New Life Old Farmers

We are having a family reunion for the 4th of July.  Here at the farm…where there is animal poop, flies, a half bath and it is going to be HOT.  It is only really hot here in the summer for about 2 weeks a year and this year those two weeks will hit with a vengeance, while we have 24 family members here who are used to things like…air conditioning.

I keep trying to remember that it is the time together that matters…and yet, I want them to have a great time and so far, God has not put me in charge of the weather, but I will for sure let you know if that changes.

My big brother and his wife usually host the family reunion and they make a hard job look easy!  It also doesn’t hurt that their beautiful pool home is a bit like going to a resort for most of us.  This time the reunion is at the farm.  We are excited that they are coming…  We’ve been working hard to get ready…  We want this to be a fun, memory maker for them all.

Will 200 Popsicles be enough?

How many inner tubes will we need for people to float the irrigation canal?

Do I need to write down ‘our’ rules to croquet?

Will anyone want to play ‘family bingo’?

Will my home-made gifts be…okay?

Will it be too hot?

Not ‘everyone’ is coming, but everyone that is coming is making an effort to be here…just as we are making an effort for it to be a special time.  So I will open our home… be our quirky regular self… be grateful for those that come and ‘love the ones we are with’.

 

We got lots done and we did it…his way, sort of a salute to Father’s Day.  Using the chain saw and burning through 2 chains and getting the saw so hot we boiled the gas, we (well…sort of ‘we’, meaning…’he’) trimmed off the tops of the fence posts made from rail road ties.  It was hot and stinky, but the wind was not blowing, so that made it a good day.

Then came the discussion about ‘the’ paint sprayer.  Last summer I gave ‘the’ paint sprayer a try, and it did not go well.  Not only did it go poorly, but I was pretty sure I’d broken it as well.  I was not looking forward to a repeat performance.  My Loving Spouse was sure the paint sprayer would work and I would love that it could glide paint on easily.  Since it was Father’s Day, we gave it a ‘go’ and he was right!  In one hour we painted the whole fence (and a little bit of grass).I even let him have a turn……and he asked me if I am now a believer…‘Yes, dear…you were right’…and he was…it was a beautiful thing.

We even trimmed the tree his way….and I pretended that it was a good idea.

99% of all visitors and inhabitants use the kitchen porch to enter and exit our home, the other 1% do not know any one who lives here or is a 6-year-old boy who wanted to use all the doors.  The kitchen porch is where the barn cats sit in the windows and beckon to be let in to the house.  It is where boots get left, (work boots & nice boots), and even muddy boots…meals get barbecued, tools get deposited on their way back to the workshop and where life happens.  The kitchen porch is where the garage sale ‘find’ awaits THE Grandson to grow into this treasure.The kitchen porch is high on function.  The summer chairs make room for a friend.  I phoned Our Friend The Farmer.

“Your chair is on the porch, stop by for a beer.”

‘I can’t I am moving my water.’

“I didn’t necessarily mean this minute, I meant in general….like the opening of Baseball season…it is now the opening of Porch Season”

‘Okay, I’ll be by.’The kitchen porch is real life….it gathers dust and cob webs like nobody’s business…but it gathers family and friends as well, and for this, I am grateful.

It is Summer time…Porch time…feel free to stop on by.

A few weeks ago we took a detour to Roslyn.  Roslyn is an old mining town that is colorful and unique.  Remember the old TV show Northern Exposure?  It was filmed in Roslyn.  Our plan was lunch at The Brick.  The Brick has been around awhile and on a Saturday afternoon, the place was buzzing.  14 foot ceilings, a spittoon that runs all the way around the bar (wide enough to run races of small home-made boats in it) and plenty of colorful character.The burgers were savory.   The fries downright sinful.  The drinks cold and flavorful, dark beer for My Loving Spouse and cider on tap for me.  Oh, yes, they hit the spot.A brief, but fun spot to stop…

We love living right where we are…

…we are blessed.

Manny, Moe and Jack are very tidy pigs.  They all poop in only one spot of their yard, imagine if I could get everybody to do that!  I think the best salesman ever was the guy that started selling manure.

