Just the Highlights

Our family is still around, just been too busy to write on our blogs. I feel like it's been hard lately to even catch my breath! Forget about putting away our winter clothes, jackets, etc.; they were all thrown into our semi trailer to put away another day, as we are into gardening with both feet. Mountain Fire Keeper has kept us all busy with everything you can think of -- and that has been good for us. We are so new to this agrarian thing that we need him to coach us in what to do when. Today we spent the afternoon planting annual flowers in Paulette's health center garden areas, and hopefully tomorrow we can get busy on our own flower beds.

The weekend whizzed by, as it was filled with company. A family of 8 stopped by on Sunday, and when they found out that more mutual friends were coming on Monday they decided to stay over and fellowship with them as well. I think I ended up serving supper for 25 people on Monday night! I am so much looking forward to some day going into my root cellar and pulling what I need off the shelves for crowds of company. With the size of our gardens this year that would be a real possibility, but we have yet to even think about building a root cellar. I just discovered tonight that this weekend will once again be filled with company, as 3 new families will be coming on Saturday.

I was more than a bit tired after the activity of last Sunday through Tues., so Tues. afternoon I thought it would be a good idea to get my 6-year-old to take a nap by taking one myself. It was rather hot and muggy out, and I had been attempting to wash clothes. Anyway, I was almost asleep when I started feeling water dripping on me! Turns out the copper pipes that run from our wood stove into an old shell of a water heater on top and then across the ceiling to the regular water heater at the back of the basement were sweating from humidity! My side of the bed hugs the water heater, and so I receive the drips from above. Needless to say, Jim needs to get those pipes insulated as soon as possible! I guess it felt like sleeping in a leaky tent.

Jim had a real education in what it would have been like to have girls in the family (we have 4 boys) ... The first family that came to visit had 6 of their 9 children with them, and 5 of them are girls. We took them for a walk through our property, and more often than not there would be a scream from one of them because of the numerous woodticks that kept accumulating on their skirts! I have been around boys for so long that I found it quite amusing. Even I have gotten hardened enough to pick the critters off by myself without so much as a shudder! I draw the line at pulling off the large blood filled ones from the dogs, though!

Tomorrow will be another day of cleaning up, baking, cooking and gardening.

Jim and the boys built this little 12 foot sailboat (in Jim's office!) when we still lived in Fargo; it has provided hours of fun for them. Since we moved up here they use it to sail to the deeper part of the lake, then jump off and swim. The edges of the lake are very slimy and full of leeches, so it's much nicer to swim in the middle of the lake.

Two of the little girls that learned about woodticks while they were visiting us!

Susanna visiting our goats Ned and Ebony; Ebony has the twins which were born on the trailer just an hour after arriving here.

Most of our friends love bluegrass as well as we do, so the boys always take time out from playing "Capture the Flag" and other activities to jam together.