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Sunday, November 25, 2012

Friday, November 23, 2012

Thankfulness Thursday (a day late)

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. We were blessed enough to not only enjoy one family meal, but two. For lunch we went to my Uncle Tom's. Present were my Grandmother and her best friend, Mary, all of mom's siblings, she has three brothers; my brother and family and 5 of my cousins and their families or spouse or significant other (you get the picture) We enjoyed a great meal. We planned our Christmas gathering, what we would do, where it would be etc. We will exchange ornaments and have decided to help out a family friend who is struggling with health and employment issues. My grandmother has decided that because of her failing health she is going to scale back on some things. One of those things is the decorating for Christmas that she does. She has a rather large Santa collection that she has always said I could have. I have always answered, while yes, I would like to have it, but I want you to enjoy it as long as you want to. This year she insisted that she didn't want it all out. So we went through her Christmas things and put out the basics, a small tree, a nativity set and an arrangement on her dining room table. The rest of the items were passed out to family members yesterday at the Thanksgiving dinner, minus the Santas, which are on my display shelf in my living room.
Last night, probably still a little bloated from lunch, we went to The Farmer's mom's house for round two. There we shared our meal with both of The Farmers' sisters and their families. Although we weren't particularly serious in our 'what are we thankful for' time, in fact we got a little silly, but I think everyone realized that even in our silliness, we all were thankful to be together and for each other.
So my official 'thankfulness' for yesterday is my family. I really and truly wish I could have gotten to see more of them, but was just as truly thankful to spend time with the ones that we got together with.
Finishing up my blog as the kids start picking up and rearranging the living room in order to put up the Christmas Tree,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Tune In Tuesdays-Polar Express


I decided that on Tuesdays, I am going to share a song, movie, or something similar and tell you why I love it. For this first installment, I decided to share 'Polar Express' as its my favorite 'new' Christmas Classic movie. We aren't to far off from Christmas and I am sure that it will soon be on TV, but no matter, of course I own the DVD.
Basic storyline is that boy doesn't think he believes in Santa and because of this and it being his 'critical year' he is invited to ride the Polar Express to the North Pole on Christmas Eve. What he learns about Christmas is absolutely wonderful and without telling the ending, I really can't share much more. It's got what all great Christmas movies have, action, adventure, humor, and heartwarming scenes. It's a movie that any age can watch. This computer animated movie is a masterpiece in my opinion. If you haven't seen it, you should plan to watch it this year, or better yet, buy it so your family can enjoy it every year.
On the eve of Thanksgiving eve enjoying the quiet before the storm but looking forward to the storm that is our family enjoying the holidays,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Friday, November 16, 2012

