Celebrate Kansas Day

We went to Kaufman Museum's Celebrate Kansas Day festivities yesterday. The boys were terribly excited to go and counted down the hours until it was time to finally leave.

 The organizers  have hands on activities for the kids just about everywhere you turn.
Levi and Noah worked hard to color sunflower hats.

 Oh! And Noah lost his other top front tooth on Wednesday. It still surprises me when he smiles and doesn't have his front teeth. :-)

 They made origami meadowlarks, too. I think it was their first try at origami and it seemed pretty challenging for Levi, but Noah had a good time with it. 

 Last year we had just about zero success with the activity of walking on cans. But this year, with a few helpful hints, the boys did great!

 We saw lots of friends there too!

 Inside the museum the boys found more hands-on activities. Planing wood,

 making bison, and box turtles (not pictured),

 and salamanders.

 The bean bag toss was a fun change of pace for them.  The further we explored and the more activities we found the more worn out I became.

By the end of our time there, I felt like a zombie. We made a quick trip over to Mojo's for some caffeine and snacks afterwards. Surprisingly, the boys still had energy to play at the park before we finally headed for home. It was a long, long afternoon but all of it was really, really good.

Progress....and cookies

The old chicken barn is keeping us busy. The poor old building was in such sad shape, and well if I'm being honest, it still is. But we're working on it and that feels good! Here's how she looks now:

A week ago, it looked like this:

 The other half of the building currently looks like this:

Calves lived in this half of the building and ever since the skid steer that fits inside it broke down it hasn't been cleaned out. But, that old skid steer is up and running again and fifteen years later this space is getting cleaned out too.

Hauling all that old dust and straw out was a major endeavor. It took Ben and I a couple hours to shovel it all out. I'm not sure I've ever been so dusty and thought it was worth documenting:

 The kittens from the hayloft have been brought down to our garage. They're skittish but only because they've only known the straw world of the hayloft.

 I rarely make cookies. Drop cookies just take too long. I don't have patience to bake pan after pan of cookies. But on Saturday, I went for it.

 The boys in my house enjoyed cleaning out the bowl. Who knows how much longer it'll be until drop cookies happen again at our house.

The middle of January

I'm not very good at blogging in the middle of January. I take very few photos and life in general has a sense of normalcy. Just one normal day after another. But when I take a step back and really think about it. Some important things have happened, some I don't want to lose track of in the continuous spin of life.
On Thursday we said good-bye to our daycare provider, Debbie. Noah and Levi don't remember going to anyone else for daycare. That's a big deal. Debbie let us know they were moving out of town a couple weeks ago and let us know that another woman in town was going to start-up a daycare to take all of Debbie's kids. Awesome! What a relief, I told myself. I felt almost no stress about the change. We visited Tara's house and the boys already know her and her daughters. It's in a convenient location - great! I thought saying good-bye to Debbie would be easy, until the day I had to say good-bye. It hit me like a ton of bricks on Thursday when I had to pick the boys up that nothing about this would be easy. She was a mom to my kids when I was at work. She fed my babies, changed their diapers, helped to potty train them, she gave them medicine, taught them to share and to clean up and to be kind - all while I was at work. But the part that gets me the most is that she gave them love. She genuinely loved my boys and I have known that from the start. She wasn't perfect, none of us are and I didn't need her to be, but she loved my boys and they felt loved. I am so thankful for the years of love and care she gave our family.
So tomorrow Levi will go to Tara's house and I pray that it all goes well. He's excited and Noah's excited to go there after school. I'm not worried about it. But it is a change, something new, and that's a big deal.
Ok, so switching gears....you better watch out, because Levi's got his eyes on you.

 He's been doing this a lot this weekend. It cracks us up because he looks so.very.serious.

It was a glorious day outside today. Crisp, clear and cold. We headed outside in the middle of the morning to finish a tree clean-up job we had started on Saturday. The silo is making a strong shadow on the photo below, but you can at least get a feel for the mess we were working with. Several dead trees had fallen over, a couple healthy trees were mixed in with a bunch of dead ones. 

The boys found the ice covered mud right away. What's better than mud that's covered with a layer of ice?! 

