The Lumberjack's Wife

This summer is flying by.  Usually around this time of year, I am looking forward to summer ending and fall beginning.  But not this year.  I feel like we just got started!  We have been busy, busy, busy.

On Wednesday, the kids and I cleaned our vacation rental.  I had a few days in between renters, so I had already taken home all of the laundry, which saved oodles of time.  The reason I am sharing this with you all is this:  my girls were so helpful!  They helped me get through the house and we made all the beds, cleaned the entire house, and mowed the lawn in 2 1/2 hours.  Usually (with laundry), it takes me about 5-6 hours by myself.

And my boys?  Well.  They did a great job just SITTING STILL and watching a movie for that entire time.  I know that doesn’t sound like much, but for my boys, that is huge.

Seriously.  Their one job is to sit.  It is hard for them, because I ask them to please not eat the throw pillows (true story) and pee on the bathroom floor (even truer story).  Bless their hearts.

On Thursday, we picked up the girls’ friend and headed to the amusement park.

And it amused us.  It did.

Hold on to your pants, folks!

My boys are old enough to go on the bumper boats without adult supervision.

They cannot yet use the bathroom without adult supervision, but driving a boat while simultaneously spraying people is a task they have mastered.

We drove some cars.

Sweet Pea and Handsome Dude

Have I mentioned that Sweet Pea now wears contacts?

Daisy Mae

Little Dude and I

Afterwards, we went to my parents house for dinner because Sister Meagan was in town.

Remember Sister Meagan?

So we are having dinner.  Sister Meagan brings up a topic and I start to ask her about it.  My mother, from across the table, tells Meagan we need to drop the topic because it might upset my father.

I cannot tell you the topic.  My mother forbade it.

Forbode it?

Forbid it?

Whatever. It’s a no-no.

Meagan looks at me and tells me to drop it.  I am a bit taken aback because I do not know why this particular topic must be dropped.

Meagan:  Did you drop it?

Me:  Yes!

I look at David.

Me:  Can you give me more pork?

David:  Why?

Me:  Um . . . because I want more?

My dad looks annoyed.

Dad:  Did you drop it?

Me:  YES!

Now Dad is super annoyed.

Dad:  She is always dropping things.  Just like at our old house and the house before that.

Now I am uber confused.  And David is still grilling me as to why I want more meat.  Which makes me feel like he has started to monitor my caloric intake.

And I take issue with that.

David:  Well, what happened to your original pork?

Me:  I ate it.  It is in my belly.  And I am desiring more.  Is that ok?

I am laughing.  Meagan is laughing.  My dad is looking more annoyed.  I know not why.  Everyone is staring at me and I take a drink of iced tea.

The coaster has stuck to the bottom of my glass, and when I lift it, the coaster falls to the floor.

My dad hears the clang.

Dad:  NOW WHAT DID YOU DROP?  And where is the pork?

And then it was all clear to me.  Everyone thinks I am “dropping” my meal everywhere, as if I were a toddler.  Nobody is aware that we were “dropping” a topic.

And David is still questioning my motives for wanting more pork.

My dad is reminiscing about past “episodes” of me spilling food all over the place.

“Remember the spaghetti disaster of aught-four?”

I take a drink of iced tea and David asks me, yet again, what happened to my pork.  I look at Meagan and I have one of two choices:

1)  Spit my tea all over her.

2)  Spit my tea back into my glass.

I chose the latter.  Because I am super classy like that.  And because my parents have a booth, and I was on the end next to a wall, I could not get out and empty my glass.

So I just kept drinking out it.  Drinking my spit-up tea.  Like a proper lady.

And I will never ask for seconds at dinner again.

***

I best be off.  I need to get my girls to Writing Camp at the library.

Total homeschool nerds, my friends.  We are total homeschool nerds.

Raise your hand if you thought I was pregnant.

I’m not.

The big news around here is . . .

We are officially horse owners.

This event was three years in the making, my friends.  David told the girls they had to save up a certain amount of money before they could start looking for a horse.  They met their goal this past spring.  This summer we have spent many hours and MANY dollars building a fence and a barn.

And last weekend, David and the girls picked out a 14 year old paint mare named Rhubarb.  And did I just sound smart right there?  Throwing down words like “paint” and “mare?”  I hope so.  It was my goal to impress you.

Ask me not what a mare is.

I think paint refers to the color pattern.  But really.  I know nothing.

Who names a horse “Rhubarb?”  I would vote for a fantastic name, such as Gladys.  Or Ina Mae.

Anyways.  The horse was prenamed.  Such is life.

