The Internet Meets Bailing Wire

Soon after Grampa Tom got his fancy-schmancy new John Deere tractor, he forgot about the roll-bar and hit my internet satellite dish. He cracked the brace that held it in place and since then I've had to take a hammer to it periodically to knock it into place. Yesterday, I went out to bang on it and decided the hammering was just making the entire thing to loose.

Desperate, I cried out to God, "LORD, what am I going to do?" I the next few moments, I had an awesome thought! Bailing wire! So I fixed my internet with bailing wire. I think I've been on the farm way to long.

No Time!

Has it been almost a month since I last posted? I keep telling myself " You have to blog. You have to blog. But it hasn't been done. Life has been a wonderful whirlwind and I'm loving every moment! Well, today I forced myself to take a bunch of pictures and promised myself again that I would update you all as to what's happening on the farm, but I can't seem to load the pictures! So here is my picture-less blog ...

The dogs are so sweet. They are gaining weight and looking much better! We had a problem about a week ago. They killed the geese and then went after the chickens, but they seem to understand we won't put up with that. I think the geese were a territorial thing (the geese were eating their food and trying to take over their sleeping spot) and they thought they were helping me with the chickens because I was throwing chickens that were roosting outside into the hen house at night. One of the chickens clawed me. I yelped and Molly and Lady are very protective!

The other day, they were under the house when I went to leave. I wanted to shut them up so they wouldn't bother the chickens while I was gone so I lured them out with a couple of eggs in bowls. I tried to give them time to eat the eggs before I shut them in the livestock trailer, but they started playing around so I put them away and left the eggs in the bowls. When I got home, I let them out and went to gather eggs. I put the egg bucket near the door while I took care of something else and Molly started sniffing at the eggs. I told her no, so she went over and laid down by the bowls that had eggs before I left (Blue had eaten them by now) and smacked it with her paw as if to say, "Well, where is MY egg!" They are so smart!

Molly seems to be with puppies! I talked to the lady who gave them to us. She thinks the daddy is a bull mastiff so they should be pretty good LGD's. If you are interested in a pup, let me know!

Grandpa had abandoned me for the time being. He took a temporary job with a seed company for a few weeks, so I'm on my own. The garden is slowing down some, but I still don't know how he did it when I took off for assessing classes this summer. It's a lot of work for 1 person! Grandma Whitson has been helping me some. We have put up about 60 quarts of green beans and about 6 gallons of tomatoes. Next on the agenda is apples. Our apples are very small this year, but we are planning to make apple butter to take to the Iowa markets.

I am taking apples and grapes from Baxter's Vineyards in Nauvoo to the markets.

Most of the markets will probably end within the next month, but Burlington is planning to have a weekly market until Christmas and then monthly until May. I will probably be there!

We went to a poultry show last Saturday. Grandpa entered our eggs in a contest that judged the quality and we won first prize! Our younger chickens are starting to lay. We haven't had enough eggs to take to the farmer's markets, but we're back in business now.

Well, I think I'll leave the rest for a time when I can upload pictures.


GOD BLESS YOU ALL!

LOVE, GRAMA SUE