Fridays on the Farm

In an effort to blog more frequently, I recently decided on several daily writing prompts (to get me started and keep me focused). Based on the day of week it is, I will add posts accordingly. I even thought I figured out how to type them in ahead of time and then I set them to what I thought was a setting that would post them automatically. Silly me, guess I won't be a techie when I grow up. Sigh..........
In my further need for cutesy titles, I decided on Fridays on the Farm for todays post. Since this is the first installment, I'm going to attempt to do a 'history of' post.....or at least as I know it. My actual knowledge, based on being a witness to events of historical importance around our farm spans almost a quarter of a century.
About the time I was a Senior in HS, I started running around with my cousin and his friends, we hung out quite a bit in the neighboring town, as he had a job there. Well, in time, I met and fell in love with The Farmer. First we were friends, best of friends, then by the end of my Senior year we were dating. The next few years were college, wedding, then before long it was babies. I didn't grow up on a farm and worked in town before our kids were born, so my ag education came right along side of my kids. The last several years have been spent in the trenches of parenthood, some of the times depending on the date, it's 'seasonal single parenthood' as The Farmer spends long hours working during planting and harvest.
As our children have grown, my involvement on the farm as evolved. I am sometimes the parts runner, the gal who picks up stuff at many an equipment dealer, parts house or feed store, could probably tell you where most in the 50+ miles radius are located and how to get there. I have slowly (very slowly) became a decent truck and stock trailer driver, but if particularly accurate backing up is required, I am always more confident-----when one of the boys are with me! :) I have done some of the field work, but honestly we have generally always been blessed with many hands who are more capable and I am generally put on 'chuck wagon' duty, which I happily take on. I think I can cook up a hearty meal that competes with the best of them.
During the busier times when The Farmer needed to spend more time in the field, I have been the evening chore girl, feeding what needs 'supper' around here, four legged as well as two. I have been known to dump trucks, pull silage wagons, hay wagons and more. Over the years I have slowly gotten to where I can usually do the requested job without having to have a 'full lesson' and of course now we have cell phones and I can call if I am unsure.
So since I am not a 'back bone' piece of the daily operation, I try to do what I can to make sure everything else runs smoothly. Whether its taking the meal to the field, mowing the grass, or being both mom and dad some days; I like to hope that's a contribution. I sometimes say I am in the 'future employee development' division of H&K Farms. It's gotten to the point as our kids have gotten older that I could manage to add some other jobs to my main one, as mom. I now substitute teach in the buildings my kids attend. I teach sewing and quilting classes. I sew for others. Those are the paid things. I also strive to 'Agvocate for Agriculture' through social media and this blog.
Now that I have gotten side tracked and rambled on about the very minor contributions I make to our farm; I'd like to offer a virtual picture of H&K Farms. The actual farmstead we live in on was purchased by The Farmer's parents when he was 6 yrs old. Before that they lived in Warren County MO. The west bound rest stop near Wright City on I-70 used to be part of their farm. They have lived in Monroe County for 40 yrs.
We have a diversified farming operation. We row crop corn, soybeans and wheat. We bale alfalfa hay. We have a large herd of mostly registered Angus cattle, its primarily a cow calf operation, we no longer feed out many calves, except for the kids show animals and a few we sell as butcher beef. Until about 5 yrs ago, we also had a farrow to finish hog operation with 75-80 sows. We do custom baling. The Farmer sells seed corn, and our partners, his sister and her husband, are ABS dealers; so we do a little of it all.
A typical day changes almost daily for The Farmer. Depending on the time of year, he is likely to be doing almost anything. Every morning, 365 days a year, yes even Christmas morning, there's something to feed. This chore might take less than a hour or most of the day depending on weather conditions, time of year and where the herd is located.
Maintenance is a good job security activity on the farm. There are miles of fence that needs to be maintained. There are hundreds of head of cattle that depend on The Farmer for food, assistance in maintaining their health and require him to provide them with a safe and healthy place to live. There are multiple tractors, trucks, combines and pieces of machinery that need to be fueled, require properly moving parts, might need to be lubricated, repaired or properly stored until their use is called upon next season.
There are acres and acres of land spanning two counties and 4 separate pieces of property. This land, in order to be profitable and take care of our family financially, needs to be productive. On some of it we raise row crops, other parts are set aside for hay production and yet another part is this real estate is home to our cattle. This ground all needs to be fertilized regularly, weeds need to eliminated and the part that is in production requires long hours spent preparing, planting and maintenance and if we are very lucky, it will yield a harvest that will support both our ongoing business and our family. This cycle is in constant motion.
Then there is the 'book work'. This might be paying bills, figuring the pluses and minuses in order to pay taxes, it might be recording information in the herd book, or logging what chemicals were applied into which field. It could be researching for a new purchase, whether that is a feed improvement or more proficient piece of equipment. Its reading about new advances in animal care, an improved computer monitor system for a piece of equipment or the combine.
After writing the rough draft on and off this afternoon while subbing at school and thinking about all that The Farmer does, I truly find it ironic when I ask 'How was your day?' and he says 'Same old thing'

Reading alot of sewing and farming blogs and writing alot of the same and really wishing I was doing more of the things that I only seem to have time to read or write about as of late,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Thankfulness Thursday

I thought I was all smart and had this set to post automatically, apparently I was mistaken. Here it is a day late.


