Note to self:

The next time your back hurts for more than a day, call the doctor. Do not wait 3 stinking weeks. The antibiotics they can give you for a bladder/kidney infection will kick in within 24 hours & you won't have to spend weeks aching.

Duh.

These Boots are Made for Walkin'

Once upon a time, I was a Doc Martens kind of girl. In my defense, I grew up during the era of grunge rock. I wore my over sized jeans, funky t-shirts, and flannels. With my high school graduation money, I bought myself my first (and only) pair of Docs. They were my pride & joy. I dreamt of a day when some kid at school would taunt my children with, "Your mama wears combat boots," and my children would reply with, "And your point is?"

I rocked Chuck Taylor Converse All Stars with cow spots painted on one side & daisies painted on the other. I wore black Sketchers, canvas Chinese shoes, satin embroidered slippers, crochet flats, and many other odd items of foot ware.

Things have changed. Doc Martin has changed. Now, instead of coveting a pair of Ox Blood 16 hole combat boots, I covet these (Yup, they're Docs):

With a bit of age, some help from Stacy & Clinton, and influence from the Hot Mama Revolution, I've developed a new love for shoes. Girly shoes. Shoes with pointy toes. Shoes with heels. Shoes I wouldn't have touched with a 10 foot pole in high school. Shoes better adapted to an office or a run way than a cow pasture or mine field. Shoes like these:

QM sent these up for me last weekend. She called me a few weeks back & asked my shoe size & I promptly forgot about it. Daddy gave me a big bag when he met us for our trip to the Circus Saturday. Tucked inside (along with some super cute flannel pajamas & new hair bows for Bitsy) were these fabulous boots. I immediately tried one on. Husband immediately told me I couldn't wear them to the circus. He had visions of me tumbling down the concrete steps of the arena with one of our children in my arms due to a misstep.

I've worn them everywhere since. Church on Sunday. To the eye doctor & Wal-Mart with #1 Son, B.B., and Bitsy yesterday. To take the kids to school & go visit Busha & Bucka today. They were a hit at pre-k pick up this morning.

Someday my feet & back will hate me, but for now, I'm rockin' the heels. Maybe I'll do like Sarah & wear them to vacuum.

Illinois FarmWife & the Black Hole of BabyGirl's Closet

Yesterday BabyGirl & #1 Son were sent to clean up her room. #1 Son is doing extra chores to make money to buy a Christmas present for someone in his class. I figured helping his sister was worth at least 50 cents.

After 20 minutes of bickering & pestering & a bit of actual work, they came in the living room where I was vacuuming & announced they were done. By done, they meant everything was off the floor. By off the floor they meant most of the stuff that had been on the floor was now piled on her desk. "Clean" is a relative term when you're 8.

Unfortunately the same cannot be said when you're 33.

This morning that meant I had to tackle BabyGirl's desk & closet. Both needed doing in a way an 8 year old simply cannot comprehend. It involved a trash bag. It was cathartic. I love throwing things away. Not all things, just things that have cluttered my home for ages & have little to no sentimental value or usage.

Sunday morning we discovered 90% of her dresses were 6/6x and the child wears a 7/8....so there was some serious thinning that went on there as well. The vast majority of the dresses were hand-me-downs from Art's Syd & will be going back to the land of Art to be handed down to her niece....which is even more cathartic than tossing it all in the trash (which I would have never done anyway). Now her closet is oddly & fabulously uncluttered.

Next is my closet. As long as I'm sneezing, I might as well keep at it. Dust is not my friend & it is always stirred up when you empty a closet. Better to tackle it all at once & keep the misery short & severe as opposed to long & drawn out.

Maybe once that's done, I'll be able to get to my Christmas ornaments....then all that's left is getting Husband to heft the tree out of the utility closet for me.

The New Adventures of Bitsy FarmHand

It didn't take long for Bitsy to notice the harvest happening earlier this fall. Giant pieces of farm equipment were blocking us on the roads on a regular basis. Grain trucks flew by our house day & night. Lilly May was constantly barking at the windows in attempts to protect us from every Case, John Deer, and International Harvester that putted down our gravel road.


And then she discovered the combines. Every trip to town was filled with shouts of, "BOMBINE! Mama, gween bombine! Bonbine torn!" (For those of you who are not fluid in toddlereese, that's "Combine! Mama, green combines! Combine corn!") Since fields of corn & beans abound around us, she had a lot of combines to holler about.



The three older FarmHands told her they'd been in a combine with Uncle Gick when she was tiny. As you can imagine this lead to an insistence on Bitsy's part that she would be combining with Uncle Gick soon. I mentioned to Busha that when Uncle Gick was farming back in our area that I needed to call him. Before I had a chance to call, he called us. The next day, Bitsy had plans to, "Bombine if Gick! No Mama, me, Gick."



