Farming in the shade

I am extremely proud of all four of our kids. They are all surprisingly different, despite my feeble attempts to use cookie cutter techniques while parenting. I have not blogged a lot about our kids, out of a desire for privacy, and because that's not what this blog is about. But every once in a while it's right to blog about family things. A week ago, we celebrated the last one's graduation. No, there is no diploma, and we had no ceremony. Like the rest of the educational process, this, too, is up to the family. And we decided that a transcript (in case of future education) and a celebration were what we'd do. We held the celebration at our church, and displayed some of the things that our son was proud of. The kayaks that he and The Farmer have finished and are currently working on were displayed and admired. The robot that the local public school's robotics team built for competition came to the open house, and some of the team members were happy to de...

This week I'm planning/scheduling school for the year. Every summer my parents (bless their hearts) go camping for a week with our kids. The kids get away from the farm, build memories with their grandparents, and have fun. I get solitude. Solitude doesn't automatically equal peace. I've got a bushel of pears on the basement floor, ripening faster than I'd like. The knowledge that I should be canning them robs me of some of my peace. The Farmer wants me to accompany him on a day trip for his work, but I need to make the most of my time scheduling and planning now, while the house is quiet. A project at my job continues to take up some valuable real estate in my brain, always making little bumping noises in a far corner of my mind, even when I'm not working on it or consciously thinking about it. Summer is almost over, and some shoulda-coulda-wouldas nag me a bit. And there is the fire monitor that continues to intrude. The Farmer is a part-time firefighter and medi...

The Farmer recently talked his way into owning two antique seed cleaners. He bought them from another farmer who had bought them from a now-closed feed mill. It was the feed mill that my hobby farmer father (and all the farmers, hobby and real, for miles around) purchased feed and supplies from when I was a girl. When our daughters were very young, they would ride along with The Farmer on his trips to the feed mill. But like most cooperative feed mills that catered to the small farmer, it went the way of the telegraph. The two antique seed cleaners were not put together when we bought them. In fact, we weren't actually sure that all the parts were there, or which parts went to which cleaner. I wish I'd taken a photo of the piles of parts, so that you could see the scope of the project. But at that time, I was busy having pneumonia . The larger of the two cleaners is basic ally t ogether, thanks to hours of puzzling fun by The Farmer's father, my father, and our son, with oc...