Hello friends and family. I'm sorry that I have not been updating the blog this year. 2021 has been the hardest year of my life, easily. I will not be sharing on here the specifics and if you aren't aware of them and find yourself worrying, be assured that I have support and love from those closer to me and the Lord, most of all, is so near. But as I was doing our Advent calendar with the kids we had a question we were answering: What is the best thing that happened to you this year? And as I thought about my answer and listened to theirs' I was amazed at the outpouring of blessings in my life during a year of such intense suffering! God has dealt with me bountifully. In fact, a few days later I made all of the kids make a list of all of the blessings they experienced in the whole year and we were shocked at how many the Lord could cram in such a short year. The blessings, in reflection, make it seem like longer than a year. So, here is a quick overview of the blessings of 2021: 1. The first two months we had a whole hassle of bloodhound puppies at the house! And we got to see the looks on their new owner's faces when they met them. 2. I took Hurricane to Kansas City for her 14 year old birthday trip. 3. Wild Man continued in Gymnastics, switching to private lessons. I so enjoy watching him work hard and get better. He got first in a meet and got to compete against another boy his age. 4. The Boy played baseball for the first time and one of his closest friends was on the team as well as a father we trust, coached him. Attending those games was such a highlight! 5. We got Honey, our new pony. 6. We got surprised by Honey being pregnant and getting to raise a part quarter horse part pony: Theodore Lawrence (Laurie or Teddy) 7. A dear friend and her little boys came to visit twice this year! 8. Hulk played soccer for the first time! 9. I purchased a pass for our local fun pool and scheduled times for us to use it throughout the summer. Hulk passed the swimming test there on the last day we went! 10. Some friends from Louisville, who are older friends, visited twice this year! 11. The Boy and Hurricane got horse riding lessons and joined a homeschool riding group. Wild Man and I got some riding lessons too. 12. Tender went to her first prom. 13. Both of the girls went to their first homeschool dance. 14. The Boy has hit a growth spurt and watching that pan out is great fun! 15. Taking Tender on College tours. 16. Tender has been working in patient access in the ER for months now and is currently training to be a Tech! 17. We got a ping pong table to lay on top of our homeschool table. 18. We got a new kitty named Mrs. Bennett. 19. Hurricane successfully weaned Laurie/Teddy and him and his mama are both very sweet ponies. 20. We got a new boxer puppy: Gilbert (as in, Blythe) 21. We saw some great movies! Quiet Place 2, Dune, Spiderman: No Way Home, and Ghostbusters. 22. The Boy had his first sleepover for his 13th birthday. 23. The Boy had his first bike rides through town with some other boys. I have to pack up his bike and drop him off in town but they love it! 24. I am still attending home births as a doula or assistant. 25. We have amazing neighbors! 26. Robert is having great success at work. 27. We decided to let Bryse try public school next semester. 28. We watched great TV shows together: LOST (just girls), Stranger Things (just older three kids), and Gilmore Girls (just Hurricane and I) 29. We had a girl's trip to Tulsa to see Mercy Me in concert with G.G. and her daughter. Photo dump below. Don't forget you can click on them to make them bigger and read a caption, if I wrote one for the picture. Below the pics is Hurricane's Farm Update. And then there were five.
Farm update the 5th. It's been a while. Not a ton has happened. Helen, our silkie, was finally put out of her completely footless misery. Probably by an owl. One of the chickens(Heather Chandler) got a bad case of bubble foot. We couldn't really figure out what to do about it, so I watched a few videos, wrapped her in a towel so she would fall asleep, and stuck her with a scalpel. It was horrible. The combination of the smell of poultry and dried pus was unimaginable. I spent probably an hour digging and cutting and soaking the scabs on both her feet. Eventually, I got bored with it and the pus wasn't coming out, so I put some thick, nasty-smelling salve on it and wrapped it up till it went away. Eventually, it did. And now several other chickens have bubble foot. So... I kind of hate everything. The cattle are doing well. Getting closer to their inevitable end with every pound they gain. I really wish we would get more, but mom and dad won't cave yet. Charlotte has escaped again! Twice! I thought she was getting way too big to get out, but she keeps proving me wrong. Pigs are so hard. I never want one again. I installed a metal grate in her escape corner and she literally bent the bars with her teeth. Let's see... The ponies. Laurie is almost nine months old now. He's completely weaned and halter broke(through several months, many mistakes, and even more tears). He got castrated on the 16th of October, just after he passed six months. It was seamless, and he's well recovered now. The vet told us that we either needed to keep him and Honey apart for over 6 months, or send him away for about a month. So, he stayed at a friends house for a month. I'm happy to say I have successfully retrained Honey. She was horrible, wouldn’t do anything for me but stop and go. Eventually we got some professional help, but before that I just did the best I could. At one point I saddled her up and got up on her and didn’t ask her to do anything. I just sat there, didn’t even put my feet in the stirrups. I did literally nothing, and she bucked five times. Eventually she realized she was too fat and little to dismount me, and after that things only got better. A few weeks of in person training and my instructor telling me to kick and pull harder and she was almost perfect. The only thing holding her back at this point is me. I cannot for the life of me canter properly. I ask her to and trot all I can but the second she transitions I almost fall off. She’s a bumpy ride to be sure. Laurie is doing great. I was so worried that he would just go straight back to nursing, but Honey can’t stand him. I taught him(after weeks of stalling) to pick up his feet. Only his front though, it’ll take a few more weeks of stalling to get the back done. In mid November, everyone went on a mid-morning walk with our neighbors and I joined with Honey. At the end of our road there’s these blonde twin geldings. They’re super sweet but… I hate them. We went all the way and at the end I decided to ride her. I didn’t have her reins but I figured she was docile enough to make it fine. She wasn’t. One the blondes took off and she wanted to join him. Granted, she didn’t actually disobey. It was just she had no halter on so she didn’t know I wanted her to stop and instinct says that when one friend starts running you should too. Long story short, I got a concussion and had to chase her through the woods for 20 minutes, barefoot and bleeding from the head. It was a fun experience altogether. I wouldn’t say I want to repeat it but everyone has to do at least one stupid thing that beats all other stupid things they’ve done, right? I couldn’t ride for a week, which was definitely a bummer but at least it makes for a good story. She’s only dismounted me one other time and then I didn’t even fall off. I just sort of stepped down when she was freaking out. Anyways, that’s all I have for now. Sorry if it’s not as impressive as it usually is, I wrote this in a hurry. Till next time. -Hurricane. P.S. we got rid of Hazel and got a hay ring. That’s been a relief.
