This is our garden corn patch, in the far part of our back yard. You can see the ripe oats in the hayfield to the center and left of the picture, then some pasture and the shed between the corn and the oats. Since this picture was taken the first week of September, and we're now in November, it looks a bit different out our dining room window today.
This is Ben, walking back towards the house after bringing home some hay from a neighboring field. He must be looking at the mailbox to see if the farm paper has arrived. I can't believe how grown-up the boys are!
The combine that harvested our oats -- it isn't ours, and neither is the operator! We were so thankful to get someone to do this for us.
Here is big sister Jeannie with her two youngest brothers, watching the combine from the edge of the field. And, yes, also her faithful companion, Kes the English shepherd.
Our two youngest boys are inspecting one of the grain wagons full of oats -- and probably dreaming of the day when they'll be in charge!
Kes the wonder dog, in his favorite position. The family that kindly gave him to us had given him the nickname "Mushbubble." He's very good at saying with his eyes, "Did you want something?"
Two hunters and a hunter wannabe on top of the garage to practice bow hunting. See, the garage gives them the feeling and angle of being up in the stand in the tree. And see, the garage gives Mom heart palpitations when she sees them up there. But since Dad gave his okay, Mom just doesn't look out the window.
The goal of bow practice!
After two summers of drought, we had lots of rain this year. These are big mushrooms!
Our woods in late September/early October. God has so blessed us with eyes to see the lovely fall color!
This is looking down part of the Poplar River on our property, about the same time as the previous picture.
We thought we would show you what one of our family pictures- that -didn't- make- the- cut looked like. Calves have no photography manners! And I don't think Dad and Jeannie were even aware of what was going on! You can't see our 12 year-old, because he was fighting his own calf that decided it had enough of this silliness.
And the family picture that did make it -- you know, the one where everyone actually has their eyes open, and the calves are behaving pretty well. You can't see one of them, but at least he's just lying down at the end of the rope, not pulling a boy around the yard!