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With a deep sigh, I can say summer ball was over the 1st week of July. Our girls loved playing, had great coaches and learned lots but I did a quick calculation (remember I'm a mathematician by trade) and 70% of our days in June were spent at a practice or a game.
Once ballgames were over, it was time for swim lessons. Allison is, of course, too old. You'll understand this statement if you have ever spent time with a middle schooler. By the end of the week, Natalie had passed her swim test and can now swim un-attended in the deep end. The little turkey went and swam for the lifeguard and started playing in the deep end without telling her momma! Anna also learned lots and will go under water without prompting and swim 20 feet or so on her own. Sunday, she got very brave at the pool and about gave me a heart attack. Of all 3, she is my fish!
Also squeezed in there was volleyball camp, art lessons, a basketball camp or two and vacation Bible school. Oh, and lots of time to be lazy, hang out and stay up too late. Gotta brag here just a minute. Both Natalie and Allison went to the Bob Knoll basketball camp. They enjoyed the camp and have been playing ball even in the heat of the day. Highlights for their momma though were the awards. Natalie was awarded the H-3 award - the Hustle, Hustle, Hustle award. That's a pretty big deal especially if you know how much Natalie hates to sweat. Allison was named the MVP of the middle school players.
Since the last time I wrote, the girls have also all had visits with my mom. The girls each get to spend a few days ALL. BY. THEMSELVES with Grandma. Each gets to spend quality time with my mom and by the time everyone's home, they're glad to see each other. I did note that after this year's rotation my mom mentioned that we miight want to spread their visits out a bit instead of cramming three visits in one week.
We have received some rain over the last 6 weeks - about 2.5 inches in mid-July. Really weird rain though - neighbors a mile to the south got 4 inches, Protection had 5 and my in-laws, who are a mile north of us, got 1 inch! The rain was great to get but it's still dry although this summer has not been as brutal as last year. I know more of the state is dry this year but we're in a little bit better place. More rain is always good though.
Beef and chicken are still well stocked. Kurt will be taking in beeves this week to restock our hot dogs, beef brats and summer sausage. Pork we'll be waiint awhile longer - oh, that bacon will taste soooo good. We are starting to take names for fall beef and pork if you'd like to be on the list.
Our second liter of piglets was born on the 28th. If you've never seen piglets, they are adorable! Come and check them out! Our first liter was born about 10 days ago and it was HUGE. Sows usually have around 8 piglets - there were 17 pigs in this litter! Some were too small to make it though and a week later, she has 11 healthy piglets running through the trees. The litter the other day was 13 but two were stillborn. One of the hard parts of working with livestock. Amazing thing though, both sows delivered on their due dates - 3 months, 3weeks and 3 days after conception. Wish I'd been that predictable!
Another hard part about raising livestock is predation. Just before Kurt left for football camp, we lost a lot of Cornish Crosses (our meat birds). While he was gone, I lost another 8-10 chickens. After much detective work and research, we have decided our problem is a badger, a mean nasty, cousin to the weasel. Over the course of a month, we lost over 70 chickens and probably some turkeys. Kurt's hooked up a hot wire around the Eggmobile and thinks the added cattle traffic has kept the badger at bay the last few weeks. We'd sure like to catch him though.
This weekend, will be a big one for the Dales. In June, Kurt's folks celebrated their 60th anniversary. This weekend, ALL the brothers, sisters, spouses, children, children's spouse will be home to celebrate - we expect the head count to hit 30. I'm sure there will be stories to share.
We're about to start experimenting again and would love some feedback. Allison has decided to breed her 4-H does which means we would have chevron (the fancy word for goat meat) available in the future. Thoughts? How about rabbit? Fresh vegetables in the fall? Any feedback?
I can hardly believe that school starts in just 2 weeks - and we will have a middle schooler! Looking forward just a little to the routine that the school year imposes on our lives.
In just a couple months, we'll be hosting our 2nd Customer Appreciation Dinner. I had a sister-in-law suggest we call it The Cattle Call. Kind of liked it until I Googled the phrase and was reminded of the association with acting. Yep, we'll stick with Customer Appreciation for now.
Mark your calendar for Saturday, September 29th. Kurt and his brothers will be in charge of smoking the meats and I'll take care of dessert, tea and water. Toss your lawn chairs in the trunk and your kids in the car and come out for an evening of good food and fellowship. We'd love if you'd like to bring a side dish to share but if it turns out to be "one of those weeks" don't let this little detail keep you from coming!
We'll give farm tours from about 5 to 6 and shoot to eat around 6 although we're still working on the time - this might change a little. The tour will include cattle, pigs, chickens, turkeys, bunnies, goats and if we get some rain in the next month, we might head out for a ride through the pasture as well.
New this year will be some live music by Mike Benish of Spearville. He, alone, will be worth the drive - google him, you'll be impressed!
Questions, let me know by email at thedales@unitedwireless.co
September 27th (our 15th anniversary, awwwwww). We want to make sure we have plenty of grassfed meats for everyone to enjoy.
**Our "farm store" will be open on the 29th. You can either pick something up that evening OR if you want to guarantee we have what you want, you can email or call in a pre-order and I'll have it packed and ready for you.
I'm going to finish up with a quick review of Fair Week. Before we had 4-H'ers, I had no idea what Fair Week entailed. We go for the carnival one night; the bar-b-que another. Now, I know the hours of work that go in ahead of time and during the week. We're still tired!
Allison's been in 4-H for 5 years and this is the first year that I really felt like I understood what was going on enough to explain it to someone else. I could give you an accounting of everyone's blues an red ribbons with a few purples thrown in but that doesn't really tell you the highs of the week. Yes, Allison got two blue ribbons on her sewing projects but that doesn't tell you about the hours she spent with Grandma talking about patterns, cutting, assembling and last minute repairs that were made. Or her champion layer cake that she got to auction off Saturday night. There are lots of stories here and many lessons learned over the last 2 years. Natalie earned a Reserved Champion ribbon in the Fashion Revue but only Allison and I know the whole story there and how very, very brave Natalie had to be to model in front of others. Or Natalie's blue ribbon cupcakes that she practiced with Grandma Billie and ended up wearing more batter than ended up in the cupcake liners. She had a plan though the next time we worked and while she wasn't mess free, it was much much better. The highlight of the week for Allison though was the goat show. It was much smaller than in years past but her goat, Rascal, was named Grand Champion Goat. What you need to know though is that Allison has shown goats in 5 shows prior to this and has always ended up at the bottom of her class. But even this doesn't describe the hours she spent hanging out and loving on her goats. And, if I only tell you she won Grand Champion, you don't know that the goats will follow her through the yard and do just about anything she wants them to OR that after 3 years in the project, she's become just pretty independent. I won't argue that 4-H is for everyone but right now, it's a good fit for our family.
Hope to see you in a few months!
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