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Good morning, afternoon, evening, night, or whenever you read this. For the first time ever, I, Robert Coffman, am writing a blogpost on our family site. This entire site and our long history of family posts has been maintained soley by my amazing wife (with a couple of farm updates by Bryse)! This is a blog entry about our family trip to Yellowstone National Park. We actually had t-shirts made as you can see in the above photograph.
Not only did we travel to Yellowstone for vacation but we celebrated our 19th year of marriage and traveled to Texas for the funeral of Robert's grandmother (New Nanny). She always read and commented on this blog and that will be missed. Also we remebered the 11th birthday\anniversary of our deceased son Jasper and celebrated the 10th and 7th birthday of Wild Man and Hulk. Our vacation was a huge deal because.....we have NEVER had a family vacation. Well, not really. Our whole 19 years of marriage has involved time off as traveling to Arkansas or Texas to see family. Even though it is nice to see them, it is usually not a vacation! Once, when Tender was young we went to St, Louis for a weekend and another time we travelled to Nashville to see an old college friend after she married. Lindsey’s parents took us to Disney World when we only had Tender. But that’s it. Other than Tender, and like, oh, 17 years ago, we haven’t done anything as family. So, this was first for most of the kids. Many of you may have different opinions about the government giving out money but we didn’t think too much about all the COVID relief and we put it back in the economy with a huge vacation. We actually used a travel agent. Her name is Jennifer and she did a fantastic job. She travels to Yellowstone often and booked everything we needed and even planned our trip. Her website is www.whimsicalvacations.com and I highly recommend her. Not only did we use an agent, we flew there! The whole family, all eight of us. We traveled from August 4-10, 2021. We drove to Kansas City and flew from there to Salt Lake City. We rented a large family van, which there are many of them in Salt Lake, and we drove the 4.5 hours through Utah and Idaho to reach Yellowstone. We stayed at a huge cabin in a small town about 20 minutes away from West Yellowstone. We had three full days to explore to Yellowstone before heading out. We then drove back to Salt Lake and enjoyed almost two full days in Salt Lake. Here is how we explored Yellowstone. Day 1: Lower Loop focusing on Grand Prismatic, Lower Geyser Basin, Midway Geyser Basin, and Old Faithful. We really enjoyed combining the Grand Prismatic Observation hike with the Fairy Falls Trail. This is about a 5 mile out and back easy hike. Day 2: Canyon Area- Check out Gibbon Falls, Artist Paintpots, Upper Falls and Lower Falls, and Artist Point Day 3: Yellowstone Lake area- Check out Yellowstone Lake and Hayden Valley for some wildlife sightings In Yellowstone we also visited a wolf and bear sanctuary and attended a rodeo. In Salt Lake we did a lot of resting but went to the Mormon Temple Square (which made me feel nauseous), visited a huge aquarium, watched a movie, ate some good food, and went onsite to where High School Musical was filmed (which you can guess was not my idea). For most of the kids this was not only their first vacation but also first time flying. I hope you enjoy the pics below!!! Robert: He is enjoying his job and being very productive at it. He is just now pulling out of the exhaustion of post-Covid recovery. And he stays busy around the house doing different things to improve our lives at home. He scheduled our first ever family vacation for August. We will be going to Yellowstone National Park. Lindsey: I am excited to finish up the school year. Its been a hard one. I've struggled with distractions and joy. But I have already started thinking and planning for next year which will be our first and only school year with all six kids officially schooling. I am still blessed with getting to assist at births with some local midwives. And I am enjoying spending time with friends that I've made here. The joy the kids and I have in taking care of all of these animals is just amazing! Tender: She just finished her classes at SBU for the semester but will continue working on her math at home throughout the summer. Her dad has also assigned some theological studies for her for the summer. Tender will be a senior in the fall. She got to attend a public school prom with a good friend from church and that was such fun! Since it has been forever since I updated everyone, she has also gotten a job at the same hospital Robert works at. She was a Temp. Monitor but is slowly leaving that to work registration at the ER. Hurricane: She is busy with farm animals and homeschooling. She has also had a couple of jobs this year. She has been cleaning a house every other week and babysitting for a community group at church. So its exciting for her to have some cash. She was baptized at church a couple months ago and really enjoys our church. She just finished up eighth grade. The Boy: His big news is playing baseball for the first time ever! We have been trying to practice a little every day but overall he is enjoying it immensely! Some friends from church moved into a house right beside us and The Boy spends a lot of time creating adventures with the neighbor kids. He is finishing up sixth grade but will be working on math throughout the summer as well. Wild Man: He is finishing up third grade and continues to be pretty wild. The biggest thing to him to happen lately is a run-in with pepper spray (by his own hand). Wild Man will work on math throughout the summer too. He really needs to get better at writing but I think that is because he is such a large motor fella. Hopefully his fine motor skills will catch up. Meanwhile, he is running around barefoot catching frogs and enormous snapping turtles. Hulk and Bug: I'm just going to do them together because they are basically inseparable. They play at the creek everyday. They play with cars, wrestle, play on riding toys, and chase Marmee around all day. It seems like they entertain each other so well that I rarely reign them in to do something formal for learning. Although Hulk did work on reading this year and did well with that. They also liked to play math games on the iPad. In the fall I'm going to have to get stricter with them learning how to sit still for tiny amounts of time. : ) Hulk busted Bug's forehead open with a golf club.... again. Farm Update: the fourth
