Happy Birthday Mr. Bechtel

I am pleased to announce that Mr. Bechtel is another year older and wiser.  

In honor of the occasion we decided to make homemade ice cream.  This was the first time we used our old fashioned crank ice cream maker and it performed beautifully.  

We were lucky to have real experts manning the machine.

But waiting can be HARD.  "How much longer??"

Ok, times up! Let's check.  OOOOOHHHH!  Yum.  What?  The instructions say we should now chill it??  No way.  Let's try some....

Fabulous! A little peach cobbler with our peach ice cream.  We're so glad Mr. Bechtel had a birthday so we could celebrate!  Here's to another great year.

The Girls at Crabapple Farm

The Boys at Crabapple Farm

Weaponry

This morning I had one of those experiences in life when you say, "What?  Other people don't live like us??  Hmmm."

The neighbor came over and said a stray dog came and killed some of her little kittens in the night.  This is how our conversation went:

"My kids are so sad, and I don't know what to do!  What can I do?"

"Well, shoot it the next time it comes over."

"Shoot it!  With what?"

"A gun."

"Oh.....a gun....I don't have any of those."

"Do you have even a BB gun?"

"No."

"Airsoft gun?"

"No."

"A sling shot!!??"

"No."

"Well, just do what you can, I guess."

"OK."

Then I came home and realized I'd forgotten about mentioning bow and arrows, and wondered what my boys  would ever do without all their weaponry.

We have a bow and arrow target, air soft stuff, bb guns, etc.  etc.  etc.  (Just work your way up the scale..)  And the shop is full of wooden guns of various makes and models that are being created.

They would be bored stiff without them!  And would invent weapons regardless of whether or not we lived in a peaceful home. 

Why?  Because they are boys.

Summertime Reading List 2008

I've created a summer reading list for Golden Delicious and Braeburn.  So far, no one has taken me up on my tempting selections though. Golden Delicious started Johnny Tremain.  And Braeburn has started Whatever Happened to Penny Candy.  But I have been having a great time reading some of these books.  So here they are, and what I think of them so far:

• Richest Man in Babylon.  Very fun, especially where "the phonecians are scoundrels and sell him glass beads..."  I especially like its sound advice amidst all this strange financial mumbo jumbo stuff you hear about these days.
  
• Johnny Tremain.  One of my favorites about the Revolutionary War.
• Whatever Happened to Penny Candy and Whatever Happened to Justice, both by Richard Maybury.  I just finished these and LOVED them.  They are on a junior high level, but the ideas in them are timeless and very thought provoking.
• The Bronze Bow.  Another favorite.
• If You Want to be Rich and Happy, Don't Go to School?  I tried to slog through this, but it was kind of dull.  Braeburn likes the title though!
• Peggy Noonan Speech Writing Book.  Well, that's not really the title, it's a library book, and we had to take it back.  But Peggy Noonan was President Reagans speech writer and her book on how to write a speech is excellent.
• Adam of the Road.  We read this a few years ago in home school, but since the kids went to England, I thought it would be fun to re-read it.
  

That's it!  Want to join us??

Scout Camp

Braeburn has spent the last 3 weeks up at Scout Camp on "STAFF".  Please read on as he chronicles his adventures.........

Well, I got home from England and spent 2 days at home, then increased the culture shock by heading from Kent, England to Island Park, Idaho with my buddy Garret.  For the most part camp was tiring and tedious - waking up at early hours, and going to bed late - kept awake by irritating bunk mates.  However, there were a few moments of excitement to break the tedium, which I will spend most of my time describing.  

On staff, I worked on waterfront teaching BSA snorkeling patch.  When I wasn't teaching, I did swim checks and laughed as the scouts jumped into the glacial lake, then decided they didn't want to have anything to do with the water.  I spent plenty of time in the water as well, completing my BSA mile swim, after which it took me several hours to thaw out.

When I wasn't on waterfront, I spent my time eating, sleeping, and doing dishes.  I spent far too little time doing the first two, and far too much on the last.  

Probably the most funny thing that happened to us occurred on the last wednesday I was up there.  The senior staff decided that they'd been working the waterfront staff too hard and that we deserved a treat.  They took us to Mack's Inn where we got ice cream.  On the way home, one of our leaders suggested we do a chinese fire drill in the middle of the highway.  So, we jumped out of the car, ran around it, and then quickly reassumed our seats.  To our great dismay, we then heard a siren and turned around to see a police car about 3 feet behind us.  As it turns out the police had been there the whole time.  One can only imagine the officers point of view.  He walked up to our window and simply said, "SCOUTS.  Oh, boy."  

He did not ticket us, but rather asked if we wanted an escort back into camp.  

All in all, my experience up at camp was a fun one.  However, I'm enjoying sleeping and showering and it will take awhile before I'm ready to go up again.

Hopes & Wishes Meme

Ok, I don't even know what at "meme" is, for heavens sake.  I'm just trying to be an obedient girl.  I was tagged by Cocoa at chocolateonmycranium,  to write 7 of my future hopes and wishes, and so I'm trying to respond adequately. 

 And no, I don't know how to link yet, so I can't send you to her great blog with one little click, and I can't tag anyone, because the only other blogger I know is my darling sister in law who just barely had a baby girl named Hannah (another story).

