September, 2018

Our #10 kept us busy on Thursday evenings in September. 

 The photo below is just awful, but Noah scored a touchdown and this is how I managed to capture the moment!

 It was a joy having the spiderwort bloom all through September.

 The garden kept me and my stove busy on Fridays.

 We grabbed our opportunity to go to the State Fair - potentially one of our quickest fair visits ever - but we still had fun!

 The only food we bought was a basket of fried cheese curds, lemonade and root beer.

 And after the boys each did some rides,

 we all went for a spin on the Ferris wheel!

 I've never been big into growing this kind of begonia before, but this year they did very well taking the summer heat on our deck.

 The tomato plants started looking worn out in September but the fruit just kept on coming!

 I made two big batches of tomato soup to freeze in containers. It's one of my favorite ways to enjoy tomatoes throughout the rest of the year.

 These cats...always cute, always annoying. We're in a love/hate relationship right now.

 When Ben refs football games he's almost always on the opposite sideline from me, so I took the opportunity to snap this post-game pic.

 Dicing tomatoes to can is just a little too time consuming for my life. I had to split this job into two or three days to get it completed.

 Noah's science teacher took his entire class on an overnight camping trip to the McPherson County fishing lake. I think it's astounding that the teacher would take on such a task and I loved that Noah was still smiling in the morning when I picked him up!

 The strangest thing happened at the school - there was a mattress fundraiser for the music department. A company brought in all of these mattresses and made the gym a showroom for one day - and they managed to raise $5,000! Levi wanted every mattress he tried out.

 The fall green bean harvest was more than I could keep for myself! I gave big bags of beans away because I ran out of jars!

 Just a little backyard football. :-)

 And the beginning of the aster bloom.

 I took a work trip up to the Northern Cheyenne Reservation in Montana.

 We visited the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and learned a lot in the visitor center but then even more from our board member who's Northern Cheyenne.

 Montana is gorgeous and we had a beautiful day to be out and about soaking up the sun and gulping fresh spring water.

 Back at home the asters were showing off and keeping the pollinators busy.

 Levi got to visit the allergy doctor.

 

 Thanks to the hens, I get to enjoy yummy eggs for breakfast everyday. Sometimes, I'm lucky enough to sit at the island and soak up the warm sunshine while I eat my breakfast!

 Corn harvest happened without my participation except to help get equipment home on the morning after they finished. I don't think I had ever seen the combine quite so dirty before. The cobwebs and dust on the railing were crazy.

 A year ago, Ben and I worked to landscape around this big rock and I'm glad we put the effort into it. It's nice to have something at the front edge of the farm that names this place.

 The garden just kept going!

 I made peanut buttery goodness for my friend Joni's 40th birthday party. We managed to celebrate her birthday two times and this is the only photo I have to show for it!!

 We went out to Camp Mennoscah to join our church retreat and enjoyed a few lovely hours out at camp. It's always good to be out at camp.

 The boys slept all the way the home. :-)

August, 2018

August is certainly a sneaky month. It feels like summer, but school gets going and then the month is suddenly gone in the blink of an eye!

The boys and I wrapped up our summer vacation by meeting up with Joni and her boys at her parents' place in Jennings. 

 I've heard so many stories about this town and the people that live there and it was fantastic to visit and see if for myself!

 Joni's dad had the older boys help him check cattle.

 That evening we ate pizza and went to the Decatur County Fair!

 Once we finally all got up the next morning we headed for home,

 but not before I made the boys pose for a photo (they weren't thrilled about it).

 So after being gone for a long time, I was curious to visit my garden again. Holy moly were my tomato plants tall!

 Vacation is great, but there's nothing like coming home!

 We had a fun church swim night in Hillsboro with lots of juicy watermelon to snack on!

 Levi got his trombone - and immediately started to work on figuring out how to play it.

 And Noah got his football practice pads.

 While we were on vacation, my mom had picked several large bags of green beans for us from the garden.

 And then it was time for school to start! 5th grade for Levi and 7th grade for Noah!

 August was a beautiful time in the garden - all the flowers were in full bloom, the plants were healthy and producing strong.

 We had way too many grasshoppers this year - what a gross and crusty insect.

 The tomatoes came on and they came strong! Levi helped me process them to get sauce going.

 We also had lots of peppers!

 The goats!

 The boys got together with Abram and Mabel and friends for their annual lemonade stand! Technically, this happened before school started...but it was in August. :-)

 Flowers and sage from the garden for co-worker Kate's 30th birthday party!

 Happy birthday dad!

 And then for Labor Day weekend we got to host Ben's family! It started out with fishing with grandpa Schrag at Kyle and Mandy Funk's pond.

 The clouds that evening were just magnificent!

 Ben the goat whisperer. :-)

 The tomatoes just kept coming!

 And our fall planting of green beans came up quick and put on lots of beautiful blooms!

 Oh it was so fun to have little Simon at our farm!

 He even got to come to Noah's first football game! Noah's #10.

 It was warm and windy that evening!

 Simon loved all the animals at our house. Wilbur and all the cats got lots of love from Mr. Simon.

 Cousin Ezra was here too! It was a full house and it was so good! Ezra was really excited about the tractors at the farm

 so we made sure he got to ride in one!

 Grandma and all the Schrag grandchildren!

 Aunt Susan came and joined in the fun and it was so good to have everyone together!

The visit was quick, but lovely, and then it was back to canning tomatoes.  

Next year, I'm not allowed to worry about tomato production until school starts. Someone, please remind me.