Villhauer's Farm Blessings: Slippin' Away

Time, and summer days, keep slipping away. This week's end marks the halfway point of summer, in terms of most school calendars. According to the astronomical calendar though, the first day of summer was June 21st, and it goes until the first day of autumn, September 22nd... so we are just 1/6th of the way into summer. I like that better.

     Joe, Britney and I were at Moraine view by 7am Saturday, so Britney could register for a 5K race. We were delayed getting there because we had to turn back to go home to drop off Missy who had climbed in the car un-noticed and started howling when we got about a mile down the road.

     I walked the three mile race loop around the lake with Kaysha, going in the opposite direction as the runners. I cheered them on as they came around the loop and ran past. Britney placed first in her age group. The rain then came shortly after the race, and was off and on all day Saturday. This was probably best because I was working on last weeks Blog post much of the day, Joe was busy with State Farm work and Britney was trying to do home work for her class that starts Wednesday. We were all ready for dinner and a break, so went to Jack's
                                                   in LeRoy to eat, and then to the

Princess Theater to watch the movie, "Now You See Me." It was a kind of a cheesy, far-fetched, action detective film; but fun none the less. Like time, now you see me, now you don't.

Sunday morning it was to the nursery, Church, grocery shopping and Courtney's for water. We got rained on, all the way home.

Abbey loves to distract us, trying to start up a game of "Hide & Seek" or "Catch Me If You Can."

With threatening skies, I stayed in until midday. Then I took Amiga for a ride. I went down Baker's Lane and across the wooden bridge with her. This is the farthest (longest) I have riden her since she came up lame two years ago. Other than wanting to go in her own direction, which I kept correcting, she did very well.

Joe brought home carry-out Chinese on his way back from a second place finish in a poker Tournament on the river boat in Peoria. After we ate, Britney and I took Kaysha into Downs to walk, and dropped off some left over Chinese at Dan & Dan's.

There was a big cat fight up in the Chinese Elm by our deck. I called Brother down from a high branch and tried to photograph the Tom cat. He soon slipped away into the night.

It was cold and I was lazy Monday morning, so I skipped going to LeRoy to workout in the pool. And I had five cookies and three cups of tea. Guess I fell off the wagon. Worst yet, five hours of time slipped away before I even realized it. I did learn about bamboo flooring (which is in one of the houses we are going to view) and I got caught up on my daily devotionals that I had gotten a little behind on. I also made some calls and sent e-mails... so it wasn't a total loss of the morning.

I found this skull (along with a ton of hair) up in the hay mow when I was getting some hay. It looks to have been a pretty good sized rabbit and I was impressed that one of the barn cats could get it up the ladder to eat it up there... explains why I kept smelling something dead in the barn a week ago.

I mowed for almost 2 hours and then came in to bake brownies to take to Growth Group. After I had already poured two boxes of the mix in the bowl, I discovered I was short on vegetable oil (I needed 1&1/3 cups). So, I used it all up and then grabbed the olive oil. I ran out of it too. Last of all I got butter to complete the total grease needed. Then, I over baked the brownies! I am just not apt at cooking. I wasn't sure how good/bad the brownies would be. They ended up kind of dry... but a little ice-cream could help that.

The cows picked an odd place to lie down. At least they seem fat and happy.

I was up at 4am Tuesday, with too much going through my mind to get back to sleep. At 7:30 I squished into my swim suit and drug myself to Water Lilies on a very cold (for July 2nd) morning. Luckily we were in the indoor pool and it wasn't all that bad.

I know that I am not very good at multi-tasking... but I really set myself up for failure when I tried to bake cookies while raking up piles of hay left out in the field. Actually, only one pan was a little too "done." But I did have to sprint to the house once, to save another batch.
<- The dessert tray is ready for our picnic.

This is one of three wheel barrow loads of hay I raked up while Britney drove by on the tractor.

She cleaned the chicken coop, including the floor, which was quit a job. I had showed her how to run the tractor... and she was a natural.

I spent the afternoon outside working around the yard, trying to get the place looking nice. When Joe got home he mowed and sprayed weeds.

At one point in the day, three of the neighbors horses got lose and came over here. Stew went nuts, running back and forth in the back pasture, while the loose horses were running around. I nabbed a halter and walked out to get the horses whom had run back towards their farm yard. By the time I got

there, the neighbors had two of the horses caught. I wasn't much help, other than making a "block" so the third horse wouldn't go back out toward the road. This big section of tree in the other neighbors yard must have blown down in a recent storm. We have had a lot of high winds. I always have lots of sticks to pick up.

Wednesday, before Water Lilies, I took the recycling into town and dropped the Expedition off at Hutche's for an oil change. Shelly came to join us with the water exercising. Britney dropped me off back at Hutche's, and once home, it continued to be a busy day getting ready for company.

Brian came to get the rest of the round bales of hay and deliver them to a lady who bought them from us.

Meanwhile, Britney was setting up her tent for camping.

As Brian was finishing up, I was off to town to do some major grocery shopping. The Cruz's (Valencia's parents and her sister and boy friend) arrived just before I got home. We all scurried to un-pack and put away food, then enjoyed a cold beverage while sitting around the "campfire."

By 6:30 Independence Day morning, before anyone else had rolled out of bed, I had chores done, coffee brewing, and an egg casserole in the oven.

It was a leisurely morning, with people eating as they woke up and came into the kitchen. I found that we gathered in the kitchen much of the time.

We went to the park in Downs to catch some July 4th festivities.

The Biscuits and Gravy band was playing, and we enjoyed their first set.

Above, Ricardo and Yaneth and Joe and Britney.

Alexsys and Dom to the right.

We watched the small town parade, catching and eating some candy, and then headed home.

New York Times Columnist Bob Herbert wrote a controversial editorial June 21 titled "When Greatness Slips Away." Even though times are tough, and Americans disheartened, I think the Spirit of America is alive and well.

After we got home from the park, we hung out, played, rested and even napped.

Yaneth had marinated chicken and flank steak and Ricardo grilled them.

After a large, late afternoon lunch, Dom and Dan played while others of us rested or took a siesta.

Then we decided to do a little horsing around. I got Amiga ready to go, including riding her around a short while to be sure she was relaxed and behaving.

Alexsys gave it a try first. She did
a great job considering my feeble instructions.

Ricardo also hopped on to give it a whirl. Britney had wanted to try bare back, so when we were ready to quite, I took off the saddle, and rode first to see how Amiga would do. Then I gave Britney a leg up and she rode around.

     Everyone did a great job, including Amiga.

     Missy in the rafters between the stalls as I fed the horses their evening feed.

     We had a light supper and then the guests had to head for home.