I am thankful this Thursday to be an American. In the last few weeks many examples of why have came to mind. Here are a few:
While I wasn't thrilled with many of the election results and ashamed at how candidates ran their campaigns; I am glad we have the democratic process. I am starting to think that the electorial college is an antiquated idea. It's frustrating to me to look at the 'Red/Blue' map of American broken into counties and you can quickly see the differences in rural and urban. Kinda sad that stating your case either for or against a candidate or issue is like speaking another language when the conversation is had between the two groups. I think that's mostly because our environments are so different, it's just hard to see the other side.
In my endeavor to not make this a political rant, I will continue. I'd like to share some of the other reasons I am thankful to live in this great nation of ours. I think freedom of speech is something to be thankful for as well. It allows me to create this blog. While sometimes on forums like Facebook you can see both the worst and best that freedom has to offer; its still a great tool to freely express our feelings.
Freedom of Religion is an important one in this household as well. While my family considers it to be part of our everyday life to practice the religion of our choosing, we forget how rare that is world-wide. We attend church weekly, pray daily before meals, with our family, in private and in public. It's hard to imagine that this basic part of our day isn't 'allowed' in other parts of the world.
I've been sort of going down through the Bill of Rights, and if I continue, this is likely going to get long, so instead I want to highlight just one more thing from this past week that makes me thankful to be an American.
Veterans Day was a few days ago. I had the privilege to see our district's youngest students honor our local vets. While there were extraordinary events/ceremony's going on throughout the day, this was the one I witnessed. That building had a coin drive. The ultimate goal was to sponsor a local veteran's trip to Washington DC on the 'Central Missouri Honor Flight'. That building has about 300 students. Those kids not only sponsored a vet, they collected enough to sponsor 4 vets! About $1500. Our youngest son was one of the kids involved in counting up the collected money, so  he and a friend presented the 'big check'. Then to see the Marine who received it get choked up by the generosity of these littlest kids, of course also made me cry; this was such a heartwarming example of what is good and right in this great country of ours.
Proud to be an American and God BLESS the USA,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

What's for Dinner Wednesdays

I have a blogger friend who posts one of these every week. I hope to be as consistent. It's also my hope with these posts to offer great tasting meals for families to share, easy for moms to prepare and ones that the whole family will eat. I will be posting 6 star meals, in other words, ones that all 6 of us like.
For my first offering, I'd like to share 'Crock Pot Chicken and Dumplings' I am not sure exactly how the original recipe went, but I am going to tell you how I fix it. :) Keep in mind I serve 6 people, two of which are teenage boys, so you might want to adjust for your household.
In a larger (6 qt-oval) crockpot add:
5 or 6 frozen chicken breasts
'Cream of' soup (use whatever you have on hand that your bunch likes, I haven't found one that doesn't work, any will do)
about 1# of frozen veggies (I have used a combo of raw baby carrots and frozen corn or peas, again use your favs)
1-2 boxes of chicken broth (it's do-able with one, but I like the finished product with two better)
1 pkg of Knorr homestyle chicken stock this
salt/pepper
Place in crockpot before work or early in the day. About 1 1/2 hrs before serving, add two cans of biscuits, that you have cut each biscuit into fourths. At this time I generally break up the chicken into smaller pieces and make sure the biscuits/dumplings are covered by the broth. That's all serve later and enjoy.
This is a recipe I found on Pinterest probably a year ago and we have eaten this twice a month since then. Everyone likes it, there's never any leftovers. I like that I can stick it in early and outside of throwing in the biscuits there's very little pre-supper prep, as it seems that later in the day, time seems to be a hot commodity.
Another thing I use that I like when using my crockpot are these. They are liners for your crockpot. We all know how 'cooked on' things get in a crockpot, and these guys make that heavy scrubbing step practically non-existent.
Rough draft blogging with paper and pen while subbing and wishing I had actually put this in before leaving this morning,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Thankfulness Thursday

Well Thursday has rolled around again. This week I am thankful for my oldest son and the proud tradition he has been a part of for the last 6 years. He's been a Centralia Panther Football Player. He's grown up with such a great group of young men and been mentored by an even greater group of men (the coaching staff).

Tonight was the last 'official' game of the season. This one was important. They played in a Bowl Game. There are many traditions in Panther Football, one of the most special is the 'Goodbye Bowl' The boys met on the field tonight for some fun, a little scrimmaging and just to spend time together, one more time, as a team. 
There already have been many 'momma moments' in this Cody's Senior Year, and I know there are several more to come. They are coming faster than I like. But isn't this what we are supposed to do as parents, raise them up into adults? I guess that's what we are doing. I sure wish I could hit the pause button and savor this moment and all of the others a little longer.
I can't even phathom what these young men will accomplish. They are all extraordinary young men. We had the pleasure of feeding the team this year after the away games. Do you know that I don't believe one boy picked up his burger as we served them without saying thank you? Our team consists of about 80 boys. That's 80 sets of parents who are doing it right. That's 80 boys who are respectful and polite. Don't tell me todays youth are 'no good' because I am here to tell you, no shout from the mountain tops, that Centralia Panther Football Players are some of the greatest young men I know.
Boys, you closed the door on an exciting chapter of your lives and I know it's hard to say goodbye. But, this is only the first chapter, there are many more to follow, each holding their own excitement. Just remember who you are, where you come from and what that means.
Wondering if my hands will ever thaw out but glad I attended the 'Goodbye Bowl',
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Saturday, November 3, 2012

