McKillipKlan

Lord grant me the strength

  to accept the things I cannot change. 

  This week has been one of those weeks.  My cousin has had her breast cancer return, she is 35.  Yesterday I got word that HER father, my dad's brother, has inoperable lung cancer, and today I got word that my dad's other brother has extremely advanced leukemia and is facing imminent death.  My family is exceedingly close.  I grew up with my uncle who has lung cancer.  My poor cousin has to face her own health crisis while her father is far away facing his own crisis.  I am burdened with the enormity of it all. Today is certainly a gift, and tomorrow is not a guarantee.  Family is so important.  Hold tight to all that is dear.

USDA hardiness map

Map of my area for hardiness.  So if you are in this area, you might find this helpful.  We are 5A zone and parts of Elbert county are 5B zone (a bit warmer).  Just trivia for you this am.

Finished!

The high tunnel is done, done, done.  Talk about a project from hell.  Totally took over our lives for months, and now we have conquered the monster.  I hope.  Here's praying that it holds up to our high winds we get here at 7100'.  But the tomatoes and cucumbers are happy.  After I harvest all the seed from the lettuces and spinach, I'll replant spinach and some other hardy greens for winter salads. 

Ducks are my new favorite critter, an hour watching ducks play could be as effective as an hour of expensive therapy or prozac, not positive, but just saying they make me feel mighty good inside. 

Funny~

  I needed a laugh today, really quite badly and this nice lady made my day with her posting.  A video from Tim Hawkins.

 

I do blog, honest I do...sometimes

  We have been taken up with the duties of daily life around here.  We cleaned out our basement and got ready for our homeschool.  Today we are playing hookie from our chores and driving up to the Denver Zoo.  I have two young boys who have never been there!  Can you possibly believe that?  Child abuse or mommy burn out, one of the two.  Pictures to follow later!  The weekend should be one of relaxation, and a mini-family reunion with all my siblings and their families, I'm looking forward to a nice few days.

Margin

Long ago I read a book on margin in life.  The premise was to find areas that were taking up too much time and not allowing one for time to simply breath and recharge.  I scoffed at the idea then.  Because, who could really afford "time" for such a luxury?  I'm NOT laughing now.  We, as a family, are in desperate need of margin.  I think I need to go find that book and re-read it.  We had a nice family meeting, which I always love because it allows to to all talk about how things are going and what changes each member would like to see or make.  We all agreed, we need more time and the head of this household needs to spend more time on himself and less time on work.  He fits every singe definition of work-a-holic.  bummer.  But we are working on change.  So that is progress.  I hope that we can stick to our plan!

Finally, finally, finally

We are done with hay season.  I have to say that this has been the longest, hardest year of hay I've ever done.  We've done our own hay for 20 years and I did hay as a teenager in high school and college, but this year wins the ugly award.  It started with promise, lovely green grass growing tall and staying green longer than usual.  But with all our rain this year, it seems that just starting the swather and baler was as good as a rain dance.  We have fought with troublesome equipment, broken tractors and balers, late employees (or non-existent employees), flash floods and lightning.  All in all, very much work and most of our weekends(and a few all nighters just cutting between regular work hours) all summer long.  But finally we are done.  I may not be able to get out of bed in the morning, but I did keep up with my 17 and 12 year old kids, and I'm still the best stacker around, my loads don't tip or fall over. :)  So there.  My main concern is with our time.  We have stretched our family to the limit this year.  Granted we all have worked together and that has been a lot of fun.  But still, an enormous amount of work.  We took on growing for a  farmer's market this summer, with every Saturday spent at market, (not to mention all the hours it has taken to maintain the stuff!) and two additional hay leases besides our own hay at the family place.  It has been too much.  We have had virtually no weekends off this summer to just sit and recharge our family batteries or take a trip or just enjoy watching the grass grow.  And with hunting season starting in two weeks, we are facing the real prospect of very limited family time until the end of January.  We are tired.  And need to change some things.  I'm not at all sure where to start.  The economy is a fragile place to operate in right now when one has chosen the self-employment path, but I'm sure we'll find the right way.
Unloading at the back of the barn. 

But as I was sitting outside tonight I was greeted by this sight.

There really is nothing more happy than a flock of ducks running around fertilizing the lawn and eating bugs and weeds.

The resolution is lousy because I dropped my real camera the other day and used my cell phone here. 

And we're supposed to start school a week from tomorrow?  Lord help me.

 

Jack LaLanne

  When I was a kid my mother would have friends over during the day to have their "exercise club".  They would put on a record, an old LP, and exercise along with Jack LaLanne.  And then after their exercise, the ladies would have coffee and some sort of pastry.  Sort of defeats the purpose don't you think?  I used to laugh hysterically if I had the opportunity to watch because it was summer or I was home sick from school.  Honestly, I had no idea that the man would still be alive.  But he is and in astoundingly good health.  If Wikepedia is correct, he will turn 95 in Sept.  And still works out for 2 hours a day.  Wow.  And who knew he was so brilliant and ahead of his time with nutrition.  I'm very impressed.

hhmmm....

  "To have a school room or not have a school room." 

<insert your best Shakespearean voice>

A novel idea was suggested to me by a friend today and you know, I think it is a fabulous idea.  I love the school room, hate the school room.  When I'm down there I can't re-load the laundry, get a snack for the kids, get dinner going, bake bread, fold laundry, make appointments (my calendar is upstairs), etc. All  the little details that go into keeping a household running.  So the novel idea is to just do away with the whole schoolroom idea.  We have too much stuff anyway, so pare it all down ruthlessly, and make the previous school room area into an older kid hang-out.  The kids are getting older and they need their own space so that when they have friends over, there is a separate space for them.  Or if they want to watch a movie they won't keep me up late.   I'm thinking now of just schooling upstairs.  We can keep all our books in the computer/sewing/music room.  That way, our basement is freed up for alternative learning space, exercise (the treadmill and weights are down there), and just a family room type deal.  I have a ton of old LP's, and an old turn table would be fun, we have another TV that can go down there, and horrors of horrors I'm even considering putting satellite TV in the basement.  I can block all the unwanted stuff anyway and then they could rent a movie or stay up late once in a while without it being loud upstairs.  So, after a couple hours of just thinking, I'm really getting excited.  And so are my older kids, so with them on board, I'm thinking we could get this thing done.  But I think I better get going, we're needing to get our school year started here very soon.

The arrogance of this man is simply.....

....beyond words!  Have you seen this clip?  I am vaguely reminded of Hitler here with all his promises to save the world.   I have to say I think he's making a huge mistake.  The country is more divided than ever, the blogging world is full of "tea parties", and town hall meetings that come complete with security details.  The natives are restless Mr. President and you are not God.  And if you really believe your statement of:

 "But I don't want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them to get out of the way so we can clean up the mess. I don't mind cleaning up after them, but don't do a lot of talking."

Might I suggest your resignation  and those of most of the idiots that we elected to represent us in Washington?  I think next fall will be very interesting at the polls.