Our pigs eat very good food.  Their preference?  Pancakes, omelets and the occasional slice of bacon (no, they do not know where it comes from).  Our friend owns a restaurant and the plates scraps are deposited into pig buckets, which we pick up nightly.  Win-win and what do our boys have to say about this…more pancakes please.

 

The chickens hang out around the pigs at feeding time as well…running into snatch a bit of pancake, french fry or omelet, what can I say they are all a bunch of cannibals.

With hot temperatures upon us, we need to fill the pigs water multiple times a day both in and out of their water trough.  It is not the first time I’ve enjoyed seeing others play in the mud.

The skies have been our beautiful blue with glorious clouds and the vegetable garden is taking off.It is best to take these pictures, right after I have weeded!

The beans are a bush variety this year and I think they are starting to look mighty nice!My neighbor is also growing beans and his look pretty good too…

We had been talking about my riding my horse Beau home from school for quite some time.  Friday was the day!  The weather was beautiful.  My Loving Spouse was able to bring the horses down to school at noon, which was just when the first graders were out at recess.Horses near the play ground even in a country town can induce excitement in 6-year-old kiddos.  They lined the fence and asked deep meaningful questions, like…

“What are you doing?” to My Loving Spouse and My Girl, who was going to drive the truck home…

When they saw me walk up to the horses, out of my usual spot in the library, where in their minds I ‘belong’ they were nothing short of incredulous…aren’t kids fun?

 

“Miss Ellen!!!  What are you doing?”

We jumped on our mounts and waved goodbye to the kids, who ran alongside the fence and took the trail back home.  What fun it was, life is good……and we are blessed.

 

When at the store buying 20 gallons of vinegar, more than one person asked,

“What are you pickling?”

‘A driveway’ we said…and we were, sort of.

We’d been hired to re-gravel a double driveway packed with weeds.  The owners keep bees so they did not want to spray any Round up type weed killers.  Doing nothing to the weeds would be a waste of time and money.  The owner instructed us to use vinegar and Epsom salts…and so we did.

Mix 20 gallons of vinegar,

3 boxes of Epsom salt,

one complete bottle of Dawn Blue dish washing detergent…

and in the end I smelled like a bad salad, some of the weeds were killed off, but a lot of them were just highly irritated.The owner assured us that the weeds would continue to die and that we should order the 4 Dump Truck loads of gravel it would take to cover the driveway.  Blue and I spent the day spreading gravel and in case you are wondering, NO, I did not catch anything on fire or get stuck in any bogs…just a lot of spreading, attention to detail and around and around and around…I loved it.

…and then came the tricky part…getting home.  The job was far away and it hadn’t made sense for My Loving Spouse to stay all day or come back to load Blue up, so it was up to me.  Loading and chaining down the big heavy tractor and drive it home.Driving with Blue is a very heavy load, so the truck acts differently and the trailer bangs and rattles and it all comes under the heading of ‘not fun’.  There was NO way to get from where I was to home with out going on to the Highway.  I was so scared I almost cried and exited the Highway just as soon as I could…and as a reward for not dying or killing anyone, I stopped at the first location that had the two things I needed…a big open parking lot so I could pull in and pull out…and ice cream.

The bathroom with three doors has been on the restoration list since day one.  Since we had a plan, we’ve been living with ‘it’.  ‘It’ being an aged white on white, with holes everywhere from old screws that had been removed, tired and forgotten room, except this is ‘the’ complete and working bathroom for all to see and use.  I walked through there the other day (yes, through, because one must go through it to get to the laundry room) and was mildly horrified that we’ve been living with it this way for so long.Three years into this massive restoration, I’ve finally realized that the long list could take some time.  Off I went to the paint store, because this just had to change….even if it does still have three doors.With paintbrush and roller in hand…a light grey-blue was applied by me, Chief Painter of All.  I have something of a love/hate relationship with painting.  I hate doing it, because doing it well is hard, but I do LOVE the difference it makes.My favorite part is the water heater cubicle, with a repurposed shed door to hide it and the steamer trunk for storage.  The room is not done or off the list, but it is better and I can enjoy it every time I go to do the laundry!