Busy Monday & House Progress

All sorts of things happened at the farm and new house on Monday and I missed all the action because I was at work. So here's a glimpse at what I missed:

Ben dug the trench for our electrical and propane lines (we're getting closer to cooking with fire!):

 We got a well dug - they hit water at about ten feet but continued drilling until about 60 feet, or so I'm told.

 There was quite a bit of very wet sand leftover from the drilling.

 The soffit and fascia work is all done now.

 And we also had a wet cellulose insulation crew worked all day long in the house.

They filled in the space between the 2x6's with ground up newspaper (mixed with other stuff), added water and now after a couple days, it's soft and dry.

 The farmers were busy getting equipment ready for wheat harvest.

 Which also means it's time to be prepared to plant double-crop soybeans.

 And! A guy came to swath our brome hay!

All this activity kept the boys, and their babysitter Aimee, very busy!!

House Progress

All sorts of things are happening at the house - it's just that most of it is hard to see from the outside. 

Kenton and Zach have spent a lot of time putting up soffit and fascia. Then it rained a whole bunch, so they found as much work to do on the inside of the house as they could. 

 Kyle Funk has been super-busy installing lots and lots of wires and switches and boxes and all sorts of electrical things.

 Somehow, he has all those wires organized...

 The plumbers have run all the water lines. The H VAC guys have installed both units...which means we're just about ready for insulation!

 My job is to sweep the house. It's the one thing I can do to make it feel like my space...

 This water/mud hole needs to dry up so Kenton and Zach can finish up the soffit and fascia. Although none of us are complaining about the rain, after the dry spring we had the rain has been incredibly refreshing.

Busy Days

Last week was a wonderful, but busy week for our family. All four of us participated in bible school this year. The boys had a wonderful time learning about Weird Animals and how God loves them no matter how different or "weird" they are. 

 Ben was in charge of collecting the offering each day and I was tasked with taking pictures for the week! In all I probably snapped at least 600 photos and had a lot of fun doing it.

 Sunday morning the kids gave a program during church, then afterwards we had an outdoor lunch with a bunch of activities planned for the kids including some "weird" animals . This pig was quite something!

 I think it's hilarious how Levi, Caiden and Noah are all chomping down on their food in this photo.

 They ate fast so they could get to the inflatables, games, sno-cones, crazy balloons and other weird animals. The weather was perfect and we all had a wonderful time.

 That evening we went to Song on the Lawn, a fundraiser for MCC.

 The boys both helped me serve supper at the event, then they ate and played on Maynard and Carol's farm.

 Ben and I enjoyed listening to music while sitting under the trees - especially because for the most part the boys were on their own.

 The boys do great on their own except there's always some sort of trouble. This time it was their shoes. Noah's tennis shoes were soaked with mud and water and Levi lost one of his flop flops in the creek. Oh well. They had a great time and thankfully it's easy for us to replace a pair of flip flops.

Fun with Water

This post should actually be titled Fun with Water and a Few Chickens, but whatever. 

Each time we dump food scraps into our compost bin either the chickens, the dog or the cats immediately show up to snack. On this particular day, the chickens were the winners, sorry Chuckles.

 The real excitement that evening wasn't the compost, it was impromptu Slip-n-Slide! We have a couple cheap tarps so we laid one out, added a bit of dish soap and water and let the boys go cray.

 They thought the farther back they started their running approach the better the slide would be.

 They had a great time! Plus they were actually clean when they were done....kind of.

 They continue to enjoy having their "pool" even though the weather has been cool and rainy for days. I think Levi put a frog in it...so who knows what else might make a home in the pool, too.

 Likely the most exciting addition to the yard lately has been the Razor Rip Rider 360. The boys can pedal all around the shed (it only works on concrete) and spin themselves until they're dizzy.

 The best part is that it doesn't make any noise!

 And the chickens...we love how they make their way all over the yard...we just have to keep an eye out to protect grandma's flowers (right, mom?!). :-)

Fun with Water & Kittens

Since school let out for summer, it's become clear to me that our children don't have much to do outside. If they put their imaginations and muscles to good use they could come up with endless things to do outside, but they either aren't to that point yet or aren't wired for that kind of play. 

 So, we're trying to provide the simplest of outdoor play options. First up, a place to play with/in water.

 This black tank has held a couple batches of chicks, baby kittens and provided water to cattle. Clean? Nope. But we did scrub it out and rinse it several times before the boys jumped in.

 Jump isn't the right word....they got each other wet and then had fun splashing each other. Levi cracked me up when he came outside with his swim trunks on an his new pool noodle around his waist. He's been begging to go swimming since school got out on May 15!

 They played for a long time and had a great time.

 We ordered a new toy for them to pedal around the shed on, it should arrive on Wednesday. The calendar is marked and it's a frequent topic of conversation. Hopefully, the toy lives up to all the hype.

 I have the materials for a tree swing, so once we get that all figured out that'll give them one more thing to do outside...when they aren't busy following farmers or house builders around.

 We'll see how long they think this tiny stock tank is fun...I've got my fingers crossed....

 We also have absolutely adorable little kittens living outside our back door. Mama Chuckles moved them there from the hayloft. We think she intended to get them into the garage but we won't let her. That's happened too many times and then we end up killing kittens as we drive off the yard. Being a kitten killer is a terrible feeling...

 It was a warm, lazy evening for these little ones.

House Progress

The blue roof is gone and now we have lovely Thunderstorm Grey shingles. 

 Plus, the little roof over our walk-in garage door was added. The front of our house is getting closer and closer to looking like it's supposed to.

 Harold, always curious, always a part of the action (even if that's just me walking around snapping pictures).

 Jeremy's crew put up sheet rock for our three mechanical closets. We'll slap a coat of paint on them so the H VAC guys can move ahead with installing our heating/cooling and water systems.

 Thankfully we like the shingles! We picked them out so long ago, it's a relief to see them up on the house looking just like we hoped they would.

Now the crew is busy putting up the soffit.

On the landscaping front: there's a short strip of wheat growing in our new front yard. It's out there all by itself, holding strong and standing proudly. I smile each time I see it.

Baseball Season

It's baseball season again for Noah! Ben's helping coach, while Levi and I make up the cheering section. 

 They played their first game this week and did a wonderful job! Noah had a lot of fun, getting several hits and a home run!

 The home run was a HUGE deal to him. Noah lucked out that his first game happened while Grandpa and Grandma Schrag were visiting.

 Levi always has a handful of friends at each game to help pass the time.

 He wishes he was old enough to be on Noah's team...but he'll have to wait to play until next year.

 Thank goodness Levi's got friends (and usually somebody's got snacks to share) and Noah's games are only an hour long. I'm not sure how we'd survive if the games went much longer than that!