Schragville

Six!

2012-02-16T22:17:00.000-06:00

Wednesday was Noah's 6th birthday. We celebrated it first thing in the morning, since we were busy in the evening at church. He asked for Rice Krispy Treats for his school birthday treats, so we jazzed it up by doing Cake Batter Rice Krispy Treats.

Check out the load of Valentine's that landed at our house on Tuesday!

This is how Noah said someone should be photographed on their birthday.

At breakfast Noah opened the cards he got in the mail and his presents from us. He got an awesome card from Grandma and Grandpa Schrag that plays a fun song and was full of cash. Noah had a great time counting the twenty $1 bills that came in the card.

He's already scheming what he'll buy at the John Deere store with his money.

We gave him a John Deere sweatshirt, fences and

a Big Wooden Lean To.

At church, in an attempt to make it feel more like his birthday, I stuck a candle in Noah's piece of cake. Ben lit the candle and we sang to him. We actually had to light it twice so Levi could get a turn to blow out the candle.

When we got home from church, we could barely pull him away from his new lean to, fence, animals and tractors in order to put him to bed. He laid down complaining that his head hurt, but eventually fell asleep.

It didn't last though. He spent the last hours of his birthday with an earache. He woke up at 10:30 crying and moaning (loudly) about his ear hurting. It went on and on until 1am when the medicine finally kicked in enough for him to sleep. Thankfully, he woke up today happy and ready to go to school.

Valentines

2012-02-13T21:26:00.000-06:00

The boys and I created Valentines last week. It just so happens that I really enjoy working on Valentines and could spend an enormous amount of time picking out designs, paper, candy, cutting, pasting, etc. However, when you add a 4 and 5 year old to the mix my patience with the project quickly dwindles.

I realize that working on writing their own names and the names of their classmates is an excellent opportunity for them to work on their writing skills. They were excited when we started and I could hardly keep up with them. But quickly their interest waned and all three of us simply wanted to get the project done so we could move on to playing with tractors and cows again. In the end, the Valentines do represent what the boys asked for. They wanted to use Smarties candy and Noah asked that I get all different colors of paper.

And then, at Story Hour on Friday morning Levi made Super-Hero Valentines.

Pretty awesome, right? Happy Valentine's Day!

Outside Today

2012-02-03T22:19:00.001-06:00

I'm all for a mild winter with no snow (so far), but it was getting boring...and weird. So, the rain we got today was a very welcome change of pace.

Randomly, the boys decided it would be fun to put the tools we gave them for Christmas to use. They found out that it's harder to drive a nail through wood with a hammer then they thought.

In fact, Levi jumped at the first distraction he could find.

These ladies watched all the action - they're a captive audience for just about all the goings-on outside our house.

Our stinking dog (literally today, since rain + dog = stink), still has a plastic cone on his head. Hopefully, for just a few more days.

The boys had a great time playing and running all around the yard this afternoon. I'n not sure, but I think they were transporting water from one area of the yard to another.

Lucky for us, it rained this morning and started up again this evening but the afternoon was dry

Thankfully, neither one of them ever slipped in the mud and their trusty boots kept the mud off their clothes. It was a great way to spend a February afternoon.

Kansas Day

2012-01-28T22:32:00.000-06:00

Kansas is 151 years old, and today was the day to celebrate it.

Kaufman Museum in North Newton celebrates Kansas Day each year with a big ol' event that touches on a pretty big variety of presentations and activities highlighting our past and present.

The boys were pretty curious about the blacksmith - and were intrigued with the use of fire and big hammers.

The event is spread out across the museum's campus. The only trouble was that it seems to be a VERY successful event with LOTS of people. A good problem to have, really. But, it did make it feel a bit chaotic at times. Noah enjoyed helping make a new kind of paper airplane and seeing how far it would fly (his went 4 meters while Levi's went 5).

We learned about beekeeping,

and then made bee hats.

We tried walking on cans,

and fed goats - along with about 20 other sorts of activities. It was a whopper of an afternoon and a great way to celebrate the state we call home.

Reminder

2012-01-28T10:19:00.002-06:00

Levi brought home a little bit of "new life" from preschool this week. It's a very welcome reminder that the blahs of winter will one day turn into the beauty of springtime.

Outside

2012-01-25T21:59:00.000-06:00

The mild winter weather is allowing us to enjoy being outside more - don't let Levi's 2 hats, hood and mittens fool you. It was like 50 degrees outside.

Noah's learning about basketball in PE these days,

which means he wants to play it all.the.time. Levi was good with just kicking his basketball.

The warm winter weather is good, but it's also leaving us wishing for some snow.

Failed

2012-01-24T09:30:00.000-06:00

That's a jar of homemade dishwasher soap. I was tired of buying expensive eco-friendly dishwasher soap. And, I wasn't convinced of how eco-friendly it really was. So, when I saw a recipe for soap that needed few ingredients I was excited to try it.
2 c. washing soda
2 c. borax
6 Tbsp. citric acid powder
25 drops grapefruit essential oils

Easy enough - between a local eco-friendly store and Dillons, I was able to buy what I needed. The stuff smells AMAZING - it just leaves behind a film unlike anything I've ever experienced.
Ok, to tell you the truth I haven't ever had dishes come out of a dishwasher with a film. I find this new development very troubling. I have reduced the amount of soap I used from 2 Tbsp. per load, to 1 1/2 Tbsp. per load all the way down to 1 Tbsp. But, the film is still there and the cleanliness of the dishes is coming more and more into question.
I was so hopeful that this new soap would be a fun, eco-friendly way to start cleaning in new ways this year. But, I'm at the point where I have to admit, it failed.
Anyone have ideas for what I should do with this jar of soap now?

Fun Times

2012-01-23T23:00:00.000-06:00

There is no shortage of goofiness around this farm. We've got goof boys and

and a silly cousin that comes to visit.

But most of all, our boys have one goofy, fun-loving dad. The trouble is, Ben comes up with crazy games (this particular one is from his childhood) that the boys want to play every single moment their daddy is around.
Nachie - a Schrag family original. Ben and his brother Andy (and Sara, too?) played Nachie as kids. Ben and Andy came up with it - probably in the middle of a bleak Nebraska winter. Each person playing has to have socks on (the taller the sock the better). The goal of the game is to get the other person's socks off while they're trying to get your socks off.

The boys thought this game was fantastic!

Although there were some pretty serious whines when Ben got their socks off.

All in all, I think it was the most laughter I had heard from the three of them in a long, long time.

Busted

2012-01-23T21:43:00.000-06:00

Oh Axle. Our poor dog is suffering through week two with this horrendous plastic cone around his head. We've had to put several layers of duct tape on it already to keep it intact. His stitched up cut was looking really, really good - until Axle got the cone off his head and licked the scab off it. I know that's kind of gross, but we all know that scabs work best when left to fall off on their own, right?

So, we Ben wrangled the cone back together and got it securely fastened to Axle's collar with some zip ties. Poor Axle. For about an hour he had the freedom and joy of licking places on his body that he's been trying and failing to lick for an entire week. Hopefully, he didn't do damage to his healing wound so the cone can officially come off on Friday.

The trouble with dogs...

2012-01-14T14:27:00.000-06:00

is that humans quickly become attached to them. The trouble with attachment is that we therefore have a terrible time allowing them to suffer. And, the biggest problem with that is then the dog is pretty much equal to a human... Or at least Axle is. You see, on Monday evening Axle cut his leg (maybe on a piece of tin...we're not sure). We came home to find our dog with a bloody leg...so after careful examination, visits from my dad and our friend Brian and all of us standing around looking at Axle...we decided we'd just let the farm vet take a look at in the morning. Good enough. Well, in the morning the farm vet was out, looked at Axle, snipped the small piece of flesh that was hanging and said, "He can lick it, he'll be fine." Great! That was cheap and easy - two words we like to hear. Wrong.

A day later Axle's leg was NOT looking good and he would NOT stop licking it. We called our vet and took Axle in. She said he needed stitches and a round of antibiotics to clear up the infection that was growing in his leg. Great. So, after a couple days at the vet, stitches and 2 kinds of antibiotics Axle is confined to this collar and inside for two weeks.

He cannot run or jump for 2 weeks. That plastic collar just might do us all in yet. We'll see....
So, hanging around outside feels a little different without Axle running around with us. But, the boys and I had a nice time outside in the sunshine this morning.

One of the calf pens is empty at the moment so the boys decided to crawl all over the hay and explore where the calves sleep and so on. It was great to spend time outside. No TV, no computer, no fighting over who gets to play with this tractor or that tractor.

And best of all, after they finished crawling around in the hay - they decided to go pretend to milk!

They were busy for nearly an hour "milking" in the barn. I spent that time picking metal out of the burn pile. I know, an hour to myself and I spent it picking through ashes....but it was a satisfying project. The metal in the burn pile has been driving me nuts and now most of it is gone. The pile is big and soon enough my dad will scoop it away and dump it elsewhere but it felt good to get some of the most noticeable bits out. I also established a small fire ring for us to use for burning our trash. Now if I could only get one line of a clothesline strung I'd really feel productive.
Fire rings and clotheslines...it truly is the small things in life that put a smile on this girls face.

Saturday morning

2012-01-07T21:41:00.000-06:00

It was another beautiful morning on the farm. Had Ben been home to watch the boys, I would have taken off on a long walk with Axle. But, since he was off hunting for a deer I stayed much closer to home.

Little 570 lives in the calf hutch nearest our house, isn't she cute?

Burning our trash might be one task that seems pretty simple, but is the one that makes me think and question more than any other. All those bits of our life, gone - just like that. The paper could have been recycled, but is it worth recycling something when it can be reduced to ashes in a couple seconds? I'm 100% for recycling, but it seems to me (and I have no science to support this) that my carbon footprint would be larger if we did recycle the paper and cardboard. I don't know. I do know that anything that can be recycled beyond paper products does get recycled around here. It's amazing to watch trash burn. Even a little fire of castaways has a way of making me feel small.

The hauling of poop was already underway when the boys and I got ourselves outside this morning.

