A Glimpse into my Life.

Just a few of the happenings around here:

A Cowboy came to take up residence in our house...

And learned a little about using his six shooter...

We built some castles...

Built some Fortresses....

And promptly destroyed them.....

Someone learned how to sneak food off the table..... And yes, he is wearing his Winter coat, we can't get him to take it off very often right now....

Luckily the food belonged to his sister so he didn't get sick....

The cat had a standoff with the neighbor's cat. The score is 1:1:4 They've each won one and had 4 draws....

Trying to find where the snow that *should* be in the backyard went to....

Not over here either.....

It's been a wee bit busy at our house!

No matter what Rynie does, Dutch likes to be involved. Here they are painting a craft. Note the similar state of dress.


Meals must be taken sitting next to Big Brother. And he must feed himself.



An Army campaign always need a 2nd in command.


They love to wrestle and roll around in a puppy pile!





I think they're lots of fun!

I figured since it is a little girl's Birthday today, I should put up some of the pictures from Rynie's Birthday. He had a few buddies over to play in the water during the day, then he had a dinner with his cousins and grandparents!

To start the day off, he and Little Miss had to inspect his presents. They were enthralled with them. In fact, it was almost killed Rynie to have to wait for his dad to get off work to open his presents. Then, to get ready for playing in the water, we filled up the kiddie pool and since there was water in, off came the clothes and they were in the ice cold water!

They stayed out in the water until their lips were blue and they felt like popsicles when you touched them. In fact, we had to fight Little Miss to get her out of the water because she was in seventh heaven!

Then, some buddies and cousins came over and the water fun began! After spending over an hour with Kelli filling water balloons, I think they were all done in about 45 seconds! They also played in a fun, wiggly armed sprinkler and played with the bubble machine!

Little Miss sure loves her cousin B!

This is what Little Dutch did the whole time!

While we were cooking dinner, we had some entertainment courtesy of Little Miss!

Sneaking into the cake! And getting caught.

So, some days I wonder if I am a crazy mom or not. Not in the sense that anything remotely bad happens, but we'll get something for the kids that in hindsight seems a bit odd and after they've used it for a while I wonder what I've committed myself to. Also, I seem to be the only 'adult girl' I know who chases after livestock and wildlife in skirts and dresses.

Case in point #1:

Rynie worked very hard to keep his fingers out of his mouth and it took him almost 2 months, but he earned himself a mini set of bagpipes! Now most people might find that a bit odd, but it was something he's wanted since he found out that Scotland existed and they had bagpipes, so I thought it would be a good incentive for him to break a habit that I'm not particularly fond of. Now, he knows how to fill up the bladder on it, and use his mouth and arm to make noise, but he can't get notes done yet. It sure makes a lot of noise! We've had to put the rule of not playing it while anyone is asleep, because he wants to play through naptime for Little Miss! Little Miss wanted in on the action, so she picks up the bagpipes any which way, and then she hums to try and make the right sound. Unfortunately, there are no pictures of him playing yet, nor of Little Miss playing, but soon!

Case in point #2:
Brownie points to anyone who knows what this little guy is! We came home from Church a few weeks ago and this guy was holed up under our back steps!

Here is Dad trying to get the marmot out from under the back steps and the grill so we could use it!
Rynie and I made up part of the guard detail to try and 'herd' it in the right direction.

The marmot sure scared the bunny though. Since it was running everywhere, the bunny didn't know where to hide so she just held completely still and hoped for the best!

Finally! It is heading for freedom!

Thankfully, he hasn't been back to visit. Spitfire was outside while this was going on and was very vocal in her displeasure over the uninvited houseguest!

In other news, we found out that Baby #3 is a little boy! Rynie is so excited to have a little brother to play with. He has been making plans for them to play Army guys, trucks, robots, fire-guys, you name it, they are going to do it. I've been trying to explain that this little man won't be up for doing rough and tumble for a little while and I hope that theory is sinking in. Little Miss on the other hand, was in denial for a bit. She thought we were getting another kitty for some reason. Lately though, she's warming up to the idea, but I think it'll still be an adjustment for her more so than Rynie.

Rynie decided he wanted to make some bread today. I couldn't find the recipe that Aunt K gave me that we really like, so we just did the dough recipe with the bread machine. Not doing that recipe again!!!! First off, the dough was crumbly in spots, so I had to mix more water into it to make it feel like dough. The consistency was really odd, a silly putty consistency, and it wouldn't beat down or anything. I tried to knead it and it wouldn't. Then Rynie wanted to have a go at it. He took a rolling pin to it and whacked it for a while. We had some rather um, lumpy things and he wanted to put them on a baking tray instead of in a pan. I put them in the oven and hoped for the best. This is what it looked like going in:

Here is the 'bread' once we got it done. No idea how long it took to cook because I didn't time it. I just left it in there until it was golden brown.

The proud little chef Rynie with his bread!

Guess what folks! This bread is actually edible. Oh, don't get me wrong, I've had a lot of better bread, but it was bread consistency inside, crisp (read really hard) on the outside, and although it was lacking on the flavor, once you dunked it in your soup, it was like putting croutons in it.

All in all, even though it wasn't a great bread, my little guy got to learn about making bread.- He also did a ton of dishes by hand and helped make soup because he wanted to be a Helper Guy!

I know I've been on a bit of a blogging hiatus, but I think life has settled down enough for me start to reclaim my life and do some of the fun little things I have missed doing.

