Hello blog readers!
Things may have been quiet here on the blog for the past couple months but that's in part due to the fact that our lives have been anything but quiet. Time has flown by and life has been a bit of a whirlwind.
As I (Emily) reflect on the journey of this fall, I've chosen some of the highlights and happenings to share with you. I'll let you know right now that this is a lengthy post with quite a few pictures... [There- you've been warned!]
The beginning of September was challenging and hard, but the Lord was faithful to give us grace and strength for every day. Our dear Grandma Betty, (Dad's mom), went home to be with her Lord and Savior on Sept 5. My parents, along with most of my dad's siblings and spouses, spent the last 6 days of her life with her in a hospice home in the Cities. Grace headed things up here at the farm and kept things going while they were gone, with help from the rest of us. It was the first week of the school year, and I was attempting to get my studio up and running for the semester. It was a long week of working and waiting. Grandma was a hardworking lady, and though she was unresponsive for most of that week, her hardworking body wasn't ready to give up. Grandma would have celebrated her 89th birthday two weeks ago.
The visitation and service was held in the Southern MN community where our grandparents raised their family. This is the same community where Dad and Mom lived for several years before they moved to WI. Us kids got to meet some of the folks who would have held Nate and I as babies, and who had stories about when Nate when he was little... I can't count how many people, whom I had never met, came up and said to me "You must be Ann's daughter". I never realized I looked so much like my mom! :) We are grateful to some long-time family friends who opened their home and let our family stay with them the night before the funeral.
I had the honor of playing prelude for Grandma's service and also played for the closing song which was sung by all of the grand-kids. It was a very special time, and was nice to have lots of time to visit and catch up with our cousins. Here is a picture we took of the entire family after the funeral. We are blessed to be a part of the legacy that Grandma left behind....
During that long week and the days following one of the songs that played over and over in my head was: "Knowing what I know about heaven- knowing that you're all the way home- knowing that you're somewhere better, is all I need to let you go. - I could hope that I could pray you back, but why on earth would I do that - when you're somewhere life and love never ends."
We miss her, but knowing that she is free from pain and in the presence of the Lord in a place beyond our imagination is a such a comfort.
The rest of September was spent harvesting food, enjoying puppies, teaching music lessons, trying to make hay in between the rain showers, attending a cousin's wedding and honestly, I don't remember what else- it's already a fog.
Our CD's arrived- as was mentioned in the last post, and we celebrated with Root Beer floats. (This is our family's favorite way to celebrating milestones and other occasions. We find as many things to celebrate as we can!) These floats were well earned and deserved as those CD's were a lot of work. It's been fun to have them to share with others during the past couple months and already we've heard reports that some CD's have traveled far and wide across the U.S. Crazy- but we're glad that they are being enjoyed! I took pictures of various stages of the recording process and hope to someday put those into a blog post to share with you- but it will probably be a while before I get around to that.
October was a cold month. We had a week of near zero temps which is not normal, we got several inches of snow which stayed for several days.
Our brothers went on a hunting/camping trip to WY for about 10 days. It was their first hunting trip out west and they went in quest of antelope. They did lots and lots of walking and enjoyed the trip. The hunting part of the trip was unsuccessful as they were hunting public land and didn't see antelope that would have been legal for them to shoot. But they came home with pictures of antelope, and are already talking about next year. A leaf spring in the truck broke the day before they were to head home. They managed to rig something up (I'm not sure what- you'll have to ask them) to keep it together and they made it all the way home without more issues.
Looking at their pictures makes all of us want to go visit WY again! Maybe this spring we'll be able to take a family trip again.
Also in October we poured cement for a new building on the farm. More on that later.
November:
Matt worked on an addition to his kennel. A project which became known as the "Erie Canal". He got two of the three trenches dug before the ground froze to much, but for the final side, he was digging (chopping) through frozen ground for pretty much the whole depth of the trench. He made a final push to get it done before the snow came this week- and several of us went out and helped him finish digging and he was able to get the fence and gates installed.
