of the "stanchion" here. We had the sides of the stall in place before the stanchion was built, so all we had to do was take a few of the lower boards out to allow two milkers at once. We built in the opposite side. There is a piece of plywood with a hole in it for a (well, I think it was a chicken waterer at one time) feeder. It works quite well.

Claire got this picture with Kyle in the milking position. We could improve the milking stools. Let's see, where to start on this picture? Ummm... well, there is a hole with a heavy metal pipe to keep her from backing up. We've already changed that a little since we've started milking her again. All we did was move it closer to the 4x4 to push her closer. I'm not sure what to call the heavy kickboard/table we set the milk bucket on. It rests on the 1x6 (rough-sawn), and we put another pipe so Clarabelle won't kick or push it forward. The kick board thing (the plywood in back) works very well. She used to manage to stick her hooves into the milk bucket, and now whe can't really get her feet over. We've had to scoop out the middle of the plywood, now that she's calved, because her udder wouldn't go over the top of it if we hadn't.

I don't think I explained it very well, but I did the best I can for now. Little Chuck (Claire and Kyle kind of decided on that name for Clarabelle's calf) is doing very well, although he could be a bit better trained at the halter and bottle feeding. Not much going on around here. Everybody's a bit exhausted for one reason or another, mine is from having to get back on a schedule. I'm not forcing myself to get up at 5:00 am yet; 6:00 am is a bit of a stretch right now! We're getting very creamy milk right now, but it tastes very strong after many months off it. It will definitely take some getting used to again.

A New Face

2007-08-13T10:36:00.000-05:00

Clarabelle calved!!! He's a little bull calf, and just as cute as can be. From the looks of her udder, we're going to have lots of milk! Clarabelle is a good mother, as far as I can tell. Her calf is clean and allowed to eat as much as he wants. She lets him stray quite a bit farther from her than our Angus cows let their little ones. Well, the Angus usually have a sort of sitter for their babies. One cow will stay close to the calves, and the others will graze farther off.

Quotes of the Evening

2007-08-06T21:26:00.000-05:00

The first two here are from Luke; the last is from Kyle!

"I was gonna check email!" Excusing his extreme distraction during the discussion after family worship.

"My hair was like pig slop!" Talking about how he came in after picking the garden with Claire this morning.

"Well, if I knew big words, I'd like to use 'em!" During a conversation on vocabulary.

Hmmm...

2007-08-03T11:32:00.000-05:00

MOLLER INTERNATIONAL LAUNCHES PRODUCTION OF JETSONS-LIKE GROUND-EFFECT VEHICLE

Moller International (OTCBB: MLER) has completed tooling and has begun producing parts for its Jetsons-like M200G volantor, a small airborne two passenger saucer-shaped vehicle that is designed to take-off and land vertically (see www.moller.com).

The M200G is the size of a small automobile and is powered by eight of the Company’s Rotapower® rotary engines. This vehicle is intended for operation continuously in “ground effect” up to approximately 10 feet altitude.

Dr. Moller calls the M200G, “the ultimate off-road vehicle” able to travel over any surface. “It’s not a hovercraft, although its operation is just as easy. You can speed over rocks, swampland, fences, or log infested waterways with ease because you’re not limited by the surface. The electronics keep the craft stabilized at no more than 10 feet altitude, which places the craft within ground effect where extra lift is obtained from operating near the ground. This lets you glide over terrain at 50 mph that would stop most other vehicles” he continued. While the Company does not foresee the requirement for significant training or licensing to operate the vehicle, it is prepared to offer demonstration sessions in Davis, California once the vehicle is ready for market.

Production on the initial six airframes started earlier this week using hard-tooled molds with the capability of producing one fuselage per day.

Depending upon engine production volume the M200G price could start as low as $90,000. The key component in determining the M200G production price is the cost of its Rotapower® engines. The Company is working with a strategic partner to produce this engine for a number of different applications in order to obtain the cost benefits of high volume production.

Persons interested in purchasing a M200G volantor may reserve a delivery position by making a refundable escrowed deposit.

The future?

