Raspberry Pickin'

I thought Daniel and David might enjoy picking raspberries this morning, and they did!

You can't see it on the picture but there is a smile on that face whenever he found a berry to pick!

"My container's almost full!"

Of course, picking berries wouldn't be nearly so much fun if Grandpa wasn't out there!

And Josh too!

Daniel, David, and Priscilla's Trip

Just a quick picture of Daniel and David before Priscilla tells about her trip.  The boys are loving the "spring puddle" that takes over part of our yard every year.   For the most part the snow is all gone except for a little in the woods and ditches.   Okay, I'll turn this post over to Priscilla -

Ok, so about my trip. I had a great time! I think I said this last year after my Journey to the Heart, but spending ten days just seeking God is always so encouraging. It's so hard sometimes at home to just take and set aside time to really fellowship and spend time with God.

This is myself with Elizabeth B. and Tabitha K. The weather there was beautiful the first few days, and then we had a snow storm, and it was still beautiful, just in a different way.

Jessica J. Alexis B. Abby H. and Rachel M. all went with me, and we had so much fun together! It is such a blessing to have friends who want to seek God and encourage you.

At the Northwoods, some of the girls built this snow bear before we left. One of the arms fell off, but it was still cute. 

On the way down to the Journey, we stopped to visit the Gillette hospital where my cousin Victoria M. was a patient for a while. It was such a blessing to get to see the place, and meet some of the people that worked with her. When we went back to the parking garage to leave, the van broke down so we had to hall all of our stuff into the hospital while the van was towed. We were so blessed that the van had broken down at the hospital, and not on the middle of the free way. It also gave us the oppertunity to give thanks in EVERYTHING. Well it was an awesome trip, I would highly recommend it to everyone else. Keep enjoying spring, and make sure that you're giving thanks in Everything.  Take some extra time today to get alone with God and thank Him for everything, even the things in your life that are less than desirable. Through Christ we are more than conquerors!

Farm Work - Corn, Tractors, Hay, Fishing, Legos

I don't know if you call this farm work but it does go against the norm to cut down perfectly good corn!  Hopefully we will finish cutting the maze this evening.  The heat has made it really hard for me too spend too long out there at a time. Yes, it was taller than "knee high on the 4th of July".

You might not call this farm work but we do!  It's Arthur's way of educating kids to farming and agriculture!  We had the privilege of watching my niece's son for a day and he loves tractors!

Baling square bales.  Jonathan J. is driving, Isaac, Caleb J., and Matthew M. are on the trailer doing the stacking.  It really doesn't look "too hard" but with the heat we've been having along with high humidity, it's almost too hot to stand outside let alone work.  Thankfully, they got the job done safely.  They're out raking more today.

Cowboy Matthew standing on top of the hay trailer.

Silas took this photo from on top of the hay wagon.  The cut hay did get rained on several times one day when the forecast said clear and sunny.  The cows won't complain.

Isaac took a couple of his nephews and their grandpa and Aaron fishing. (Isaac figures fishing is a type of farming.  You know, getting food :)

Daniel especially just loved being out on the lake.

Grandpa N. hanging onto David.

Aaron should be happy.  They only caught two fish all morning and Aaron got one of them, also the biggest one.  The girls think their brother-in-law makes a pretty good cowboy in the white hat.

Just waiting for a fish to bite.

No, the addition isn't done.  We moved the legos to the new room and so the grandchildren have a place to play where we don't have to worry about the little ones eating legos.  That room is much cooler than the rest of the house so it's a nice place to be. Legos could be farm work if they would make farm lego sets with tractors and farmer people!  If anyone has free time and enjoys taping and puttying seams, I sure could use help :) I have a hard time doing anything over my head and I'm not sure I'm patient enough to wait for Arthur to have time next winter!

Esther and Anna both love Rosa.  Miriam gets the girls to sing with Rosa and visit with her.


4th of July photos coming soon when I get a chance.  Have a wonderful hot day wherever you are.  Remember that God is in charge of the weather, whether rain, shine, or snow and sends us what he knows we need!

Christmas at Our House

I have to admit, probably the most fun thing about Christmas is the grandchildren!  Esther is such a sweetheart and is SO much like Naomi was when she was little I can hardly believe it.  Takes a person back in time!



Little Anna is adorable too and looks more like Aaron's side of the family.  She has such a sweet smile and when she got a cold it was hard to see her not feeling good.  These little girls will be greatlly missed!

Then there's the active little boys!  I loved this picture of Jeriah reading the Cowboy Small book upsidedown.  I don't have a really good picture of it, but they each got new cowboy hats with pistols and holsters.  Jeriah especially seemed so tickled and pleased that he had something that big brothers weren't taking away from him.  Little girls are sweet and little boys are so much fun! They have such energy and eagerness to do things. 

