Watchin' the Corn Grow

Sure is handsome! 

The kids, minus Isaac, are all at camp this week so it's been very quiet.  I've taken over the kitchen by painting signs for the maze.  This is a 4x5 foot pumpkin with questions about pumpkins.  They can lift the boards for the answers. (And the P. family would want to know the answer to the top left question is Illinois!)

And this is a 4x8 foot corn cob.  I'm not the greatest artist but at least people should know it's a corn cob!  There's a couple more I want to make yet too when I have time.  Have a good evening remembering God's great gift - Jesus!

Maze Photo

Well here it is.  The aerial photo of the maze.  I know it's not the best and it took a heap of editing to make it as good as it is but it still looks kinda cool and a relief to know it really does look like Minnesota!  The bridge is up in the clouds.  The big lake on the top of Minnesota is Lake of the Woods where we live by.  The other lakes are the Upper and Lower Red Lakes, and Mille Lacs Lake. (Not room to add all 11,000+ other lakes!)  The curvy trails are the Minnesota and the Mississippi Rivers.  Some of the state and trails get a little hard to see because we took parts out to make the maze a little harder to venture through. Most of the trails in the state are county lines.  If anybody has any ideas on how to "turn" the photo to make it more flat I'd welcome them!

And these are Priscilla's cute scarecrow guys, Lew and Orville C. Cornpone.  One boy said at the parade referring to Silas, "Look, there's a real scarecrow!"  One little girl said she liked her maze postcard as much as her candy!  That's what makes the maze fun to do - seeing others have fun!

I forgot to mention, Priscilla's Buff Opferington (I'm sure that's spelling wrong!) has a baby chick!  A whole nest of eggs but when the one chick hatched, she deserted the nest despite Priscilla continually putting her back on the nest.  Sure a cute little thing.  We'll post a photo sometime soon.

It's day three of our County Fair.  The kids are working in our church booth telling the wordless book to children.  So far this week they've had 109 children and 11 salvation decisions!  Today is usually their busiest day so please pray for them.  Have a great day in the Lord!

Ah, Summer Days...

And summer days always bring our local county fair and with that a county wide parade.  We did a maze float as you can see.  The poor scarecrow guy kinda took a nap!  Silas agreed to sit on the back and handed Priscilla and her friends maze postcards to give out. 

In the orange shirts are Elizabeth, Jessica and Krystal.  All together they passed out about 1,000 cards and got lots of good responses.

I mainly posted this picture because after I downloaded them and saw it I had to laugh at all the children running around on the street!  Amazing no one gets hurt!!  There sure was a lot of candy given out and I would guess most kids grocery bags were about full!

These are a little out of order.  Sunday night Arthur, Isaac, Miriam, Hosanna, Silas and Priscilla and I decided to wander over to the maze.  The guys hadn't been in it yet so we let them find their way.  When we got out Aaron and Naomi's truck was there so we knew they had found us and were in the maze too.  While waiting for them Amos and Rebekah drove up with their sweet boys.  So, we had quite a maze party!  Here's the expectant mothers, hubbys, and grandchildren.  Pretty pathetic grass isn't it?  It's very sandy and the grass just doesn't want to grow.  Oh well, it will be nicer than last year!

Still newlyweds!

The guys had to play king of the hill on the bale tires and Daniel had to imitate Miriam and climb up on a stump.  In the background you can see the fence Arthur built to kinda create a buffer zone between cars and the events.

David played with rocks quite nicely!  Tasted some too!  Sometime I'll try to catch David's adorable smile for you all to see.

There was a nice sunset as we sat around the fire pit getting eaten alive by mosquitos.

Back to the parade.  Here's the float closer up.  It was kinda windy so the corn blew around some.

And here's the great float crew - Silas, Rachel, Elizabeth, Priscilla, Julie, Jessica, and Krystal.  Thank you all for your hard work!!

Happy Birthday, Silas!

16 years old already!  I can hardly believe it!!  Silas is known for his diligence and preciseness.  Thank you, Silas, for all your hard work and the humor you bring to our house!  We love you very much!!  I would post a picture but lately he's the one with the camera and so I don't have any current photo's of him.  Today he had the fun of going up with Arthur to take an aerial maze photo.  Unfortunately, he gave Arthur the good camera and he took the blurry one so we didn't get any really good ones.   We'll see what editing will do.

Arthur had two big projects this week that the J. kids, and some nephews helped out with.  Picking rocks was one of them.  What a hard job!  There's Ronnie, Jeshua, Arthur, Nathan, Mathias, Caleb, and Joshua.

I liked this one of Joshua.  He comes from way down south in South Dakota so maybe that's why he has an insulated coat on! 

Our nephew Ronnie, and brother Jeshua have been a lot of help on the farm this summer.  Thanks, guys! 

Then the guys went weeding in a neighbors soybean field. 

The J. girls and Priscilla are in the background.

Well, have a great day, Silas!