Ok. We've had a few thing happen since last time. One, Cresent died. Of mysterious causes. Two, we got two new rabbits and I named them Montague and Capulet(if you have any class at all, you know those are Romeo and Juliet's house names). I didn't gender them at first so the boy ended up with the girls name. Montague(the girl) was slightly crippled but got around surprising well. However that didn't stop her from being the first to die. Capulet died a few weeks after. Both of whatever mysterious causes took Cresent. Hazel remains alive and well; possibly the killer of her brethren. Who knows. Three, new chickens!!! Only one has died so far and the rest are doing great. All different breeds. So far I've only named three; Heather, Veronica, and Heather Chandler(don't ask, I don't know myself). They're very good layers and only mildly aggressive when they're hungry. Which is always. Four(I guess there's more than I thought), we got rid of Jake. Eventually he just got dangerous to be around. Very temperamental. Unpredictable. He would randomly buck and kick at us for no reason. So we sold him. And replaced him with... Five! A pony! We got a pony. Her name is Honey. She is eight years old and 12 1/2 hands. We drove three hours there and back to get her. She's quite a bit better at riding than Jake was and it took barely any time at all for me to be comfortable on horseback again. I got a riding lesson back in March, and while it was very helpful, she still started to act up and tried to bite my feet no matter how I was sitting or if I was using the saddle or not. Eventually I stopped riding her(that was about a month ago) because I was worried I would screw her up if I kept trying. I was planning on getting more lessons but that hasn't happened yet. Dad said I should still do things with her though, so I kept giving her baths and making her walk on concrete to get the mud out of her hooves(I remain too much of a coward to pick out her feet and concrete walking beats it out better than I ever could). Anyways, there's some backstory for you, onto the real story. Six(5 1/2?)! Last Thursday (the 6th) we were outside for the morning and while they were in the garden I went to give Honey a bath. I noticed she was looking and acting a little weird. I didn't think anything of it until I was rinsing her belly and noticed her udder's were not only full, but dripping and waxing as well. I called mom over and we pulled together as much information as possible. Either she was full-term pregnant (I didn’t mention she’s enormously fat) and we didn't know it this whole time, or she had a tumor, or some other unknown cause that just happened to have all the unrelated symptoms of equine pregnancy. I was convinced it was the last, not because I didn't want her to be pregnant but because I was both unbelieving and knew it was safer for her not to be. For one thing, I had ridden her up until a month before we found out. Horses are pregnant for eleven months and you're supposed to stop riding at six months. Another thing is we have a kind of grass called fescue. It's toxic to pregnant mares. It can cause prolonged gestation and a thickened placenta, potentially causing the foal to suffocate. Another thing is if she was pregnant, that would mean that the father was not a pony, but a quarter horse. So it would be a miracle if it even got out of her. That Saturday I dragged dad to the vet and watched nervously as he stuck his entire arm into her and confirmed she was pregnant. He said the baby was alive(for now) and he couldn't tell if there would be complications. We watched nervously for five days and the second I came to terms with the fact that I didn't need to watch it happen for it to happen, it happened. It was the next Wednesday morning(prom day. YES I KNOW ITS WEIRD IT WAS ON A WEDNESDAY). I woke up at seven a.m. And laid in bed for a full three minutes before I heard dad on the phone downstairs. I could tell it was mom and immediately checked my phone and saw she had called me right before dad. I was outside in a manner of minutes and mom was yelling for me already(how she knew I was outside before I'd said anything or alerted anyone to my current existence in the premises, I don't know). She said a jumble of words that eventually translated to: HONEY HAD THE BABY AND IT’S IN THE OTHER STALL FOR SOME REASON! I went in the barn and sure enough, a pitch-black colt was in the corner of our bigger(unfortunately mold and maggot infested) stall,(Honey was in the smaller one before, we still have no idea how he got there) Mom had let her into the other field and she was losing her mind trying to find him. Eventually we got them together and got a good look at the situation. I’ll have mom tell the whole story, it’s very complicated, but here’s the end product: his name is Theodore Laurence(Laurie or Teddy for short), he is pitch black with a white mark on his forehead (don’t you dare suggest we should’ve named him something like Blackey or Midnight or Obsidian! I’ve had these suggested to me and I turned them down for a reason! Have some class). He is perfectly healthy and definitely part quarter horse, which means he’ll make a very fine steed. I’m still in shock at the fact that everything went fine and there were no complications. It really is a miracle that she even got him out of her birth canal. He’s very big. Anyways, I’d end on that, but we just got a pig too, so... Her name is Charlotte, she’s black and adorable and we should’ve named her legion. She’s certifiable. It’s terrifying. Her screams sound like the souls of Hades. She escaped for a couple of days but we just got her back. All’s well that ends well. Signing off with a crazy few months of farming– Hurricane P.S. Also our Silkie(Helen) had both of her feet fall off. So... That happened. And now, my (Lindsey's) version of the Pony's birth. Once we discovered that Honey was pregnant I went outside to check on her every morning before my walk to make sure that she hadn't given birth in the middle of the night. On Wednesday, May 12th, when I checked on her she was pacing back and forth frantic and I figured she was in labor. So I texted the girls (knowing they would still be asleep for a while but hoping they might see it soon) and took off on my two mile walk. When I returned, Tender met me at the barn to check on Honey again. She was still acting the same so I got her out of her stall so she could have space to move. I had her on a lead in the yard and she was just frantic. I could barely control her. I noticed some blood on her tail, assuming it was more sign of impending birth, I sent Tender to check her stall for anything other than the normal types of things. She came back saying it looked like there was a placenta in the hay. Well, not being able to control