Well, My Job Here is Done!

 This was the sight that greeted me when I came into the living room yesterday:

 

I said, "Oh! You must be playing 'car' with your brother. That's one cool ride, Grace!"

"No, Mama, I'm not playing car," she said with a serious look in her blue eyes. "I'm busy training Jonathan."

"Potty training him?" I asked, figuring there was another misunderstanding about the whole 'train/train' homonym.

"Nope. Jonnie's always so fussy in the car, so I'm car-training him so he'll learn to ride better. I gave him a book to read to keep him busy, and I made him a booster seat. I'm also singing him songs."

"Well, OK then!" I said. Because what more could I say? This big sister has an incredible inner drive to organize, mother, and do all things typical of a first-born female. As a result, my job as a mama is made either much easier...or much more difficult. It largely hinges on little brother's mood at the time.

He is, however, always happy to have her read him stories. He will never, ever get tired of his favorites: The Little Blue Truck, Please Baby Please, Harry the Dirty Dog, Baby Cakes, and the one you see here, Old MacDonald's Farm. Fortunately, Grace still loves these as much as Jonathan, and she's had them memorized since she was about his age, so they will sit, read, and re-read them until something rumbles through the yard needing their immediate attention.

They are peas in a pod, my two little blondies. I'm so glad they have each other, and I'm so thankful I have them.

The View from Here

Today was, as Grace termed it, "a perfect day on the farm." The weather was just right--not too hot, not too cold, beautifully sunny, and dry. This meant harvest was in full swing, and I even had time enough to capture it on film as I ferried people between fields with the kiddos by my side. Here's what we saw today:

Back in MN, we regularly look out our kitchen window to see our elderly neighbor making his morning coffee in his skivvies and a flannel. Ahem. Here, we have a bit more privacy, but the lack of trees and open farmland make even distant neighbors feel a little closer. I love the different shades of gold and tan in this photo above; it's autumn on the prairie. The field in the foreground held rows of soybeans just this morning!

When I was younger, I could always find a willing cousin or friend to explore old farm sites with me. How exciting it was to run across an ancient piece of rusty equipment, a license plate tacked on a barn wall, or an old rope swing tied to a rafter!

Grace is determined to climb on top of this monster before we go. I'm hiring Daddy for the job of spotter.

No, the blue of this lake hasn't been doctored; today, it was an amazing shade of teal. Who needs Bermuda when you can have South Dakota's alkaline lakes?

It really is a lovely place to have a snack, don't you think? The kids and I took a short break to munch and take in the scenery before heading to the next field. Jonathan kept giggling when he saw me climb into the pickup: "No, Mommy! Papa brrrm-brrrm!" Apparently, I'm supposed to drive things like minivans. We're working on this.

 

 The goldenrod (Achoo!) is just fading, leaving the rose hips to take center stage. Call me crazy, but I think this bunch of grass would make a lovely bouquet. And come to think of it, that may explain my childhood logic; I was more of a prairie-grass kind of gatherer than a dandelion picker. That may also have stemmed from the fact that my dad detailed the whole noxious weed thing to me at a very young age: "We spray for those." The life of a farm kid, I tell ya.

In the top photo above, Greg M. gets the truck ready for loading. He's just moved it from our last field, and we're getting all set up for another round. My dad's driving this combine--the newer of the two, because Matt's almost sleepless with anxiety these days due to his fear of wrecking one. (OK, he's really sleeping like a log right now, but it's a concern!) See that golden pile of soybeany goodness ready for unloading?

Aaaaand, thereyago. Get the auger to the right spot, and all goes well. Place the auger in the wrong spot, and...well, grab a shovel.

Quiz: Why is my dad smiling?
A. He is harvesting, a farmer's favorite activity
B. He finally has his sack lunch in hand, delivered two hours late (Sorry, Dad!)
C. He knows I'll be posting this photo to the blog tonight
D. His grandkids are laying on the horn back in the pickup and cheering his name
E. All of the above

Answer? C!

Nah, just kidding. E all the way.

My, my, mymymy. Who is this professional combiner? (Is that a word? Combiner? Well, it is now.)