Yes, the boys spent every moment they could being involved in this. Nobody fell in that poop pool today, thank the good Lord! But the smelly clothes just kept on coming. The washing machine has certainly earned its keep around here this weekend!

What if...

2012-01-06T15:04:00.000-06:00

Farm life is good. Just last night Ben said it's so refreshing to get out of the car and breath in this air, even if it literally smells like shit. The cows are a stones throw away from our house, remember?

So as good as life is on the farm there are some particular dangers that if I let myself think about, I'd never let my kids out of the house. In many ways it's just as dangerous, or maybe much MORE dangerous, then living in town. It just doesn't feel dangerous until something happens, or you think something's happened. Let me explain....

A couple weeks ago, before 6am, Levi was up. I was already at my parents' house exercising (yes, I get up pre-dawn to exercise in my old bedroom...call me crazy). He didn't wake Ben up, instead he got dressed in pants, a t-shirt and his orange Crocs and walked outside to find me. It was cold with crusty snow on the ground and he didn't have a coat on, he started to cry. Ben woke up, from a dead slumber, hearing Levi crying and couldn't get his brain to figure out where it was coming from. Levi wasn't in bed, he wasn't upstairs, he wasn't outside the house....so Ben came to find me. While Ben was looking inside the house, Levi made it to me, thanks to my mom letting him in the house. Not knowing Levi was safe and sound, Ben burst into my parents' house too and found Levi snuggled in my old bed watching me exercise. It was very scary for Ben and the What If questions started to spin in our heads.

Later that same morning, Levi put his coat on and said he was going out to help Uncle Bruce grind a bale. Ok we said, but then come back inside. Well, while Ben, Noah and I were inside getting ready for the work/school day, Levi was wandering around from one area of farm action to another. The sun wasn't up yet and big tractors were moving and little Levi should not have been out there. My dad took Levi with him in the tractor to go mix up feed and thankfully brought him back when I needed to be leaving for work. He told me they hadn't always known where he was and it was too dark for Levi to be out there. Again, in the same morning, the What If questions started to spin.

Today, Levi told me he was going out to play on the skid steer. Fine. Ok. Happens all the time. He'd been gone for a while and I went out to check. Oh, Uncle Bruce and Roger were busy clearing out the manure pit, Levi was riding along with Uncle Bruce. Hauling poop ranks just under harvesting and hauling grain. So, I went back inside for a while. When I was ready to leave to go to story hour at the library with Levi I went outside again to see if I could coax him off the tractor. Much to my surprise, he walked out of the milk barn with my dad soaked with water from head to toe. Levi had fallen into the poop pit. It's like a zero entry 7 or 8 foot deep poop pool. He hadn't walked in the poop, he fell in the deep end. Thankfully, they've been working at clearing it out for the past few days so there was only two or three feet of poop in it this morning. And thankfully Roger was out there and actually heard Levi calling for help. Thankfully, my dad was around to help him get cleaned off. The What If questions haven't stopped spinning yet. That poop pit has been one of my biggest fears on the farm for almost 6 years now. Today it was for real life.

Boundaries and guidelines. We need more boundaries and more guidelines or the What If questions are going to keep on spinning.

Christmas on the 30th

2012-01-06T09:49:00.000-06:00

Well, while Levi's outside helping haul off cow manure, I'm going to (finally) wrap up my blog posts from Christmas.

The weather was beautiful for the entire week between Christmas and New Years and lucky for us it's continued on for another week.

We got to have Rylee out at the farm on my birthday. It was fun to have her here and watch the three of them play together.

I got a new lens for my camera from Ben for birthday. It's very exciting because now with one lens I can shoot up close or far away! For example, I was standing three feet away from Noah when I took this photo:

and with the same lens, I opened the back door and took this photo of Bruce, Levi and dad from about 60 feet away.

Later in the day, the Epp family gathered for our Christmas gathering. As the sun was setting, the second cousins got a quick game of football going.

And then once it was dark, but not quite everyone had arrived yet, we thought since all the kids were gathered we should take a group photo. It was quite the challenge, but we got some decent photos and some good laughs. One with smiles:

and one silly photo (I love Delaney's belly in these photos - she'll appreciate that someday....):

After a delicious meal and before opening presents the kids sang a few songs. My boys actually agreed to sing a song together! They sort of wanted to melt away into the floor from embarrassment, but with some added encouragement from grandma they made it all the way through. I think they sang "Away in a Manger" but it's been long enough ago that I can't quite remember.

Then we had one cute Angel Band perform for us (who needs rhythm instruments when you can use cooking utensils?) :

It was a wonderful evening and the children played really well. There may have been some running and the house was unusually loud, but it was good to be together.

Leroy the 4 Year Old

2012-01-04T23:00:00.000-06:00

Did you know Levi is often called Leroy around our house? Ben came up with it one day long ago and it stuck. A week ago (time is flying) Levi turned 4! Thankfully, it worked out for Tim and Sue to stay here long enough to celebrate with Levi. And lucky for the rest of us, we ate Semmel (the s is said with a z sound) for supper.

Semmel is a simple bread made with yeast, flour, water and salt. It bakes at a high temperature so the outside gets hard and the inside is chewy like sourdough. It's a Beatrice, Nebraska tradition that continues within the Schrag family. You eat them when they're fresh out of the oven, sliced open and filled with a slice each of cheddar cheese and summer sausage. Or, slather it with butter and strawberry jam or honey. Or just with cheese, or even with peanut butter. They're very good and make a simple supper.

From the flavor of the cake, to the candles and sprinkles Levi picked out his birthday cake. He picked the cake mix and container of frosting at the store and told me how to "decorate" it. It was fun to have him help and since I didn't have anything special planned for his cake it helped me out too.

He also picked out Birthday Party ice cream - which was surprisingly good, despite all the blue goo swirled in the ice cream.

Levi is a lucky boy. He had all 4 of his grandparents at his birthday party and got some great gifts. A big front loader (check out that tough guy face he's making), a whiteboard and markers (whiteboards are all the rage in our house these days), a marble game

and a cowboy hat!

Levi is such a joy. He is expressive, loves to sing, play with tractors (big and small), adores his brother, is an eager helper and is very opinionated. We can't wait to see what the next year brings.

The Beautiful Outdoors

2012-01-03T20:56:00.001-06:00

In general, the Kansas landscape in winter has little to offer in the looks department. But, when the highs are in the 50's or 60's in December everything suddenly seems much more beautiful. Maybe it's the pure joy of being able to spend a lot of time outside, knowing that if the weather pattern was ever-so-slightly different that we could have highs in the teens with a howling north wind.

At one point or another, our whole family went out "exploring" last week. I helped Noah discover that there are several creeks that snake through the pasture here at the farm. He was proud to show Ben a couple days later. My over-active imagination was thankful for Axle's presence. That dog is quickly becoming a safety blanket of sorts for me.

It was balmy outside for December, but I was still surprised when Axle took more than one dip in that frigid water! It's hard to tell in the photo below, but there are 2 beaver dams built in the creek.

With hindsight I can say, it was good to play a game of 2-person football with Noah 5 out of 7 afternoons last week. I can't say I was excited to play football with Noah, I usually wanted to be doing something else. But, he loves to play football. He won every game because he put all his energy into it, and somehow didn't mind that I didn't. No matter how bad my attitude is to start the game, I always get into it and we always have a good laugh or two together.

And, thanks to clear skies and lots of sunshine, we've been blessed with one colorful sunset after another. I honestly believe the small things in life, the colors of the sunrise and the sunset, the construction of beaver dams and the "discovery" of creeks are worth taking time to enjoy and be thankful for.

Schrag & Schmidt

2011-12-31T17:03:00.003-06:00

Gatherings, lots of Christmas gatherings. But, I grew up going to lots of Christmas gatherings and I enjoy them. It's a blessing to have family close enough (and the rest willing to travel) so we can see each other at least once a year.

It was a privilege to host Ben's parents in our "new" place for a few days. You never know how it will go to host folks in a new space, but it was great and they said they slept well upstairs in this old house.

The Schrag family gathered in Peck at the Tahitian Room (aka, Susan and Cully's place). The Tahitian Room is full of quirky, glorious, random and historic bits and pieces collected over many years. While I don't recall a Schrag gathering where the bar was put to it's intended use (consuming alcohol), we do use it as our buffet table. It's odd to have all the kids saddle up to the bar and nibble on peppernuts but it certainly works. They don't know what they're looking at and think all the bottles and lights are wonderful.

Levi tried playing Hi-Ho Cherry-O on his own, hopefully he didn't lose too many cherries.

Poppy Seed Roll, a Schrag favorite.

The second cousins did a great job playing together. Gabe and Bethany played so well with Noah and Levi. Little Henry was a joy too, but still too little for marbles and hide and seek, maybe next year Henry!

Susan and Brittany managed to successfully roast coffee beans in an air pop popcorn popper! You never know what'll happen next at the Tahitian Room.

The boys felt pretty comfortable at Susan and Cully's barn (the Tahitian Room is inside the barn that they live in), but they wanted me to accompany them to the bathroom. We had fun counting the 9 different toilet paper holders and this tag hung from the ceiling fan. Like I said, the place is full (and not in a bad way) of all sorts of interesting stuff.

Noah said he ate 400 peppernuts that day and he very well may have been correct!

During the day on the 27th, the boys and I were with the Hertzler family. For some reason, I didn't snap a single picture during that time....but we ate wonderful soup and sandwiches, put together a booger of a puzzle, and had a good time hanging out together. That evening, Ben went to the Hertzler's and the boys and I went to our Schmidt gathering. The boys got to spend more time playing with second cousins and had a blast.

Sam is a year younger than Noah and a year older than Levi, so you can imagine that the three of them can have a rip-roaring good time.

See what I mean about those old "cowboy jeans" that Levi simply will not quit wearing?

We were a group of 22 or so and had a great time eating and catching up with one another. Almost all of us still live in the Goessel area, but sadly we don't see each other all that often.