Honey well I walked her to one of our fields and released her while I called Robert and told him we ought to call the vet because I thought Honey had placenta previa and the foal is surely dead inside of her. I went back to the barn to fetch a shovel for the placenta so that I could take it outside and look at it in the sunlight. The shovel was over by the other stall, which we had left open since we werent using it. When I knelt down to pick up the shovel I glanced over and there stood a black foal staring back at me, alive and well, and obviously lost from his mommy. I screamed in shock, he jumped in fear and I ran out of the barn yelling for help. Honey was sprinting around the other field, not in labor, but searching for her missing baby! Robert came out with Tender shortly after I came out of the barn and I told them to get Honey back, her baby was in the barn. Hurricane came running out of the house and yelled at her to follow me, the foal was born and fine but somehow squeezed out of the stall he was born in and wandered into the other stall. Finally we shooed Honey through the open gate back into the field with the barn and gave the trembling foal a little nudge out of the stall and into Honey's eye line. And they were reunited. Phew! And that all occured before 7am. We went on to preparing for a prom and anxiously watching the colt and mama to make sure they were doing well. I slept like a rock that night. Hello friends! For those of you who are self-disciplined enough to not scroll down and find puppy pictures, we have puppies over here! Marmee labored all day Christmas day and started having her puppies at 1:15am the 26th. She seemed done by 7:30am with 12 puppies in all. We got her cleaned up and situated and two hours later Bug yelled at me that something new was going on and when I went over to see what it was, it was a 13th puppy being born! I feared he would be dead since it had been so long since the last puppy but he wasn't. He was by far, the biggest puppy and came out kicking and squealing. So we had 13 puppies, and all have survived. Marmee has been an amazing mama to them. She is very devoted and seems to have great instincts. Everything has been quite easy so far. Now that they are walking and wrestling I'm sure things will get more lively! Oooookay
Farm Update: The 3rd So, It was me and Tender’s day to do the outdoor chores. We noticed Paulo was acting weird. He wouldn't get up and eat or drink. It wasn't like Grady; he was relatively awake and alert he just wouldn't get up. Tender being the worrier she is, immediately started coming up with these crazy things and tried to drag me into her panic. Me, being the optimist by decision, talked her down and said he was just tired or something. Somehow, by the grace of God who makes no mistakes, I was at a nine-hour youth event when he stopped breathing. Apparently, he still had a pulse but it wouldn't have lasted long. They'd kept me updated during the day and I was in class when they said they needed to ”put him down”. I managed to forget about it the rest of the day and I'm so glad that God has kept me out of the house the two times a more significant animal died. I hope he continues to do so. For now, all we can do is hope he didn't have a contagious disease. I found out a few weeks later that it wasn’t a disease. Buster was displaying something of the same behavior so we called the vet. The vet told us what I kind of suspected all along: we took them off formula too early, and Paulo’s digestive system didn’t know how to process real food properly. I was... if not angry, then horribly grieved to find this out. I’d begged dad and told him over and over we were taking them off too early, and his confidence cost a living thing it’s life. I wasn’t mad at him, maybe just really disappointed that we didn’t have the hindsight (or That I did) to prevent something like that. Anyway, Busters doing fine. We also sold Edward and Joon. Which makes me kind of sad, but that's farm life for you. We would've had to butcher them anyways. On a lighter note, Marmee’s had her babies! On Christmas day I woke up and mom said she was in labor. First stage to be specific. We set the kiddi pool in a corner of mom and dad's room and I rigged up a camera system. Unfortunately, the second stage didn't start until like 6 pm, when we were going to see the new Wonder Woman. Thankfully she didn't have any until much later. Dad called me at 1 am and said Marmee had just had number one. I went down to see her, but didn’t stay for more than a few minutes. In the morning, before I’d even properly woken up, I was downstairs to help with the last two. They were all 12, perfectly healthy. We moved them to beside the desk and I guess moving around triggered something because Marmee had another! Number thirteen, an absolutely huge Black and Tan, male. He was the first one reserved unsurprisingly, in case you were wondering. They were sooo perfect. Technically you aren’t supposed to touch newborn puppies, but we broke that rule every minute of the day. We put up a Craigslist page and got responses within 48 hours. By a week after we had about 9 reserved. Now they are all reserved. Anyways, that’s the scoop on Marmee’s (and our) babies. Not much else has happened in terms of our growing farm. We got rabbits(two does, Hazel and Cresent), a couple chickens died (old news right?) and that’s about it. The Gardeners came to visit us and rode the horse. He bucked eventually but we worked him harder and he did well the rest of the day. Till next time guys Here we are in the last month of 2020. I am currently typing this up while Robert watches Charlie Brown Christmas special with the three youngest kids. We haven't decorated for Christmas yet this year. We were gone around thanksgiving to visit Robert's extended family for 6 days and nights and since we got back we have dealt with a broken dishwasher, a small flood from a leaking hot water heater, Robert fixed the hot water heaters (for now), and someone has been gone for something every night since we got back so decorating is waiting until Friday December 4th. Which is also The Boy's 12th birthday. November 27th was Tender's 17th birthday (while we were traveling). And November 1st was Robert's 40th birthday which we had a big party for. AND working backwards, Bug turned 5 on October 28th. Personally I have been working out every morning, which is new. I've been doing that for 11 weeks now. Bu that is about all I have ot share but Hurricane helped out by typing up an update about our little farm! It is below the pictures. Again, click on the pic to see it bigger and the caption. Farm update 2
