Late Summer Life on the Homestead

Once again, I find myself in a position to play catch up when it comes to blogging. We spent the last half of July in Missouri visiting Grandma Vera and Grandpa Larry. We had a great time. Once I finally sort through all the photos, I'll post a highlights link for those interested. We were quite busy, and had a great weekend family reunion with my Grandma, Aunt and Uncle, Cousins, and their children. I hadn't seen most of them for a few years. We have plans to get together again next summer in Nebraska. We're already looking forward to it.

When we came home, Andy was motivated to move around the furniture, so I just sat back and let it happen. I remember well, about a year ago, I had the brilliant idea that we should move all the boys into one room, and create a TV room in one of the bedrooms. After about the third time moving a wide piece of furniture through a doorway and smashing my fingers, I said to Andy, with great conviction, "I am not going to do this again. This is the last time I'm moving the furniture." He looked at me with a small smile and said, "Um..this was your idea. Never once have I thought to myself, Hmmm...I think I'll take all the furniture from this side of the house, and swap it with all the furniture from that side of the house--Just for fun." That man knows how to make me laugh!

The room situation didn't work out too well. The TV room furniture didn't fit in the bedroom. The boys' room constantly resembled the site of a great natural disaster, and we never did get either room fully organized. So, when I started muttering a few months ago about moving everything back again, Andy pretended he didn't hear me. I muttered a little louder. Still he ignored me (smart man!). The final straw was the floor disaster in May. The entire floor in the boys/family room will be replaced this month or next. We were going to have to move the furniture out anyway. So, without so much as a squeak, Andy and the boys dissembled beds, carried toys and dressers, and swapped out rooms. All I had to do was vacuum and clean book cases. Piece of cake.

This month we're dealing with the organizational aftermath of the upheaval of three rooms. It's coming along quite well. We're all happy to have the family room back. Our project table is back, and all the homeschool supplies and books are back in one spot.

Today, I turned this:

Into this:

I have 25 more pounds of peaches to process, and around eighteen pounds of nectarines. I plan on making jam and freezing the rest. I got them from our favorite farmer at the Saturday farmer's market.

The kids and I went out to play in the tree house and read, The Magic Tree house: Sunset of the Saber tooth. On our way back, we discovered this exciting development in the chicken coop: We got a kick out of how tiny the first little eggs are. Our girls are growing up.