The Skid Steer

 If you remember, last weekend we brought in 15 big round bales to feed the critters, and I was complaining how difficult it was to move 1000 pounds with nothing but your hands. Well fast forward to today. We bought a skid steer to help out with all the heavy duty projects we do around here. We like the idea of a tractor but a good tractor with a front end loader is more than we want to spend right now, but skid steers....they can be quite affordable.

Sean found this one for sale and went and picked it up on Friday. It starts right up and runs like a champ. It's a diesel with a ton of hours on it that has been used at a stone retail shop but will be perfect for us to move round bales, put gravel on our driveway, clean out the horse pen and countless other projects we do. We're pretty excited about it.

Here is a video of Sean unloading it. He did great considering it was his first time driving it! The trailer we rented was an awesome hydraulic lift trailer. It raises and lowers with a switch, which was great for unloading stuff like this. 

Osprey Nest

I found this on my camera and thought I'd share. When we were in Idaho
visiting the Mesa Falls we were told there was a osprey nest on the other
side if the waterfall. I decided to find it and use the zoom on my
camera to see if I could spy the chicks. My favorite part of this video
is the zoom out at the end....it was pretty far away!

Chicken Greta

I'm in the kitchen and look out the window to see Greta running around the side yard squawking like a chicken. Just thought I'd share.

Pinewood Derby Race

Yesterday evening was the Pinewood Derby race for Cub Scouts and Wesley was super excited (and a little nervous). He'd been building and sanding and painting his little car for a few weeks now and last night was the big night where the boys gather and race their cars to see who is the fastest.

A few posts ago I talked about his using the band saw for the first time while cutting out his design. Then after the painting he got to hammer in the axles and wheels.  Sean was really good about letting him do the whole thing himself.

The finished Minecraft Zombie car. We used pennies as the weights. You have to get the car as close to 5 ounces as possible, pennies made this pretty easy.

The car lineup. He got second in Best of Show (based on the cars appearance). Lost out to the orange car next to his.

He came in second overall, first in his pack. He was a pretty excited kid! 

Look, There's Guinea Pigs!

It's Alive!

The 3D printer is up and moving! Sean is calibrating the motors and it's still got a ways to go but it's moving. The audio on this video is pretty cute as the kids were really excited to see it move, if you can't tell.

Bumper Boats

What's better than bumper cars? Yep, bumper boats. The kids thought they were epic.

Slip 'n Slide Fun

Frozen

It's a tiny little video (because it's from my phone) but if you make it large you can kind of see Miss Greta there on the front row far right. She was so excited because this year they got to sing a Frozen song. Oh and please note the poor dad up there on the stool, his kid was so scared. So thankful that wasn't me.

Jumping Beans

What I predict we'll be doing most of our spring break.

How times have changed

Last night around dinner time (aka "the crazy time") our littlest dog Chance decided to do his dinner dance. He proceeds to find his dish and scoot it all over the floor, shoving it into every wall, chair and toy in his path. The idea is to make as much noise as possible to alert me to his never ending hunger. He's one of the more annoying creatures around here (at least at dinner time).....and that's saying a lot. I thought I'd take a video to share on here since it can be quite funny. But after taking the video I decided I couldn't share it because it showcased just how messy and cluttered my house can be at the end of the day.

We're talking disaster area.

Toys strewn everywhere, shoes haphazardly dropped all over, crunched up leaves, puddles of melted snow water, cans of cat food that turned into a fun stacking toy and clothing dropped wherever the four year old decided her next wardrobe change would happen. It's embarrassing.  

Which leads me to discuss the latest article I read. I wish I could find it but alas it was a random read never to appear again. It was about how the times have changed and women in the home have gone from "Homemakers" to "Stay-at-home moms". In the 50's a woman's job was to maintain her house, cook a healthy meal and look presentable to her husband when he arrived home. Kids were raised in a playpen. Not a thing out of place. Women these days (that stay home with their kids instead of out in the work force) are to raise kids, if that means the house chores are at the bottom of the list then that's how it goes. The times have definitely changed, that's for sure.