Ok, take two. Before I say anything else, there’s one story that stands out more than the others. I believe it was sometime before Halloween (the weather was cold enough that I hated it but not cold enough to get dressed before tending to the animals) and it wasn’t my morning for outdoor chores. Which meant I could kind of sleep in. Except not. Because as soon as it struck 7 mom was yelling that there was an owl in the barn. Not my chore day, but definitely still my chickens and my problem. I ended up getting to the barn a few seconds before dad did(he had gone inside to get a 22) and saw an owl not in the barn, but in the chick pen. Which explained why it was so urgent. The owl had just finished mauling one of the baby Jersey giants and was trying to get out. The other chicks were freaking out but otherwise unharmed. Dad burst in just after me and shot the owl(chill guys, it’s legal if it’s destroying your property). It died pretty fast and we were then plagued with the possession of a very dead owl. We would’ve liked to stuff it but apparently it’s illegal to taxidermy birds of prey. So now it’s hanging off a tree in our Watership Down field(we named the fields apparently) Anyways on to the normal stuff. After a couple of weeks of looking and begging for more calves, I ended up going to the sale barn with dad to put my own opinion with his. There were three jerseys(that were actually very healthy all things considered) and like 5 or 6 Guernsey mixes that also looked pretty healthy. We ended up getting two of the Guernseys. And they’re my hands down favorite. I named the first (who was full blood Guernsey and sooo small) Paulo, which means small in Portuguese. The second was part meat cow and instead of having a pitch black nose and eyeliner like Paulo, possessed more albino features. We named him Buster on the constant insisting of dad, who had been vying for that name since Grady. They’re weaned now, but just as perfect as before. Paulo’s a little wary of people but Buster is ecstatic at the sight of them. He’s the only one I’ve managed to halter train unsurprisingly. Not much has gone on with the chickens(mercifully) except one older chick(Elise) dying of a leg injury while we were in Texas and both the ducks disappearing (I guess I forgot to mention that Lonnie flew south weeks ago). Mom found feathers everywhere and a body in the woods from one of our white ducks. We don’t know if the other one got away, but it’s probably not coming back anyhow. The almost last animal I must address is Jake. That horrible little twerp. A few weeks ago, after mom and dad incessantly urging me, I made Jake go faster than his usual slow, begrudging pace. He was pretty ticked but obeyed pretty much fine until we got into the other field. The one with his food. And he was not happy when I made him leave it. So unhappy that he almost immediately took off running and bucked me off. It didn’t hurt, like, literally at all, but I was mad. I don’t think I’ve ridden him since, but when we went to Texas, I did get a chance to ride my aunts horse, who though she was pretty young, rode very well. When we got home, dad started looking into horse boot camps and found one 45 minutes away. He says if we can’t train him well enough by January or February, then Jake will go there for six weeks and have the stubborn trained out of him. I kinda hope that happens. We also found something out in Texas. Jake is not 21, but 16. Which kind of ticks me off because this whole time we thought he was a tired old man when hes really barely middle aged. The last animal I’m going to talk about is Marmee. She’s huge. A few months ago mom got to the point where she was ready to breed Marmee and dad had surrendered reluctantly. We found an AKC registered Bloodhound a few months ago and went to meet him. His owner had bred him before and was educated enough to educate us. Marmee was on a schedule of going into heat every 8 months. For some reason she was late by a month or two, but eventually it came and all we had to do was wait nine days. It felt like forever, but soon they were up and Marmee’s friend came over for a “play date”. I’ll skip the details; She’s due just after Christmas. I'm currently uploading 962 pictures onto my computer from my phone. I have NEVER had so many pictures on my phone. I usually take care of uploads quicker than that. Obviously I have been delinquent in more ways than this blog. So last time we had just cleaned up the homeschool room for the summer and now we have been back in that homeschool room for the 2020-2021 school year for about a month! I will break down our update by person: Bug is going to be 5 in just a few weeks! Eek! Our baby... and I am striving to not treat him like a baby. He started gymnastics a couple months ago with his brothers. He loves his coach and sometimes needs a reminder to not talk to his coach all through gymnastics practice! This school year he is required to sit with the family while I teach bible to start off our school day and we are being a little more intentional about learning his letter sounds and he gets to play Monster Math on my iPhone to work on his math. Hulk just turned 6 last month! So he is allowed to do more formal learning this school year and we are calling him a kindergartner. He has officially started Alpha-Phonics which is the book I use for teaching reading. He is doing very well, when he is able to focus. ; ) But we only work on reading about 10-15 minutes a day. He also sits with us for bible and reading aloud. Him and Bug play a lot together and often Wild Man is hanging out with them as well. Wild Man turned 9 last month and is in 3rd grade this year. He has been working really hard on his penmanship, which is not great. But he's made a lot of progress. He does all of the school work that his older siblings do. Wild Man is wild and has a really hard time with focus but in general he is a great joy to teach. He doesn't get overwhelmed easily. And he doesn't spend a lot of time thinking about himself, wether that means his abilities or lack of abilities, which frees him up to just enjoy stuff. I signed all of the boys up for gymnastics because I wanted Wild Man to take gymnastics. He is very strong and demands a high volume of physical stimulus. There is a gymnastics gym just three miles away from us and I saw a great opportunity for Wild Man's benefit. He has loved it and has excelled. All three of our youngest kiddos have grown 2 inches each since we moved here! The Boy is growing so much. His body is lengthening and looking more like a young man, while his face still looks like his. He joined the youth group this fall because he is in 6th grade now. Which does not seem possible to