Late Nights-Early Mornings and Anticipation

All year these kiddos have been working for something.  Looking forward to it.  Talking about it.  Planning for it.  Snapping about it. Anticipating it.....The Illinois State Fair 2016.

It's our little tradition to pack our trailers and trucks and campers and hotel rooms full of food and stuff, moms and dads and lots of kids.  And lots of food.  Did I say lots of food?  Lots of kids eat lots of food.  We set up shop at the Illinois State Fair!

Yes, it's about showing the animals that we have been working on.

Yes, it's the big crescendo before school starts.

Yes, it's fair food, and 4H milkshakes.

But a big part of it is these 9 kids right here and how blessed they are to have each other in their lives.

See, their moms have been friends for at least 167 years.  There dads were all AGRs (fraternity boyzzzzzz) and friends (2 at ISU and one U of I alum, but an AGR is and AGR:) 

  You see, this crew, we are deep and wide and long.  A win for one is a win for all.  Likewise a tough loss for one in the ring echos through the camp.

These kids rush from the cattle show ring to the sheep and over to the swine ring watching each other do their thing. Each willing to wash, carry or trim or lead the other's animal if needed.  Each loving each other in a genuine, unpretentious way that makes their mamas and daddies proud.  

Friends since birth.  Through thick and thin.

YEAH!  IT'S ALMOST HERE!!!  

ISF 2016!!

SSS

(Sorry so sappy, I blame it on these photos we shot last year that keep popping up.)

Last Day of High School!

Our sweet Essi.  Since she kept her grades up, she did not have to go to the last two days of school...no finals!!  She was so happy!  I got to snap a photo of  her before she made her last ride on the big yellow American school bus!  

She describes riding on the school bus like something in a movie.  Bunches of little kids, many of which are Amish.  All with their eyes on the tall blonde haired, blue eyed Finnish girl!

She enjoyed the experience enough that when he sister arrived to the US, she wanted to be sure that she got to take a ride on the bus as well.  Benefits of country living I guess!

Flowers In Her Hair

Throwback to ISF 2013 maybe?  Kids and livestock.  Makes me proud.  I didn't get to be a livestock kid much when I was growing up.  Showing a few goats at the McLean County fair is not exactly being part of it all.  

My kids on the other hand are getting to experience it all.  Rhode Brothers' Cattle are tied up in the barns at the Illinois State Fair.  The "Nine Is Fine" crew spend their time between the swine, cattle and sheep barns checking on a tending to their animals.  Bonding!

Show days tend to be staggered between the families.  Someone is almost always getting ready for the ring or showing.  So there is ALWAYS something to do.

Sometimes something to do looks like this.  

Back in the day, my girl like flowers in her hair.  Not anymore.  Fifteen year olds don't wear flowers in their hair in the show ring I guess.

But they do wear blingy belts still.  And they do wear those cute numbers on their blingy belts.

This was a gilt she was working with.  We got out of showing gilts for a few years after this show.  Hubs decided that we needed to focus on barrows.  Gilts are very different than barrows. 

Loving on the pigs.  Important part of the job.

Can you tell I like the little numbers and clips.  Some moms have make up and leotards.  I get exhibitor numbers and boots.  I'll take it.

Oh, and it was the year of sequined shirts.  She's going to love reading this post about all things from the past like:
1. sequined shirts
2. jeans that are a little too short with her boots (because of skinny butts and long legs!)
3. gilts
4. flowers in her hair
5. BRACES!

Illinois State Fair 2016, we are excited for you!!  We won't pack our hair flowers this time!

30 Days of Thankfulness on a Family Farm-Day 28

  Day 28-Farm Kids and Their Love of Animals

New born kittens are a regularity on our farm.  These are from the newest litter. 