"Hello, handsome farmer! You come here often? Gosh, you sure do know how to maneuver that 9600!"

"You're crazy."

"Crazy-impressed, maybe. But here. (*picking up a pod from the ground*) You missed this one."

"Har har."

"Alright, get back to it, man. Some of us have to work around here."

Like Grace, for example! The child is entirely convinced her responsibility on the farm is to go forth each day seeking grease and dirt. She feels as if her day's been a success if her entire wardrobe has to go straight into the wash come nightfall.

And speaking of nightfall, here's what we done-did after everyone got cleaned up: not much of anything at all. Happy harvest, everyone!

Made-you-laugh Monday!

"Oh, what a sweet little g-g-g-G-GRACE!! What did you do to your brother?!"

"Well, Mama, I found this blue veil, so I thought it would be perfect for being Mary. But I needed an Angel Gabriel."

"So...he's Gabriel?"

"Yes! He took off his golden crown, though, which looked more like a halo."

"Or a princess."

"Or that."

Home again...and home again!

Matt and I are just back from a lovely weekend visit to our MN home and family. We had some errands to run, but we mostly spent our weekend enjoying the lovely weather, changing foliage, amazing coffee, even more amazing friends and family, and each other. My parents graciously agreed to keep the little ones with them, so this was, as one mama friend put it, "A real DATE!" We even went to a concert, and I didn't cook a single meal during our trip, which virtually sealed the date deal.

Perhaps the highlight of the trip, though, was having the opportunity to just talk--uninterrupted, in-depth, honest discussions with each other, and with people whose opinions we sincerely value and respect. On our ride home, we agreed that we felt renewed, which is just what a couple heading into the harvest rush needs!

This week, weather permitting, soybeans will start coming off the fields in earnest. Matt's excited for this part of the farming process, but a bit nervous, as well. He'll be learning how to handle a combine--a big, expensive piece of absolutely critical farm equipment. To harvest soybeans, the combine is fitted with a head that runs along the ground (soybean plants are about knee-high when fully grown), making it even more necessary for a farmer to be vigilant; a rock in the header can bring harvest to a total standstill, and it is incredibly frustrating watching the sun shine down on a defunct combine! Dad called the combine 'doctor' this past week to troubleshoot and fine-tune one of the combines:

Stay tuned this week for more photos of the harvest, as well as some fairly ridiculous (and always hilarious) shots of the kids!

The REAL Country-Time Lemonade

Today, Grace said to me, "Mama, let's make a lemon-stand! You know, like they do in books." Now, you have to understand that up until three weeks ago, we lived on one of the busiest streets in our fair city. That's right: prime lemonade stand territory. However, the idea didn't strike my little sunshine until this very day.

Naturally, the practical side in me surfaced: "Well, sweetie, that would be fun, but we aren't near any main road, so we wouldn't get any customers. And I don't really want you out by the road, anyway, and Jonathan's going to be heading down for a nap soon, and..."

And then I gave myself a swift kick in the pants. Because the child simply asked for a "lemon-stand," darn it. We also (randomly) had four lemons in need of use in the fridge. And there were even men working in the yard--read: customers.

So, I put Jonathan down, and we set to work. When I asked her what our sign should say, she dictated: "We have a LEMONADE STAND! FREE! Our names are Mom and Grace!" She signed it herself, and added a very detailed picture of a lemon, a heart-face, and a pitcher of lemonade, with purple ice cubes. After we'd squeezed the all lemons by hand (the child is strong, I tell you!), we stirred up a delicious pitcher of the real stuff, and we headed out to put our stand together. Here's how it all went down.

She is SO proud...can you tell? She even changed her clothes into some that were fancier, for the big occasion, of course.

CUSTOMERS! Can you tell how impressed they were with our bargain prices? This little lady knows how to bring them in! (Grandpa to the left, Daddy to the right, BTW.)

Greg Merkel stands a cautious distance away from the stand, undoubtedly remembering tepid Kool-Aid at the competitions' stands. But this is not that kind of place.

Soon, all three sign on, with lemonade and fudge-stripe cookies all around. Grace is as cool as a cucumber, taking it all with a wave of her hand: "Yep. It's good. And it's free."

