Each of the kids showing off the gifts they picked out just for me. I LOVED THEM!
I celebrated a birthday on Saturday. Everyone has them and mine was no more special than anyone else’s. However, there were a few things that made this one stand out this year.
The last picture I took of Wes
(My final blog for 2016 – although it is 2017 – and it’s the very hardest to write. I’ve been mulling this one in my head for a long time. I’ve thought of all the things I’ve wanted to say for over a year and yet the words don’t come easy. I pray that God gives me the story and the words and the healing my heart is needing by writing this letter.)
The past two months have been busy but not crazy, busy. Wait a minute…who am I kidding? It’s always crazy, busy trying to keep up with the family and all that’s going on.
Not only did we celebrate the big holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) but also a couple of birthdays, too.
Less than two weeks after Colten and Taylor’s wedding, we celebrated Thanksgiving. Our family gathering was near 100% that day…we were missing Jenna. (She made a trip to Colorado that weekend.)
The last posting brought up a question by a reader that made me realize that it’s a bit hard to read my mind. (Just ask Jim about this)
The question was, “Why did Curt and Jamie move into your house?”
The answer – because it worked out perfectly. We couldn’t have prepared and put the plan together any better had we done it. I believe it all happened as it should have – a “God thing”. Curt and Jamie made the decision to build a home in the country. That started the process. As soon as the purchasers of their home found out they would be moving, they approached Curt and Jamie about possibly purchasing the home in Louisville.
Each step they took came at perfect timing. As did the transition from one house to another. Their house did, in fact, sell – prior to the completion of the new one. The new owners agreed to let them stay throughout most of the summer, hoping the closing date of the new house would happen before the beginning of a new school year (for the new owners).
The idea of moving to our house was proposed. They took us up on it. The craziness is that – once again – it all happened as it should. They were packing at a time that I could help with the kids and/or packing. I moved our items out of our house to the Cottage. This gave Jamie the empty spaces needed to put her family’s items in. Perfect!
After all of the house swapping was complete, I was able to enjoy two days with the kiddos before we had to leave for the summer. I hope the kids enjoy being in the house as much as the house probably enjoys having them in it! I just wish I was home to enjoy the noise.
Jamie examining the hole in the ground that would one day be her home.
The hole in the ground changed to this in April.
What will be the kitchen and island – the heart of the house and family.
Jamie scattered these scripture verses throughout the home. When I realized she had done it, it was fun to look for them. It was sort of like a game.
This is what the house looked like the day before we left. The next time we see it, it will be more than a hole in the ground, more than studs and drywall, it’ll be a HOME. This is the area that will be the kitchen looking into the living room.
One day, this picture will be fun to look at because rather than dirt and sand, there will be grass and trees and lots and lots of wonderful memories.
Miss Nora showing us one of her many talents.
There has been a lot of activity within the household! Graduation was on May 14 and it’s already June 6.
Because the wheat harvest journey was next to happen, that’s what was focused on after the graduation party was cleaned up. And speaking of the graduation party, I’d like to thank everyone who came. Everything turned out nice, including the weather – just enough chilly to enjoy the awesome fire pit Jim and Mark built.
Callie and Kara have been best friends since kindergarten. They finished their school career off with a BANG! Callie was Valedictorian and Kara was Salutatorian. I asked Callie if there ever seemed to be competition between them and she said, “No, we helped each other”. Good job girls!! Please make sure to take that attribute with you the rest of your life! Eliminate competition and replace it with helping each other.
And just like that…it was over.
It started the fall of 1991. It ended on Saturday. The school schedule has controlled what we’ve done, where we we’ve gone, and has been a major piece of the game called life. I’ve been so focused on getting through each day that I never really thought about it being over. Oh, don’t get me wrong – I knew it would one day but that was so far into the future. Well, the future is here.
I’m not good at making New Year’s resolutions. I think they’re dumb. Mostly because when I used to follow the crowd and make a resolution, it was usually something that was next to impossible to keep. It was a good intention, though. So, rather than deal with the guilt of not living up to my end of the deal…I stopped making them. Well, now I’ve sort of made myself this pre-harvest resolution. I’ve been enough sedentary over the winter, I can see and feel a few of the extra inches that are a result of this lifestyle. I know it comes with age but until I can’t do something about it, maybe I should at least up the ante on the number of steps I take each day.
I got a bit obsessed with knowing the number of steps I was taking when I rode to New Orleans with Jenna to help her with her CLAAS booth at Commodity Classic. The facility was gigantic!!! It took many, many steps to get from point A to point B. Our biggest day of steps was 21,391 or nearly 10 miles. So, when I checked my phone the other day and the health app showed less than 1,000 steps, I decided I could do something about that. Either I needed to keep my phone in my pocket a little more OR I could just take off and go for a walk after Callie leaves for school. I opted for option #2.
You know, some days just seem to start out a bit more of a struggle than others. Today was one of those struggle days. Struggle to accept changes that are being thrown at me. Struggle just to get started with what’s on my list of “to do’s”. Just a struggle. I really hate days like this. Mostly because it takes hold of your very soul and seems to try to back you into a corner and not let you out. The tears that have been pushed back for so long seem to flow easily and won’t quit.
Why is it so hard to accept the fact that you’re not quite as tough as you’d like the rest of the world believe you are?
Sometimes, it just doesn’t feel good to sit in front of the computer anymore.
It seems I’ve been in front of the computer screen on a daily basis the past 2 months. I think I’m ready to load up the Beast and head south again! Before the new year gets much further into January, I’ve got to update my pictures and print my blog for the year. So, with that, let me tell you a condensed version of what’s been going on. One day soon (I hope), I will get the want to sit down and write again…
So, let’s back up to September. We had great weather for the proso millet harvest. The pickup header took a little getting used to for me. Seems like just about the time I sorta felt like I may have it figured out, it was over. And those of you who know me, know that the end of harvest is NEVER easy for me. Even though I was anxious to get home to see the kids, the daily routine and excitement of harvest was over.
The millet had to be swathed before the combines could pick the rows up. This was usually done about a week before the combine followed.
Throughout my many days of sitting behind the steering wheel of a combine, you see lots of “things” in the field…old machinery parts, oil buckets, seed bags, dead animals, deer antlers, swimming pools and even kids’ outdoor toys. Most of the machinery parts were lost during the working of the ground or planting of the crop. The rest can be attributed to the wind – except for the dead animals, of course.
I’ve seen a number of helium balloons. Some fields and locations within our harvest journey seem to collect more than usual. It’s almost as if those locations are on some sort of helium balloon jet stream. In my mind, I imagine that after balloons have been set free from the hands who have held them, they make their way into this helium balloon jet stream which carries them as far as it will allow. Then, the balloon that had been gracefully floating through the sky, hits some sort of cloud wall or turbulence, tumbles back to earth and lands in a field.
The fields we cut in Eastern Colorado must be in the direct balloons-falling-back-to-earth path. I used to get excited when I first saw a balloon here or there (I don’t know why). Sometimes I would stop to see what sort of celebration might have been happening at the time the balloon was allowed to enter the balloon jet stream. Birthdays and congratulations seem to make the top of the list.
On one particular September afternoon, while rolling through the millet field, a bouquet of red balloons caught my eye. “Interesting!”, I thought. “This is something you don’t see as often as the typical mylar balloon”. I kept going. Something entered my head, though, that made me back up, stop and get out of the Beast. I wanted to see what it was that made this find so different from the others.