Wheat Harvest 2015

Let it be known that we are not big time farmers.  Cattle are our primary passion.  Our bountiful wheat crop this year was a whopping 35 acres.  We were hoping to bale it several weeks ago but Mother Nature and her abundant rainfall made that impossible this year, so harvesting was our next option.  

Wesley loves to look at my Facebook account in the evenings and saw pictures of my friends and their families standing in wheat fields.  For the next week he was relentless in teasing me about taking pictures in the wheat fields.  (This may ruffle the feathers of some farmers, and for that I apologize.  Like I said, cattle are our primary passion.  You may tease me about my cattle pictures all you like - I'm not going to change.  It takes all of us, farmers and ranchers, to feed the world.)  

When the day, afternoon, evening came to harvest our wheat crop I made sure to pack my camera and oblige my loving husband with pictures.  Some of them actually turned out pretty sweet.  Am I going to tell my husband this?  Of course not.  I'm going to only show him the super cheesy photos and not tell him about the all the good ones I'm printing out to give to aunties and grandmas.  Enjoy. 

Notice the plethora of protruding thumbs?  He did not attend Texas A&M (gig 'em!),
so perhaps he was a hitchhiker in a previous life. 

My goodness, I just love this little guy.

Fleeting Thought Friday

It has been a while since I posted a series of incoherent thoughts (in list form), so here goes:

• My husband and a neighbor boy helped me frame up my shelving this morning in our storage room. It only helped reiterate how much I hate working with power tools and my husband at the same time.  Not even power tools - any tools.  Even a tape measure.  ESPECIALLY a tape measure.  I put in the minimum number of screws needed to make sure it wouldn't fall down and then told them I was finished.  Now I can go back at my leisure and fix it the way I want.  Whew.  

*There are all sorts of cute sayings out there that talk about "if you can work cattle with a man you are meant for each other/you'll never get divorced/something equally lovey-dovey".  This is crap.  My husband and I can work cattle together all day, every day.  You put us together in a non-livestock situation and I can promise you the threat of divorce will occur within minutes.  We simply cannot do it.  

• Nesting has still been going wonderfully.  My house has been reorganized to within an inch of its life and now no one but myself can find anything due to its placement within its new home.  I love it.  

• Contraction action.  It's happening, folks.  Not because we want it to, but because this little fetus-o-mine has a mind of its own.  So we just get as much as possible done as quickly as possible in the morning and then spend hours in the recliner crocheting and contracting while Kenyon takes his afternoon nap.  Yes, my doctor is aware of it.  No, I do not need to hear any lectures or horror stories.  We are being careful - promise.  

• Pop quiz:  I got to go grocery shopping all by myself yesterday morning.  Was I more excited that I almost got to see William Shatner at a restaurant or the fact that I saved over $102 using coupons?  If you chose the William Shatner answer then you should probably stop reading this blog for forever and ever.  

• I have apparently passed on my passion for killing flies to my son.  He now walks around the house, pointing out renegade flies and yelling, "MASH THEM, MAMA!  MASH THEM!"

Happy fleeting-thought-Friday, folks!

Nesting

After the past week it is my firm belief that pregnancy nesting is proof that God indeed has a sense of humor.  Why else would He give someone who is the size of a walrus the energy of a Chihuahua for brief periods of time?  For kicks and giggles, I tell ya'.

Examples of our nesting this week include:

• We (Kenyon and I) built an entryway bench with boot storage for our mudroom.
• We (Kenyon and I) built a shelving system for our upstairs storage area.  I dare you to find another one year old that can tell the difference between a drill bit and a screw.  He's the best little apprentice ever. 
• I rearranged our pantry shelves and our pantry cabinet. 
• The freezer has been organized and everything is perfectly categorized. 
• My closet is arranged by season, sleeve length and color. 
• Baby clothes, accessories and various accouterments are organized and ready to go as well. 

I'm so glad I could provide my husband and God some great laughs this past week.  This walrus is quickly running out of energy!

A Lot of Dang Nickels. (Symphony in the Flint Hills 2015)

If I had a nickel for every time I saw something like this in my lifetime......

I'd have a lot of dang nickels.