We have all of Jake's hay sold, almost all the farm equipment is moved back to my parent's house, the remaining steers and horses are also moved to the home farm. Most importantly, we are done dealing with unscrupulous people. The former owner of the land we leased tried to charge us the yearly lease at the same price for less than half the land. We found out it is because he hasn't been totally honest in his dealings with us and others and is now in bankruptcy and was trying to recoup whatever money he could wherever he could. My dad was able to work things out with him to everyone's satisfaction though, so thankfully we are done with that.

Jake and Shannon decided that they wanted to learn to make apple jelly and syrup. It was a lot of fun, but a lot of work. We also had to say goodbye to our canning buddy, the water bather for the steamer, but after 20+ years it had a good run. We had some very good little helpers who taste tested, sorted, and all around just had a good time.

Our little taste tester:

The sorting crew:

And here is part of the sorting crew sorting through the canning rings:

Is she singing, or trying to taste test???


We now have 6 of the 11 steers sold off. Thank goodness since some of the people changed their mind after we'd already taken the six steers to the butcher and they were waiting to process them. I will be glad once we have the rest of them sold off.

I have been working on a black corduroy jumper for the Pink Princess. I found out I am out of black embroidery floss to work the eyelets though so I need to run and get some. Other than that, it is done. When I tried it on her to check the fit, she just smiled and then wouldn't let us take it off her. It took both Hubby and I to convince her it wasn't ready yet.



Unfortunately for my hair, I ended up cutting off about four inches of it. The last four inches just would not untangle. It would take me over 30 minutes to comb through that section so after quite a bit of debate with myself, and talking it out with Hubby, we decided I should cut that part off, and just wait for it to grow again. I feel like my hair is so short now!!!! I know it really isn't, but I just miss those inches!!! It was getting so long and I hope it won't take forever to grow back.

Our little Mister absolutely loves pomegranates so much, we love when we have the chance to get them. It's quite the treat!!!!


Pink Princess loves my shoes. She stole my house slippers and wouldn't give them back!


We have started decorating our house for Christmas. Rynie wants to make all our decorations so we have made paper chains that we are going to hang from the ceiling of his room and then hang snowflakes off of it. We have also made a popcorn and cranberry garland for the tree. I've decided that garland would go a lot faster if Spitfire wasn't attacking it and eating the popcorn while I was stringing it. Pink Princess also was biting the cranberries and putting them back with the other ones. We have another garland on the tree, and a bunch of jingle bells and bows on the tree. We are going to make some stars and put them on the tree after we decorate them. I am hoping we are finished by the weekend so I can take pictures of everything.

I know this was random, but I hope that by starting again, I can get back into the habit of blogging and then I'll finish pictures from my trip and getting caught up on life.

Goodnight and Sweet Dreams!

So, this is going to be a mishmash of everything! It'll be LONG so get a drink, something to eat, and saddle up for the ride!

We just got done having Bumpa visit for the week. He got in around midnight on Monday night, and we had to get up a bit before 4 am for him to leave on time to go home Saturday morning.
We have all been crazy busy and running around like mad. Bump would pass out on the couch and fall asleep until bedtime some days! This is what I found one day:


Ya think he was tired? Falling asleep checking email on his crackberry!


And while we were working in our back yard, look what we found!


This is the third toad we've found this summer! He's a huge, fat toad! Check out that determination to hold the toad!


Success! And immediately afterwards, the toad jumped out of Rynie's hands!


And since Bumpa was in town, we had to celebrate Rynie's birthday with him. It was just Mom, Dad, Pink Princess, Jake and Bumpa. Shannon had to work so she only got some cake afterwards. Well, maybe she did, I don't know if Jake ate it or brought it to her. Rynie got a red helmet and a shiny red bike! What a guy!!! Rynie helped me make his birthday cake, frost it, and shared the little leftover pieces with Pink Princess! He is a huge fan of frosting!








Didn't he do an awesome job on his cake?



Pink Princess is trying to get 4 teeth all at once, she definitely doesn't do anything by halves. I had four days last week when she basically shrieked all day each day. The last couple of days have been much better though. She is making up for lost sleep and food with a vengeance.


That is a slip of mine. It was the only thing that made her happy for a few days. She drug it everywhere, slept with it, and you were in trouble if you took it.

I finally finished Pink Princess's dress that I've been working on forever. Honey helped a lot with the finishing (and she was EVIL and made me do the button holes so I'd learn how) so we got the dress done in time for Jeremy and Amanda's wedding.





I also made Rynie a pair of wool pants, and he had to wear them to the wedding since Pink Princess was going to wear a new dress.


Jeremy and Amanda's wedding was very sweet! It's always fun to gain a new member of the family, and I think Jeremy picked well. :D





Awww, Rynie lucked out and got a hug from the new Mrs. G!



Hubby and I went on a date to Boondock's with Jake and Shannon. It was super hot and lots of fun! We played mini golf, Jake and I reminisced about how we used to be good at baseball/softball, played lazertag, and had some good strawberry shakes.


Speaking of Jake and Shannon, since he let the cat out of the bag so to speak, I can now say something: Jake and Shannon are Engaged!!!!!! Woo Hoo!!!!! They are getting married on October 15 at the Mount Timpanogos Temple!




Well, there are about 25 days until we leave for England and Scotland, my wardrobe for Bath is still incomplete. I have my stays fitted again since I had to redo them since I lost more weight. Hubby is taking the next week off work since he has some vacation time to use up so I am going to try and get them done in the next week. I will post pictures when I have my wardrobe done.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but these are the major points and I'll post more, hopefully sooner than this post came about.

Evening All!