The other reason the kennel project needed to be completed was that one of his puppies (Sangre) ate something he wasn't supposed to, and had to have surgery to remove a piece of cardboard and twine string that got stuck in his system. Thankfully, Matt realized it in time to save the pup's life, but it came with a hefty vet bill and the pup has to wear the "cone of shame" and now is getting called Scoop, since that cone on his head causes him to get a scoop of snow every time he moves forward with his head down. Ha ha! Scoop err, I mean, Sangre can't be with the rest of the litter until he get the staples out and the cone off later next week. It became necessary to get the kennel expansion finished so Sangre has a safe place to be while recovering. (He might also be getting a bit spoiled during this time.)
This past week we also framed in, got the outside sheeted, and rafters built & installed for the new building on the farm. This is going to be our Sales Shed. We've been wanting to move the egg fridge and meat freezers out of the barn for a while now and this will eventually be their new location. We didn't get the roof sheeted before it snowed, but hopefully that will still happen in the near future.
We played music a few times in November, and have five different concerts lined up for December. Our town hall music night will be on Dec 21st, and you're more than welcome to join us for that if you'd like! We've started working on Christmas music and are bringing back "The 12 days of Christmas" with each verse of the song being played by a different instrument- Lots of coordination necessary- but a fun challenge for us.
Thanksgiving- a favorite time of year for us. From early on in the month the boys were counting down the days 'til our feast. We had snow on Wednesday, so we had a white Thanksgiving.We had a great day of family, fellowship and feasting. Followed by our cousin game night of Scum (it's become tradition) and then we branched out and played Code Names.
Laura made lovely pie crusts. Mom says that her Grandma (our Great-Grandma Z.) would have been proud of her pie making abilities! :) We worked together on the fillings- the pies were delicious- as was all the rest of the meal.
Also I don't have any pictures yet, but Matt and Silas went together and bought a snowmobile last week for making trails for the dogs and for fun! It's gotten a lot of use already this week. The neighbor boy also bought one, and they got Nate's old one running again. So the 3 of them are having a blast makes tracks all over the fields :)
Thanks for caring enough to read all the way to the end... I'll try to stay a little more up-to date after this so the next one isn't book length again. :)
I hope you had an enjoyable Thanksgiving! Happy (belated) Thanksgiving from our family!
Things may have been quiet here on the blog for the past couple months but that's in part due to the fact that our lives have been anything but quiet. Time has flown by and life has been a bit of a whirlwind.
"Anticipation"
The beginning of September was challenging and hard, but the Lord was faithful to give us grace and strength for every day. Our dear Grandma Betty, (Dad's mom), went home to be with her Lord and Savior on Sept 5. My parents, along with most of my dad's siblings and spouses, spent the last 6 days of her life with her in a hospice home in the Cities. Grace headed things up here at the farm and kept things going while they were gone, with help from the rest of us. It was the first week of the school year, and I was attempting to get my studio up and running for the semester. It was a long week of working and waiting. Grandma was a hardworking lady, and though she was unresponsive for most of that week, her hardworking body wasn't ready to give up. Grandma would have celebrated her 89th birthday two weeks ago.
The visitation and service was held in the Southern MN community where our grandparents raised their family. This is the same community where Dad and Mom lived for several years before they moved to WI. Us kids got to meet some of the folks who would have held Nate and I as babies, and who had stories about when Nate when he was little... I can't count how many people, whom I had never met, came up and said to me "You must be Ann's daughter". I never realized I looked so much like my mom! :) We are grateful to some long-time family friends who opened their home and let our family stay with them the night before the funeral.
I had the honor of playing prelude for Grandma's service and also played for the closing song which was sung by all of the grand-kids. It was a very special time, and was nice to have lots of time to visit and catch up with our cousins. Here is a picture we took of the entire family after the funeral. We are blessed to be a part of the legacy that Grandma left behind....
Photo credit: our cousin Layne
During that long week and the days following one of the songs that played over and over in my head was: "Knowing what I know about heaven- knowing that you're all the way home- knowing that you're somewhere better, is all I need to let you go. - I could hope that I could pray you back, but why on earth would I do that - when you're somewhere life and love never ends."