me. I'm focusing on his writing progress this year a lot but he does all the normal subjects for school. He reads for fun a lot! And enjoys playing quietly by himself. He's always been like that. Lately he has been into writing and illustrating comic books. His sense of humor runs along the same as the Far Side Comics, which I realized I need to buy him some books of to help nurture that. Hurricane has embraced the farm life whole heartedly. She enjoys researching all of the things to help us. She also spent most of her summer writing fiction with some long distance friends. She reads for fun a lot as well. Hurricane is my library trip reminder. She is in the 8th grade this year and we let her skip a grade in math. She seems to have really buttoned down in her homeschool studies. After the pictures you will find a portion of the update that she wrote. Tender started dual enrollment at SBU this fall. She is taking two classes there and as a result is only doing math and a subject I'm calling "Current Events" that I made up for the girls, at home. She was working part time at McDonalds for about 9 months and then a couple of weeks ago she switched to Taco Bell. A couple of her christian friends from youth work there so she is hoping for a more encouraging atmosphere there. She works about 16 hours a week and is gone every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9-2 for SBU classes. We have also been working on her driving skills becuase she got her permit. She is old enough now to get her license and we are going to do that soon, hopefully. Robert is getting in the swing of things at work. He is very good at what he does and is starting to enjoy it. Which has been my prayer since we moved here. I have longed for him to enjoy his job above all. Every Saturday he goes to the sale barn to see if there is any more livestock that we desperately need! Ha! Currently he is errating the lawn and hoping to plant good grass soon. We are also planning on planting several fruit trees next spring! I have been feeling out new chores in regards to new farm animals and the size of this house. I've been doing some extra studying in being an assistant for a local midwife and a doula. I started those classes a few months ago and it seems like my brain barely has enough space for me to cram that knowledge in! But I have so enjoyed it! Right now we are trying me being on call to assist at one birth a month to see how the family does with my being absent that often, which is unpredictable. I have no plans to become a midwife, I just want to be the humble "fetch and grab" for a midwife. : ) My garden is about done for the year. We had way too much cucumebrs, canteloupe, and okra! Overall it was a very productive garden this year. I also have a TON of pictures to share. Click on the picture if you want to see it bigger and read the caption... The Farm So Far by Hurricane
Near the beginning of June (I know, I know, that's like 4 years ago) a friend of ours accidentally bought a five-day-old bottle calf (how that's even possible at an auction, I have no idea). He was going on vacation the next day so he dropped it off at our house to ”babysit”. We eventually bought him and named him Grady. He was a lil sickly thing (Jersey cattle, am I right?) but ate and played fine. It didn't take more than a couple weeks for us to buy him a friend. She was a little older and feisty (as soon as we weaned her, she started to hate us). Since it was June at the time (and I blatantly refused to call her Miss Priss) we named her Joon(apparently after the movie Benny and Joon, which I have never seen). Anyway, she was fun, and she and Grady became very quick friends. The next week(or maybe the week before, I can't remember) we got 7 Buff Orpington chicks. Two ended up dying of some kind of internal problem, but surprisingly the rest are healthy to this day( I say surprisingly because our luck with chicks is cursed with the power of a thousand burning suns). Around this time Grady’s health was going downhill, and we started hyping him up on antibiotics. They didn't work in the end and while Tender and I were at camp, he stopped eating and even walking. Joon stayed with him until the end and dad eventually had to ”put him down”. Thankfully we didn't find out until we got home(although we did know they'd butchered all of our chickens(except Ms. D) because our youth leaders showed us the video mom had sent them. Both me and Tender’s reactions ranged from ”ew, gross” to ”haha. Jerks”) Mid July we got a 11 baby chicks(Rue(who died promptly), Prim(who lasted a little longer🙄), Katniss, Keefe, Spain, Toast, Dex, Tam, Lihn, Bear, and one who died so fast she never got a name and a duck(Lonnie, who is a jerk). Keefe and Prim were taken away in the night(oh joy), and Rue and the-one-that-must-not-be-named died of the internal thing(some luck, huh). The rest survived for another like 7 weeks under the rule of Lonnie(she led them around and freaked out whenever one went missing, it was hilarious and precious). Until (of course there's an until) one Sunday when we came home to find Bear, Spain, Toast and Dex all dead with snapped necks. The remaining three were gone and Lonnie was lonely and scared out of her mind. We got two baby ducks a few days later and christened them Penny and Desmond(from Lost) and she's pretty happy and over-controlling as ever now. Rewind a month and a half and Joon was spoiled single child. Dad decided he liked the bottle calf thing and went to get her a friend. Instead of just one, he brought home two: an absolutely huge black angus(legit though, we thought he was older than Joon he was so big and muscley) and another Jersey calf(the resemblance to Grady was striking and scary, it even fooled Joon). They were both about 5 or 6 days old. We named Jacob(the black angus) and Edward(the jersey) from Twilight(which was actually moms idea and dad thought it was too funny to not name them after the biggest joke in young adult fantasy). Thankfully Edward's still alive and very healthy at about eleven or twelve weeks. Jake is still unbelievably jacked and Joon is tolerating them both. A little while after we got the Twilight boys, we started wanting a horse(meaning me and dad) and I was told to wait until something came up. Soon something did: a 20 year old Paint that currently lived with dad's sister. He wasn't riden hardly ever anymore, but was chill enough to tolerate it okay. My aunt and cousins made the trip up here a week ago to bring him and hang out with us for a couple nights. Anyways, his name is Jake(we call other Jake, Jacob now to avoid too much confusion) and he does ride reasonably okay (except he did buck me the