We also got to watch a video about the first shipment of aid that went to Vietnam following the war. My grandpa, Harvey Schmidt was heavily involved with CROP in McPherson County at the time and volunteered to give some of his wheat to this shipment going to Vietnam. Church World Service organized the cargo shipment of wheat to help feed the Vietnamese people. Church World Service recognized the fact that during the war most of the farmland had been destroyed and the ability of the Vietnamese people to grow enough food for themselves had been greatly diminished. So, in this video we got to watch grandpa harvest wheat, speak during the sending service in Houston, TX and then check the wheat when it arrived in Vietnam. Many times I've heard mention of grandpa's trip to Vietnam, but it never made much sense until now. It was such a blessing to see and hear grandpa's voice again.

Christmas Day

2011-12-28T22:51:00.000-06:00

We had a wonderful start to our Christmas Day. On Christmas Eve when the boys couldn't stop talking about Santa and when he would come to our house....Ben and I bit our tongues to keep ourselves from bursting that bubble...we told the boys we would not open gifts until 8:00 the next morning. And it worked! They slept until about 7, which is normal for them, and then we ate breakfast and finally we got to open gifts.
Noah lost his first tooth on the 23rd, check out that little gap on the bottom row. He was VERY excited and thankful for the two quarters the tooth fairy left for him (even though we lost the tooth before we could even leave it for the tooth fairy).

So, on to opening presents. The boys got work gloves, underwear, toothbrushes and colored pencils in their stockings. They were the most excited about the underwear and toothbrushes.

Levi got new "cowboy jeans". He has a pair already that he's worn holes in the knees because he wears them every.single.day. Seriously (I'm shaking my head as I'm typing). But, the new jeans haven't quite taken hold yet, and he much prefers the old pair to the new pair....it's a slow process.

Noah gave me a calendar that he made in school and Ben a clay hand print he made in art.

Levi and Noah both got new shoes. New basketball shoes, like the high school boys wear. Levi's are a half size too small and one of Noah's rubs his ankle. Their old shoes, that they both love, are so worn out and too small that it was time for new shoes....except transitioning to the new ones hasn't gone as smoothly as we had hoped.

We bought the boys an indoor, over the door, basketball hoop. It was a hit from the moment they ripped the paper off.

After they got the new basketball pumped up,

it was time to play some ball!

We had a nice Christmas Day service at church and then spent the rest of the day at my parents' house.

Noah and Levi put on a surprise program for us. Noah doesn't know how to play the piano and Levi doesn't know how to play the guitar but, they both know how to sing.

It was cute and hilarious and wonderful.

Christmas Eve

2011-12-28T22:43:00.000-06:00

Christmas Eve is a special night at our church. Children from age 2 and up tell the story of Jesus' birth.

Levi's class sang a song about the Christmas star over Bethlehem. The girls in his class stole the show by trying to get good access to the microphone.

Each kid in Noah's class had to say a line in their spoken piece. Noah did well remembering his line, but was a bit shy in the speaking-clearly-into-the-microphone department.

Then more kids joined in and they sang "Stars Were Gleaming." Noah knew most of the song very well and I tried to practice it with him and wasn't sure that he ever got the last 2 lines of the second verse. But, when it counted and the entire church (it was literally a full church) was watching, he got it all and actually sang out! My heart smiled and I felt so proud of him. Maybe it's because we were sitting close enough that I could hear him, but it seemed more special than normal to me.

The Christmas musical that the older kids did was better than ever. The focus on light and the many roles that light plays in the Christmas story was interesting and refreshing.

Finishing with the church bathed in candlelight is my favorite.

It's simply magical, no matter how old you are.

The Tour

2011-12-22T22:09:00.000-06:00

I thought, mostly for the purpose of looking back on this time in the farmhouse, that I should snap a few photos of our new living space. The only problem is that the regular lens for my camera is broken, so I only have the use of a zoom lens - not ideal for snapping indoor photos!

So here we go.

From the garage you walk into a large mud room (where Axle still spends the night), then there's a laundry area and then the kitchen.

From the kitchen you can see straight through to the other side of the house.

After the kitchen is the living room. My grandma always used it as the dining room and I'm still fumbling over what to call it. It's usually something like, "Dine Living Room." Not pictured to the left is the door to the upstairs. From the living room you get to the two bedrooms we're using.

This picture is flat out awful, but it's the "master bedroom" which also has a big TV (we've never had a TV in a bedroom), a couch, and a piano (who doesn't need a piano in their bedroom?). My grandma always used this room as the living room/front room.

The bedroom that the boys share has always been a bedroom. My dad remembers when he was a kid that their entire 5 person family (my aunt Karen wasn't born yet) slept in this bedroom. I failed to ask why that was necessary, but it's interesting to think about.

And that rounds out the spaces of our daily lives. There is a large bedroom upstairs with toys and space to play.
It's starting to feel like home, like a temporary home.

Noah's Christmas Program

2011-12-21T22:13:00.003-06:00

Noah's Christmas program at school was simply wonderful. We finished up eating supper on the evening of the program with a mere 15 minutes to get ourselves ready to go. Noah went into high gear and got himself dressed, shirt tucked in, belt on. Then he went into the bathroom and combed down his hair, brushed his teeth and washed off his face. He was ready.to.go!

But, by the time his class had played for 45 minutes in their classroom (during the 5th grade band concert) his shirt was un-tucked, which was perfectly fine by me.

The kids did a great job. Noah hadn't told me anything about it because he wanted me to be surprised. I certainly was surprised by all the actions and wonderful singing.

Beautiful Day

2011-12-17T22:25:00.002-06:00

So beautiful, in fact, that I didn't take a single picture to prove it. Oops.

Actually, Levi spent the day fighting off a stomach bug...hopefully tomorrow he'll be back to normal. Ben was away for the afternoon officiating some basketball games so he missed out on the warm and sunny part of the day.

While Levi slept, Noah and I had a great time working in the garage, playing basketball, burning old wood and cardboard that we found in the garage and playing fetch with Axle. We were outside all afternoon, without our coats on. It was wonderful. It was also wonderful to get our garage organized. The garage was the one remaining space that had stuff just sitting here and there and it was driving me absolutely crazy. It was a dusty, pack rat poop filled time, but it was wonderful to get the garage swept out and all of our stuff in spots that make sense.

The weatherman's forecast calls for one more warm day and then a Winter Storm Watch for two days, so we'll enjoy this while we've got it!

Levi's Christmas Program

2011-12-17T22:15:00.001-06:00

Levi was totally pumped about his Christmas program at Preschool! On Thursday morning, he eagerly ate his breakfast totally.ready.to.go!

But, when we saw him at school, he was looking a bit more somber. The room full of moms, dads and grandparents had put a damper on Levi's excitement.

But, if there's anything that'll get our preschooler excited it is most definitely rhythm instruments!

We did see him sing along to quite a few of the songs. His biggest trouble was distraction. He'd start watching another kid, or a toddler in the audience and forget all about the song he was supposed to be singing.

We had a wonderful time watching our little guy do his best and afterwards he was eager to show us around his school and eat snacks.

He's serious about wanting a saw...he keeps talking about it. I'm not sure Santa will bring him a saw, maybe a hammer, but not a saw.

Adjustments

2011-12-15T22:18:00.002-06:00

Soon I'll take some photos to show you the inside of our new digs. I haven't been home during daylight to take nice pictures yet, but I'm hoping to soon. It's a charming house and it's especially cheerful when the sun is shining through the windows.

We've had some adjustments to make in the past 5 days. While this is a big house, we're only truly living on the main floor - with play space upstairs. But, for the most part we've been in the living room, our 2 bedrooms and the kitchen. I'll explain the layout when there are photos to go along with it. It's cozy, and I mean that in a positive way. When the boys are playing a game of basketball or football and yelling and running while I'm trying to cook it may not feel like the best situation, but for the most part it's been cozy in the best way possible.

We've had to adjust to having a dog. Axle, we found out from taking him to the vet for shots, weighs 98 pounds! He's been doing very well with all the adjustments he's trying to make and thankfully continues to be a very kind and obedient dog. I've never had a dog, but have found it pretty fascinating to get to know Mr. Axle (the running joke is, "Hold your tongue and say it...." Just try it. :-)).

We've had to adjust to Noah getting on the school bus at 6:55am. He LOVES it and has been ready early every day so far. He just walks over to my parents house and visits with them until my dad is ready to go. It's sweet to watch him walk out the door and across the dark yard, so confident and carefree.

We've lucked out and the dishwasher hasn't leaked! There was some fear that since it hadn't been used in more than a year that the seals would be brittle and leak. But, after two uses it seems to be doing well. Also in the kitchen, we've had to adjust to a gas range and oven. I'm still getting used to the oven, but otherwise that's been a fun adventure.

We're getting used to having dairy within a stone's throw from our house. There sure is a lot of commotion outside early every morning. The boys have slept past 6am once out of the five nights we've been here. I'm hoping that catches up with them and they decide to sleep a bit longer soon. In Hesston, it often felt like I was the only person up and at 'em at 5:30 in the morning (when I'd go exercise). But, now when I get up there's a tractor driving by and cows being milked and feed being ground. The whole yard outside our house is buzzing with activity, while inside it's quiet and we're all sleeping.

I've had to adjust to doing my morning exercising at my parent's house - in my old bedroom. Their elliptical machine resides in my old bedroom, so each morning I trek across the yard (which is WAY better then driving anywhere) for my daily workout. Having one machine to chose from instead of 15+ at the Hesston Wellness Center is a pretty big change. I'm sure I'll get totally bored with this option before winter is over, but I'm very thankful to have an option like it so close.

I've enjoyed not having a working TV in our house. That should change tomorrow when the satellite dish guy comes out and hooks everything up. We went several days with no TV and no internet. That was OK with me too, there's something refreshing about not having those things available for a while.

We've had to adjust to the mud and muck of 2 days of light rain on the yard and roads. I even bought myself a pair of mud boots - now I can go anywhere the boys can go around here when it's wet.

We've had to adjust to being CLOSER to daycare, church, and Ben's work and farther away from my work. I certainly didn't get to work this week at the same time I got to work last week. I'll make some adjustments for next week.

There are about 1,000 other adjustments we've had to make too, but many of them are the realities of moving. It takes mental energy to remember where your clothes are, where the drinking glasses are, where....well, everything is. But, Ben and I were just saying tonight how we feel content and at ease out here on the farm.