I thought I'd post this just 'cause it looked interestin'. Kinda funny lookin' at my blog now! I've got a flyin' saucer post closely followin' a farm post! Well, you never know! Maybe one of these days someone will come out with a very affordable flyin' farm machine!

Another Name for Yoda

2007-08-02T12:42:00.000-05:00

Luke comes through with something amusing once more! He didn't understand what they called Yoda when we were watching Star Wars the other night. He heard Soda and Theoda! There were other things he heard differently, but I can't remember them right now.

More Farm Pictures

2007-07-27T20:41:00.000-05:00

Clarabelle. This picture is a really good angle for her; it doesn't show how barrel-like she's getting!

Teddy, with all his pride and none of his tail.

Pretty or pesky.

Our first giant sunflower.

Scruggs is livin' the life.

We canned 19 quarts of green beans this morning.

Kind of pretty, I thought.

We didn't get even enough corn to eat this year! The coons (or whatever it is) have eaten very well though!

Now tell me, how can little tomatoes and mid-sized tomatoes grow on the same vine? Really, there are golf ball-sized tomatoes and normal-sized tomatoes growing on this vine!

Here's a volunteer weed, only... I think it's called ground cherry. I've read that they'll take over, and that they're related to tomatoes. I've even read that they're edible, although I don't know how.

Pig Pics

2007-07-27T20:01:00.000-05:00

Well, that's a sort of good picture to show their ever-increasing size.

You know, it's terribly hard to keep these piggies still in order to get a good picture of them!

I just liked this picture.

Guess what?!! You never will so I tell you! I took these on my own! I still hate the camera though; almost none of my pictures came out clearly!!!

A New "Toy"

2007-07-26T10:15:00.002-05:00

Daddy got an Olympus digital voice recorder to be used for our music lessons. Since the Pickin' Parlor closed Mr. Brantley has not been able to record our lessons, making it extremely difficult to learn hard songs. This week he recorded "Rawhide" for me, and it is making it much easier!!! The midi on that page sounds a little like the one he's teaching us.

Well, not much has been going on around here lately. Not too many predator problems. Not much rain (although we have gotten some amazingly). No processings. No calves. Nothin'. We're just going on with laundry and our ordinary, boring life. I suppose boring isn't bad, just kind of dull. It's much better than lively if the liveliness comes from predators though!

Things

2007-07-17T20:55:00.000-05:00

I don't know what to title this post. It's not going to be about anything in particular, so much as things that have been happening lately.

Saturday, we went to our cousins' birthday party. Kyle amused us all by picking out the tune to Psalm 25A on some mounted PVC pipes that you play with the sole of a flip-flop. It was hilarious!

Dug some of our potatoes the other evening. Well, I didn't, but the others did.

Sometime last week poor Teddy lost all his "only beauty", but, with that, none of his pride! He looks so funny strutting around with no tail! We, unfortunately, have no idea how this calamity happened, but right now it is the least of our worries!

The dark, wild-turkey-looking turkeys will probably have to be kil... umm, I mean processed soon. We'll probably put them in the freezer until this Thanksgiving.

I wish I had some pictures of the pigs to put up. They are getting huge!!! I don't know why, but just lately they seemed to have gotten much bigger. Perhaps I haven't been out to see them as much.

I was given dinner duties recently. I've been at it for almost a week now, and I am trying to adjust my thinking. I have to get meat out of the freezer in the morning, do any prep work that can be done beforehand, and get started so that dinner will be ready by 5:30 pm. So far I have not done too well. No burned dinners yet; no undercooked meat yet, but my timing isn't great. Still, I think I've had it ready by 6:00 or 6:30 pm; I did a bit better this evening. I have learned a bit already though. I've done fruit and veggie trays or arranged salads with almost every dinner, and they've gone over quite well I believe. It adds a nice touch to simple meals without too much hassle!

I'm being told to "hit the publish button". Better stop now.

Predator Problems

2007-07-12T19:24:00.000-05:00

In the past couple of weeks the corn in our big garden has been almost ready to pick. Of course, the raccoons or something began to find it around that time. However, we had corn on the cob for lunch and dinner today!!! I am convinced there is no better vegetable!