Note: white fluffy kitten, days old, eyes not open yet

Note: sticky, terrified toddler

We worked with the kittens and the toddler.  We made progress.  Sigh of relief for the future of our farm.  If our little farmer is afraid of white fluffy kittens, the future may be bleak for our operation.  Farming ain’t for the weak of heart.  You gotta be tough.  You can’t be scared. Scared of grain marketing, maybe.  Scared of kittens, not okay.

  Now that’s more like it!

Want to start at the beginning?  Start HERE!

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,kids,kittens

30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 27

Day 27-Elf on the Shelf Goes Country

This year, the Elf on the Shelf showed up at our house.  Some families with great, on-top-of-things moms have been visited by the Elf for years.  I’m a bit of a slow learner.  Didn’t want to invest my $20 if it was just a passing thing you know!  Yields were low this year and all. 

Usually these elves show up at your house with a book.  Not mine! I like to outsmart the system!  Instead of buying the book, before placing my Amazon.com order, I did a quick YouTube search and found this!

Saved myself a ten spot!  And hey, lets admit it, this is way more fun than a traditional book!  We gathered around the table and watched this little ditty on the ipad.  The little guy was totally enthralled.  He bought it hook, line and sinker. 

We named our Elf on the Shelf “Elfis” as in “Elvis, the King.” Actually it’s in recognition of Jesus, our new born King! Ya, I don’t buy that line either.  It’s all about Elvis and Jail House Rock around here lately. So Elfis is perfect.

There are lots of great videos that we watched of some sneaky elves in action. Our youngest watched all of these with his hand over his mouth in utter suspense.  “That’s hilawious” was spoken more than once. 

 

This morning our silly elf got caught riding on a John Deere tractor! Surprising, I know! (Please ignore the train pieces located under the couch.  They got moved shortly after this photo.) 

Little man loves Elfis and this is the best picture I could get of him. He was moving away to get the trailer to hook up to the tractor so Elfis could work some ground. True. Farm. Boy.

Our oldest understands the story of Elfis and has not missed a beat presenting it to the younger ones.  The joy shines in her eyes as she watches the boys look for Elfis each morning and delve in to the magic.  I am thankful they have each other.

Heck, I’m thankful for Elfis,, but he’s staring at me right now.  Gotta run, it’s creepin’ me out!

 

Want to start at the beginning?  Start HERE!

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,christmas,kids,Elf on the Shelf

30 Days of Thankfulness-Day 17

Day 17-Small Town Living

 

We love our small town and played a little game the other day about "if you could live in any of the surrounding towns, rank them in the order in which you would prefer to live in them and why!" Well, it was clear to all of us that THIS is the town for us to live in and we wouldn't change that.  Yesterday, exemplified the small town atmosphere we love.  It is a new tradition in our town to have a Lighted Christmas Parade!

We donned our Santa hats and helped with our organizations' entries. Our local 4H Club had an entry of course!  It was last minute, but we are flexible and it was so much fun for he kids!  Love it!

The Cub Scouts had an entry involving a tractor and trailer on which the boys collected canned good for the local food drive.  Someway, somehow, we are always working for those in need in our town and that is amazing!  We have a very active food pantry and clothing closet here.  There is a lot of need in our little town, and there is a lot of giving going on as well. 

This little Boy Scout is a little goofy….but I wouldn't trade him.

Next up is the cutest little thing ever!!!  I think we need one of these out on the farm.  Ours would be a hopper bottom of course instead of a van, but we haul corn and these guys haul garage doors!  It's a tiny little tractor/trailer.  It made it's first public debut at the homecoming parade, which is where I fell in love.  You can visit the company's website here.

You can see the driver and the scale from this angle.  He's crunched in behind the cab.  Isn't it adorable?  It would take us forever to haul corn, but I'm going to vote for one of these to be added to our fleet here on the farm.  haha!
The mayor may have had the best ATV entry.  That's him in the passenger seat.  He worked all day on all of those lights and even had a reindeer mounted to the front with sparkly reins and a fully decorated Christmas tree finishing it off in the back. 
 