We Moved!

2011-12-12T17:00:00.000-06:00

It sure is a lot of work to move from one house to another! We managed to move a whopping 12 (or so) miles, from our house in Hesston out to my family's farm near Goessel.

Saturday was the big day. I'd spent the past 2 weeks packing up boxes and moving them over to the farm house one carload at a time. Anytime we were headed toward Goessel we'd drop off boxes just to help move things along. I also took time to put our stuff away once a mountain of boxes had accumulated in the farm house. Friday was our last day and night in Hesston. Our entire kitchen was bare, our dressers were just skeletons since all the drawers were already at the farm, our basement was bare except for couches and the house was quiet because we had our cable, internet and phone turned off.

So, when 8:30am rolled around on Saturday we hauled all of our furniture outside.

It all fit in the U-Haul and 2 pick-up trucks!

My mom took the boys to the farm for the morning so we could work without worrying about stepping on them. Noah was genuinely mad that he didn't get to help us move and we felt bad about that. We love a good helper, but it just wasn't safe to have them running around "helping".

After about 3 hours everything was loaded, and then we slowly drove the 12 (or so) miles out to the farm!

This is the over 130 year old farm house we're currently living in! My grandmother lived in this house just about her entire life. Her grandfather, or my great-great grandfather built it around 1880. Just last year my grandma moved from this house into Bethesda Home in Goessel.

It's an honor to live in a house so rich in family history. The memories are thick in this house. I got all emotional at dinner on Saturday night when Ben, the boys and I sat down to eat. I realized I had set the table in the exact same way my grandma did when I was little. I was sitting where she always sat, Ben was where my grandpa sat, and the boys were in the spots my sister and I would have occupied. It hit me as we sat there just how much has happened in that house - most of which I'm not even aware of. It feels special to me and I feel honored to call this house home for a while.

We had a wonderful group of friends and family help us move on Saturday. Different people from our Sunday School class helped us at different times of the day and before we knew it, beds were made and all the furniture was in place! Some of the younger movers were helpful not only with putting stuff (books) away, but also at helping our own kids feel comfortable in their new space.

And Axle came out to the farm too on Saturday afternoon! He's learning again what it is to be an outside dog and has shown us just how much he loves to fetch! We've been slowly transitioning him to being an outside dog, so hopefully in the next week or so we can get that done. Lucky for us, the farm house has a big mudroom that's closed off from the house that we can keep Axle in overnight. So far, he's done great with the boys and seems to be getting along with most of the other farm animals.

We spent 4 years in Hesston and we'll miss our neighbors and some of the conveniences of town. But, it certainly does feel good to be in the country again and only driving 5 minutes to get to church on Sunday morning was great compared to the 15 minutes we were used to!

Birthday Surprise

2011-12-07T17:00:00.000-06:00

Today is my mother's birthday - happy birthday Mom - and on Sunday we managed to surprise her. :-)

She knew that her family was going to be at her house for lunch. She knew that we would bring all the food and that all she needed to provide was butter and jelly. She didn't know that some dear friends would also be showing up for the party. Gene and Cindy Hastings and Bob and Nancy Becker made for a fantastic birthday surprise.

It didn't hurt that the food we catered in from Keith in Goessel was amazing. It also didn't hurt that my sister made a fabulous cheesecake for dessert.

It's hard to believe that my mother is 60. I don't feel like I'm almost 31, so naturally I don't feel like my mother should, or could possibly be, 60. Oh well, I guess that's how life works.

And while my mom was not looking forward to her birthday, I think in the end she's found out it's not that bad. Especially when food, family and friends magically show up at your house to surprise you.

Thanksmas

2011-11-26T21:41:00.001-06:00

The entire Schrag family gathered for Thanksmas today. Josh and Sara arrived last night to complete the gathering. And, due to different schedules and available vacation time, this was the only 24 hours that we'll all be together this holiday season. Sadly, it's been a year since we'd seen Sara and more yet since we'd seen Josh.

Today was our Christmas! We had a great time opening gifts.

Levi was thrilled with his book of animal stickers (and all the other stuff he got)

and Noah was thrilled with his football tee - although his expression in this photo doesn't show it.

He tried it out right away and later he used it outside.

Both boys got Chicago Bears hooded sweatshirts, John Deere jammies and socks, DVD's, a Nerf football and more.

I walked around today taking some random photos to capture some of the other things we've been doing while we've been here. The Wii has proven to be an excellent source of entertainment. Noah and Levi mastered bowling and golfing and even got the rest of us in on the action.

Sue introduced me to her homemade powder laundry detergent. It's simple - 1 bar of Fels-Naptha soap, 1 c. Borax and 1 c. Washing Soda. You grate the Fels-Naptha and then mix it all together. It works great in her High Efficiency washer and she only uses 1 Tbsp. per load. I think it sounds like a much more ecological and economical way to do laundry.

We have eaten enormous amounts of delicious food. We've had fabulous soup, bread, rice & beans, ham, potatoes, pie and more. Sue outdid herself with providing us with wonderful food, hot chocolate and peppermint tea.

Levi was so thrilled with his new jammies that he wore them all day. He had a purple upper lip from the grape juice he drank all day and twice today I found him watching a DVD that he had gotten out and ready by himself. How does he know how to do this?

We had a wonderful Christmas celebration with the entire family. We completed 2 3/4 puzzles, colored pictures, played hide-and-seek and football, watched movies, took naps and laughed a lot.

Paint & Clippers

2011-11-26T10:48:00.001-06:00

Sue found a fantastic recipe for making finger paints online and Noah helped her whip up a batch.

We had a great time making all sorts of gooey colorful creations on the glass kitchen table.

And later in the day, Levi agreed to a haircut, while Ben took Noah out to a local place to get his hair cut (he continues to refuse to get his hair cut by anyone he's related to).

And after the haircut wrapped up, Levi vacuumed up all his little blond hairs from the floor.

Thanksgiving Fire

2011-11-24T14:24:00.001-06:00

Grandpa took the boys outside this morning to gather sticks and rake leaves. The boys were pumped to help make a fire and getting some sticks and leaves picked up from the yard is always a good thing.

The boys worked hard and had a great time raking, jumping into piles,

adding leaves and poking the fire to help it keep going.

Levi was not so helpful in picking up the leaves,

but he made a wonderful cart driver - sound effects and all. Happy Thanksgiving!

9 Hours Later

2011-11-24T13:25:00.001-06:00

It took us 9 hours to drive to Illinois on Tuesday afternoon/evening and when the boys got up on Wednesday morning, they were READY TO GO! It's exciting to be at Grandpa and Grandma Schrag's house. There's always lots to see and do.

First things first, help grandma in the kitchen.

They helped Sue mix up Sourdough bread.

And then Ben and I took the boys to the Children's Museum. As soon as we told the boys we'd be traveling to Illinois, they asked to go to the Children's Museum. So, we put it at the top of the priority list.

I think we spent about an hour in the farm section. The museum has a wonderful set up of combine, grain cart, auger, bins, feeding troughs and grain elevator all connected by tubes. The grain are the little green balls you see below. Air flows through the tubes, so when you put a green ball in, the air whisks it away to the next place grain goes.

The boys fed the cows, made the grain go up the auger, gathered more grain in their buckets,

then they'd run their full buckets to the cows,

and run their empty buckets back to the grain auger.

They spent time picking corn on the combine and then they were finally ready to move on.

We spent quality time in the painting area. I could tell they were a year older than the last time we'd been to the museum. They both painted their names, rainbows and shapes instead of randomly brushing paint on and spending most of the time washing it off.

At the pretend stage, Noah got involved by operating the curtain and lights. He wasn't interested in putting on a costume and acting in the show the other kids were putting together.

Levi wasn't interested in the big stage, but did have a good time with the hand puppets.

We had a great time and thanks to the Amtrak train just outside the museum, we were able to lure our kids out so we could go eat lunch. Without that train, I'm not sure when we would have got them to quit making pretend pizzas.

Axle

2011-11-21T07:43:00.001-06:00

Meet Axle. He'll join our family in December, when we move out to the farm. The other night we got to meet him and the wonderful family he's been living with. They live in town and decided to give him away since they don't have the time or space to let Axle run and be the dog he wants to be.

I think that's right....I don't know...I've never owned a dog before...so most of this is brand new to me.

They had great things to say about him, so we're hopeful that Axle will do well with us and have a good life out on the farm.

Busy

2011-11-16T21:11:00.001-06:00

So, if you can't tell by the absence of blog posts in the past couple weeks, our life is busy. See, we're moving. We sold our house and now we're moving out to the farm. We're excited to move out to farm, to adjust to country life, to be closer to church, school and Ben's work.

We managed to move our compost, thanks to my dad, his truck and pitch fork.

And now, I'm busy packing boxes and moving them out to the farm one carload at a time. We have the benefit of moving at our own pace. Maybe it's a curse...one box at a time, for weeks at a time might be the death of me.

And there's talk of a dog. Oh my.

Halloween festivities

2011-11-01T21:57:00.000-05:00

On Thursday, Levi's preschool class visited Bethesda to give a short program and show the residents their costumes. We dropped a couple "jack-o-lanterns" off at Great Grandma Schmidt's room for her to enjoy.

Levi was not his usual self at Bethesda that day. He was very shy and he never seemed very comfortable, which is highly unusual for him when we visit Bethesda!

He was one shy motocross driver.

But lucky for the preschoolers, Levi's daddy works at Bethesda and handed out candy to each one of them as they left for their walk back to preschool.

On Halloween, Bethesda hosted a Carnival for all the kids in the community. It was a ton of fun! They had a lot of the residents there too, so they could watch the kids playing games and having fun.

Ben was in charge of the bowling game, so that was our first stop. Can you guess what Noah's costume is? He decided to dress up as Grandpa Schrag. He was very handsome and even had a name tag, just like Grandpa Schrag wears at his church.

The cowboy boots were Noah's own spin on things...

Levi's preschool teacher Gayle had amazing hair and tons of tattoos!

After the boys won 2 liters of pop, ate popcorn, got lots of candy and had played each game at Bethesda at least once, we headed out to the farm to trick-or-treat.