Or this picture:

Or this one:

Are you starting to get an idea of what my childhood was like?

Pickups, trailers, teams of horses and covered wagons.  Yes, that hits quite a few of the major points during my primary years.

Picnic lunch on a flatbed trailer.  Yep, still reminds me of my youth.  The only thing out of place is seeing a man that's like another father to me trying to operate a smart phone.  Still can't wrap my head around that one.  

Perhaps I should take a step back and explain why I was completely surrounded by horses and covered wagons yesterday.  The 2015 Symphony in the Flint Hills occurred yesterday and our friends and family have been given the opportunity to provide rides to the patrons of this event every year.  To see more photos of the actual symphony, google: Flint Hills Media Project.  They do a wonderful job of covering the event.

Yesterday morning while getting everything hitched up it crossed our minds more than once that it might be a rather wet and miserable afternoon. Thankfully we only received a brief shower before the skies cleared and light breeze came up.  It was a beautiful afternoon to be either horseback or on a wagon.  My six month preggo self decided it was much more comfortable to ride a horse than a wagon and I had ample opportunity to do both.

Feel free to click on any photo to enlarge.

See that on the left?  That's my thigh.  The only time I made it into a photo.  There's a reason I like to take photos and always be behind the lens.  Driving; however, usually requires both hands so I lent my camera to my mother for a period of time.  Turns out, it is rather difficult to take non-blurry photos while riding in a covered wagon.  Who knew?  I don't remember Laura Ingalls Wilder mentioning this ever.  

See that "thing" on the left?  That's a cowboy hat I didn't take the time to crop out.  You're welcome.
It's a Sunday morning and I'm feeling lazy. 

The internet will undoubtedly be flooded today with selfies in front of teams and wagons. 

My brother-in-law.  Because I think he'll be mad to see his picture on my blog.  And I live to make him mad.
We're tight like that. 

These vans hauled in all the orchestra members that made such sweet music for the attendees.  The excitement is rather palpable every year when you see this procession pull in.

Unhitching from wagons and unharnessing after a long, yet enjoyable, day of work. 

I'm telling ya', if I had a nickel for every time we did this growing up, I'd have a lot of dang nickels. 

Daddy Pray

For the past month or so, Kenyon and I have prayed twice a day - naptime and bedtime.  He is a very good boy when it comes to learning routines and sticking to them (heaven help you if you leave your shoes in the living room instead of the mudroom) and now has firmly established in his mind that before you go to sleep, you must pray.  

Wesley has been getting up early most mornings this week to ship cattle and coming home late at night after working in the heat all day.  Finally, the heat and stress of the week seemed to catch up with him and he decided to come home early (8 at night in the summer is early to a rancher, trust me) and head straight to bed.  It was cute to see Kenyon and Wes get ready for bed at the same time, changing into jammies, washing faces and the like.  

At the very end of their routine, Kenyon asked his dad, "Daddy, pray?"  So we all huddled together with folded hands and prayed for friends that are sick, said thank you for our good day and asked that we all be good little boys and mommies and daddies the next day.  

Kenyon let me carry him up the stairs to his room instead of walking up himself and the entire time he was on cloud nine.  "Daddy pray!  Daddy pray!"  I must admit I was pretty impressed too.  Although my husband has a relationship with God, it is one that he keeps to himself.  It was touching to see him share such a moment with us.  

I was so glad both boys went to bed so early last evening.  It gave me a chance to quietly clean the kitchen, shed lots of happy tears and feel the baby in my belly celebrate with somersaults of joy.  Or maybe the baby was hyper from all the Mexican food we had for supper.  No matter; it was a lovely evening all because Kenyon's daddy prayed.  

A Marriage Counselor's Dream

I'll talk more about our wonderful vacation on another day.  Today?  Today we talk once again about the tragedy that is our marriage.

My husband and I, like many couples, don't communicate well.  The last time we had a decent Q&A was many, many years ago.  It went something like this....

"Will you marry me?"
"Okay."

(We're a walking romance novel, I tell ya'.)

We had company coming to visit on Saturday at noon.  All week long I had been preparing food, cleaning house and folding laundry.  I was beyond excited to see these folks and I didn't want anything to ruin our few precious hours together.