But wait!  My brother!  Clark, I'm tagging you.  Will you play the game??  (To check if he does, go to rfamilyfun.blogspot.com - that's as good a link as I can give you....)

So, 7 of my hopes and wishes:

1.  I've always wanted a family band with my kids all playing different instruments, having fun making music together.  

2.  I would like to go to Japan with Mr. Bechtel and see the very different oversea world he works in.  He lived 9 years of his life over there and I don't know anything about it!

3.  I dream of having a little cabin on the edge of the water somewhere.  Very small, cosy and full of character, with a separate guest bunkhouse so people could come visit and an open wood fire for chilly evenings.  A retreat.

4.  The constellations in the sky are fascinating to me.  I would like to know all of them, their stories, and be able to find them, like friends, in the night sky.

5.  Sometimes I will hear part of a song on the radio and It will grab me.  Some chord progression that becomes magical.  If I was my brother, I would know if it was the 5th or the 7th or whatever.  I'd like to learn musical theory better.

6.  Well, everyone wants to write a book, and I do too.  I would like to write a little story with a Mormon Relief Society President as my main character.  She is a delightful grandma that just happens to solve mysteries as she goes about her normal life in a small Idaho town.  Sort of Agatha Christie meets Mitford.

7.  I hope for a lovely yard with arching shade trees where I can invite family and friends over on Sunday evening for homemade ice cream.

Little Fishies in the Sea

This week all the kidlets sprouted fins and scales and became fish at swimming lessons.  We had a great time and the kids were in the water at least 5 hours every day.... Let's see, over five days that makes about 25 hours in the water - amphibious!

They swam...

They dove off the diving board...

They even had time to play...

This is what kids look like when they are tired.  I wish there was a video so you could hear how QUIET it was.  No talking, no teasing, just SITTING.  Very strange for our family!

And now we're home again and you would not believe how many weeds can grow in a week or how deep the water can flood in your barn when the neighbor runs water down the ditch and forgets to tell you.  Ahhh.  Back to life on our little farm. 

Country Girl

See How They Grow

The chicks have graduated from their swimming pool nursery. 

 They are now tumbling around in what is supposed to be our potting shed, but is doubling as the meat bird coop.  This is fine because what the potting shed really was being used as before this was a nice mouse hotel.

I can't believe how fast these meat birds grow.  And they ARE getting uglier by the minute!

Cabin Update

The cabin is to the finishing point where we can stay in it.  And since it's not sold yet, we're doing just that!  Well, this cabin is so fun Mr. Bechtel had to pry me out of it with a crow bar.  I completely forgot about things like milking goats, adjusting temperature on baby chicks, watering garden, and cleaning house - even though we were only there for 12 hours... 

 Somehow, cleaning a cabin is just easier.  We went on a walk in the evening and the pines smelled so good.  It was  perfectly still and all you could see besides forest, meadows, and aspen trees were the little yellow lights in a few other cabins.

I loved it.

The kitchen is my favorite.  I love cooking in here and feel like I could possibly have my own food network show on cabin cooking:  how to make popcorn and hot chocolate.  Yes! I know we are selling it!  I know we are selling it.... I know we are selling it....Do you want to come visit before we do?

Can you find the baby Killdeer?

We have a little family of adorable killdeer at our house.  Several nights ago Mr. Bechtel was driving down the lane when the momma or daddy killdeer flew right in front of the suburban, laid down on the road, and flapped it's wing like it was broken.  We stopped the car and opened the door, and there, running all around the car were little baby birds.  Granny Smith said, "They're so cute!  They're like little eggs with legs on them."  They are so cute, and they are amazing at blending in perfectly!  See if you can find this one...

Happy July 4th

Little Red Shoes

We have trouble with shoes at our home.  We lose them or get them so muddy in the ditch they are just rectangular blobs of mud.  This happens especially when the back field has been irrigated but we still need to get back there for milking chores.

Enter the solution:  

This is the best $5.00 I've spent recently.  Granny Smith now has shoes I can spot a mile away and they can be sprayed with water.  I know, I don't know why it took me so long to come up with a solution.  These little shoes have been available for years and years, but it takes me awhile sometimes.  Now the Spy twins want a pair (NOT red though, they stress) so we'll have to see if I can find some - and THEN we'll see if they wear them, or just look at them and then pull on their old muddy familiar shoes.  Old habits die hard you know.

Cheep, Cheep, Cheep

Let me introduce to you our 15 new chicks.  These adorable creatures are cornish cross chickens bred for MEAT.... At 8 weeks of age we are supposed to think they are MEAT and put them in the freezer for winter.  To further this goal, we're not naming them.  Right now, though, they are so darn cute it's hard to imagine them being MEAT.

Aren't we great chicken farmers?  Look how happy they are.  I know all the magazine and book articles say you are not supposed to use pine shaving as bedding because the chicks eat it instead of food.  But the book recommended corn cob hulls....corn cob hulls, who in Idaho has such a thing as that??  So far the birds have not eaten (too much) of the pine shavings.

This brilliant little nursery was designed by our neighbors: round so the chicks can't suffocate in a corner, washable, and tall so the birds can't fly out.  In a few weeks the birdies can graduate to the potting shed.  Stay tuned for further exciting poultry events.