The funny thing about our boys is that they like to change costumes. Levi caught on that Noah was dressing up at school as grandpa Schrag. So, Levi wanted to wear a costume to Debbie's, too. But he'd already worn his motocross outfit on Thursday so he could not wear that again. Finally, he decided to dress like grandpa Schrag too. So, he put on his church pants, white button-down shirt and church shoes. But, I grabbed his motocross outfit before leaving the house that morning hoping he'd change his mind. He did. So, he's got his motocross outfit over his grandpa Schrag outfit. Just after supper, Noah decided to be his other grandpa for trick-or-treating up and down our street.

And surprise! Ben dressed up too. At Bethesda they all dress up for Halloween so he took advantage of his reddish beard and went Scottish for the day.

And, now that Halloween itself is over with...I can start throwing candy away. Candy causes lots of problems at our house, so I just slowly get rid of it. And, interestingly enough, after getting home this evening they never once asked about their Halloween candy. Maybe I should just dump it all before they remember!

Arkansas Weekend

2011-11-01T21:23:00.002-05:00

The boys and I went to Bella Vista, Arkansas with my parents, sister and niece for the weekend. It was such a nice get-away - except that Ben couldn't come with us. He needed to save a vacation day for our upcoming trip to Illinois for Thanksgiving. So, the rest of us took off on Friday morning. I ~~quick~~ long 5 hour drive later we arrived at our destination.

We got right to work playing football. The house we stayed in didn't have much of a yard. Most of it was on a steep downhill slope and all of it was covered with rocks. Noah was just about in a crying fit when I finally got him to hear me saying, "There's a grassy area just down the street. We can go play there!" Phew! We played LOTS of football - hours worth of football over the weekend.

My dad worked with Noah on learning to tie his shoes (or in this photo the drawstring on his pants). The difference in the size of their fingers is pretty amazing. My dad has fantastic big farmer fingers.

The leaves on and off the trees were gorgeous. The weather was absolutely perfect for spending every possible hour outside and we did our best to enjoy all of it.

Saturday we walked on the nature trail, checked out some lakes,

the waterfall and tried to take in all the small things that we so easily pass by without noticing.

I let Noah walk with me right next to the waterfall, where the rocks were slippery and the water splashed on us - he thought it was "really cool!"

We made and ate wonderful food, we laughed, told stories and spent good time connecting and relaxing together.

Random Sunday Photos

2011-10-24T16:55:00.001-05:00

Sunday afternoon and evening were spent at the farm with my parents, sister and niece.

We kept busy outside working in the trees

playing with tractors

and the main event, which isn't pictured, was playing football.

Tractor + wagon + two boys (thankfully) = amazing teamwork

Singing Cowboy

2011-10-24T07:58:00.003-05:00

This guys just melts my heart.

Lucky for me, he sang me a few songs on Friday morning.

It's great to watch him explore music, who knows if his interest will last. But I'll certainly take a personal concert any day - especially from this shy cowboy.

Football Boys

2011-10-24T07:51:00.002-05:00

Saturday evening, our Sunday School class had a get-together and these boys played football. I walked over to watch the game for a while and was surprised to see Noah at quarterback. He can through an amazing spiral with a kid-sized football, but these "big" boys wanted to play with a "real" football. I assumed that meant Noah would need to be a receiver or lineman, but I guess they gave the young kid a shot at QB.
There's the snap...

he's looking for an open receiver....

spotted one...

and the ball falls incomplete. Shucks.

Next snap...

this one looks more promising, but I don't recall if it was caught or not.

Time for a huddle, and time to share the QB spotlight...

apparently, Noah opted to be the ref. Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of him waving his arms to stop the clock and "whistling" at the players. It was legit.

These boys had some serious speed and intensity

but they seemed to keep it in check. There weren't any tears and there were lots of smiles.

The P Patch

2011-10-18T21:40:00.000-05:00

Saturday morning we made our annual visit to Papa's Pumpkin Patch.

Levi was pumped to show off his new boots

Lucky for us, the weather was perfect!

The boys took turns seeing who could pump water the fastest

and then we played tic-tac-toe,

shucked corn, played in corn and used the new auger system (no photos to prove it)!

And then, we made it out to the pumpkin patch! We managed to keep the boys from cutting any pumpkins until we were sure it was one we wanted. It was fun to make the decision together.

Three pumpkins later, we made our way out of the patch.

I could not get a decent smile out of Noah, but we did run into our friend Britton just before we left.

See ya next year P Patch!

Buckin' Bull

2011-10-17T21:21:00.000-05:00

For what seems like months, every night the boys have begged Ben to play Buckin' Bull with them.

At some point, after the rodeo we went to this summer, the boys came up with this idea and Ben went along with it. I have never been a fan and had never actually watched the activity until the evening I snapped these photos. Please prepare your eyes for blurry photos - clearly, I have a thing or two to learn about taking action shots in low light. But, I couldn't miss the chance to document this nightly event because already it's popularity is waning. Ben and I are both perfectly happy with that.

Levi holds on for dear life

counting the whole time

trying to stay on for 8 seconds

Noah's turn!

It takes some serious strength to hold on while Ben bucks like a bull

Getting ready for another ride (they check themselves out in the bathroom mirror...).

Ready for another ride

thankfully, this bull smiles at the end of an 8 second ride.

Rain Play

2011-10-09T14:32:00.001-05:00

Does life get any better than when your mom says you can go out to play in the rain?

Saturday was Fall Fest at Bethel and we squeaked in the essential parts of that (New Year's Cookies, playing in the kids area, visiting with friends and eating vernike) before rain drops started falling. In the afternoon, the boys and I played out in the rain. It certainly is more fun to draw with sidewalk chalk when it's wet.

It goes down easier

and the colors are much brighter!

The boys kept busy with all sorts of activities in the rain/drizzle while I headed back inside.

Thankfully, they have learned the skill of washing cars with water and paintbrushes. It's an important life skill, right?

Ben's car got a thorough washing on Saturday afternoon thanks to Levi and Noah's handiwork.

Writing

2011-10-08T15:45:00.001-05:00

Noah is getting more and more interested in writing out his name. The other night, after he was in bed, he kept coming out of his room asking about how to spell his name. Finally, I decided to write it out for him on paper so he could follow that. Here's what he showed me in the morning:

Farm Work

2011-10-08T15:37:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, the boys supervised Grandpa while he re-loaded the air seeder to continue sowing wheat.

The boys love to watch the fertilizer and seeds go into the yellow air seeder bins.

In between air seeder excitement and various other activities around the farm, we worked on clearing out these overgrown hedge trees.

We cleared out a lot of old, overgrown and fallen down trees. We made pile after pile of these branches and in the end they all got pushed into a big burn pile.

That part at the end is what remains for us to do. We're hoping that the boys will use this space for exploring and climbing and making pretend worlds. So far, there's been some farming - not much of a surprise, but it's certainly a start!

Harvest Festival

2011-10-04T22:26:00.002-05:00

Saturday morning we took in some of the activities in the Goessel Harvest Festival. Ben and I walked/ran in the 5k. Then we ate blueberry pancakes at the Fireman Pancake Breakfast.

They were delicious!

But the best part, was that they could put on real firefighting gear.

Levi was so loaded down with gear that he actually toppled over. Noah tried to help him out but Levi turned out to be way too heavy. I even had trouble getting Levi back upright.

Then we headed outside so the boys could jump on inflatables.

Noah and his friend Jake raced on these bouncing horses. They had horses for adults to race with, but after attempting to run and then filling up with pancakes, Ben and I decided against a horse race.

There were lots of other activities around town during the day, but we headed out to the farm once we the horse races wrapped up.

Sunflower Harvest

2011-10-04T22:04:00.000-05:00

We planted giant sunflowers in the spring, watched them grow and bloom and then turn brow and ugly. We finally decided to cut them down and harvest the seeds. In the end, we filled that bucket about halfway.

We even took our pile of seeds over to great grandpa and grandma's to clean them up a bit. When it cools off a bit more, we'll put our seeds out for the birds to eat.

Fun on the Farm

2011-09-28T17:30:00.000-05:00

Sunday night our church had a Fun on the Farm night and it was FUN! The boys just love going to this event each year and we do too. Delton and Janice Voth have a wonderful farm for hosting the event, including a swing set, a big grassy area for playing baseball and football and a wonderful red barn. The weather could not have been better and it was great to see young and old from our church out enjoying the evening.

We explored the barn before supper (that's Levi, Ben and I standing up there), and later in the evening the kids played some games in the hay loft (which doesn't have any hay, it's all cleaned up, strung with white Christmas lights and has a big screen for projecting movies on).

Just as the sun was setting we went on a hay rack ride that turned out to be quite the adventure! We went through tight tunnels of trees and over tricky bridges. It was a GREAT way to end the evening. Well, actually we ended our time with boys bawling because they didn't want to leave. As it turns out, they were actually crying because they were so tired from playing so hard with their friends at the farm.

I didn't have my camera with me on Sunday so I stole all these photos from my cousin Megan's blog. Thanks Meg!

State Fair

2011-09-22T22:21:00.000-05:00

The State Fair is becoming a family tradition for us. So far, we don't have to pay for our kids in the gate.

Seeing baby animals and huge Watusi cows all in one place certainly feels like an adventure.

Pronto Pup, Root Beer, Nachos, Chicken Fingers - it was a well-balanced fair food supper.

The boys got to take their turn at being weathermen. They didn't understand what was going on, so after we told them to point to a number, this is what they did. Noah, clearly, was still confused.

We rounded out our already healthy meal with a funnel cake - it was DElicious!

As it started to mist, we headed for the midway. We had already rode the train around the fair grounds, so we let each boy pick one more ride to go on. Noah chose the motorcycles.

Levi picked the race cars.

And then we all went on this Ferris wheel.

The boys LOVED it!

The boys love coming to the state fair grounds. They go there for the fair and for the MCC Sale in the springtime - what isn't to love about that?!

Outdoor Rock Concert

2011-09-15T16:33:00.000-05:00

The other day I found the boys outside performing a concert at the top of their lungs!