We heard several comments that there were so many spectators at the parade, we were wondering who in our town was left to be IN the parade.  The streets were hustling all day with local shoppers.  We were offering buggy and even camel rides.  Yes, our town has it's own camel that shows up often at festivals and most notably, our Christmas Eve service held in a barn in the middle of the country. 

 

After the parade, Santa and Mrs. Claus were there for the kids to visit.  They brought cookies and hot cocoa and the grade school children decorated the Christmas trees lining the area for Santa. Our baby wasn't going to have any part of Santa.  Had he been our oldest, I would have pushed for him to sit on Santa's lap for a photo.  Being that he is the third, I videoed his crying and used the video to entertain him later at supper. It's called Evolutional Parenting. 

Dirty little sweet face. 

I'm thankful for our little town, where we can participate in so much COMMUNITY!

...and I'm thankful for this dirty little sweet face...

 

 

Want to start at the beginning? Day 1

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30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 15

Day 15-Raise your hands for concession stands

This post is really more about family than family farming.  But, we are a family first I guess.  Tonight we had another basketball game to attend.  I am thankful for ALOT of things about basketball games  in our little town. 

1. Great kiddos playing hoops!  I love to watch the girls play their little hearts out.  They seem like big 6th graders as they are chatting it up over pizza in your kitchen, but put them out there on the court and they look like babies.  Wahhhhh, I miss those babies! 

2.  Great parents in the stands.  In our town, games are a little social time for us parents.  We have the best time hanging out cheering on our kiddos and talking about Thirty-One parties and fertilizer and all that jazz.

3. Grade school “thugs” in the lobby.  Our school has two gyms and the little brothers and sisters all meet and hang in the lobby.  Tonight, a game of chase was going on our there with poor Miss Harrison watching on while taking money.  Miss Harrison, if you read this, please text me next time these thugs are partying it up unsupervised by their socializing parents.  We can surely stop our conversations on Thirty-One bags and fertilizer to take care of our little thugs!  Sorry!  That 8 and under sect is a wild one…:)

4. Concession stands!!  Who can resist popcorn and a pop, even if we did JUST eat a nutritious meal of gas station pizza and fried chicken.  The good ole’ FFA gets at least $5 out of us at each game!  Thanks for the snacks!

Thankfully we have MANY years of ball games in those gyms, like 15 more years of it, and I’m thankful for every one!

I’ll be missing posting tomorrow, because I’ll be BUSY having a little bit of Mommy Fun!  But will post twice on Saturday!  I’ve got some wonderful things to share in the next few days about Farm Family Thankfulness so stop back by! Thanks for reading and I’d love to hear what you are all thankful for in the comments section. 

 

Want to start at the beginning? Day 1

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,kids

30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 12

Day 12-Crafting time on the farm

 

My little girl, since age 1, has always been a crafty girl.  She is a table-top activity kind of kid.  Give her a worksheet or 25 at age 2 and she was doing a happy dance! 

 

Several times in her life, we have made corn husk dolls.  I have linked up with a few corn husk doll related sites for you to look at.  Unfortunately, I’m not a keeper of things, so I don’t have one of our actual dolls to show you here. 

They are surprisingly easy to make and turn out so, so cute!

Even the rough and tumble son of mine has made corn husk “action figures” with us.  His usually end up drop kicking the other “action figures,” but hey, it’s quality time right?

 

Here are a few links to get you started. 

Luckily, we have an abundance of shucks to make our dolls.  This year is slipping by and we haven’t picked up our husks to make our dolls yet!  Hey kids, get the heck out there in the field with your flashlights and get us shucks!  It’s crafting time!

There’s always someone out there who shows us up…. show-offs!  These are some high level corn husk dolls here!  I’m betting even dear daughter crafter won’t want to tackle these.  They are adorable.  Pinterest is such a wonderful place!!

What are some of your favorite farm-friendly crafts? 