other day and sprained my finger, because as nice as he is, he's still overweight and old and kinda cranky) We also got more chicks and chickens a couple of days ago along with 4 Guineas(who, guess what! Were killed last night. I told you our luck with birds is cruddy. And to add to that, we also got a chick Splash Silkie with separation anxiety and kept her in my room for a few days, succeeding only in making her believe she belonged with us humans and causing her to panic and book it her first night outside😒) Anyways, that's all that's happened in terms of attempted farming in the past few months(or should I say years? That's sure what it felt like) "When I am filled with cares, your comfort brings me joy." Psalm 94:19 Joy in the middle of immense cares comes from the Lord's comforts. Not what the material things he gives us but the comfort he brings. The eternal comfort, not the temporal relief of cares in this world. No one can take that comfort away from you either. Everything else that brings us happiness or joy goes away eventually but the comforts of the Lord are forever. I've been meditating on this a lot lately. I don't have a lot to share beyond that. Its my favorite thing to think about these days.
In the pictures you will find Hurricane, The Boy, and Wild Man with all of the books (that we own, there were dozens more from the library) that they each read or were read this school year. Our homeschool room all cleaned up for the summer and all of our books put in the right place on their shelves. Feels good. Another fun breakfast idea. Marmee's photo shoot to get her ready for finding a bloodhound to mate with. A quilt that I made out of our favorite baby/toddler clothes. And finally, some of our baby farm pictures. Click on the picture to make it larger and read the caption. Yesterday was our first Sunday back in church for 10 weeks. It was lovely. With the new regulations for church because of the pandemic the nurseries and children's church are not open. I have heard some moms talking about the difficulties this presents for them. Personally, I love hearing your littles throughout church! Robert and I have always preferred to worship with our kiddos. : ) But I remember what its like to teach your kids how to sit in church. Its not easy. Well, with some kids it is easy, with others it feels impossible. But this morning my mom, a pastor's wife, told me I should write up a little something on how to train your kiddos to sit in church. So, I am obeying. If your kids are school age and go to a school this will be easier. In fact, I'm not even going to address school aged kids. I'm only going to talk about babies up to 4 year olds,
First, you are not alone. For thousands of years parents have been teaching their children how to sit through a church service. And adults knew how to listen to a sermon without being annoyed by children. This skill has only been lost in the last 100 years. It is possible! And in this situation other parents are trying o figure it out too. I hope that this season makes church folks more gracious toward children in church. Personally, I love seeing your kids in church! BUT I am going to strive to not get into the philosophy behind why we keep our kids with us. I am going to just stick to practical stuff here. (This is driving Robert crazy, if you want to hear the philosophy and why its a great season to worship with your kids, give him a call.) Second, basic obedience is a must. If your child won't come to you when you call them or won't stay seated at the table for dinner when you tell them to, if they scoff at any command you give them, then there will not be any magical trick to getting them to obey you at church and no where else. There has to be a basic respect for your authority. Babies: For very young babies I am a big believer in wearing them and teaching them how to fall asleep on you. If you have more than one child you have realized the gift this is. With my first everything revolved around her and she always slept in her bed and never could fall asleep in the car or on me. But with subsequent children you are just too busy for that. I train my babies to fall asleep in the sling so that church is easier (along with other things, but I'm staying focused here). This works great with most babies. As for older babies you may need to start teaching more formally. One of my boys had the hardest time with this. He was a screamer! He screamed for joy, anger, boredom, excitement, you name it, he had a scream for it. For this particular baby, starting around a year old, after dinner I would sit on the couch with him in my lap and say "We are going to sit still for a little bit." And we would sit like that until he would sit quietly for just a few minutes. Which took a long time. There was lots of bucking and screaming and lashing out. I just repeated myself and stuck it out. I didn't work on his volume until I got his sitting. It took a year of this practicing before he made it through a whole sermon without my needing to take him out because of how loud he had become. That is extreme. All of my other kids took about a month or two. Toddlers: I recommend (for all of my children, any age, we do this) setting up some chairs in a row(big ones because church chairs and pews are made for adults and feel different to sit in than little kid chairs), putting on a sermon audio, and tell them that we are praciticng sitting in church. Start shorter and add minutes as they get better. In this environment at home you can pause the sermon and deal with behavior freely. You can sit two particular children together who are always fighting and teach them how to keep the peace. I'm going to say the ultimate goal is sitting without anything to play with. And then if you decide that its worth it later you can incorporate paper and crayons or a snack or what have you. Speaking of coloring, here is my favorite sermon notes page for this age: www.mamaslearningcorner.com/listening-pages-for-non-readers/ I think that I've shared it before but just in case! In General: -Snacks are more of a pain than help. They drop them, cry over them, "brother has more raisin than I do!". Its just a big pain! But that is my opinion, it may work for your family. -Everyone goes potty before church starts. -Sit in the front. I know, I know, you don't want to be a distraction but sitting in the front helps little children to pay attention better. If they are in the back they don't even know why your there, they can't see the pastor. And all of the people in front of them are a distraction to them. The closer you are to the front, I promise, the better they behave! -Strategize seating arrangments. At home