I couldn't pick up what the tune was, but the lyrics were, "David and the Giant Pickle....and Star Wars!" Seriously. It was such a funny combination and they just kept repeating it over and over - at the top of their lungs.

Camping

2011-09-10T23:30:00.001-05:00

We had so much fun on our first family camping trip that Levi couldn't stay awake for the drive home.

The four us, plus Ben's parents and brother made the journey to Kanopolis for our 2 night tent camping adventure.

Thank goodness Tim and Sue have experience camping - not to mention all the helpful cooking equipment! Ben and I have a tent. Well two of them actually, but we took our 6-person tent, blankets and some food and clothing. Otherwise, Tim and Sue brought everything else. Sue even planned the menu for us and it was fantastic!
We borrowed my dad's pick-up truck to help with hauling the wood (thanks James Wiens!), and all our bulking camping gear. Thankfully, Levi was eager to help clean up the mess the wood left behind in the bed of the truck (if nothing else it kept him busy while the rest of us set up tents and started to figure out what we'd eat for supper).

The hammock chair was amazing. From the moment it was hung from the tree, it was popular with the boys. They swung and had Andy give them tornado ("tomato" as Levi calls them) rides.

S'mores - hmmmm! They were so good.

We counted it up and we think Noah consumed 8 of them! One of those may or may not have been for breakfast.... He enjoyed them so much that since it was his turn to take snack to school this week, we made Ooey Gooey Indoor S'mores for him to share with his classmates.

Pancakes, bacon and syrup with hot chocolate and a fire to warm your toes - what a lovely way to start the day.

We lucked out with the weather. It's been a miserable summer, but just before our trip it turned cooler. The highs were around 80 each day and the lows were in the 50s! We were actually COLD for the first time in a long, long time. I was surprised to see my breath while making breakfast one morning!

So while some of us finished eating our breakfast, others were getting ready to go fishing. Tim gave Noah his very own fishing rod so Noah did some "practicing" while waiting to head over to the water.

And low and behold, Noah caught the only fish of trip! And it was a good sized carp!

But, after Levi saw the fish flop around and struggle for air, he declared himself done with fishing. Lucky for Levi there was plenty of space to explore and throw rocks into the water.

Little pizzas, made just to your liking and baked over a fire makes for a delicious lunch.

Cleaning up after meals was pretty simple. Our campground actually had a sink with running warm water so we simply took our dirty dishes over there, washed and dried them and then brought them back.

Our humble abode.

It got warm enough for Andy and the boys to take a dip in the lake/reservoir/body of water near our campground.

Great Grandpa and Grandma came out to spend the day with us on Labor Day. It was handy for us, since we'd forgotten several items at our house and they brought them to us. Who needs most of the refrigerated food we planned to eat? Or coffee mugs? We made it through one night and two meals without that stuff pretty well, right Sue?

It was wonderful to camp, to feel life flow in a different way then what is normal for us, to see the velvety night sky, to hear nature (and the 24/7 weather announcements from the speaker outside the bath house), to spend time with family and watch the boys thrive in a new adventure.

Makes me smile

2011-08-31T22:45:00.000-05:00

Both of the boys can get themselves started swinging and Noah just learned how to keep himself going! He is SO PROUD of himself for figuring this out.

Farm Play

2011-08-31T22:23:00.002-05:00

Sunday evening we celebrated all the summer birthdays with my extended Epp family. It was hot, but it was also wonderful to see the kids play together. The girls worked together to travel across the farm from the cows to the swing set.

The boys played soccer and frisbee and pretended to drive the bus and never seemed to stop moving.

We celebrated little Delaney's first birthday!

Levi was completely consumed with the magic of a birthday card that played music. He kept listening to it over and over. It's amazing to watch him enjoy music.

It was great to spend time celebrating and playing together.

First Day for Levi

2011-08-30T22:00:00.002-05:00

Levi was very excited for his first day of preschool. When Noah told him he'd go to preschool today Levi yelled, "Yay! Yay! Yay! Yay!"

I even got Noah to stand in a couple of photos (with his microphone, of course...)

Levi reported that he had a great time at preschool. He had bananas and pretzels for snack, they read a story, sang songs, played outside and he found out where to put his back pack. He said it was fun and he wants to go back on Thursday.

Reunited

2011-08-27T22:16:00.004-05:00

Two years ago these two were kissing in a wheat field

last night they were reunited. Levi and Isabelle had a wonderful time together. The two of them could wordlessly go from playing independently to playing together and back again.

My friend Tonya brought her two kids over to play last night. It was great to catch up with her again and watch our kids play. Her oldest, Cole is Noah's age and Izzy is Levi's age.

Great games of tennis were played in the backyard.

Cole and Noah ran around constantly chasing each other or finding something new to play. It was pretty tough to catch them still long enough for a photo.

The older boys were better at tennis, but they also excelled at hitting the ball over the fence.

It was good to catch up with my friend and it was fun to watch the boys reunite with old (but at the same time new) friends.

Oh the corn...

2011-08-27T21:23:00.002-05:00

Dry land corn has not done well in our part of Kansas this summer. We've seen 100 degrees on 46 days so far and with little rain in between it didn't give the corn much of a prayer to prosper into a high yielding crop.

(Bonus points if you can spot the plastic purple swimming pool in the picture above. Dad hauled it out of the field to the ditch and this afternoon we noticed it had been picked up.)

Thank goodness for crop insurance or my dad would be feeling more pressure and stress than he already is. But I don't think there's a farmer out there who prefers to get a payment from insurance over harvesting a good crop.

We got a couple rides on the combine in this brief corn harvest. Most of the corn fields won't see the combine this year. So we took full advantage of these fleeting harvest moments.

Levi took the picture above and the one below.

Noah had a great time riding to the Canton elevator with Uncle Bruce on Friday afternoon. He waltzed into the house with a can of Coke and smile from ear to ear.

There's no shortage of dust around here these days.

It was hot today and it'll be hot tomorrow. Can you tell which one of these three has been working the hardest? Can you tell which one had been outside for only a couple of minutes and still has tons of energy?

Levi too?

2011-08-25T21:39:00.004-05:00

Yep, Levi's starting school too! Preschool that is. We had an open house at his preschool tonight. They were excited to see the boys they go to daycare with - Kacen, Koy and Kreed!

Cutting takes tongue-in-cheek concentration.

Levi and Sam found there way up to the loft while Gayle introduced the preschool families.

Gayle and Levi had a nice visit while I filled out paper work and Levi chowed down on snack mix.

It took 3 attempts for us to get out to our car at the end of the open house. On our first try Noah scraped his leg coming down from a tree and we had to go inside and tend to the wound.

On the second attempt, Levi realized he had forgotten to look at the play equipment outside and NEEDED to see it.

Finally, we made it to the car on our third try. Levi is excited to start preschool on Tuesday morning. I'm certain he'll have a wonderful time with Gayle and Aunt Pat!

Turning the page

2011-08-25T21:14:00.003-05:00

Oddly enough, it felt like today came up from out of nowhere. We've been anticipating Noah's first day of Kindergarten for a long time, but still it seemed like it was suddenly here. Suddenly, our schedule and way of thinking is having to change. Lucky for us, Noah was excited to start school, although he was pretty emotionless this morning while he didn't eat his cereal.

It got a bit chaotic at our house just before we needed to leave and I wanted to snap the traditional first day of school picture outside our front door but this was as good as it got. The boys were wiggle worms and time was ticking away.

At least I got this photo of Noah once we got to school.

Just inside the door we found grandma and several other familiar faces. Since Noah was a Kindergartner he was allowed to go to his classroom a bit earlier then the bigger kids. The teachers were busy with other kids, so I got to help Noah find his hook and name tag.

And then we found his seat.

Here's Noah's teacher, Mrs. Janzen. She was my first grade teacher.

And this is Mrs. Booton an aide in the Kindergarten room.

Kids and parents piled in. All the kids seemed eager and ready for a new adventure. It was a fun space to be in this morning.

So, it was time for me to leave. Just before I left, Noah asked me to stay, but he said it very quietly and I reassured him that he was surrounded by friends.

It feels like a significant page has been turned and that there's no turning back. We've got a kid in school. Soon it will become normal and the feelings I have today will be forgotten. Thankfully, I held my emotions in until I made it out of his classroom. But then I ran into my mom and Noah's music teacher and somehow I couldn't keep the tears away. It wasn't hard to leave him there. I trust everyone in his school and I know he'll do great and have a wonderful time. I think the emotions come because now I have to start learning to let go more than I've ever had to.

The good news is that Noah had a wonderful morning at school. He had PE, music, milk break (chocolate milk!), learned about his classroom and had time to play. He gave school an enthusiastic thumbs up and is very willing to go back tomorrow!

We're ready

2011-08-24T21:52:00.003-05:00

Noah's back pack is stocked with crayons, Kleenex, markers, paint shirt and more. His clothes are laid out on his floor. He wants to eat toast for breakfast. I think we're ready.

He has grown-up this summer in so many subtle ways. He's cracking jokes, thinking through problems to find a solution, anticipating what will come next, counting to 100, obsessing about what time it is, and seems to think that going to kindergarten is no big deal. His legs are longer, his muscles are stronger, he rarely makes a mess when he eats and he can take care of his hearing aids by himself. I'm in awe of him sometimes. How in the world has he become such a big boy?

But, there are still many moments that remind us he's only 5.

So tomorrow, I'll take him to school and a new chapter will begin.

Last Evenings of Summer

2011-08-24T21:38:00.004-05:00

Summer is drawing to an end this week at our house. Noah starts kindergarten tomorrow, Levi starts preschool on Tuesday. The rhythm of our life will need to change. But, we had three evenings this week to enjoy before we turned our focus to school.

Monday the temps were pretty mild and we took advantage by mowing our lawn and then heading over to the Arboretum.

Noah kept an eye out for this guy:

I couldn't get a photo of this huge snapping turtle with anything near by to reference its size. It was big - can you see how thick its legs are? Yeesh.

Last night we watched "Wipe Out" together. It was 100 degrees outside all evening, so we didn't bother to go out. Tonight it wasn't quite that hot, but our boys were tired (which automatically equals CRANKY) so we had to get creative. Our Playdoh stash hadn't been played with all summer, but tonight it certainly got a work out.

