Harvest 2010 cont.

We had a GREAT harvest this year, with no rain delays and no major break downs. Other than a little mud to start things off, we just had great wheat harvest weather. Here are a few more pictures of harvest activities.

In the above pictures, Uncle Mark was driving grain cart, and Grandpa was bailing straw with Cousin B riding along. All the boys enjoyed riding along in one of the tractor, truck, or combine at some point during the harvest. I think only Ethan (and maybe Cousin C) didn't actually get to ride much.

2010 Wheat Harvest Begins...

Here we go...wheat harvest 2010 is underway...hopefully we don't get too many rain delays!

Here is a picture of Marion and all the kids at the combine...they LOVE to ride the combine with Daddy! Unfortunately there are too many of us now to all ride at the same time which means Mommy doesn't get to ride as much but at least the kids get to enjoy it!

Hopefully we will have more pictures for you later on as we do various field meals and help move things around!

Jonny's Big Day...

Well, yesterday Jonny showed Grandma and I that he is ready to be a BIG boy! All day yesterday he kept his diaper dry and every time Grandma asked him to pee in the potty he did! Then when he came home, he peed in the potty for me twice before bed.

This morning I went looking for him (as he was being far to quiet) and found him sitting on the potty, pants and diaper off reading a magazine. But more than even that, he POOPED in the potty. All on his own, all by himself!

SO, it was decided that this little boy is ready for big boy pants. We've had a few accidents today but overall, I feel it is a successful day. No more pullups or diapers for Jonny! (except naps and bedtime that is)

Ethan found his THUMB

I just couldn't refuse this:

Isn't that the cutest thing you've seen in at least the last 5 minutes! :0)

Spring Kittens

Marion was outside getting Strawberry ready to ride and while in the barn he found three kittens. Here are some pictures of Marion and the kids taming them down!

We have two white ones and one brownish one. Originally the kids had named them 'snowball', 'white cat', and 'brownie' but they have since changed their names and I'm not sure what they are now!

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On our way to town today, Abi was blowing her whistle and then Nate would go 'whoo-whoo'! They were being a train.

Storms

Well, I don't have any impressive storm damage pictures to show like some people do, but I thought these were worth sharing. On one of the nights when we were getting torrential rains, Marion wanted to see how much we had gotten so far...well, as you can see, the kids wanted to join him.

After the storms were over, we had a beautiful rainbow. The pictures really don't do it justice!

Marion loves how green and clean things look in the above picture. And some people don't think Kansas is ever green! :0)

Ethan's First Swim

Ethan had his first swim today...and he loved it! We only got two shots since Abi was taking the pictures but after we got used to the water a little, I then tried to get him to float...he did GREAT! At one point, I was only holding his head in my hand the rest of him was all relaxed floating in the water - even with splashes from the other kids. Ethan just might be my fish (if I continue to work with him that is).

Here is one of the pictures we got:

After we got out of the pool, Ethan lounged around in his bouncy seat while Mommy sat and watched the older kids play.

Mommy started playing around with the camera and got a couple really cute shots...I especially love the second one!

A Day in the Pool

Honestly I can't remember if I've posted other pictures of the kids in the pool this year or not. I'll have to go back through my blogging and see (and if not, back post them). Nonetheless though, here are some pics of Abi and Nate playing around. Ethan and Mommy also got in, but I'll do a separate post for those since it was Ethan's first swim!

The kids used their water shooters to have a blast, if you can, try to blow up the pictures larger 'cuz some of the expressions are priceless!

After they got done shooting each other, they started shooting into the sky...they had a great time and didn't want to get out to eat supper!

My boys (minus the littlest one)

Marion and the boys were outside hoeing the garden...they each had a hoe (Jonny's being plastic)...working HARD!

They also pulled a few beets and potatoes. Garden season is definitely on its way! Then they decided to pick the cherries from the two cherry trees. One didn't have much on it, but the other had quite a few ripe ones...below are the pictures of their adventure:

Yes, Jonathan has on a stocking cap and winter gloves, as does Nathan. They insisted they needed some working gloves and I couldn't find the ones we had for them last year. (I guess I know what I need to be buying the next time I'm in town.)

Marion and I just LOVE this one...He is so genuinely proud of his pickings! Now if I could only remember where I put that cherry tart recipe...it was to DIE for last year!

Our First Family Camping Experience...

I don't know if you know this or not, but my husband is an outdoors man at heart. Now mind you, he isn't the kind of outdoors man you might be thinking...he isn't into hunting or roughing it out in raw nature, but he does enjoy hiking, camping,and occasionally fishing. And he really loves the mountains! (This is also what makes him such a great farmer...he likes being outdoors watching the wild life around him as he works a field and he adores planting things and watching them grow.)

