Week 36 - Bragging - Just a Bit

We have always lived far away from family - either side - and I have not always been good about staying in touch with any of my family or that of my husband.  It's been a good number of years since I've seen my nephew but we've stayed in touch via email for the last several years.  He recently sent me some pictures of his family and I asked permission to share them - actually, I asked permission to brag!  This is my nephew, R.  He is the principal at the High School where he, himself, went to school.  I'm so proud of the man he has become.  He is a wonderful educator, an amazing husband, an  involved father, and he makes me proud to be his aunt. 

This is A, his daughter, on her first day of the new school year.  

And this is E, also on his first day of school for the new year.

R and his wife T....on their way to a function.  T is also an educator - bilingual studies.  She runs a school for bilingual education.  AND, she's awesome pretty to boot!

Remember I told you about Pinkie and Fluffy going to Freezer Camp?  Well, they are home from Camp.  Here they are: Bottom two shelves here.

And the entirety of the smaller freezer here.  That's sausage you see.  Yum

Now, if someone had asked me when I was a teenager if I was bossy, I'd have been offended.  Really offended.  Of course, I wasn't bossy.  

Well, upon reflection, I have to admit that I am sometimes....just sometimes....a bit bossy.  But only when I'm right! 

Thank you so much for visiting again.  See you next week.

Week 35 - Foxes Abound

We live in the country.  That means gravel roads, tractors, fireflies and wild animals in the yard.  Look at the picture...that gravel road is Wilderness Dr....our street. The gravel goes on for about a mile before it becomes somewhat paved for the next 6 miles into town. You can sometimes drive on the road and come upon a tractor, going as slow or as fast (it depends on what end of the tractor you are on, I suppose) as it can go.  You wait for there to be an open area in the oncoming lane and then you can drive around it - regardless of the lines on the road. Same goes for Amish buggies! Fireflies are rampant in the spring and summer, everywhere!  Then there are the wild animals...No, not lions and tigers or - well sometimes - bears.  I mean wild animals like bobcats, or deer, or foxes.  Like the critter here, who decided that our small gravel pile was the perfect place to take a snooze.  It's broad daylight, on a Saturday morning, and he curls up for a nap.  Now, foxes are cute little things, I'll admit.  BUT...and that's a huge But...they have to eat.  And what do they eat, you ask?  Well, they eat chickens and baby rabbits, and other small creatures that they can catch.  

John went about 10 days ago and got 6 chicks to raise for their eggs.  Now, I can't abide fresh eggs - they disgust me, really they do.  But I'm not going to stop him from having fresh eggs for himself.  I can still get eggs from the grocery store and we can all live happily.  But little chickens are favored by foxes for their own food supply.  So we (make that John) have begun the process of enticing that little fox into a trap so he can be dispatched soon and save our chicken herd.  This will hopefully happen quickly since John also went this past week and ordered 3 dozen chicks that we can raise for meat - it only takes about 8 weeks before those chickens will be ready for Freezer Camp.  I'm all about letting animals live a happy life, but when they don't know what is theirs and what is mine, there has to come a division of things!  

I've always had dreams.  Haven't we all?  Sometimes I chafe at how long it takes to have dreams come true.  I don't have any burning dreams right now...just some reasonable hopes for the future. The item below came across my Facebook feed this past week and it just smacked me upside the head.  I have to keep remembering that it's not going to happen in my timetable, but it will happen in HIS timetable.  Patience is a virtue. Sigh.

English Paper Piecing.  I've always been intrigued by this and have actually done one or two items with it, but mostly did it without any true understanding of the process.  One of the blocks for this year's Saturday Sampler at Merrily We Quilt Along uses English Paper Piecing and they are offering a class.  So tomorrow I get to take that class...I'm really looking forward to this.  I like hand work in quilting, except applique - that's too time consuming - so this might turn out to be something really fun. I'll show you next week how I do.

We had a short visit with some friends of ours today. Lee and Katlin moved from here to Florida about 7 years ago...they moved back to Missouri 2 years ago and we see them every 6 weeks or so when we meet for dinner in Springfield.  They came out to see all their former neighbors and take a look at their old house across the street from us.  It sure is great to see them.  

Hey, thank you all so much for stopping by.  

Week 34 - Rainy Weather

Mom and I went to the yarn shop today, our usual Tuesday morning jaunt.  I meet with a student there and Mom gets to talk to people other than me!  And she's being exposed to yarn and knitting like she's never been exposed before.  Mom started a sweater for the first time in over 70 years this past weekend.  She's so excited to finish it...I will post a picture once it's done.  Back to my original thought:  When we got to the shop, we were early.  Lisa hadn't arrived yet so we sat in the car (actually, I napped) and waited.  I glanced around and saw this:

It's a beautiful spider web.  We'd had some incredible fog this morning and the sun hadn't quite burned it all off yet.  This was just magical.  

Our rain totals for July was an incredible 13 inches...since July is usually a dry month, this is quite amazing to us.  The Farmer's Almanac is telling us that this winter is going to be quite wet and snowy.  But that's what they said we would have last year.  We had a total of 2 snow days last winter.  One of the dryest on record.  So we will see what this winter brings us.

Thanks for stopping by. 

Week 33 - In Which Bacon Seeds Grow Up

February 20, 2016 these 6 little Bacon Seeds came to live at my house....well, really at the property next door but 2 of them are ours. Our Grandchildren named our two Pinkie and Fluffy (don't ask me why..we let them name them and the names are written in stone!) 

Two days ago, all 6 of the grown Bacon Seeds were loaded up into a trailer and transported to what we like to call Freezer Camp.  It doesn't do to stress the 'little' critters - stress causes meat to be stressed as well.  So we don't tell them they are going to the butcher, rather we tell them they are going to freezer camp. By the time what's going to happen to them is happening, they don't have time to get stressed. 

Fluffy and Pinkie are in there, I'm just not entirely sure which is which.  Suffice to day, our 2 pigs weighed in at 309 pounds and 379 pounds.  The largest of that particular drift of pigs weighed in at a whopping 403 pounds - he went to our friend and neighbor, John, whose property they called home for the last 5 1/2 months.  That's a lot of bacon....and sausage, and ham. 

Here is John's dog, Bella, when the little piglets first came to live with John.  She loved going down to the pigpen to check out 'Her" friends.  Every day, she would venture down for a quick chase on each side of the fence and then go back up to the house. 

It didn't seem to matter much how big those critters got, they were still her friends.  I wonder how she's faring without them being there? Must as my John.

The weather is wet and rainy today and yesterday.  We are told to expect rain each day for most of the week.  That's fine with us - farmers need rain to grow the crops and the hay fields.  John says the garden is flourishing - we will be inundated with tomatoes for sure.  The canning supplies are ready when he starts bringing in the bounty. 

Thank you for stopping by.  See you next week.