So now, the daily routine is the kids eagerly await for their patriarch to return home.  When he arrives, he leads a Beginner Horsemanship class right in our very backyard.

Complete with popsicles.  It is all very exciting.

What do you think will come next?

A second horse?

A cow?

A goat?

What say you?

Alex and Holly came to town this weekend.  So, of course, we had to go on the boat.

I’m sorry!  Are you confused?  Do you not know who Alex and Holly are?

Alex is David’s brother.  Holly is his beloved.  Please try to keep up.

And, no.  We do not have a boat.  But Jack and Lisa do.  And Lisa is David’s sister.  Is it all coming together for you?  Hmmm?  HMMMM?

Yes.  A boat ride.  Here are some photos to capture this special event in time.

You’re welcome.

Here is David insisting he can fit into this life jacket.

Which is made for a child.  And isn’t just a little sad that he has to tighten the straps?  Yes?

But at least he is being safe!

David, Alex, and Jack had some sort of bet going on for their tube ride.

They look a bit goofy.  They are super manly in real life though.  Promise.

They had some sort of contest to see who could last the longest on the tube.  In the spirit of all things safe, the boys (or men . . . you be the judge) would push each other off.  While the boat is moving mind you.  The last person on the tube was declared the winner.  And everyone always wants to be the winner.  I think Jack won because he was the last person actually on the tube.  But David said his hand was always touching the tube and, even though he was in the water, he pushed Jack off the tube and declared himself the winner.

But I think Jack won.

Of course if David actually reads this blog post, I would like the records to show that David is totally the winner.  He is awesome.

Look!

That is a bay.

You may ask, “Taylor!  What is so special about that there bay?”

Well.  14 years ago, David took me on a boat ride and proposed to be in that very bay.

So, there you go.

Sweet Pea: driving the boat like a champ.

Fear not, Worry Warts!  Jack was closely monitoring.

Alex and Daisy Mae were like two peas in a pod on their tube ride.

For reasons unbeknownst to me, Alex would randomly put his legs in the air.  As you can clearly see in the photo above.

They had a good time.

Alex and Holly’s dog, Cruise, also enjoyed the boat ride.

He stayed on top of the boat like that the entire time.

Will wonders never cease?

Happy Tuesday!

I am supposed to be planning out my homeschool year.  Instead, I am blogging.

And I wonder why I feel so stressed out during the school year.

A list!

1)  We had a mother robin build a nest in our front porch.  She faithfully sat on those eggs and they hatched!  It was uber exciting to see it all.

Here is a picture of mama robin feeding the babies.

Yes.  The picture has a smudge.  Deal with it.

This mama bird was constantly having to feed her little babies.  It was a full time job.

They were always hungry.

Reminded me of my own baby birds.  Speaking of which, Handsome Dude woke up last week asking,

“Mom, can I have four English Muffins for breakfast?”

Um, no.

There were three baby birds in all.  The last baby had trouble actually leaving the nest.

Our cat, Mr. Poppers, was watching him-just waiting for that bird to falter so he could have himself a little snack.

Fear not!  We locked Mr. Poppers up for awhile and, after a few hours, the baby bird was gone.

We *hope* he was gone in the sense of “he flew away!” Not gone, as in, devoured by some creature.

2)  The girls and I had a “Girls Night Out” on Monday.  David was working late and we were already in town for the dentist (4 kids, no cavities-holla!).  My mom watched the boys and the girls and I enjoyed a boy-free night.

Everyone needs a boy -free night upon occasion.  Especially us.  Have you met our boys?

Precious?  Yes.  Exasperating?  You betcha.

Aaaaaannnnnnddddd . . . . I love them.

Anyways!  Girls night!

Yes, we took this picture of ourselves.  Can you tell? Hmmm?  Can you? Can you tell I have no idea where to put my eyes? Hmmm?  It was tricky.

The astute reader might notice that Sweet Pea (middle) is not wearing glasses.  This is because she now wears contacts.

CONTACTS!

3)  We have a bat in our shop.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

4)  I took the kids to the gym yesterday.  Remember?  I have a gym membership?  Because I lack a brain?

After we swam, the boys and I went to the family locker room.  In this locker room, there are two bathrooms and a common area.  I sent the boys together (big mistake) into one bathroom whilst I was in the other.  As I am getting dressed, I hear my boys causing a ruckus.

Oh, yes.  A ruckus.

I quickly dress and opened the door to my bathroom.  As soon as I do this, Handsome Dude, who is completely naked, opens the door to his bathroom and shoves his brother, also naked, out into the common area and closes the door.