Too bad the "end of summer" doesn't seem to be the end of really stinkin' hot weather.

New chair

2011-08-20T14:36:00.003-05:00

So, I bought a chair at the flea market in Newton last week. I took 2 layers of vinyl off it and spray painted the chair white.

Then, I found some new foam for a pad and fabric to cover it and now we have a new chair!

I think it turned out pretty well. This was my first time to re-do a chair like this and it wasn't quite as easy as they make it look on TV but it's a drastic improvement over the gold-ish and green that it was when I bought it.

"Gooder"

2011-08-16T19:04:00.003-05:00

While the boys dressed up as farmers Levi declared, "I'm a gooder farmer!"

The sombrero, backwards hockey jersey and pink boots surely make him just that.

Random photos

2011-08-11T22:06:00.002-05:00

It's rained, the weather is cooler and we're enjoying spending time outside. It'll get hotter again soon, but this change has been life-giving.

This is how Levi "rides" his bike....he's so close to being able to actually ride it. He just gives up too soon and "rides" it this way instead.

Some of the neighbor girls were out playing volleyball and the boys invited themselves over to join in.

We wrapped up the evening with a run to Scoops for ice cream and a visit with Great Grandma and Grandpa Hertzler.

Close-ups

2011-08-11T21:37:00.003-05:00

Parade

2011-08-07T21:40:00.002-05:00

The boys got to be in a parade this weekend. They were so excited to be able to throw candy at people and ride in the back of a gator. It was the topic of many conversations last week and finally on Saturday it became reality.

Ben drove a gator representing his employer through the annual Goessel Threshing Days parade. The boys were supposed to throw out all the candy, but Ben said they kept getting distracted so he ended up doing a lot of throwing, too.

When we got to town on Saturday, Noah said, "Holy cow, that's gonna be a lot of throwing!"

And halfway through the parade, Levi told Ben, "This is fun!"

It was very warm on Saturday. Too warm to carry a camera around.

At the museum grounds we watched a saw mill operation (I don't know what the men were doing is called but it was absolutely fascinating to watch). We checked out some old harvesters, ate some delicious vernike and dropped a few sno-cones in the sand....but the weather really kept us from enjoying the rest of the activities. We were drenched in sweat and tired before we could see everything at the event this year. Thankfully, there's always another year!

ZBB & KC in KC

2011-08-02T20:52:00.006-05:00

Confused? ZBB (Zac Brown Band) and KC (Kenny Chesney) in KC (Kansas City, Arrowhead Stadium to be exact). Yep, that's what we did this weekend. Ben and I took off to celebrate his 30th birthday with one fantastic, sunny, hot, sweaty, 6+ hour concert.

Photo via zacbrownband.com

We pretty much went to hear Zac Brown Band and once again they didn't disappoint.

Our seats were a section or two to the left of this photo and 6 rows up from the field. We had a good view of the stage and lucked out with having decent people next to us.

Photos above via kansascity.com

Thankfully, my parents kept the boys overnight and we got just under 24 hours away. Happy 30th Benjamin!

PJ's in the rain

2011-07-24T22:29:00.003-05:00

The boys decided to ride their (dirt) bikes down to the fire hydrant to "fill them up" (with gas). Levi dressed himself in pajamas before he came out to play. He was DETERMINED to keep them on...

He even played a little bit of tennis in his frog pajamas.

And then, Praise The Lord it rained!!! That hasn't happened since I don't know when. It didn't last long, but it was refreshing to feel rain fall on us again.

Don't let this serious face fool you. They had a great time playing in the rain. Levi's poor frog jammies sure did get a work out tonight!

Corn Chopping

2011-07-24T22:09:00.001-05:00

Fensky Harvesting was around the farm last week chopping corn. The boys LOVED the excitement of corn chopping.

The chopper itself is quite the machine. It seems to speed through the field gobbling up the corn and shooting it out it's auger. It's an impressive operation. The corn has suffered this summer in a relentless dry spell and heat wave. Corn does not thrive in 100 degree weather. And we've been at or over 100 degrees for 30 days this summer (so far).

Both of the boys got to ride along - too bad chopping goes so quickly. After just a day and a half, the farm had a big pile of silage and the Fensky's moved on.

Sweet

2011-07-21T22:42:00.002-05:00

These moments are worth remembering.

Sunflowers

2011-07-21T22:23:00.002-05:00

The handful of giant sunflowers growing in our yard have proven to be some of the few bright spots in our yard this year.

The extreme heat has held the plants in our yard in survival mode. There have been very few blooms and when plants do flower the flowers don't last long.

Since I snapped these photos the taller two sunflowers have opened, but they're already almost loosing their petals. Oh well, at least the flowers were stunning for a couple days.

Rodeo Night in Canton

2011-07-18T21:45:00.008-05:00

We headed out to Canton with friends on Friday night for the Canton Rodeo. We didn't know we'd get to see goat judging, run into other friends and get rides on a barrel train! It was quite the place to be on a hot Friday night.

Levi was planning to ride a bull, at least he was until he saw them. Then he quickly changed his mind.

Kreed is around 18 months old and goes to daycare with the boys. His older brothers and dad ride in rodeos and it looks like Kreed might join them someday.

I took quite a few photos during the bronco riding. I don't know who these men are but I'm pretty sure their bodies do things mine doesn't do.

This guy stayed on his bronco for longer then the rest of the guys did.

But I'm not sure how much of his ride was due to his skill or the fact

that his hand was caught. He got bucked this way and that right over to the fence where our boys were standing.

After his horse pinned him to the fence - smack dab in front of us and our kids -

he got up and gave his horse a look, and walked out of the arena.

That had the boys talking!

Then the clown came over to make sure everyone was doing OK. That same clown may or may not have put several of the boys in a trash can later in the evening.

This looks like a stressful sport.

After several events, all the kids were invited into the arena. Since we never go to rodeos we had no idea what for, but both of the boys went out there. Then we found out they were all going to chase down 3 chickens.

Noah and Levi didn't catch any but they still got a 50 cent piece for their efforts.

It wasn't our typical Friday night but it certainly was a fascinating and entertaining evening in the great city of Canton, KS.

Soccer & Sprinkler

2011-07-18T21:41:00.003-05:00

It's hot. So hot that the only way we can play out in our yard is with the sprinkler on.

So, we played soccer in the sprinkler the other day.

Hopefully this awful heat wave passes soon and we get some much needed rain.

Although for the next 7 days the highs are all above 100 with no rain in sight.

Sand pile

2011-07-13T08:19:00.002-05:00

Life is good when you've got a sand pile, isn't it?

Especially when someone parked the loader tractor in the perfect spot to jump off the loader onto the sand! Gotta love happy coincidences like that.

Uncle Carl

2011-07-13T07:51:00.003-05:00

Nope, Noah doesn't have an Uncle Carl but he did go to Uncle Carl's Way Back When Camp at Kaufman Museum last week. Tuesday through Friday for 2 1/2 hours each morning Noah, Abram and Mara (from swimming lessons) and a bunch of other new friends got to learn from Ms. Kristen and her helpers about how life was "way back when".

Noah had a great time and was eager to go each day. They learned about all sorts of ways that life "way back when" was very different from how we live today. They visited the horses near the museum, cut out log cabins, made mud bricks, washed rags the old fashioned way (after getting them as dirty as they could), explored the old red barn and the old house at the museum. On Friday, they gave their families a little program and then showed us around.

To start things off we had a campfire - each camper got to take their own campfire home.

They sang us a song, as Ms. Kristen and her daughter Naomi led them.

He seems to take programs pretty seriously and I think I'm OK with that.

After the short program Noah took Levi and I out on a tour. We went to the barn,

and the Voth-Unruh-Fast farmhouse - my great grandmother grew up in this house. It was fascinating to walk through it. It helps that we've been reading Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie book series. We're currently reading On the Banks of Plum Creek so all of this "way back when" stuff fit right in with what we've been reading at home for the past couple months.

We even spotted a few mud bricks in one part of the house.

Noah really wanted to show us the horses, so even though it was steaming hot outside we walked over there. I thought there was no way the horses would come to us, but sure enough! Noah started calling to them and they all came right over. I was amazed!

Finally, we grabbed a snack and Noah showed us the "snack tree" - I guess they ate snack in the shade of the snack tree each day. It also happens to be a great tree for little ones to climb on. We walked through the museum - we didn't even break anything!

What a great week of fun, time making new friends and learning new stuff for our little Noah. He certainly seems to be growing up this summer - I think he's actually turning into a kindergartner in front of my eyes.

Weekend Happenings

2011-07-05T21:08:00.005-05:00

Friday afternoon I took off with 5 other lady friends from church for a weekend away in Kansas City. We stayed on the Plaza and spent all our time eating, shopping/looking, eating some more and hanging out at the hotel pool. I only took a couple photos...but this is from the fondue restaurant we enjoyed. It was a fabulous, nearly 3 hour long meal at The Melting Pot.

We came home on Sunday afternoon and then we (and a few more friends) got together (along with our families) for a 4th of July gathering on Monday evening.

Mysteriously a container of gold glitter was spilled in the basement...the only story we could get from the girls included some kind of trap/deterrent to keep pesky boys away from them. It cleaned up pretty easily...but when you get 19 kids together you never know what might happen.

Here are most of the 19...

Boys with red cups and fireworks...looks like trouble to me...

Shari grows some amazing flowers and has a wonderful, ever-expanding garden.

I'm not much for patriotism, but I had to snap this photo with this particular color combination - it was the 4th of July after all.

The boys got some pretty good baseball in. Levi and Noah both hit the ball but I think they were just about the only one's out there that didn't really understand the rules of baseball. But they had a great time anyway.

Jenna was not pleased with the loud popping sound from the firecrackers...but after she got some ear muffs she seemed to feel a little bit better about it.

Levi didn't want anything to do with the fireworks but the rest of us enjoyed them until after 10.

And then it was time to get ourselves home!

Swimming Lessons

2011-07-05T20:35:00.003-05:00

Noah and two friends took swimming lessons together last week. Levi was signed up to take lessons but...well, Levi wasn't willing to participate.