After a little bit of work with the turbo saw, chain saw and loader tractor the area was looking much better.

 Levi found the best place to relax, we considered keeping it for lounging on the patio...but it eventually found its way into the fire. Working to clean up dead and in-the-way trees is really satisfying work. You can see the progress you're making and I'm a total sucker for instant gratification.

Noah had a good football weekend. We played on Friday, he played with Ben on Saturday and then we played again today! He loves it - and I usually have a good time too once I'm out there playing. 

 

 Today we even kept score on his dry erase board. We ended with a tie, 35-35. Noah has learned to be a good sport, especially when Levi plays with us. Levi often doesn't follow the rules and gets upset when his physical ability doesn't match up with what he wants to do. So Noah steps up and gives him extra chances, says things that build Levi up and give him a chance to run for a while before Noah tags him. It's sweet to watch them work it out and to watch Noah be a nice older brother.

Things are looking up

We were sick last week. No fun. Thankfully our stomachs were fine, but Levi and I were out for a few days with fevers, coughs, sinus pain, etc. Then one of Levi's eyes got infected, then Noah got an ear infection and finally it was all over.  We happened to have left over eye and ear drops on hand so we actually, almost unbelievably, avoided visiting the doctor's office.

 Another project that's looking up is the chicken barn! This well-used building once housed 400 chickens, then 200 pigs, then many, many rounds of growing calves. So, for my entire life half the building provided shelter for calves and the other half was left untouched. It was a mess! So, after a couple hours of work, Ben and I managed to get all the old pig pens and gates out. Today Ben ripped down the chicken wire and straw "ceiling" that had been plaguing the space and this is what it looks like! The hedge posts that are still standing were the corner posts of the pig pens.

We're working on what exactly will happen with the space. We hope that part of it will be for chickens, just not 400 of them. For now, the clean-up, fix-up and firm-up work continues.
Note to self: take actual before photos!

Brotherly Love

Every once in a while, this happens and we love to see it.

This also happened tonight, but we were mostly sick and just cuddling to keep snuggled up and comfy. Hopefully, we all feel better tomorrow!

Illinois Wrap-Up

Our time in Illinois was good. It was relaxing, rejuvenating and eating a ton of delicious food was like icing on the cake!

Our dear friends Mike & Mandi drove to Bloomington/Normal from Goshen to see us! It was so kind of them, especially when they weren't feeling their best, to drive four hours to see us. And then we made them ride in the car another hour to get to Springfield to the Lincoln Museum. :-) 

Well hello Mr. President.

It's a good museum. We got to visit the White House and learn a lot about Lincoln the man. The museum is very nice, Mike can tell you about the excellent and creative craftsmanship. :-) The artifacts and images presented were interesting and in the end made me more curious about the Civil War, the different perspectives and voices from that time and how those dynamics continue to work in the United States today.

We had a great time with Mike and Mandi - and it was a great birthday gift (Mandi and I share birthdays on Dec. 30).

Otherwise, to wrap-up our time in Illinois. Here are a few photos captured on phones by others:

Oh and to explain the photo below: it's from the evening that Sue and I took Noah to see the Wizard of Oz at the Normal Theater. It's the original movie theater in town that has been showing movies since 1937.  I think Noah took this picture on Sue's phone. :-)

Andy and Lia's dog Otto was with us the entire time. He's a sweet dog, with stinky gas. The boys just loved Otto and I think Otto loved them right back.

Our drive home took exactly nine hours and while we were sad to leave it was also good to return home. It seemed that as soon as we got home, Christmas was officially complete.

Schrag Christmas

 Saturday morning when Andy and Lia arrived they shared the exciting news that they're now engaged!  Not too long after, the boys reminded us that it was time to have Christmas! They'd waited for a couple days to open presents and wanted to get to it.

 Grandma and Grandpa Schrag give the boys something to wear, something to read, and something to do/play, keeping it fun and simple - for everyone.

 The boys also got fun books, a trumpet, and a subscription to Zoo Books.  It was fun to enjoy another Christmas together (minus Sara and Josh) and fun to have Lia join in the fun. :-)