Why?

Well.  Why not?

May I remind you that any person could walk into this scene at any given time.

So I pull both boys, who are ever so confused as to why they might be in trouble, into my bathroom.  And Handsome Dude has the audacity to tell me he can’t change because we will see him.

He needs his privacy.

Hello?  You were just prancing about family locker room in your birthday suit.  I think not.

The family locker room.  Not for the faint of heart.

5)  Speaking of Handsome Dude, do y’all remember how he makes up words for food?  He used to call cereal, “Silly-roll” and if he didn’t like something, he would tell me,

“I can’t eat that.  It makes me sausage, you know?”

Well.  I took the kids to Costco the other day, and as a special treat I bought David the bottled Frappucinos.  I had a coupon!  I also bought tortillas.

For dinner that night, we had tacos.  With the aforementioned tortillas.  Handsome Dude would not stop calling the tortillas Frappuccinos.

“Dad, can I get my own frappuccino?”

“Mom, I think I need another frappuccino.”

“These frappuccinos are good!”

Poor, confused lad.

6)  I found a new food blog and I am really enjoying this gal’s recipes.  Her blog is called Mel’s Kitchen Cafe.  So far, I have made her Sweet and Sour chicken (seriously-so good!) and Beef Stroganoff.  Tonight, I am trying Sweet Balsamic Pork Loin.

Can you guess where I got the pork from?

Yes.  That’s right.  From our very own pigs.

Oink.  Oink.

Look at me with my big-girl-eating-animals-I-knew-in-real-life pants on!

Alright.  I should probably figure out how I am going to facilitate the education of a 5th grader, 4th grader, 1st grader, and Kindergartener.

If you don’t hear from me, you can assume the planning of it all killed me dead.

Later, dudes.

Earlier this week, I posted some pictures for you to guess as to what we have been up to these days.

So.  Here we go.

1)  Our Cat Flam-i-lee hath arrived.  The astute reader might recall that we already have kitten named Mr. Poppers.  We answered an ad from someone needing someone to take a stray mama cat and her baby.

And because we like acquiring gobs of animals (hello, 30 rabbits!  how ya doin, 40 hens?  10 pigs?  Why not!?), we said we would take them.

Here is Little Dude with the baby kitten.  Her name is Daisy Sue.  She is terrified of everything.

The kids named the mama cat, Mrs. Poppers.

Do you get it?  Do you ?  Hmm?

We are still just getting to know our new feline friend, but this we know to be truth:

She hates Tank (the dog) and Mr. Poppers (her betrothed).

Loathes them.  Hissing.  Fangs.  Claws.  The whole enchilada.

Cat Flam-i-lee for the win!

2)  The girls have been helping David work on the horse fence.

They finished Monday night!  Now they are working on the barn.  Because we love to spend all our monies at The Home Depot and every Farm and Ranch Establishment in the near vicinity.

Horses!  Not cheap.  And we haven’t even gotten one yet.

3)  This is the most exciting update of all, my friends.  I have launched a full force attack on the peach walls that permeate my home.  What’s that?  Were you not aware that my entire house was sprayed peach when it was built by the original owners.  We are talking ceilings and everything.

Here is a picture from when we first moved in:

Seriously.  I shudder.

We painted the living room and kitchen areas last fall and I made it my own personal goal to rid my house of the peach this summer before homeschool starts up again.

Homeschool.  I shudder.

Anyways.  I have been painting for five days straight and I painted the walls AND the ceilings in the master bedroom, master bath, and homeschool room.

Go, Me!

Turns out I am not-so-good at the whole ceiling painting thing.

David helped me out with the vaulted ones in the bedroom.  And yes, I look fantastic in this picture.  You would too if you had been painting for 12 hours straight.

I am on a mission, people!  Begone, peach!  Begone!

4)  And now, for a sad tale of woe and broken dreams.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in my parents’ backyard.  They just moved into a new house last fall and we were there helping them with some yardwork.  I looked up and discovered a tree laden with cherries.  We laughed for joy at the good fortune and started planning out all the delicious treats we could make with this bountiful fruit.

Pie filling!

Jams!

Oh, the joy!

The amount of planning that went into this event, which we dubbed Cherry Fest 2013, was insane.  Supply orders were placed on Amazon.  Canning jars were collected by the dozens.  Sugar was purchased at Costco in an ungodly size.

We were ready.

On Sunday, we went to my parents’ house for Cherry Fest 2013.  We picked cherries for a couple of hours, not even getting 1/5th of the cherries available because the tree is gigantic.  As we were picking, we were even sampling a few of the delicious treats.