Grace examines the damage. It's been a very successful day at this rural lemonade stand!

A Tale of Two Schedules

This is a tale of two schedules. Two schedules contrasted with two other schedules, actually. So, a tale of four schedules, but that's not nearly as much of an allusion for this English teacher, and certainly not as catchy, so let's just go with two schedules, broadly.

The first schedule of note is the one which my dad and husband currently follow. It starts at about seven in the morning, and it goes something like this:

7:00 -- wake up, shower, eat breakfast, drink coffee, check the markets.
8:00 -- touch base with everyone working on the farm. Start attending to phone calls (because on a farm, the minute the hand ticks to 8, it is assumed that it is safe to call anyone, and the phones start ringing off the hook...which directly affects schedule #2, as you'll soon read).
9:00 to 12:00 -- work, work, work. This may be desk work, like contacting buyers, haulers, or agronomists. Or it may be field work, behind the wheel of a tractor, sprayer, or combine. For a large part of the year, it may also be the good, old-fashioned physical work farmers of all ages still do: fixing machinery, shoveling bins, tearing down old fences, putting new ones up...the stuff that makes a person collapse into bed after a long day.
12:00 -- lunch
1:00 to 7:00 (or much, much later, as the season and crop demands) -- more work. See above.
7:30 -- supper
8:30 to 9:30 -- catching up with the family, and if you are a dad of young kids, like Matt is, then your schedule includes helping bathe and bed down these little ones for the night.
9:30 to 10:30 -- squeeze in coursework; Matt's still working on finishing his degree while we are here.
10:30 -- hit the hay, most nights


The second schedule is the one that I currently follow, and it goes something like this:

7:00 -- roll over when the alarm goes off. Try to ignore the looming sense of responsibility that I should be up, too.
8:00 -- put pillow over my head when phones start ringing incessantly, waking up the kiddos and removing any further chance of sleep I may have had. Determine to wake up with the alarm at 7 tomorrow. If there is time, get into clothes, put in contacts, brush teeth, and assemble myself in some sense of order, in case the UPS or Schwan's man stops by.
8:02 -- help kids out of bed, change diapers, etc, and get everyone downstairs for breakfast. Pour a huge mug of coffee.
8:30 -- clean up breakfast and start cleaning the house, while children make messes as fast as I can clean.
10:30 -- concede defeat. Stop cleaning. Play with kids.
11:30 -- realize guys will be in for lunch in a half-hour. Throw something edible together.
12:00 -- lunch
12:30 -- clean up lunch, and start on the laundry, while potty-training child does his best to keep me in a job.
1:00 -- get kids down for naps. Heat up the huge cup of coffee I poured in the morning, but haven't yet had time to touch. Settle in with the laptop for a few hours of grading and lesson planning.
1:30 -- get off Facebook. NOW settle in for a few hours of grading and lesson planning.
3:00 to 6:30 -- kids get up. Snack time, and then the play/clean routine continues.
6:30 -- start making supper. Children smell food and start circling like sharks.
7:30 -- supper. (Or, supper is ready but in a holding pattern until guys get home.)
8:30 -- clean up supper and catch up with family.
9:30 -- get kids bathed and to bed.
10:00 -- the 'other' workday begins. Grade, grade, grade.
12:00 -- hit the hay...or keep grading, as the time of year requires.

After paralleling these two schedules, it's pretty clear that they very seldom overlap. This means that the bulk of the day (sunrise to long after sundown), Matt and I only see each other (and he only sees his young kids) during meal times. Now, it's true that when the season and job allow, the kids would be able to work alongside their dad. This will be even more true when they are older. However, for now, this is a bit of a dilemma.

Also, consider that this schedule is a 6-day-a-week schedule. There is no such thing as a two-day weekend for a typical farmer. Crops don't just stop growing and ripening.


Now, contrast this with the two schedules we had prior to our time on the farm.


Matt's schedule (on the days he was scheduled to work):

Whenever the kids wake up to 2:45 -- Whatever the sam-hill we want to do.
2:45 to 11:30 -- work at the hospital.
11:30 to whenever -- coursework (the degree thing still applies).