I do try and have a healthy meal ready when the Mister walks through the door, my kids are clean and happy but my house looks like a tornado ripped through it. I feel bad, I should be able to keep it clean. That's kind of my job. But I always think of this phrase: "Cleaning a house with kids around is like brushing your teeth while eating Oreo's." There is nothing more true in this world than that phrase.  At the end of the day I enlist help to pick up toys and clothes but it is no picture perfect house, by any stretch of the imagination. But you know what? I'm ok with that. This is life.

To prove that, here is the video I was not willing to show because of my messy house. Isn't Chance a hoot?

Burning Lungs

A few weeks ago the local evening news put together a piece about snow pictures and how nearly all the viewer submitted pictures of snow accumulation are taken of their deck, or patio furniture or grill covered with inches upon inches of snow. Then they started showing picture upon picture of viewer submitted photographs to prove their point. It was really quite hilarious. Apparently after a snow storm every human likes to take their camera and, from the warmth of their house, take a picture out the back window.

I have to admit I was always so jealous. People with snow piled up on their decks and patio furniture. I so wish I had a deck full of snow to take a picture of.

Oh wait! I do now.  (insert giddy laughter)

I should submit it to my local news station.....just. because. I. can.

We got maybe an inch or more of snow, it wasn't much. A nice layer of ice under it. Not nearly what they had forecasted. Which is good I suppose. Hubby took the kids out to enjoy it yesterday. I think he got quite the workout. After seeing this video you'll understand why his lungs burned for hours afterward. This video is after he'd already pulled Greta once. He's superman, I would have collapsed after about 50 feet.




My folks came over last night to feast on a lovely ham and all the fixings and then we finished it up with some really tasty (if I do say so myself) triple berry cobbler. They are going to be visiting my sister for Christmas so we exchanged gifts last night after the kids went to bed. They were very generous and we can't wait to try out our new present.

Tiny singing humans

One of my favorite parts of the Christmas season is the holiday programs. Last night was Greta's program and it was too cute. Little tiny people up on stage belting out Jingle Bells at the top of their lungs, not much beats that. She's got a wonderful teacher that puts a lot of time and energy into these programs and I'm thankful we found her.

I know, I know....this is probably something only a parent or grandparent would enjoy so I'm posting this for her out of town grandparents. Plus the kids love watching videos of themselves.




Her teacher always asks the parents to bring some cookies for after the program. This year I wanted to do something like a whoopie pie but with chocolate chip cookies. So that's what I did. They were (and are) sinful and unfortunately I didn't send them all with her last night, I kept a few for, you know, the kids. Yeah right. I want them for me but I'm trying not to think of them in the kitchen right now. I'm probably going to have to throw them away to keep them from padding my hips (and then pour dish soap on them to keep myself from digging them out of the trash can).

This is the filling (talk about a heart attack waiting to happen):

Filling:

-1½ cups marshmallow crème
-1 cup vegetable shortening
-1 cup confectioners' sugar
-¼ tsp salt
-1 Tbsp water
-1½ tsp vanilla extract

Daily Treat

Some days I feel like a zoo keeper. On a daily basis I take a big bowl back to the garden and pile it up with the more questionable tomatoes (you know, the ones with the big holes in them or are getting a bit too shriveled up), along with some bell peppers and squash. I then take a plastic bag out to the walnut grove and fill it up with mulberry leaves from a sapling that is growing alongside a walnut tree. I'll add a few dandelion leaves to the bag. I bring this all in and wash it and then get to work chopping. What I have left is three bowls destined for three very different species.

