Wheat Harvest

They say you can never go home again, but I'm not so sure that's the case. To me, "home" will always be "home". Maybe it's because we've moved so many times and lived in so many different places, but it just always feels like we're going home when we go back to the place where I grew up, and where most of my family still lives...Oklahoma.

Every June we spend about 10 days helping with harvest. Over the last 20 years, my city-boy husband has become quite the farmer. He looks forward to it, and I THINK they actually count on him. It's a family event, and although my girls have been many places, and experienced many different things, I think this might just be the most wholesome wonderful thing out of them all.

Every kid should get to experience country life...at least for a moment.

There's nothing like some good old-fashioned dirt-diggin' kind of fun!

Remember "Parachute Men"? They make for some cheap and great entertainment. :)

I love that my kids can get a small taste of how I grew up. I come from a hard-working family with good strong values, and, although there were times during my teenage years that I didn't want any part of it, I'm very proud that those are my roots. I can only hope that I can be the kind of example to my children that I was shown throughout my life...that of my family.

Tornadoes, Mother-In-Laws, sad pet news, and the end of school

I've been a little MIA lately. I'll be back to my regular postings soon, and I'll expand, but all of the above is true. My mother-in-law actually came in the midst of the tornadoes, which, of course, don't happen in Wyoming....or so we were TOLD (WRONG!). One of the ones that hit here was close enough that I could hear it, and so could my kids who were on lock down at their schools. It totaled cars in Paityn's school parking lot, took down fences and garage doors in our neighborhood, and put the football bleachers on top of Cassidy's school. So I guess you could say we were in the thick of things. BUT...we were all okay, and that's what important. My mother-in-law played "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles" to get here. After getting as far as Denver,her flight to here was canceled, so she took a shuttle part way, and then some kind strangers that she'd ridden the shuttle with brought her the rest of the way. By then, we'd already lost power...for two days. And then came the snow. She had quite a "vacation", I'm sure.

On a very sad note, Paityn's parakeet, Sky, passed away last Thursday. She's still pretty heartbroken. I got her a new parakeet, whose name is "Cloud", but I'm afraid it's not the same. Time will tell.

And...on a much brighter note (it IS a bright note, right?)...SCHOOL IS OUT, as of today!!! It was time. It's an adjustment for all of us. For me, it's about finding the balance between being a good mom, making sure we all have fun, and still managing my work. I'm sure we'll find it though. :)

Look what we found!

BABY FOXES!!!!

or is it baby fox?? Is the plural of fox FOX, or FOXES?? Whatever...there were SEVERAL of them.

...and aren't they CUTE!!!

They're living right in front of Paityn's school.

I WANT ONE!!

It's better than CHICKENS!!!

You may remember last spring when Paityn visited a farm with a friend. She came home and put 2 goose eggs and 6 chicken eggs in the fridge. What we DIDN'T know was that the other half of the dozen was in her room...wrapped in blankets...on the baseboard heater..."hatching". Of course when we realized she'd turned her room into an incubator, we explained that we couldn't burn the house down, and that THAT kind of heat would cook the eggs anyway, etc., etc., etc.

So then she was devastated. She'd "killed" the chickens. She was SO sad, and there were lots of tears. Now...I need to add here...we normally just let the tears flow. I mean...tears don't usually work around here. There are two female children in the house (one being a teenager), so we've seen lots of 'em, and we're pretty much immune. But this was serious heartbreak. So we went online and ordered an incubator. I doubted that the eggs had even been fertilized, and even if they had, surely she'd cooked them on that heater. Besides...even if they were fertile, and even if they weren't cooked, chicken eggs are only viable for about 2 weeks, and that's how long it took to get the incubator.

This kid researched all there was to know about raising chickens. She was a walking encyclopedia of chicken facts and coop building. And would you believe...one little chick did develop. When it was time to hatch, we had to leave town. She held that incubator, plugged in, the entire 8 hour trip there and the 8 hour trip back. But the poor thing never hatched. :( So then we ordered fertilized eggs. Unfortunately, the post office scrambled them. Kudos to the seller...the eggs never broke, even though the box was destroyed and had to be replaced en route. But, nonetheless, they didn't develop into baby chicks.

Somewhere in the midst of all the heartbreak, apparently we promised that THIS spring we'd get live chicks. I use the word "we" rather loosely...I really don't recall there being any "we" to it. Regardless..."we" were playing the odds...the odds that by this spring, she wouldn't give a flip about chickens. WRONG! We've been able to put her off so far, due to the weather.