Something has been getting into the layers the past week or so. It's coming into the chicken house and killing the birds. We still have a few layers left, and we're hoping to build a hoop tractor with built-in nest boxes soon. Kyle set up the live trap in the hopes of luring our current predator with tuna (really, I don't think anything could be lured in with that!). He caught the cat.

Last night was the second night in a row that something has managed to get into our broiler hoop tractor. This predator gets in there, kills one bird by pulling the head off. It must be some sort of game for it because the head is on one side of the tractor and the body is on the other (from what I've heard). So far nothing has gotten into our turkey tractor. It's close to the house though. I think, if I had my way, we should have all poultry in tractors rotating through the yard.

Maybe we should just stick to larger animals. All cattle, pigs, dogs, and cat are still alive and well (although the cat may be a little traumatized).

Fourth of July

2007-07-05T19:32:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I wonder what it is really that we are celebrating on the fourth day in July. In the Revolutionary War we were fighting for representation more than anything at first. Nowadays, the taxes still go up, and we have representation. I can't help but wonder if we have the representation we need. The media has us in its grip. It can control nearly a whole nation just by a thing one person decides to "report"; it is able to sway the thoughts of millions by the way they bias their report! We are not against government, but, man, it sure would be nice to have wholesale reform!!! I'm going to get myself in trouble; I'll move on to yesterday's pictures and light commentary. There won't be too many, don't worry.

Daddy smoked our ribs in the smoke house. He decided that we needed fire bricks and/or another layer of bricks in the firebox.

Kyle getting some green wood for better smoking.

Waiting for lunch/dinner (the ribs took longer than expected).

Bottle rockets. They turned grown men into boys once more.

After lunch (and a little time to allow for digestion) Daddy, Uncle Craig, Kyle, and I played "Pitchin' Warshers". Daddy and I won.

Around 8:30p.m. we shot off a few fireworks. All in all, it was a very pleasant day.

Another Good Quote

2007-07-03T22:00:00.000-05:00

From Luke. Hey, some of the best things come from him (even though he doesn't mean to)!

"Do you know what insightful is?" Daddy asking Luke.

"What I say." Luke answering.

We had a good laugh over that.

Saturday

2007-07-02T12:39:00.000-05:00

The Stouffer's came to our place Friday, and, on Saturday, we got a great deal of work done!!!

First thing Saturday morning we processed thirty, very small Cornish Cross birds.

I got the scalding job again. It was quite a hot job in the near-ninety degree weather.

See, I told you they were small! I don't think this was the smallest one either!

Gizzards and feet! We were requested to keep the gizzards out. We were not very sure how to clean all the grass and stuff out, so we left that up to the recipient!

Kyle and Daniel moved the younger chicks into the newly-emptied, larger chicken tractor. Still, I think we will have to make another one for when they get larger.

While they were putting the chicks in the chicken tractor, Daddy, Mr. Stouffer, and Chris started stringing the extension for the pig fence. We got it finished before dinner, but the pigs didn't go past the old fence line until well into the evening or the next day! We can't thank the Stouffer's enough for all the work they helped us with! They did so much yard work too! We can't wait for them to come back (we've got plenty more work to do to keep many people very busy!)!

Anticipation

2007-06-28T09:03:00.001-05:00

We are in a state of anticipation here at Allelon Farm. We are eagerly looking forward to our first bit of fresh, home-grown corn, the first mess of green beans, and the first ripe tomato. We are keeping a close eye on all our cows. By our none-to-detailed calendar they could have calved two months ago, or it might still be two months away. They are looking so huge though; I expect the calves any day now. My brother is looking forward to lunch. Claire is anticipating the day when her current sewing project will be done. I think she hopes to have it done by the Lord's Day; she is making a short cape, anticipating the air-conditioning that will be "chasing away the humidity". I am looking forward to the time when I will be able to play a song in B flat well. All winter we have been like a spring that has been slowly pulled tighter and tighter. We are ready to let go and get started until this winter when the gearing up will begin anew. Perhaps, once we get going, we will be overwhelmed, but we won't know until everything starts.

A New Version

2007-06-26T12:16:00.000-05:00

As Kyle was fixing lunch and Claire, Luke, and I were cleaning blackberries, Kyle was trying to get Luke to sing with him. Kyle would sing a line or two and try to get Luke to finish it. This is kind of how it went:

"Some glad morning when this life if o'er I'll..."