Heavenly.

We finished picking and got to pitting.

Pitting was the pits.  The pitter was taking forever, so we resorted to pitting with our bare hands.

And that’s when we saw them.

Worms.

At this point, we are fully into our mission.  We have spent hours with these cherries and we are not going down without a fight.

First we try to reason.

Surely the heat from canning will kill the worms.

Surely it is not harmful.

Surely we have eaten more disgusting things in our lifetime

So, we went back to pitting.  But more and more of them had worms.  Some worms were even escaping from the bowl and having a meet and greet on my mom’s kitchen counter.

So we made some calls.  We called two people whom we feel are quite lenient on these matters.  People who would not bat an eye at eating road kill.  Surely they would tell us that worms are a splendid addition to cherry pie filling!

We were mistaken.

They declared it disgusting.

So, with heavy hearts, we took all our cherries, and their wormy friends, and dumped them.

The saddest part is not the fact that we had to dump them out.

Nay.

The saddest part was how desperate we were to convince ourselves that we were okay with eating worms.

That is all.

Life has been busy around here!  Let’s play a little guessing game to see if you can figure out all that we have been up to.

I’ll show you some pictures and you can guess what’s been happening in the comments section below, if you’d like.

Come on!  It will be fun!

Event #1:

Event #2

Event #3

Event #4

And Event #4 came to a screeching halt about 3 hours into the whole ordeal.

Let’s see if you can reckon why.

If you’d like to take a guess, you can leave a comment.  I’ll be back soon to fill you all in.

Happy Monday!

The children have decided to go into the wildflower biz.  That, of course, means they are gathering wildflowers around our property for the purpose of selling them to innocent bystanders.  Like grandparents who feel too badly to turn them down.

Are they flowers? Are they weeds?

You be the judge.

We are still working on the installation of the horse fence.  I thought we were going to be working on this fun-filled activity all weekend long when David informed me on Saturday that we must take a break from our mad-fence-building-skills (or skillz, whichever you prefer) and go acquire some hay.

Growing up, my family never had the need for hay, seeing as how our pet was a severely obese cocker spaniel.  So, I was unfamiliar with the hay process.

Oh!  Let me tell you all what I have learned from my brilliant husband!

1)  Hay.  It is just grass.  That is all.

Mind blown.

It is really tall grass that has been cut and dried out a bit.

2)  Straw.  It is the part of hay that animals don’t eat.  You can use it for bedding and such, but it is not for consuming.

There is difference between hay and straw!  Who knew?!

Consider yourselves informed.

Anyways.  I have never had to go to Farmer Bob’s house and load some hay bales.  David informed me that this activity, and I quote, “pretty much sucks.”

There are a lot of things we do around here that David seems to enjoy and I think are downright wretched.  So doing something that David thinks is horrid . . . sign me up!

Turns out I got the easy job.  And I still found that part stressful.

The kids, David, and Farmer Bob were all to load the hay bales onto the truck/trailer and I was to drive the truck/trailer through the field.

The hay bales were too heavy for the kids, so they just started to try to roll them closer to the truck.  Little Dude quit after helping for about 2.8 seconds and joined me in the truck.  He then proceeded to ask me 18 million questions involving the meaning of life.

“What’s a mother?”

“What’s a father?”

“What makes a Grandma ‘great’?”

It was my first experience towing a trailer.  It wasn’t as glamorous as you might imagine.

David and Farmer Bob, whose name isn’t Farmer Bob at all, loaded 3 tons of hay onto the trailer.  Then, being men and all, decided that they should try to get another ton of hay onto the truck.  Because men enjoy seeing how strong their trucks are, didn’t you know?  It’s all very exciting for them.

So, David informs me I must drive the truck towing the trailer with 3 tons of hay up a hill and turn it around so they can load more hay into the truck.

I tried my best to appear cool and collected.

Midway up the hill, David hollers for me to, and I quote, “Hold up!”

Now, I do not know what on earth was so important for me to “hold up” at that particular time, but to even stop the truck mid-hill-climb-whilst-hauling-3 tons was a feat in and of itself.

Then he looks at me, with all the confidence in the world, and says, “Ok, you can keep going.”

Have you, pray tell, ever had to start a truck towing a trailer with 3 tons of hay mid-hill using a stick shift, ALL whiling trying to explain to your five year old why we call Great Grandma, “great?”

It is not for the faint of heart.