 

Want to start at the beginning? Day 1

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,corn,kids,crafts

30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 8

Day 8-Sharing the love of the farm

 

Every year we have a celebration of harvest and a time to fellowship together with all of the guys that help us with harvest and all of their wives and kids.  The guys are NEVER all in the same place during the harvest season, as they each have their job and they are going many different directions at all hours of the day and night, tooling away to finish the work. 

We love getting everyone together and just hanging out for a few hours.  This idea came from a farm-wife/speech therapist friend of mine.  They have done a version of this celebration on their farm for years and we decided it was such a great idea, that we adopted it and adapted it to our style. 

This get-together not only is great for all of the families to meet each other (as our crew changes a little each year) but we hang out and laugh and reminisce about the hard work and the long hours and the funny stories that are bound to happen throughout the season.  Another little part of the dinner is the opportunity to share our farm and the love of the farm life with the kids of the guys that work for us.  You know, John Deere Love isn’t just for traditional farm folk.  John Deere Love is everywhere! Good heavens with the number of true farm kids these days, poor old Deere would be out of business!!  All little boys (and girls in our case) light up when they see the traditional green and yellow!

These photos are from several years ago when we went all out!  We had a take home craft of corn and bean “sand art” and we made a farm coloring book (orange) that was personalized to our farm.  We also showed the beloved movies “All About John Deere” on a little TV.    The hit of the night was the kiddie pool full of corn and scooping toys.  Kids young and old spent a lot of time in this area!This is kind of an awful picture of these two normally adorable kids.  I had to include it because it shows their FARM PRIDE.  We made them logo coats for the night and they proudly wore them and shared their farm life with all the farm loving kids that have shared  their daddies with our farm for awhile during the harvest season!  This is my niece and daughter when they were a few years younger. muwah!   

We are getting ready to have another Harvest Celebration and I will post some pictures of that.  The kid corner probably won’t be as extensive, but we are sure to have a great time.  Our family is so incredibly thankful for all of our hard-working guys that make harvest possible.  There is no way my hubby, his brother and their dad could bring in the crop and do the fall work all by themselves and we are so thankful for our guys and their families! 

Have a wonderful day and county your blessings! 

Feel free to comment….I have it set to moderate the comments, which is a little bit of a pain, but I thought that would be a good way to get started.  I know from emails and comments “in town” that people are reading and I would love to hear your stories of farm love and blessings.  Thanks for reading!

 

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,kids,party,farm,harvest

Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 5

Day 5-A SHOP

About seven years ago we got a ginormous gift.  Nope, I’m not talking about this adorable brown-eyed blondie. I’m talking about the opportunity to build a heated shop on our farm. At that time, I didn’t live on the farm, but lived 5 miles away in a little farm house that was away from all of the action, therefore I didn’t realize the gravity of building a heated shop. 

I had, on numerous occasions seen my hubs and his dad, laid out on the gravel under equipment.  I had seen them washing equipment in all sorts of weather.  I had seen them in the snow and cold have to do all kind of things that made me glad NOT TO BE  A FARMER!  Mostly because I hate the cold!  Don’t get me started on the horrible memories of sledding as a child.  Maybe my mom didn’t dress me right, but good gravy it was awful!  The guys however, never seemed to mind or complain.

I do know that when this shop was completed, their lives changed a great deal.  Now they can wash equipment in the relative heat of the shop, they can pull a semi over a big pit, go down the steps of the pit and turn the light on and work on the underbelly without frozen wrists or rain in their face or gravel in their hind ends. 

This shop is a game changer you could say.

They still have to work out in the elements, they still have to get wet and dirty and they still have to work long, hard hours, but at least some of their work can be done in a better environment and I know they are thankful for that. 

Now let’s get to the Farmer’s Wife part of this story… this shop has been a blessing to our family in many ways!  I mean, who can turn 5 and have a cowgirl party inside in the middle of a snowstorm in January?  My girl can!