"...Die?"

Nettled

2007-06-25T19:59:00.000-05:00

We've got these here... in great abundance. They are quite a grievance around the garden; the almost-invisible thorns tend to find their way into our flesh. It is tremendously hard to get the thorns out once they're in, and they are incredibly painful. I don't know that I want to get close enough to it to harvest any part of the plant, no matter what the uses are.

The Last Night

2007-06-22T12:43:00.001-05:00

The Pick'n Parlor is closing. We're all sad about it, but we are determined to be there, for the last time, tonight. We're going to miss having that place to pick, but something else will probably come up. I've read lots of books where the main characters talk about the different "chapters" in their life. I thought when we stopped working at the Pick'n Parlor that that was the end of the "Pick'n Parlor chapter", but I suppose this really ends it. The Stacy's sold it, and I don't know what the new owners are intending to do with it. Maybe it will still be sort of the same, but I don't think it can ever be the way it was. I am glad I had a chance to work there. In doing so, we became a closer part of the people there. We probably would have never made it into the group like we sort of are now if we had not been forced to go every week for a while. It was great fun, and I'm going to miss everyone.

Quote of the Day

2007-06-21T07:27:00.000-05:00

"I'm gonna play the downright bass!"

That was said by Luke on our way home yesterday. We think he was thinking of the tuba... maybe, but we straightened him out. Only, he doesn't want to play the upright bass either; he said the banjo. I have nothing against the banjo, but we could really use a good bass player here at home.

First Failure

2007-06-20T18:50:00.000-05:00

Actually, that's really pretty good considering what normally happens when we try something new. This being our third kraut-making year, it is really good. When we kids and Mama got back home from our few days with my aunt, Mama checked on the kraut. It was bad. We can't really figure out what went wrong except that it may not have had enough liquid. Anyway, the cabbage was black, so the pigs got it. This is the recipe we've used every time though. It probably would have worked this time too; we just weren't home to check on it. We will most likely make another batch with farmers' market cabbage.

On to more interesting stuff..... ummm...... I got some new boots............ *think, think, think* uh, apparently Dickson has a nice Goodwill 'cause Mama and Claire spent a long time there yesterday........ umm....... Claire and I are learning a tune by Bill Monroe called " The Longbow". It's a fiddle tune, not a hunting song. Okay. I guess I don't really have anything interesting to post. We're back to our dull, boring life. The pace will soon be picking up as the garden is nearly ready to harvest. Oh, we watched "Anne of Green Gables" at Aunt Carol's last night. I am the only girl I know of who can honestly say that I don't like it!!! That may be putting it a bit strongly, but I don't really enjoy it.

I Have Been Remiss

2007-06-16T13:39:00.000-05:00

I should have blogged about this earlier, but I didn't remember. I wasn't actually involved in it, but Kyle trapped a skunk the other night near the chicken house. Daddy killed it with the shotgun. Fortunately, it doesn't smell too bad, and the dogs haven't found it yet.

Daddy was at things early this morning. He was gone to Crossville before most of us were up! Anyway, he came back with the truck loaded with four barrels of feed! Almost as soon as he was home, he went off to get some more hay from a man down the road. Thankfully the man really is just down the road. The hay isn't exactly top-quality, horse-people hay, but it's good enough.

We are trying out a fly rub solution thing on Clarabelle. The flies have been getting around her feet and driving her crazy! We are trying one ounce of citronella in a gallon of apple cider vinegar. I think it may be helping some, but nothing will eliminate the problem altogether.

After lunch Daddy and Kyle moved the Freedom Ranger chicks outside into the newly-repaired, Salatin-style chicken tractor. The chicks seemed to be kind of amazed and unsure of what to do next.

We canned twelve pints of sliced peaches the other day. Aunt Carol brought them back for us. They were delicious peaches! Then Mama requested this pie done with peaches for her birthday "cake", and that was delicious. It's too bad we cannot find good peaches around here very often.