We miss her, but knowing that she is free from pain and in the presence of the Lord in a place beyond our imagination is a such a comfort.
The rest of September was spent harvesting food, enjoying puppies, teaching music lessons, trying to make hay in between the rain showers, attending a cousin's wedding and honestly, I don't remember what else- it's already a fog.
Our CD's arrived- as was mentioned in the last post, and we celebrated with Root Beer floats. (This is our family's favorite way to celebrating milestones and other occasions. We find as many things to celebrate as we can!) These floats were well earned and deserved as those CD's were a lot of work. It's been fun to have them to share with others during the past couple months and already we've heard reports that some CD's have traveled far and wide across the U.S. Crazy- but we're glad that they are being enjoyed! I took pictures of various stages of the recording process and hope to someday put those into a blog post to share with you- but it will probably be a while before I get around to that.
The grand "opening" of the finished product!
Our brothers went on a hunting/camping trip to WY for about 10 days. It was their first hunting trip out west and they went in quest of antelope. They did lots and lots of walking and enjoyed the trip. The hunting part of the trip was unsuccessful as they were hunting public land and didn't see antelope that would have been legal for them to shoot. But they came home with pictures of antelope, and are already talking about next year. A leaf spring in the truck broke the day before they were to head home. They managed to rig something up (I'm not sure what- you'll have to ask them) to keep it together and they made it all the way home without more issues.
We sent the camera with them and here are a few pictures that came home.
This was their camp
The invisible antelope....
3 great guys!!
Looking at their pictures makes all of us want to go visit WY again! Maybe this spring we'll be able to take a family trip again.
Also in October we poured cement for a new building on the farm. More on that later.
November:
Matt worked on an addition to his kennel. A project which became known as the "Erie Canal". He got two of the three trenches dug before the ground froze to much, but for the final side, he was digging (chopping) through frozen ground for pretty much the whole depth of the trench. He made a final push to get it done before the snow came this week- and several of us went out and helped him finish digging and he was able to get the fence and gates installed.
The other reason the kennel project needed to be completed was that one of his puppies (Sangre) ate something he wasn't supposed to, and had to have surgery to remove a piece of cardboard and twine string that got stuck in his system. Thankfully, Matt realized it in time to save the pup's life, but it came with a hefty vet bill and the pup has to wear the "cone of shame" and now is getting called Scoop, since that cone on his head causes him to get a scoop of snow every time he moves forward with his head down. Ha ha! Scoop err, I mean, Sangre can't be with the rest of the litter until he get the staples out and the cone off later next week. It became necessary to get the kennel expansion finished so Sangre has a safe place to be while recovering. (He might also be getting a bit spoiled during this time.)
One side of the "Erie Canal"
This past week we also framed in, got the outside sheeted, and rafters built & installed for the new building on the farm. This is going to be our Sales Shed. We've been wanting to move the egg fridge and meat freezers out of the barn for a while now and this will eventually be their new location. We didn't get the roof sheeted before it snowed, but hopefully that will still happen in the near future.
We played music a few times in November, and have five different concerts lined up for December. Our town hall music night will be on Dec 21st, and you're more than welcome to join us for that if you'd like! We've started working on Christmas music and are bringing back "The 12 days of Christmas" with each verse of the song being played by a different instrument- Lots of coordination necessary- but a fun challenge for us.
Thanksgiving- a favorite time of year for us. From early on in the month the boys were counting down the days 'til our feast. We had snow on Wednesday, so we had a white Thanksgiving.We had a great day of family, fellowship and feasting. Followed by our cousin game night of Scum (it's become tradition) and then we branched out and played Code Names.
Laura made lovely pie crusts. Mom says that her Grandma (our Great-Grandma Z.) would have been proud of her pie making abilities! :) We worked together on the fillings- the pies were delicious- as was all the rest of the meal.
Thanks for caring enough to read all the way to the end... I'll try to stay a little more up-to date after this so the next one isn't book length again. :)
I hope you had an enjoyable Thanksgiving! Happy (belated) Thanksgiving from our family!
~Emily (for the crew)
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