We had hay bales and a pretend fire!  Twenty some kids were there with plenty of room to blow off some winter steam. Yee-to-the-haw! See that boy in the middle, with the adorable little Wrangler jeans on?  For the love, those cheeks!

   Her farmer dad and grandpa helped corral cowgirls and cut pink cake.  The steel workbench doubled as a gift table, the Snap-On chest was the coat holder.  It was a down right success of a party and we had 20 sweaty cowpoke after the hay treasure hunt and the roping contest! 

Because of the heated shop, each cowgirl even got a chance to ride…..a REAL LIVE PONY!  He’s a miniature horse actually, but they all called poor Shrinky Dink a pony and most giggled as they got a photo taken in front of the semi which doubled as a corn field backdrop. 

 

Since then, our shop has served as the locale of various other parties, dinners as well as middle of the winter campground and  bike racetrack.  It allows the kiddos to hang with their dad, uncle and grandpa while they are working.  It allows us a place to play a family pick-up game of basketball and it allows us to be together and enjoy our life here on the Family Farm, just a little bit more! 

 

Yee Haw for heated shops and pink ostrich crepe soled boots.  Life on the farm…just as it is!

 

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,farm shop,party

30 Days of Thankfulness on the Family Farm-Day 4

Day 4-Playground Equipment

 

We actually own a swing set.  We own a sandbox or two as well.  We own a million balls, pogo sticks, soccer goals and the like.  But this my friends, is the one of the most popular pieces of playground equipment we own.  It’s a hopper bottom for a semi.  The corn goes in from the top via auger wagon and it gets dumped out the bottom of the trailer into a pit or an auger that takes the corn into the bin or the elevator.

What’s totally irresistible to the 6-7 year old boy set is that it is slick as snot-on-a-popsicle on the inside! AND…. it’s slanty!  So if you take off your shoes and you are wearing a nice soft pair of sweat pants you can spend all day climbing up and sliding down the hoppers.  When you are tired with sliding down the front half, you move on back and slide around on the back. 

This makes for really dirty sweatpants and socks that need to be pitched.  It didn’t take me long to learn, when the semi is parked in the shed and I can’t find the boys after repeatedly calling them, ringing the dinner bell and giving our signature “whoop whoop” call, then I should climb my hiney up into a hopper bottom where I’m likely to find a couple of really dirty, but really happy little boys.  Life on the farm, you can’t beat it with a stick.

 

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LiveJournal Tags: 30 days of thankful,kids,life on the farm

How to Catch Wild Turkeys

See if you can guess what is going on here.  I think you can't comment on the blog directly because commenting is disabled.  It's on my list to figure out, just behind get rid of the 4 million gnats in my kitchen. Here are the clues:

1. We live near a small river.

2. We went on a little gator ride recently.

 

             This is my middle son, he went first, he's got courage.

3. We ran into our neighbors out in the woods as they were taking a walk too.

4.  The woods really belong to them, and they showed us this spot!

           This is my nephew.  He's pretty darn fearless. And I love him to pieces.

6. This little spot has been active in these woods for….ever?  At least for a very, very long time.

          This is my niece.  She is a tiny little thang, and I swear she is part monkey.  XOXO little doll!

7.  The neighbors built this little box several years ago.

8. Wid turkeys used to drink here.

 

          This is my oldest.  She was a little hesitant, but she did it after she saw that the boys lived. She just very well may be the smartest one of all of them!

 

Here's the answer:

This is a natural occurring spring that is in the woods.  Apparently they would shoot the turnkeys when they came to drink here.  

It looks like turkeys are still drinking from it!  These turkeys are just ALOT cuter than the wild variety.  Wait, after having these kiddos for a few days, they got a little wild too!  

Drinking from cool clear spring water while taking a stroll in the woods, helps to fill a childhood with lovely memories!  We are so thankful our neighbors share their woods with us.