Levi spent the first day playing with the toys while safely sitting on the pool steps.

Noah's teacher, Andre did a great job with three little ones.

It was H-O-T, hot!

The week started with getting their faces wet and blowing bubbles and ended with jumping in

and swimming (or at least kicking) to the steps! That's what I call progress.

Potato Harvest

2011-06-27T13:28:00.002-05:00

Saturday morning we went to Great Grandpa and Grandma's house to dig potatoes! The boys helped plant the potatoes this spring and now it was time to harvest!
The basket was heavy!
It was great to relax for a bit and visit while we watched female Oriels feed on meal worms.
It was a ton of fun to dig potatoes! The boys loved watching for potatoes as Lee dug them up and then pulling them off the roots and dropping (or throwing) them into the basket.
We are blessed to have Ben's grandparents near us and in good health. Lucky for us, they shared some of their potatoes with us!

Creek visit

2011-06-27T12:29:00.003-05:00

Playing at Sand Creek, near Bethel, is one of the boys' favorite activities. We hadn't been there since winter, so all three of us were antsy to visit again.

The boys had fun finding tadpoles, throwing rocks, climbing the banks of the creek and exploring nooks, crannies and holes.
The boys did some "fishing" with sticks and caught some huge "fish" or blobs of moss.
We also did some jack hammering with a piece of metal we found on the bank of the creek.
It was refreshing to spend the morning in a space where we felt alone under a canopy of trees.

Wheat Harvest Finale

2011-06-24T07:29:00.008-05:00

***Formatting error - for some reason far beyond my understanding, the formatting of this post is not correct.***

The last evening of harvest lasted longer then we thought it would, but in the end Grandpa got all the wheat cut. We got to the farm and ate some pizza just about as fast as we could so we could get in on as much of the last wheat field as we could. We shnarfed down our pizza, gulped some water and got on the 4-wheeler....just as it started to sprinkle. Rain!?!?! What!?!?! The sun had been shining all day. We went out to the field (within a 1/2 mile of the farm) and Noah got in with Austin and Levi got in the combine with Grandpa. Then is rained harder and eventually the guys stopped and we all went back to the farm. What a bummer!

But, that gave the boys time to hang out with Austin while he ate his pizza supper. It happened to be a pizza kind of night on the farm I guess. Seeing Austin eat pizza reminded the boys that they hadn't eaten but a couple of bites of their pizza earlier. So, they got some more and they had a little pizza party on the tractor.
Thank goodness Austin had his jug of water along!

In addition to being time for wheat harvest, it's also time to double crop soybeans into a lot of the cut wheat fields. Ben planted beans on Wednesday and might do more in the next couple of days.

The sun came out and before we knew it, we were headed back out to the field on the 4-wheeler.

It was a dusty/dirty faced night, no doubt.

The Burkholder's came out to see the last hour of harvest. We walked through a field to explore along a creek bed but the mosquitoes and poison ivy made us cut our exploring short.

But, in just about an hour the field was done and wheat harvest 2011 wrapped up.

Short, but oh so sweet

2011-06-21T21:39:00.004-05:00

Tim and Sue were here for 2 nights and one day and while it was a quick visit we were thrilled they drove the extra miles to visit Kansas. Lucky for them, they also got to get in on some wheat harvesting.

Tim and Sue both grew up on farms so harvesting is not a new experience for them. The use of a stripper header was new though. Dad took a bit of time to stop the combine and visit with them about the header and how it works and then Tim and Levi rode along for a while.

Cousin Austin continues to be a highlight of harvest for the boys. He's been driving grain cart during harvest and the boys just about fight over who'll get to ride with him first.

Eventually, we went to the farm for lunch and then Noah gave Grandma Schrag a tour of the farm.

We were blessed with a fantastic Brazilian supper on Monday night at Tim and Laurie's house and then on Tuesday morning we told Tim and Sue farewell.

Below are some random harvest photos.

Mr. & Mrs. Frey

2011-06-21T21:21:00.003-05:00

Courtney married Zach on Saturday evening. Courtney was my mentee in the mentor/mentee program at church all through her years of high school and we continued being friends during her college years. She (and often Zach too) has also been one of our go-to babysitters for years.

The boys were ring bearers in the wedding which was outside at the arboretum in Hesston. Courtney was stunning.

The boys did great! A year ago, when they were ring bearers for Sara and Josh's wedding Levi never made it down the aisle. But this time they both marched down the aisle. Not side-by-side, though. Noah walked in front of Levi (so I missed actually capturing Levi walking down the aisle). He's right behind Noah in this photo.

And then they stood up with the groomsmen the whole time! I was shocked. They held their boxes (packed with goodies) and waited to open their boxes until after the wedding. Levi was making this tongue-in-my-cheek-because-I'm-a-little-embarrassed look while he walked down the aisle and kept doing it until everyone's attention was fully on Courtney coming down the aisle.

There was some yawning...

and stretching...and at one point Levi sat down for a while...

but they never made a commotion, or a distraction.

Congratulations Mr. & Mrs. Frey!

Sun, Dust, Wheat

2011-06-14T22:06:00.002-05:00

Monday the 2011 wheat harvest got its official start.

I can actually drive the 4-wheeler. I learned last year during wheat harvest but then forgot and now a year later I've learned again! I'm hoping it sticks in my mom/mushy/overloaded brain because it sure is fun (and handy)!

Bible School

2011-06-14T21:53:00.002-05:00

Pandamania was the theme for bible school at our church this year. Noah loved it. We got more details from him about the happenings at bible school then we've ever gotten before. It was great to hear him explaining their activities, snacks and what they had learned about the bible each day.

On Sunday, the kids gave a program during church.

Noah did great during the program! He actually sang along and did a bunch of the actions.

After church, there was a hamburger fry potluck plus inflatables, face painting and other fun activities. It was a great end to the bible school week!

365 days of growth

2011-06-14T17:53:00.000-05:00

Summer of 2010

Summer of 2011

Ready, set, go...

2011-06-12T21:18:00.003-05:00

When we arrived at the farm on Friday the combine, header, grain cart, and truck were out of the shed. The boys were beside themselves with excitement! Wheat harvest was about to begin.

We were set to go. Overalls, check. Water jug, check.

Levi relaxed while waiting for Grandpa to hook the header onto the combine.

Grandpa went to the field just across the road from the farm so we followed down the driveway to watch. Grandpa was sure he'd have to get in and out of the combine a few times to adjust things on the header so he went solo for the first round.

One load into the truck and then everything came to a complete stop. My dad hadn't been sure the wheat was dry enough to harvest when he went out. And after he chewed some kernels of grain he really wasn't sure it was ready. Uncle Bruce took a sample in to get tested and sure enough. It was 17% moisture and to avoid dockage for wet wheat my dad really tries to avoid cutting anything above 14%.

So, all the equipment came back home. After a bit of rain last night, it looks like harvest won't be fully underway until Tuesday. Ahhh....the waiting continues.

Garden Visit

2011-06-11T22:12:00.002-05:00

Visiting Great Grandpa and Grandma's house is a favorite activity for the boys. These days, the garden is the main attraction. We stopped in to check on the potatoes the boys helped plant weeks ago. The plants are just about as big as Levi now.

The cabbage is just about as big as Levi, too.

Thankfully, there's always a spot available for the boys to dig in the dirt.

College Friends

2011-06-03T21:12:00.001-05:00

The morning after we got back from Boston (on Memorial Day actually) the boys and I went to Kendall's house for a mini-reunion with several of my college friends. Lori and Emily, Kendall with Oliver and Lily and Yvette and Corynn. We missed Kara, Braden and Luke from Nebraska and Tina T. from Colorado.

Oh, the boys had a great time jumping in Ollie and Lily's pool. The little trampoline really helped them get a little air on their jumps.

We got together at about 10 and visited while the kids played. We each brought food to contribute to lunch and after we ate and the kids played a bit more it was time for all of us to head our separate ways again. It may have been short, but it sure was sweet.

Emily, Noah, Levi, Lily, Ollie and Corynn

Boston: Day Four

2011-06-02T21:00:00.002-05:00

Saturday was another beautiful day in Boston. Andy's friend Jake took us out sailing on the Charles River in the morning. It's a cool program that really makes sailing a possibility for just about everyone. You pay $250 membership per year, which includes lessons, and then you can go to Community Boating and use their boats and take whoever else with you. Pretty cool.

I went out in the first group with Jake, Andy and Noah. It was fun to watch Noah take sailing in. He liked it a lot.

He helped Jake hold the ropes and then worked with some other ropes that he was sure meant he was really sailing.

Sue, Ben and Levi went out with Jake in the second group.

Ben reported that Levi loved sailing just as much as Noah had.

We ate another picnic lunch that day and then Sue and I took Noah to the Boston Children's Museum. We had a pretty good time there, but if you're planning a trip to Boston you could skip the Children's Museum. It's just not worth the amount of money it cost to get in.

But, Noah loved the bubble area. It was almost too much of a mess for me to be able to enjoy it, but it was cool to see how big a bubble he could create.

And this one is hard to see, but he's making the bubble "grow" from his feet up to his head!

On our walk to see the USS Constitution, Tim talked to a local fisherman who had just caught a large fish.

Old Ironsides was fascinating to look at - but we didn't pay to go on a tour.

After this, we met up with Andy and he walked with us to a pizza place near Harvard. We were all so hungry that I think it was just about the best pizza we'd ever eaten.

In Boston, I got to walk through two stores that previously I'd only seen online West Elm and Anthropologie. The photo below is from Anthropologie, the petals are all made from fabric and it was two stories high. I didn't purchase anything at the stores, but I truly enjoyed seeing so many beautiful items in person - much more satisfying then browsing online.

Saturday night bedtime snack.

It worked out extremely well to share a hotel suite with Tim and Sue and it allowed all of us to share a lot more time together then we would have if we'd had two rooms.

Sunday we took the boys to the park in the morning and then headed out to the airport. We drove home from Kansas City and got to our house at about 10:15pm. We've had several days now of trying to get back into our normal routines. We've all had our cranky moments, but I think we finally turned the corner today. I certainly hope so.