When she saw that getting in the combine involved a climb up a ladder & sitting way high in the air, she decided Mama was needed after all. Mama had never been in a combine either. Luckily, Mama had her camera on hand so I could bring you all along for the ride (as well as to document Bitsy's grand adventure).Here is the "torn" going into the "bombine" so it could shoot into the hopper behind us as "baby torn." Uncle Gick offered to let her sit on his lap & drive, but that would mean relinquishing her death grip on my arm & being minutely social....which she was not at all inclined to do. But she was happy to watch that corn fall victim to the green machine we were zooming around in (I do hope you realize that "zooming" is a relative term).



Once the hopper was full, we went back to dump the corn into the grain truck.



That was the highlight of the entire trip. All that "baby torn" went "bye-bye" into the "twuck." She's been talking about it ever since....and secretly, I'm glad she wasn't brave enough to go by herself. #1. I'm glad she still needs her Mama, even though she doesn't need pull-ups. #2. It was almost as much fun for Mama as it was for Bitsy.

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And for anyone who may have noticed the small changes in my "about me" blurb, Husband & I celebrated our 12th anniversary Saturday. We spent the day at the circus with the FarmHands & my Daddy. It was a good day and kind of fitting to finish out our 12th year together!

In Everything Give Thanks!

This Thanksgiving is going to be a bit rough for me, I fear. Normally, Husband, the FarmHands, and I would be loaded in the van on our way to Grandma M&M's to have a late lunch with my extended family. Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, and Grandparents will sit & visit, play games, eat entirely too much food, stand around the deep fryer & laugh as Uncle Greenteeth keeps a close watch on the turkeys, watch a bit of football, and catch up on our lives.

Due to the hives still present on the FarmHands and the fact that my Grandparents are in delicate health, I decided not to risk exposing them to our creeping crud. Daddy is on his way north to their house. QM decided to stay home as not to risk her own health as she's recovering from pneumonia. Inkling & Henry David couldn't make it because of their trip to the States for Mary Genevieve's funeral. Other cousins won't make it down until tomorrow & Bubba & Beck won't make it there until later tonight.

I'm tempted to wallow in self pity today. We don't have a turkey. Chicken thighs will have to suffice. I have no jell-o to make Grandma M&M's cranberry salad with. There will be no pumpkin pie for Husband and B.B. There will be no blackberry cobbler for the rest of us. There will be no extended family to visit with. There will be no cousins for the FarmHands to play with.

But, I really have nothing to complain about. We have a freezer full of meat. I have a pantry full of food. We have closest full of clothes. We have bodies that are healthy in spite of viruses & infections that may set in. We have doctors & medicines to treat us when that happens. We have a home where we are safe. We have land for our children to run & play & grow on. We have vehicles that are dependable. I have a husband that works hard to provide for us & allow me to stay home to raise our children. We have things that are unnecessary, but make our lives a bit easier. We have family, that while not all are near, all are still dear. We know we are loved. We know we are cared for. And most importantly, we know that God sent His Son to die for us so that we can be united with Him when this life is over.

What is a lack of turkey & pie to all of this? Not much.

Ma Ingalls I am not.

We've butchered things at home in the past. Mainly small things, like chickens & rabbits, but we have done a couple of hogs & a few deer before. When we've butchered hogs, we've roasted half of them & packaged the other half...and I think they were only half grown. This time we butchered a full sized hog & packaged everything but the hams that we took to have cured.

I picked up a Rival Food Saver a few weeks back & discovered that I love it. It was so much easier than wrapping everything in butcher paper & masking tape & I'm pretty sure the meat will last longer.

But it was nothing like when they butchered in the Little House books. We didn't blow up the pig bladder for the kids to bat around like a balloon. We didn't render gallons of lard. We didn't boil & scrape the hog to save the skin for cracklings. No head cheese will be made, no smoking or salt curing is happening at home, and the sausage is being considered, but will happen at a much later date.

How those women managed to keep house, raise children, feed their families, do laundry, sew all their clothing by hand, and do all the other things that had to be done (like butchering, butter churning, sugaring, gardening, etc.) is beyond me. I wonder if the days weren't a bit longer 150 years ago....maybe they had 28 hours in a day.

One of these days...

I'll post something worth reading. But not today. Today my back hurts....bad.

Husband slaughtered the hog last night & we spent all morning butchering & packing away the pork. And most of the lunch time hours scrubbing & disinfecting the kitchen.

The three oldest FarmHands are sick with some odd malady that causes hives, headaches, sore throats, & an ear infection in B.B. We made a trip to the clinic where our old NP works to get scripts for Amox. & Zyrtech. That nixes our plans to head to Grandma M&M's for Thanksgiving.

Husband is on vacation all week, so that's a huge blessing....

Bitsy is officially potty trained complete with big girl panties in public & to bed at night!

I have purchased one Christmas gift for each of the FarmHands....and that's it. I think I'm in trouble. I may have to leave the house on Black Friday after all.