Friday evening my husband told (not asked) me that we would be going to town Saturday morning for a few hours.  I made a mental note of changes I needed to make in my timeline for the next day: chopping onions and peeling potatoes the evening before, gardening that just wasn't going to happen prior to their visit, etc.  I didn't question why I needed to accompany him; I knew he must have a feed pickup or something similar in the shop and I'd need to drive an extra vehicle home.

So, the next morning we got up early and drove to town.  We stopped by the vet to pick up some medicine, ran by the farm and ranch store for assorted screws and chainsaw parts and ran to the auto store for new batteries for a hay truck.  By the time we finished this third errand I was starting to feel a bit pressed for time.  I finally inquired as to what the plan was and when was the part where I would jump in and be of some use on this entire excursion.

He casually replied, "Oh, I don't need you for anything.  I just know you like to get out of the house and I thought we could all just take a nice little drive together."

I'm not ashamed to admit I began to bawl while standing in the middle of a store's parking lot.  All my planning and preparation to be a wonderful hostess that day was shifted and turned upside down.  And why?  Because my husband thought he was doing something sweet but really just made me kinda hate him (a lot) for the entire 45 minute drive home.

Please tell me we're not the only married couple in the world that doesn't communicate.  And please, someone give me hope and tell me we'll get this talking-to-each-other-stuff figured out eventually.

Vacation

At this time last week Wesley and I were driving east towards the Ozarks.  We hadn't been on vacation since 2011 and we were both chomping at the bit for a few days of rest and relaxation.  My folks were excited at the chance to keep Kenyon for several days and I didn't think they'd lose their minds watching him..... too much. 

I won't give you a minute by minute rundown of everything we did - just the highlights.  

• Branson was gorgeous.  When we ate at fancy restaurants we usually chose to sit out on their patios and watch the water/light/fire show that occurred every hour.  There was also a zipline in the background and we watched other folks blow their money on it.  We were too frugal to splurge on such a nonsensical thing. Side note: Every time we ate in Branson we experienced HORRIBLE service at our restaurants.  It was like the servers knew we were tourists and the likelihood we would be back soon was nil, so they put forth as little as possible.  Branson tourism board, take note.  

• Of course there were cattle involved on this trip.  We stopped by a friend's place and watched him weigh up cattle from area producers.  It's a country cattle purchasing facility that takes in cattle certain days of the week.  Our ENTIRE TRIP was planned around this weighing day.  I kid you not.  This log wall was inside one of their barns.  It didn't look like they used it for much besides storing hay these days, but I was nevertheless fascinated by the construction of the log walls.  Super neat to study.  

 

• We stayed several nights at a resort just south of Branson.  It was super fancy and definitely out of our normal comfort zone.  When I booked the room they asked if we were celebrating anything special - birthday, anniversary, baby, etc.  I told them we were celebrating our anniversary (a few months early, cough, cough).  They had this little cake waiting for us in our room upon arrival.  It's little things like this that made us feel special.  They don't do this at the Motel 6!  (Sorry, I'm easily impressed.)

• The grounds of this resort were gorgeous and manicured to a tee.  I never saw so much as a blade of grass out of place.  Also, I was amazed at the total lack of wind.  I never even felt so much as a breeze the entire time we were there.  No wonder they have beautiful flowers; they don't have to worry about them bending and breaking in 60 mile an hour gusts.  

The giant fish was part of the mini golf course on the resort.  It was huge, but oddly enough didn't look out of place in the least.

• My normally frugal self decided to splurge and get a massage while we were at this resort.  It was ahhhhhhhhhhhmazing.  I arrived at the spa a bit early and was the only one there so I didn't feel quite as dorky while I snooped around and took pictures of their decor 'designed to promote a sense of tranquility'.  

 

Of course I couldn't partake in the lovely hot tub due to my pregnancy, so I decide to sulk by the fireplace instead.  I suffered, I tell ya'. 

But wait - there's more!  Future posts will cover more of our trip: salebarns, cave tours, a fish hatchery and bar fights.  (Sigh.... that has to be one of the most random sentences I have ever written in my life.)