Um, I almost feel bad mentioning the word gun after this last week.  Very, very sad.  It's really sad too that people are unaware of how many lives guns save every day.  Of course we know the only real answer is our Savior Jesus Christ.  What a wonderful time of year to share the wonderful gift God has given us to all the hurting people in this world.  No, God doesn't take all the problems in life away but knowing there is someone that loves and cares about you makes such a difference. Try to find someone to share this great gift with this year.  That was our challenge this week in church and I challenge you with the same.

I'll post more tomorrow now that things have slowed down.

This and That

Yesterday Arthur (with help) worked on building a small shed to house the grill at the maze.  Miriam and I took a walk through the maze and some of it was over our heads!  Taking mostly the right trails, it took about a half an hour.  We did go slow and made some wrong turns.  We're so thankful for the rain as the corn looked pretty bad before that. 

Oh, the joy that little grandchildren bring!  Anna is such a doll and we have really enjoyed having her and Esther and Naomi here.  They're in GF right now with Aaron but should be back sometime.  Yesterday we had the little men (David, Daniel and Jeriah) over while Amos and Rebekah did a few things.  They sure keep us busy and say the cutest things!  Like David said, "Are you Grandma Camille?" I guess he'd never heard my name attatched to Grandma before.

I am mortified!! Since the whole town will probably talk about it, I'll tell you.  I was on the phone calling about a perscription this morning.  I went on to tell the nice lady that "one of my husbands will pick it up later today." Agh!!  I meant to say one of my kids!  Arthur was there and thought it quite funny but said that maybe I better pick up the pills. 

Have a great day!

4th of July

Well, another 4th of July is past.  One of my favorite things was watching David pick up candy at the parade.  All the kids were cute but he was extra fun to watch.  Sometimes he'd bend over and stare at the candy before picking it up.  Often someone else would grab it out from under his stare because he was so slow in deciding when to pick it up. 

Jeriah was sure cute too.  Someone handed him a little flag and he was so happy about that flag.  Ah, I love my grandchildren!  Naomi has also been here so we've enjoyed having little girls around as well!

And then there was our maze float.  The cow (Elizabeth M.) was a real hit as was the corn cob.  The guys and girls did a great job passing out around 1,900 maze cards!  We loved how people really, really, wanted one of those cards!  Hopefully that is a sign that people will come out this fall.

And here's a close up photo.  Thanks, Matthew, for being the corn cob!  And thank you to Alexis, Dallas, Jonathan, Abby, Ronnie, Jessica, Krystal, Elizabeth, Rachel, Matthew, Silas, and Priscilla for all your help!!!!  We could not do it without you!!

Dependant on God

The field work is progressing at a nice pace.  We could use some rain, but with a few more fields to get in, it can wait.  Day after day rain is in the forecast but we just don't get it.  Guess we are following the same dry pattern we had last summer and all winter.  I wonder if people realize when they go to the grocery store, how dependant they are on God for the food on the shelves?  Even those that want the government to feed them, won't be fed if God chooses not to send rain.  Here Arthur is fertilizing about a week ago.  Since then,the leaves have really started coming out.  There is still some corn to plant and soybeans.  Yes, the maze is planted. 

Daniel and David discovered a new "toy" at our house.  A canoe! 

Thought for the day:  Did you ever notice how when you are working on an area of your life, you struggle with it more than you did before you started working on it!

Isaac's Exciting News!!

 Isaac's excited!  He bought some property!  Ten acres to be exact and it has a barn, grainbin, garage, and trailer house on the property, plus a few really old broken down sheds.  He's had his eye on it for about a year now, and, as broke as he is now, it's all paid for, and he has a nice fixer-upper place.  The barn has a pretty good roof and is in good shape although it looks like it needs some fixing.  The trailer is small and older so I'm not sure what he'll do with it.  Maybe fix it and rent it out or sell it or something.  The grain bin has our corn maze corn in it, at least what is left of the corn.

The trees in the background are on his property and have the Bulldog River that goes behind our barn going through the woods.  Our place is on the other side of the power lines in the far back left corner of the picture.   It's really a neat, quiet place that has lots of potential.  I believe his first plan of action is to plant more trees (when it warms up some!) and do some fencing to put some calves over there or maybe his herd of beef cows that's currently with our cows.  I'm happy for you, Isaac!  God is so good!

We had the privilege of watching grandchildren this week. One of the first things Daniel does when he comes over is say, "Papa's cowboy hat?".  He loves wearing it.

The boys also love Jeriah and can't seem to hold him enough.  Davy says, "Hi, baby." over and over.

Here's the Fried Ice Cream Dessert recipe.  It's so simple but so good!