This morning Mama and Grammy (maybe others too; I wasn't there) started some sauerkraut. We only have one quart and three pints left from last year! I never really liked kraut until we made it; now I can't eat the store-bought stuff at all!

We'll have some squash soon from our lower garden. It seems a bit late, but we'll still probably have more than we can handle. The asparagus has been allowed to go to seed for the past week or two. We are have a bit of a better time with our corn than we did last year. We're suspecting any number of animals as being out corn thief; I just hope it goes to somebody else's corn patch this year. We had to use most of last years crop as cream corn to freeze it for the winter. We got to have corn on the cob last night!!! Sure it gets in the retainer, but at least I can eat it now! I went two years without being able to eat it on the cob, and I've always preferred it that way. I can't wait until our corn comes in!!!

I found one and five-eighths yards of denim fabric for $1.50 a yard at the Tullahoma Wal-mart! They're getting rid of the sewing section! They've already replaced the bulk of it with toys. I hope our Wal-mart doesn't do that! Where will we get fabric? Oh, what am I saying? I've got too much fabric to deal with now!

Claire and I are trying to learn "Black Mountain Rag", but it is incredibly difficult. Mr. Brantley said that fiddlers who usually play this carry another fiddle tuned to open A! He's teaching us a way so we don't have to re-tune, but that makes it harder.

I didn't really mean to make this into such a long post, but I just kept thinking about things I've been meaning to blog about.

I actually remembered...

2007-06-13T21:09:00.000-05:00

... after a while at least. Here's a picture of Claire in her fairly new Regency gown and chemisette, made the Simplicity pattern designed by Sense and Sensibility. Sorry 'bout the red eye.

Ladies time

2007-06-12T20:12:00.000-05:00

Nothin' much has been goin' on 'round here on the farm. Mama, Claire, and I spent a wonderful weekend away from the farm, the chores, and the noise. Still, it was very nice to get back to the men. While we were away Friday, we watched the BBC mini-series "North and South" and "Wives and Daughters", went to Joann's, stepped into a bookstore, and perused a Marty and Liz shoe store (they didn't have any boots for ladies unfortunately). We then splurged on lunch at Macaroni Grill; the mushroom ravioli was delicious! I don't recommend the veal though. "North and South" was really good, and it just keeps getting better! "Wives and Daughters" was good up until the very last scene, so I'm going to ignore that and just make up my own. :) Joann's was just a business stop. I needed a zipper, and we all wanted to look at the denim (ridiculously priced unfortunately). Marty and Liz didn't have anything desirable, and we didn't see any boot outlet. Mama got a few books at the book store, and she got me a set of really nice classics to go in my hope chest! Saturday we slept in. We needed to do a little grocery shopping, so we went out for lunch. There was a man selling bar-b-cued ribs, and they were delicious! Then we went into a jewelry shop! I've been wanting a ring since my sixteenth birthday, and we haven't been able to find anything suitable. We finally found something!!! It has to be resized, but I should have it by the end of the week! Then we went back to Aunt Carol's house, and prepped for the Lord's Day (made the brownie mixes, and laid out our clothes). Then we watched the mini-series we hadn't watched the night before. We turned in rather early considering the last time we did this, around 11:30 pm. The next morning we had a nice reunion with our men, and a lovely day with our church family and friends.

I have also decided that perhaps I ought to use this here "Labels for this post" thing. I don't know if I'll go back and label all my past post, but I think I'll try to remember to do all my future posts. I think I'll have a lot of posts labeled "stuff"; creative, huh!

Honorificabilitudinitatibus

2007-06-06T17:20:00.001-05:00

... meaning. How do you pronounce it, I wonder? I rather pity the man who had to play Costard.

Disaster Strikes Again

2007-06-04T14:07:00.000-05:00

I really wonder how people "back in the day" kept their chickens, geese, turkeys, etc. alive! Didn't they just let them roam free?! We lost all three of our geese while we were away this weekend. Considering our past reputation however, that's not too bad, being the first of our casualties. We most likely won't be staying over night anywhere as long as we have poultry, at least, not all of us anyway.

Grammy and Granddaddy are hot on the thistles again this year. Kyle, Luke and I have been out heading and cutting them down this morning, but I can't help but feel that it is a loosing battle. It takes forever; it's hot, and they're going to come back no matter what!!! Still, we're trying.