is a good place to teach your children to sit by the sibling that they are fighting with but not at church. We divide and conquer and put a lot of thought into who sits where and by whom. -Listen to your churches worship music throughout the week. Help them memorize a couple of the frequent ones. I love watching my kids' eyes light up when they know by heart a song that the worship team starts to play! -Have an exit strategy. I do not tolerate my children being disrespectful to the teaching of God's word by yelling or throwing a fit. If my baby starts crying and can't be quieted within a few seconds, if two children start fighting, if the teenager gets tickled about something that flits through their mind and they can't stop laughing, we are out of there. Leave, take a few moments to calm down, have a mini discipline session, short talk, nursing room for baby, or just standing in the back and swaying with baby, whatever it takes and then right back in. (Some toddlers will learn that if they behave badly you will take them out and they can play in a back room for the rest of the sermon. That is a reward and nothing is learned. We don't do this. We get back in as quickly as possible.) -Talk about church throughout the week! The above sermon notes are to help littles pay attention just a bit. I'm trying not to get into the philosophy here but don't look at this time as something to just survive. See it as a blessing and opportunity. Espescially if your kiddo would normally be in children's church and they are older, the conversations about the sermon can be so fruitful! Don't miss out! Don't think "How can I just get my kid to be quiet?" If that is the goal then they will be on a screen playing Angry Birds with headphones, or something. Think, "How can I help my child learn more about God and their church family? How can I prepare my child to spend the rest of his/her life enjoying a real church setting?" This is the highest most honorable and needful thing you can teach your child! It has eternal benefits! -Book recommendation: Parenting in the Pew by Robbie Castleman We have still been working hard to social distance in an effort to flatten the curve, as the authorities say. I am still sewing face masks. In fact, I sewed a couple unisex ones to keep in my purse so that if I see someone that needs one I can offer it to them. There was an (older)man that worked at Dollar Tree last week who was wearing a sleeping mask with a bandana wrapped around it. So I gave him one and he was grateful. We are still plugging away at homeschool but it is difficult without the library and fun field trips. I am grateful for a big yard and the creek on our property. I felt like this week was especially fun though. We came up with a project to bless our friends. Here is what we did. We learned about how spies use dead drops to pass something off to another spy when they can't be seen together. So we filled buckets that I got at Dollar Tree with treats and notes for 7 families in our area, who the kids were well acquainted with their kids. Then on Friday we pulled up to each of their houses, hid the dead drop and then texted them a clue to find it. It wasn't that hard to find them, but it was still fun for us! We played Mission Impossible music in the van and it was, like, one of two times that we have all loaded up into the big van in that last four weeks. It was so much fun!
I know that we have a different life style than a lot of you. I have been trying to think of how different some of your lives are. Some of our friends have their kiddos in lots of sports and those are all cancelled now. Some of them have jobs that they are doing from home while also trying to use what their kids' schools provide to educate their kids. Some of your lives are totally turned upside down. Some of you are single parents, completely deprived of adult interaction. Some people are single without kids, or elderly, living alone. It makes me wonder how everyone else is faring. What they are learning. While there is a lot that is stressful, I have heard of some sweet blessings in this. Some parents are relearning how great their kids are, after getting to spend more time with them. Some people are spring cleaning like fiends. Some seem to be deciding that maybe all of the events in their lives that they viewed as essential, weren't that essential. And some will appreciate events more when they get them back. Now for some pictures.... Tender is done with working until all of this blows over. She has been respectful of our decision even though she isn't thrilled with being stuck at home. Robert is still working but will likely be taking some vacation days here and there. I made several face masks and Robert took one for the neurologist and receptionist at his work. It took me about a week to get the pattern right and get the hang of how I'm making them. There is a pocket that you can slip a vacuum bag filter into, if you would like more protection. We have also been prepping a garden. We have all of the grass burned away and it is tilled up. We want to add some compost and then we will start planting seeds. Hopefully in the next few days. The girls have both made routines and goals for this time in an effort to not become depressed and aimless. I am trying to help the boys reach some exercise goals too. As time goes by we just get more and more strict about this social distancing thing. It's been 18 days since the boys have been in a public place. I go to the grocery store about once a week and get essentials but I don't take anything into the house without sanitizing it first and then I wipe down the car handles and steering wheel and such. I am praying about how to celebrate Jesus' resurrection since it looks like we may not be able to gather for Easter this year. Everytime I think about this I tear up. I miss gathering with my brothers and sisters in Christ. Watching a sermon on a screen is no substitute although I am grateful for the pastors that are laboring to still feed us with the Word weekly. I am so sad, missing the church very much. And I long to celebrate Christ's resurrection with them. But we trust the Lord. I am trying to make a cross to put upright in our front yard. And I told the kids that on easter morning I want to rise early and sing the sun up! Also, I recommend the playlist on spotify called CBC Women's Retreat 2019. It has been an encouragment lately!
(With how I'm having to upload pictures now, you can click on the picture and it will get bigger and reveal the caption, if there is one) |
LindseyI'm the mama and wife. Updating you on our life! Archives
January 2022
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