12 Tblps. butter melted

1 1/2 Cup brown sugar

4 Cups corn flakes crushed

2/3 Cup walnuts crushed (we used pecans and peanuts would work too)

1/2 Gallon ice cream, slightly softened

Combine the margarine and brown sugar, mix in the corn flakes, nuts, and coconut.  Layer most of the crumb mixture in a 9x13 pan.  Spread ice cream evenly over the top.  Sprinkle with remaining crumbs. (you can't ever have enough of the crumbs!)  Freeze until ready to serve.  We drizzle honey or chocolate over the top when we serve it.

Have a great day!

The "Little People" and Hard Questions

We've been watching Daniel and David while Amos helps with evening milking while Rebekah recouperates.  Daniel especially just loves "horsey" rides and blanket rides from Grandpa.

Aaron and Naomi were by one day and we enjoyed seeing how Aaron and Naomi treasure this little sweetheart. 

Daniel of course treasures David and gives him big hugs.  Isaac mentioned how he saw Daniel was dragging a chair to the kitchen sink and David was on the floor in the way.  He didn't want to push him over, this time anyway, so he dragged him out of the way by his head!  Brotherly love alright!  We've sure been entertained with these little guys and Esther.

And a neat picture Silas took of the moon.

Otherwise, Arthur's been busy getting rid of some old equipment by cutting it up to sell for scrap metal.  A hard job but nice to get rid of some things.  He made a call yesterday to another corn maze operator and if there's anything that creates instant fellowship other than both being christians, it's two farmers!  It always amazes me how two farmers can talk and talk without having ever met!  About cattle, tractors, and mazes of course!  I guess two homeschool mothers probably could do the same thing about school!

We've been watching the "Demolishing Strongholds" videos in the evenings.  Very interesting and have provoked lots of fun discussion as a family.  I think of all the things we do as a family now that the kids are older, there is nothing I enjoy more than our evenings together after the work is all done and we can just visit and fellowship with each other.  Inevitably, conversation turns to "what should Isaac be doing?", "do we really have to have a maze this fall?" (that coming from Miriam who is not a social type person), "what else needs to be done on the farm?",  and, "is there anything else we should be doing to serve God?"

Lately we've been doing lots of talking about what we should do to serve God.  If we knew we only had two years before the Lord returns, what would we do?  If we have many years to serve, then what should we do?  How is the best way to reach lots of people for Christ?  Is it better to get lots saved or to disciple one or two?  Knowing God's will is not always easy when you ask such hard questions.  Anyway, it leads to lots of discussions and desires to serve God in anyway that we can.  I hope and pray my children will all be, "I'll do it!" kind of people and not be afraid to serve God in anyway they can.

Enjoying the Nice Weather

Naomi comes over once a week to give her siblings and cousins piano lessons.  We love having her around!  We enjoy Aaron too, but he doesn't come along for lessons!

Today Amos and Rebekah did some fencing for the cows and so we got to watch the little guys.  David is getting so big!  It's so interesting how both Daniel and David have gorgeous blue eyes and both of their parents have very brown eyes.  Guess they take after their Grandma Shelly and Grandma Camille!  I enjoy watching children and seeing how God combines both parents, and sometimes even grandparents, or aunts and uncles features to make a whole new little person. 

We've finally had some nice melting weather and so we have these huge puddles in our yard.  Miriam thought she'd take Daniel for a "boat" ride.  He loved it!

Daniel also loved splashing in the puddles. 

Guess the neighbor boy was watching because he had to go for a boat ride too.  Only he made himself some oars to maneveur around.  Children and puddles - goes together doesn't it!     A lady in the store told me, " We have to go through this to get summer," referring to the mud and puddles.  Reminds me of how sometimes the greatest victories in our walk with God are after a time of hard, messy work whether it be a trial, a battle to overcome, a struggle to find direction, or whatever.  Isn't God good to send the rain and the snow, and the mud!

It's a Purse, and Daniel, and David!

Purse first. I've been trying to think of creative things to do for a VBS craft that doesn't cost much. Well, this cute little purse made out of an old pair of jeans would be just perfect for the girls but I can't think of anything for the boys. Anyone got an idea? I actually glued this one because I thought it would be easier for the girls and now that the tacky glue has dried, I am sure it would handle lots of stuffing and pulling by the girls. A person could also paint on them, glue sunflowers or something, beads, anything. So if you know a little girl, this is really, really easy! There's actually a jean pocket on both sides so there are three pockets inside the purse. Velcro would be great on one pocket for sure.

Last night Amos and Rebekah went out for supper so we watched the boys. Daniel is really starting to get into books. He sure can "talk" about the pictures even though we have no idea what he's saying.

Caleb and Isaac were a big help. Caleb read lots to Daniel, and Isaac rocked, "Want my mama!", David. My how fast these little guys grow up. Reminds me of new christians and how fast some of them grow. May we always be eager for God's Word like Daniel is eager to look at books and may we always be eager to spend time with God like David is eager to be with Rebekah. Have a great day and Lord's Day tomorrow!