Water, or the lack thereof

2007-05-30T19:51:00.000-05:00

At dinner this evening Daddy said that he had talked to one of the guys at our local co-op. This man said that we are in (or in for) one of the worst droughts ever (for around here). Daddy mentioned a seven year drought period. I think back to the year we built our house; it was unusual to have a day without rain! Last year was a dry year, but we're drier earlier this year. I've also been thinking back to the years we spent in a little, dead-end road subdivision. Things have changed so much since then! We were pretty city-fied compared to where we are now, although we did have 6 or so acres. We didn't really know what to do with it! In the last two or three years there we did have a few laying hens, three dogs, and a large garden spot. We had a big, fenced-in, back yard and a wonderful playground. I remember us talking about the weather only occasionally. It didn't really affect us! We actually enjoyed long dry spells! That meant less mowing and more outside play to us. Things have changed! We certainly don't take the weather for granted as often anymore, and the weather is not just a boring, safe subject to resort to when there is nothing else to talk about. It is a constant reminder of how God has control over all things, and we really can't do anything.

Turkey Tractors, Smoke Houses, Pig Fences, etc.

2007-05-28T20:19:00.000-05:00

Our dear friends, the Fish family, came up for the weekend!!! The men accomplished SO MUCH! It was a great time of fellowship and productivity. Unfortunately, we were having such a good time that we didn't get too many pictures.

The finished Turkey Tractor. We used the hay ring for the main structure. We never really used it how it is really intended to be used.

Mr. Fish did some mowing for us!!!

The men and boys built, or rather assembled, the smoke house in about twenty minutes (that's the number I heard at least). The harder part came later when they built the brick fire box.

Our tired piggies! They are really getting big, and they're starting to smell a little. The men and boys (all along with support from the ladies of course) put in the t-posts, so we can enlarge the pigs' area.

Mama was having a brainless day Saturday! She couldn't think of anything for us ladies to do! We girls helped Grammy make a few jars of strawberry freezer jam, but other than that we just supported the men. This morning, after the morning chores, the men and boys did a bit of shooting, and we ladies did a bit of sewing. We ladies wished we had thought of that Saturday! The Fishes left after lunch. We are already looking forward to their next visit, and hoping it will be soon.

I will try to get our photographer to get me some more pictures of the smoke house and other stuff. I better stop; Daddy's been telling me to be done for the past five minutes!

Our Version!!!

2007-05-23T19:05:00.001-05:00

Daddy, Kyle, and Luke have been working on our version of the Lingo's layer house. They finished it up this evening, and the cornish cross broilers are enjoying a bit more freedom now.

Another Piece of Media Fun

2007-05-22T15:28:00.000-05:00

I really don't search for this stuff. Mama found this one and the Muppet Show/LOTR thing; I did somehow find the Meatrix thing, I admit. You may have to search for the title: "A Kosher Cowboy Song."

The Meatrix

2007-05-19T12:16:00.000-05:00

Those who have seen The Matrix may get some of this stuff more than I do, but I thought it was pretty disgusting without having the context.

That Other Stuff

2007-05-17T09:14:00.000-05:00

Finally! We have some pictures of what all is going on around here.

We acquired four "gobblets," as we like to call them. I don't know what kinds they are, or if they're hens or jakes. All I know is that they're turkeys, sorry.

Here are our three geese and some barred rock layer chicks. Don't know anything about the geese either.

A big silly goose examining the real goose. By the way, the geese are actually a week younger than the turkeys!

The pigs are getting quite large now, and they love getting into their water trough. We have to keep several in their pen so they will still have some left to drink!

The new mower. Daddy can answer any questions about this, but, again, I don't know too much about it.

We have a batch (25, 30, I don't know the exact number) of freaky birds (cornish cross) in the basement. They are so nasty. We're getting 50 more broilers in a week or two from Freedom Rangers; I think we got the Grey Rangers, but I'm not sure. We are quickly approaching our busy season with canning, calving, milking (when Clarabelle decides to calve), mowing, etc. I love this stuff! It's all so exciting!!!