A few weeks ago, she asked for a bird. She's had one on her Christmas list for several years. So I offered her a deal. She could get a bird INSTEAD of chickens. (There's no chance of ME trudging through 2 feet of snow at 20 below to feed a parakeet) She declined. It had to be chicks. Until Saturday, when there was a change of heart. We were taking the dog to be groomed, and there were BIRDS. I'm sure she was starting to think it was never going to stop snowing and she would NEVER get her chicks. The birds were within reach. So she gave a little speech about how she'd realized what a huge responsibility it would be to raise chickens, and how it would be a big job with the bad weather, yada, yada, yada. She could have saved the sales pitch...I was SOLD! I'll take a parakeet over chickens any day!

So now she has a parakeet named "Sky".



I can't believe how quickly they've bonded.



The two have spent HOURS together.



I think it's love. :)

So I'm CHEAP!!

Last May, for Mother's Day and my birthday, I wanted to make our yard look nice. So we made a BIG trip to Home Depot, spent a LOT of money, and then made our muscles ache by digging, raking, planting, etc. We were careful to choose plants that worked for our zone...the ARCTIC ZONE. Those poor plants struggled all summer long. They looked pretty much dead at one point. We slowly nursed them back to life...if you want to call it that. Each plant sprouted at least one new leaf on their dead brown stickly bodies, so we called them "live".

Well...it's sort of spring again, or at least the calendar says it is. Let's just forget the blizzard we had on Friday. Those plants were officially dead. We were looking at our receipts, and in a few days, it would be a year since we bought them. And hey...they were guaranteed for a year. THEY WERE!!!!! So yesterday morning, when the snow had mostly melted, I sent Chris out to dig up the dead plants. We made another BIG trip to Home Depot. This time, we carted in 6 very dead plants. As we got near the "RETURNS" counter, Chris and the kids started to walk the other direction. Yours truly was, of course, pushing the cart with the dead plants. I turned to Chris and said, "OH NO YOU DON'T! YOU GET OVER HERE!" There was no way I was going to keep that embarrassment all to myself. But as I got busy explaining myself to the guy at the register, my family quietly slinked away. The young register guy with grommets for earrings was NOT amused! But how could he argue...the guarantee was for a full year, and the year wouldn't be up until later this week.

As I walked away with my $127 gift card, a man in line even complimented me on my gardening skills. I thought that was nice.

We didn't leave empty handed. I mean...what a deal! If the plants die, we'll just get fresh ones again next year.

We got some Honeysuckle (mmmmmm....it smells SO nice),



a couple of Lilacs,



and some Sand Cherries.



We even had some survivors (Lilies) from last year.



Yep...you might say we're quite the gardeners.

Tagged....AGAIN!!! :)

Just in case you haven't had enough of me...I've been tagged again...this time by Kris of Designer's Notion. So now you have a chance to find out a few more quirky things about me. :)

1. I'm terribly afraid of spiders. There's no traumatic reason behind it...I just am. I could spot them in the dark from my crib, and I still wake up in the night once in awhile yelling about spiders.

2. I'm in love with nature. Mountains, wildlife, the ocean, marine life...I'm awestruck by every bit of it.

3. People who speed in school zones really irritate me.

4. I have a thing about my house smelling good. I burn candles almost every day.

5. I'll admit it (for those of you who want to say "told you so")...I'm REALLY tired of snow. And, despite the fact that it was almost 70 degrees today...snow is in the forecast for Thursday, which is just 2 days away...well, a day and a half really. :(

6. At the risk of having my mom and my mother-in-law BOTH disown me...I'm so NOT a shoe person. I'm just not. I get a pair I like, and they're IT. Flip-flops are good, and barefoot is even better.

7. I'm sort of a morning person AND a night owl. However, if made to sit still for very long, I'm likely to fall asleep.

Ok...so here are the rules:

1. Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Just for fun, I think I'm going to tag some people I either don't know, or don't know very well. I'm tagging:

1. Emily of Sugar Sweetness
2. Christina of Abby-Lane
3. Allison of Lula Bee Boutique
4. Clara of Mimi Kattini
5. Amy of Funky Monkey

I'm going to cheat, and leave it at 5. :)

Dear Mother Nature,

I thought you might want to know...it's April. It's ok...I completely understand. What, with you running the universe and all, you do kind of have a lot on your plate. Sometimes I even write June on the date line of my checks in the middle of September. Trust me...being a mother myself, I totally get it. It's tough keeping everything straight.

Sometimes though, when I seem a little lost, someone is kind enough to give me a little nudge and bring something to my attention. I just thought maybe you could use a little help too.

I'm not mad or anything. We did enjoy what you gave us.

But could you just focus a little, and bring us some warmer weather please? And, ummmm....could you maybe stop with the snow??