Ear piercing, Duplos, and Rain

Megan got her ears pierced for her birthday. Of course, her birthday was back in May, but soccer season and the no earrings rule meant that she had to wait until the season was over. When she started asking we said that she had to wait until she was twelve. She talked about how she couldn't wait until she was twelve to get her ears pierced. It finally occurred to me that she's fully competent to care for them and therefore there really wasn't a good reason to not let her go ahead and get them. She's certainly shown a lot of responsibility in dealing with her new sister. :)
Kaitlyn attended her first parade the other night for Grantsville Days. She loved it: waving, clapping, candy collecting, and candy eating. She's also learned to stack duplos. This new skill hopefully means that she will play with her siblings instead of destroying their creations.
This is what happens when it rains hard. Want to guess where the low spot is? That pathetic flower bed is a work in progress....right now we're raising kids. ;P

Milk Dud Report:

Kenton finished planting corn yesterday. Kenton's Dad, Carl, finished spreading fertilizer today. Hey, hey, hey, that's two and a half weeks ahead of last year! Kenton actually came in this evening around 6:00. He played checkers with the kids, watched Ryan and Friends, and put the kids to bed-Kaitlyn, too. Woohoo! I could get used to this.

Why Foster Care Matters.

Kaitlyn was in foster care through Grace and Hope for Children. We are forever grateful to both the foundation, her sponsor, and her foster parents who kept her happy and healthy until she could join us.

Yet another reason we keep Kenton away from the camera

Yep, the guy needs help. At the very least, he should learn to use the delete button. ;P

Catching Up

Doing the hokey-pokey?
Pretty cute, aren't they?

Jamison is my current favorite child. Today I was in a rush with soaked hair so I rapidly whipped it into the style I wore in high school and exited the house.
Megan: Mom, I love your hair. It looks soooo pretty.
Now, no offense to my seven-year-old, but her fashion sense in clothes and hair is not typically the same as mine. Scary!
Jamison: Yeah, it makes her look young.
Hmmm, I have a feeling this young is more juvenile, than flatteringly youthful. Picture some old lummox frisking through the pasture. Great!
Megan(indignantly): She's NOT young! She forty.
Me: Thanks, Meg, for the reminder. That early onset senility made me forget for a few minutes.
Jamison: Well, it looks pretty anyway.

Today was our last day of soccer for the year. Woohoo! While I'm glad the kids have such a terrific organization and have an opportunity to play, I've had enough running around the for theyear. Megan plays so hard her face is usually red and her hair soaked when she's done.
Jamison plays hard, too. He had another great coach this year.

This is Sam, one of my favorite soccer buddies. As consolation for not letting him play with my camera I took his picture.
This is why we don't let Kenton take the pictures in our family.....but the clematis is lovely, isn't it? I can promise you, at this point he would defend himself by saying I wanted the clematis in the picture. I did....as a backdrop, not instead of my daughter's face.
Milk dud report: Make hay while the sun shines. The sun has been shining. We unloaded 5 or 6 loads of hay this morning(from Saturday) before they baled another 1500 bales. Guess what we'll be doing tomorrow?
Megan almost had a heart attack when she spotted a snake at the top of one load. Then, Davis saw it and bailed out of the wagon. I don't do snakes either, so Carl and Domingo got to empty that load on their own. Carl got a good laugh out of it to make up for the extra work. I bet he's still chuckling. Hopefully, we've had our scare for the year, and will now be snake free from here on out. Ugh!

Bender Camp

It was a busy weekend. Along with camping, we also had our choice of a wedding, three graduation parties, and Bender Camp. We had already committed to camping by the time the other things came along, but we did attend Bender camp on Sunday. The Bender's are terrific. Sometimes I think I half fell in love with Kenton's extended family as much as I did with him. What a great bunch!
That being said, I DETEST the color ORANGE! To alleviate the problem of figuring out where everyone belongs the families were color coded in t-shirts. I'll admit with 11 siblings there are a limited amount of colors to work with, but there have to be multiple shades of pretty colors. Guess who got stuck with orange? Let me just say, the person responsible better hope I never find out because I bear an eternal grudge for getting stuck with SIX ORANGE T-SHIRTS.
Megan has already claimed mine as a nightshirt. That ought to give her nightmares. As for the rest, at least I won't need to buy blaze orange hunting gear until they outgrow these.
Do you think they look more like DOT workers or escaped convicts?

Judging from this photo, they'll be easily spotted in a crowd. Do you think this was a subtle(HA!) attempt to tell us we're not welcome?
Kenton just walked in. He's finished with soybeans. Woohoo! Well, finished planting soybeans anyways.

Camping

We went camping( First time ever as a family. Woohoo!) this past weekend thanks to planning by Nick and Wendy. There were a bunch of us with an even bigger bunch of kids. : ) On Saturday Wendy planned a mini-triathlon for the kids: biking, running, and swimming. Here's Kaitlyn and her friend Adelyn.
Davis really wanted to give the axe a try.
The kids spent a lot of time waving sticks around, biking, and throwing the football.
I don't have a lot of pictures to choose from because most of the shots I took turned out like this one. Eric and Kendra brought them each a popsicle.

Aside from the rain which drenched sleeping bags, clothing, and tent. This is how we all felt about the weekend. Farm update: Kenton is hopefully planting the last of the soybeans as I write. He has about 50 acres of corn to get out yet as well. The weather has not been terribly cooperative. Lots of scattered rain showers. Saturday he probably could have been planting but he was a good sport...maybe because Nick volunteered to let the air out of his tractor tires so he wouldn't be tempted? :P

Poor Sport!

Catcher in the Rye? No, just Kenton showing off the height of his rye crop. Here he's attempting to give you a better visual of its height in relation to himself...but it made me think of "I'm a Little Teapot." Cute, isn't he?
Here, he's lost total patience with my giggling, annoyed by references to unread banned books, and irritated by references to teapots.....afraid that he's going to wind up HERE!
I'd hate to disappoint him, so ENJOY!

Gymnasts

This is one of Jamison and Megan's favorite indoor activities-climbing the walls, I mean, the doorways. I'm the one climbing the walls. : PFarm Report: Kenton filled up one silo(20X70) with grass silage, still has 80 acres of corn to plant. He's planted about 170 acres of corn, 40 of oats, 110 of soybeans. This week he hopes to finish planting the corn and chop in wheat for bedding.

All dressed up.....

Megan got a new dress this week. She loves having a little sister and loves to be "twins." I underestimated her motherliness. She's been wonderful with Kaitlyn. She carries her around, helps with potty training, has changed some diapers, plays with her, etc. Actually, the one time she is sure NOT to want Kaitlyn around is when she's jumping on the trampoline.
I think a lot of my joy in being a mother again is seeing my "big" kids interact with their mei mei.