My schedule:

Whenever the kids wake up to 2:45 -- Whatever the sam-hill we want to do.
2:45 -- put kids down for a nap and work on my courses until they wake up.
4-ish to 9:00 -- total schedule improvise. On any given day, we might hang out at the park, go biking, hang out in the back yard, clean and do home things, go to the library, go on a picnic with friends...it's all fair game.
9:00 -- put kids to bed, and then start my other job. Grade, grade, grade.

And it's also worth noting that on the days Matt's not scheduled to work, we can do whatever the sam-hill we want all day long. My job is very flexible in most seasons, so we can usually just pick up and go when the mood strikes.

So, over the course of the past week, we've really given thought to this change of schedules. They are eons apart, as you can see. Eons, friends. Lest we idealize the life of a farming family, it's fair to say that they work longer hours than most Americans. In addition, they don't have the evening and weekend flexibility that is part of the traditional 40-hour work week, especially during planting and harvesting (and don't even think of going somewhere if you have dairy cattle...or any cattle, for that matter!).

There is a bit of reprieve in the winter months, when fields lie dormant. When I was younger, all our vacations happened in January or February for this reason. However, much of the off-season is dedicated to planning, tax preparation, end-of-year figuring, and machinery repair. You don't hear about successful, lazy farmers, right?

It's tough to think of permanently moving from a schedule of extreme flexibility--one full of time with family, time with friends, and time to do whatever we wish--to one of six-day, dawn-to-dusk labor, interacting less with each other  and less with friends than we have in the past.

And so, we are left to decide if this is something we are willing to embrace, along with the things we certainly do love about this agrarian lifestyle and career. Words of wisdom will be appreciated, folks.

Helping Hands

The other night, Matt was able to spend an evening with my Dad at the local farmers' convention. It consisted mostly of eating steak and golfing, but it was also a chance for Matt to meet some of the people in our community who live this agrarian lifestyle we are considering. There were agronomists, weathered and experienced farmers and ranchers, newbies who are just getting their feet wet (though Matt wouldn't consider himself even at that level yet), and grain elevator operators, among others. The talk revolved around crop conditions, prices, the drought, the latest chemical and seed innovations, and the quality of the steaks being served (We're farmers here, but we're also Germans, who like a good meal.). Initially, when I asked him about his night, Matt said that it went just fine, but when I pressed him for clarification, he said that it was interesting to see how many other farmers live in this area. And that's a solid observation.

In many ways, the life of a farmer is fairly solitary. Rural farms can be remote, visits limited to dealerships, repair shops, and the grocery store. But gatherings like these underline the fact that although we hear regularly in the news that smaller family farms are being abandoned at an alarming rate, many farmers still plod ahead, working with the economy's ups and downs, figuring out new ways to not just maintain a lifestyle but expand it. They still have pride in their work, knowing their occupation is necessary and good. And in my experience, most still have an optimistic streak: things will get better, prices will go up, kids will return to farm, and small towns won't disappear.

But the one thing that really stands out to me is the attitude most farmers have toward other farmers, especially those who are trying to get into farming. Rather than viewing these young bucks (or does) as competition or nuisances, they view them as colleagues who need all the breaks they can get. Matt's been overwhelmingly encouraged since he first mentioned our plan to others, and none are more excited than our local farmers. This career is one of helping.

My dad would never tell you this, but he fully embodied this helpful spirit yesterday. The kids and I went out to check crops with him, and on the way back, we stopped by one of my dad's pastures that had been baled. Men were working with tractors, stacking the bales onto the stack movers, and we were flagged down by the owner (a young man, not much older than me). He trotted over to us, and we made small talk about the hay for a while, as farmers do. Then, he looked my dad in the eye and said, "You know, I really appreciate that you let me bale all this. I would have had to sell my cattle otherwise; I couldn't have fed them. It's a big deal." In his modest way, my dad made light of it, saying, "I was just glad someone could use it and saved us the work." However, the point had been made: farmers help farmers.

That makes me one very proud daughter, and one very optimistic wife.