Anyway, I bring all this up because in his heart, I know my husband has always been a little disappointed that I'm not more of an outdoors kind of person. I really don't like bugs and the other creatures that loom around outside...especially at dark! We have talked occasionally about camping but we have VERY different opinions as to what that consists of...Marion thinks it involves sleeping on the ground, possibly a fire, and being in the good ol' outdoors (with possibly a hike involved)....Melanie thinks it involves a camper or RV with some type of bathroom facility, air conditioning capabilities, and going on a road trip to relax.

With all that being said, I realized last year that I love my husband more than I love the indoors, and therefore decided I was going to at some point buy the stuff to take him camping! It didn't work out last fall like I thought (I was after all pregnant) but this spring I had the opportunity to get some camping equipment on sale and told Marion we'd go camping for Father's Day! I think he doubted me on this, but following is proof that I at least made an attempt:

I really would have liked to have gone out to one of the pastures, cooked out supper on our propane camping stove, maybe had a bon fire for roasting marshmallows, and made it more outdoorsy...but we have a 3 month old and this was our very FIRST true tent camping experience. So, we did it in the back yard! Maybe we can be more adventurous on our second attempt (we do have to practice as we are hoping to camp out at the lake when we go to a friends reunion in August).

So, here is the tent...it supposedly sleeps 8 with a screened in porchy area:

The kids were SO excited...they had a very hard time settling down!

My one concession for camping in a tent was that I was NOT sleeping on the ground. So I got a battery operated blow up mattress for Marion and I. Marion had to admit, it was A LOT better! (in the following picture, Ethan was not overly happy...he was ready for Mommy to pay some attention to him!)

Here the kids are starting to settle down. Jonny actually ended up sleeping over by us instead of by Nathan, and I think in the future we will need to rethink how we sleep everyone but overall it went very well.

Here is Daddy reading us all a bed time story. (We are in the process of reading Farmer Boy from the Little House on the Prairie series.)

Here is Ethan all tucked away in a corner of the tent. We put him on the opposite side of the bed from the kids for safety reasons. He did really well and slept all night with only a little fussing at 5 in the morning. The next time, I might take our oblong clothes basket and put him in that, I think I might sleep better having a 'bed' for him.

We did end up having to zip up all the windows and the wind blew pretty hard around 1 am. I also heard some thunder at that time but no one else was awake to hear it. Throughout the course of the night I heard coyotes, an owl, and various other birds. There was also a very strong skunk odor, but fortunately we didn't ever see the skunk. The dog and cats were very interested in what we were doing, but they all pretty much kept their distance. (Marion actually found Spottie in the pickup this morning as apparently the thunder scared her and she managed to jump through the window somehow.)

The next time you see Marion, you'll have to ask him how he liked camping, but overall, I think he was very pleased with our first attempt!

VBS Week

I have a friend who is going to give me some more pictures, but I thought I'd at least start posting about our week. In this post, we have pictures of the decorating I did in the church basement for my class - the pre-k and Kindergarten class.

First though, I thought I'd show you pics of the two activities that the kids have LOVED! The first day we played this game called 'what time is it Mr. Skunk?' where the kids had to ask the question and then directions were given to take a certain number of steps or whatever, then whenever the 'skunk' felt like it, they'd yell "Spray time" and squirt the kids with water...here are a few pictures of the kids playing...you can see the spray bottle behind Jon's back!

The kids pretty much ask to play this game every day!...below is a pic of the kids being sprayed!

The second activity that the kids loved was quicksand! We made quicksand with cornstarch and water. It was AMAZING stuff...if you hit it hard, you'd hit a solid, but if you gently placed your hand in it, it would sink! The kids LOVED it...here are a couple of pics that I took of some of the kids:

Now we get to my decorations...this first one is the one I'm the most proud of...it is my camp fire:

Here is a picture of our craft area, you can see the crafts we are going to do all week hung on the back wall there: (you can't see the glow in the dark necklace very well, but it is there with fish on it, then we did boat bottles, critter cages for bugs, back packs, and then a path banner)

This is our story time area, each poster has our Bible verse for the day on it. We are memorizing Romans 10:9 'Believe in Jesus and that He is alive.'

This is my forest with the theme animals for the week:

I just had to put this one in...he was so cure laying there with the bear:

this is a better picture of the animals. Each one is poster board that I projected the pictures onto and then colored and cut out:

I love doing VBS...the kids are so rewarding...yes it is alot of work but well worth it! When I get more pictures, I'll try to post some more!