The truck started basically screaming and generally throwing a fit and I informed David that he could drive the truck up the hill.  Because trucks should not make such noises.

Here’s what the trailer looked like:

Look at that!  I DROVE THAT!  I am so manly.

Oh!  And guess what!  We are getting 3 MORE tons of hay on this very evening!

YAY!

Why do we need so much hay for one horse?  I don’t know.  Probably because David is going to surprise me or something and tell me we are going to be cattle ranchers instead.

And in case you are wondering, we don’t have the horse yet.  My husband just got a good deal from Farmer Bob and couldn’t pass it up.

So, we arrived at our homestead and had to unload and stack the hay bales.  THAT was work, man.  That’s the kind of chore that will build character.  And I have a new appreciation for my husband and his muscles.

***

Our anniversary was yesterday.  13 years!  Go us!

Happy Tuesday!

I just finished ordering SOME of the curriculum I will be needing for the upcoming school year.  Just for kicks and grins, my pal Melissa and I discussed how much it would cost me to send my four cherubs to private school.

Never mind the fact that I already know I can’t afford it.

Never mind the fact that it is a one hour drive each way to transport said cherubs.

Never mind the fact that Little Dude would be in Kindergarten and would only go half day, making my life all that much more complicated.

Never mind the fact that all of my kids love being homeschooled and, sadly, I am the only one left wondering if there is a better life out there somewhere.

I needed to know if I could possibly make it work.

No.  The answer was no.  A big, fat no, in case you were curious.  It was  basically like adding another house payment to our finances.

NO.  No, no, no.

So, I placed a big, fat curriculum order instead.  It was pretty large-ish in the cost department as well, but nowhere near the cost of private school.

I get all excited-like when it comes to curriculum.  I tend to think we have all the time in the world and then I start to get panicky looking at all the options and trying to figure out what all we can do.  I want to do it all!  And then I feel tired and want to put them in school.

I am sure this is all completely normal, right?  I am sure I am not alone in these thoughts, right?

Right.

So I got all stressed out and made another pie.  Because pie is the answer to all my education problems.  Obviously.

Guess what kind of pie I made . . . I know you can do it!

In other news, we got a gym membership. (Because we eat a lot of pie) It sounded like a good idea at the time . . .

It was a really good deal.  $50 a month for the whole family.  All classes/personal trainers included in that price and no contract.  How could I resist?

The gym is in a town 15 minutes away from us and is actually quite nice.  Sadly, they do not open early enough for me to go by myself before Sir Lumberjack departs for the day and they are not open late enough for me to go in the evenings when Sir Lumberjack returneths.

So take the kids I shall.

Taking four kids to the gym.  Not easy. The packing alone is a workout.

We start out on the basketball court.  The kids “play” basketball and I “run” around the court.

When I say “play,” I of course mean they bicker and argue with each other and ask me when they can go swimming.

When I say “run,” I of course mean I run 2 laps, basically die, then walk 1 lap until a mile has been completed.

Taylor.  The portrait of fitness.  Be envious.

Now, I hate having people watch me and I know like two people in this town and one of them has always been there working out.  It is all so stressful for me.  I am sure the aforementioned person is judging me.  Because I have a healthy self image.

But today!  Today was really strange.  As I was completing one of my walk-because-if-I-run-anymore-I’ll-die-laps, a trainer-man stopped me.

I have never seen this human in my entire existence.

Trainer Man:  Hey!  I have some tips for you.  Can you come and see me when you are done with your workout?

And I am thinking to myself:  Great, Taylor.  You can’t even run/walk correctly.  They have to send the trainers TO you.

Me:  Um, ok.  But I will have my kids with me.

Trainer Man (chuckling at me):  Well, it’s not like I am taking you anywhere!

What does that MEAN?  I had no idea what sort of “tips” he would be offering me.  I merely assumed I was walking incorrectly.  And I probably was.

So he left and came back a few minutes later and apparently he thought I was some other gal and he had me confused with her.

Good news!  Apparently my walking skills are just fine, my friends.  Just fine.

After the fun (and I use the term fun quite loosely) gym portion of the workout, we must go to the family locker rooms to change into swim attire.

I usually only lose my patience once during this portion of the morning.

Then we swim.

The first day, I didn’t get to swim because I was too busy keeping Little Dude alive.  The second day, I put on my big girl panties and asked the lifeguard if they had life jackets available.

They did!  I threw one on each of the boys and now I am able to get in some exercise as well.

Me!  A swimmer AND a person who walks correctly!

Watch out, people.  I am the next Jillian Michaels.

Later, dudes.