Today the chickens look forward to their head of lettuce, tomato and cup of day old yogurt. The goats will dine on cut up old cucumbers, tomatoes and a bruised apple.  The tortoises get a bowl of mulberry leaves, dandelions and mixed baby greens. This is just a treat for the chickens and goats, they get their daily rations in the mornings and evenings along with prairie hay. The tortoises get their greens along with timothy hay. I've been trying very hard to make sure nothing goes to waste around here. Before I throw away any food I decide whether it could go to any of the animals. The chickens can take care of almost any scrap food. Lately they have been stuffing themselves on melon rinds from the melons in the garden.

The garden has been giving me enough produce for our family along with a nice daily treat for the animals, it's been nice. I forgot how much the dogs like the garden too. Every day I let Cody and Sophie out to roam the back yard and every day Cody runs back to the garden and plucks the biggest patty pan squash he can find and runs up to the house to devour it in the shade. He is one goofy retriever. Sophie usually joins in at some point.

Testing testing

The blog doesn't seem to like the new camera video's. I've tried uploading them every which way but nothing seems to work. So I'm back to YouTube. Which is fine, it's better quality than bloggers video option. So I took a test video today while outside playing with the kids. I think it works?

For the love of applesauce

Having a three year old in the house is an adventure. She makes me laugh daily. Today she had me chuckling at lunch. We recently found out about this magical substance called squeezable applesauce. It's just applesauce put into these pouches that have screw top lids, unscrew it and squeeze the stuff in your mouth. They come in tons of flavors and my kids are in love. It's still a new concept so my kids are ubber excited about it (they're simple kids). Greta can't leave a simple drop of this flavored gold in the pouch and will spend five minutes trying to Hulk out the last little bit. And I do mean "Hulk" it out. She squeezes so hard her arms shake and her eyes bulge. She does everything but turn green. It's too funny not to share. I have to tell her to stop so she doesn't have a stroke. That's my silly girl.

My Crazy Angry Birds

Chicken Fried

I think my love of country music is starting to wear off on my little girl. After dinner most nights she dances around to this fun song called "Chicken Fried" by the Zac Brown Band. It's cute so I thought I'd share.

Thursday Thoughts

-The nurse at the elementary school called to inform me that Wesley failed both his hearing tests. For some reason this doesn't surprise me. The kid can hear great but he's always had ear issues. He inherited wonky ears from his father and we've been battling ear infections for years. Since school started he's had one long cold so failing hearing tests would lead me to believe he's got fluid in his ears. Sure enough, his pediatrician confirmed that yesterday and we are to retest in 6 weeks. If he fails again he's got to go see a ear, nose throat doc. Poor kid.

-We had our first freeze of the season last weekend, which seems early to me. I'm bummed because I had six nice sized cantaloup back in the garden. I was really hoping they'd make it until harvest. But on a side note, I can happily say that some of that grass seed I put down two weeks ago is sprouting and looks like it will make it. 

-I've been keeping busy this week remodeling one of the upstairs bathrooms. I've started a list of projects I can do around this house to keep me busy during the week and this was one of the big ones. The bathroom is nearly done and I'll post some before and after shots this weekend. It's turning out really nice, I'm excited.

-I took a video yesterday this I think is adorable. The Minions (our three adopted cats) have always kept their distance from the dogs. Our dogs are kept in a fenced in area and the cats, up until recently, have kept their distance. The dogs have always barked and lunged as it they would murder the cats if given the opportunity. Well something changed in the past two months. The Minions started slowly entering the dog pen area and lounging until a dog got up and chased it out. This went on until the dogs just stopped getting up to give chase. They gave up and realized the cats were here to stay. And they realized the cats were no longer afraid of them. So now, this, is what poor Cody has to deal with on a day to day basis. Please mute your computer because Greta was in the background chattering up a storm.

Computer Chick

Before Wesley started school one of the kids favorite pastimes was sitting together at the computer and playing PBSkids.org. Wesley was always the computer operator, learning how to use the mouse at an unnaturally young age, while Greta would happily sit shotgun just watching what he was doing. Well I was curious how things would go once big bro went off to school. Yesterday was the first day she asked to play the computer games and it turns out she's quite capable of keeping herself entertained without her brother.