Joshua

Silas enjoyed teaching cousin Joshua to drive the tractor.  He loved it! 

Children and Prayers

Have you ever noticed how much children increase your prayer life? (I'm talking to parents here!)  They drive fast, travel with rickety vehicles, climb precarious heights, come in covered with blood, fish on the stormiest days, return home late during snowstorms, don't tell you if somethings bothering them, have babies, enjoy the challenges of poverty, act lethargic, take on huge projects, jump from tall objects, get sick, and so much more! 

I remember as a young girl when spending holidays with my grandparents that they would pray and pray and pray for devotions for just about everyone they knew and each relative by name.  I thought it went on too long but as I got older I appreciated their long prayers and knowing that each day I was being prayed for.  I enjoyed bringing them prayer requests because I knew they would never forget to pray.

I remember before I was married, every time one of us left the house, my mom would pray for our safety, for wisdom in what we did.  I know she still prays for me and my family.

I'm glad I had people that prayed for me because I certainly needed it.  Children tend to do that, make us pray harder.  I hope, and pray, I can be a godly example of someone who consistently prays for my children and grandchildren and that they will seek God as they in turn pray for their children and future children.

Maze...Maze...Maze

At least the kids think all we talk about is the maze!  I've been really busy working on a few maze things because I know once the end of July comes, the garden is going to need all my attention.  On the left above is some stuff I got for "goodie bags" for our Dairy Day at the maze.  Other than the Got Milk pencil and cheese eraser, I got the things free - a great thing when you're on a budget!  In the middle on the top you can see the postcard we had made with the details on the back side.  They were actually cheaper to make than flyers and we wanted them to be easy to pass out in the parade.  They're very nice and glossy.  Then we're making tee shirts for the workers.  Even changed our header on the maze website to kinda match.  Next year I have someone very sweet lined up to make us an "official" logo, if we do this again! 

The girls headed over to cousin Rachel's house for her birthday yesterday and had a great time.  Thanks, Rachel, for inviting them!  I think they came home with, like, 130 pictures or so but I'll only post this one.

Have a great day enjoying God's blessings!

4th of July

Well the long weekend is over and did we ever have a good time!  Here's the Krahn side of the family. 

And the Ortmann side of the family.

We did lots of eating!  So did the mosquitos!!

Priscilla and her cousins had fun hanging out together.

My nephew Benjamin was the patriot on the tea party float at the parade. 

Priscilla talked Aaron into wearing Arthur's cowboy hat to the parade.  Cute couple aren't they!

Took one quick jaunt out to the corn to see how much taller than knee high it was and it was about waist high on me. 

We always have our own "fireworks" in the form of the booms of guns target shooting.  These are my nephews.

Hannah brought along her pink .22 which everyone loved.

And Reuben just had to have his picture with that nice gun!   Even with all the fun, we enjoy having a day to celebrate our Indepence from being under a king, to our Dependance on God to sustain us as a nation.

Another Hay Day

Another really hot day to bale hay.  I heard someone say it hit 90, which around here is a "once every couple of summers" kinda thing.  This is Jonathan J.(with the hat), my nephew Jeshua(with the bandana), and Nathan(in the camos), Rebekah's little brother.  Altogether the crew put 1,355 bales in the haymow.  Good job guys!

What is it?  Well, a lady at church shared her rhubarb orange candy jam recipe.  It sounded kinda strange but Miriam tried it out today since we happened to have everything for it and it really is quite good.  The picture doesn't really do it justice as it's more orangy in color.  Here's the recipe:

6 Cups rhubarb cut in slices

2 1/2 Cups sugar

Mix and let sit for two hours.

Add: 1/2 -1 lb. candy orange slices cut in little pieces.

Bring to a boil for about 15 minutes.

Add: One box apricot jello.

Boil one more minute and put in jars.

Miriam waterbathed the jars for about 10 minutes and got five small jars.

It's a Hay Day!

Yes, it's hot but hot days are always good hay days and the guys and Miriam, along with nephews and J. guys are busy making square bales to put up in the haymow.  It's an old barn and so square bales seem to be easiest to feed although they do feed some round bales too.  They sell some to horse folks.  Had a few of the guys in though with headaches and generally feeling lousy because of the heat.  Rest, lots of water and Emergen-C's seem to help and before you know it they're back out. 

A couple of days ago the girls and Isaac went Juneberry picking.  Makes one excited for the blueberries!

Isn't she cute!  Cousin Abby made her the daisy wreath.  I love having bouquets of daisy's on the table this time of year.  Seems like I never have quite enough of my own flowers to pick the huge bouquets.

This summer we're working on learning about some of the wild plants around us.  This is the 'red elderberry' and you can find it along woods, in ditches, etc.  The berries, leaves, and stems are all toxic so don't go eating them!  They bloom really early in the spring and are kinda a nice bush to look at.  They are not to be confused with the common elderberry bush.