Saturday Sewing


Here are a few recent projects. I can't actually sew today, too many other things on the list of to-do's, but thought I would drop by and share a couple of pictures. Lately the sewing I have been doing has been for others and I can't share those pictures till customer gives the gift. So I had to dig back a month or two to projects that were either for me, yes the top one actually is for me, surprising, yes I know. The other project was for a baby gift, gift has been given, baby has been born, so picture of project was fair game.
Not sure if I have shared a couple of great 'free places' to find patterns or learn techniques. The first one is Moda Bake Shop. When going to this website, it sort of looks like just another blog, which it kinda is. But each blogpost is a pattern, or sewing instructions for great quick and easy projects. Just looked on it and there's a 'charming scarf' The company behind the blog is Moda and they sell quilt fabric, BEAUTIFUL quilt fabric. One of their greatest retail products is their precuts. You can get 'samples' of an entire designer line cut into 2.5 inch strips, 10 inch squares, and 5 inch squares, there are others, but those are probably the three most popular ones. The what you can do with them are showcased on this blog. I totally love it, the projects are quick and easy and can a lot of times be done in an afternoon or over a weekend.
Now my other favorite place to learn about quilting projects is You Tube, yes, the place we go to watch funny video clips. You tube is much more than that! The Missouri Star Quilt Company has an entire channel devoted to it. Look here and pick anyone of the videos. They are a Godsend to 'visual learners' like me. If I am wanting to learn a specific technique, chances are I will find something on their channel that covers it, or I can get distracted with something else, us quilters are kinda like that.
Well that's all I have for now. Cody has 'two a day' football practice in order to prepare for Monday night's district championship game, Sam is hunting (youth gun season for deer), Jenna and Seth are 'paying the piper' AKA The Farmer, for mischief they got into with the friends who were over to play yesterday and they are cleaning their rooms. I am cleaning and cooking for the family birthday lunch that is tomorrow celebrating their 10th and 8th birthdays, and The Farmer, I am not sure what he's doing, but looking at the clock, he will be looking for lunch soon, YIKES!
Jumping up and scrambling through the pantry looking for inspiration,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Thankfulness Thursday

Okay, so like about EVERYONE, except my mother and my husband, I am on facebook. (actually they are both closet lurkers on the facebook of their spouses, in case anyone wondered) And those on Facebook know that with the turning of the calendar page and probably so we won't all delete our accounts because we are sick of political posts, comes 'The Thankfulness Posts'. Thankfulness posts are something that many of my friends do, most do it all month long, I always attempt to and generally don't miss to many and try to add 'make-up' posts when I fall behind. It was so refreshing to get on there today when I got home from work and see so many of these posts. Since its so close to the election, I generally skim the 'news feed' pretty quickly, avoiding all political posts, cartoons, etc........at this point in the game, I think EVERYONE is so sick of those, there would be no changing anyones mind anyway.
To me the Thankfulness posts show us a little window into the souls of our friends. We have so much to be thankful for in this country, in the time that it is so easy for all of us to take for granted what all we really do have. If we can pick out 30 things (30 days in Nov) and say thanks for those things or people, etc........... yay for us.
In my endeavor to be a more regular blogger, I am going to attempt to start posting 'Thankful Thursdays' I will pick something or someone that I am thankful for, tell you what it is and why. So besides the 30 posts on Facebook, hopefully my readers will get 52 more things that I am thankful for via this blog.
Since today is Jenna's birthday, today I am thankful for Jenna.



My little doll baby. You were the first of two surprises to come into our lives. At one point after struggling to get two kiddos, Dad and I figured we were about done having kids, boy were we wrong. You came into this world in sort of a 'whirlwind' and that should have been our first clue, but sometimes Dad and I are a little slow on the uptake. From day one, you have done things your way. Some of the best traits in adults are the hardest ones to deal with in children. I have no doubt that anyone will take advantage of you or ever wonder what you are thinking or how you feel about anything. I always say my boys are physically demanding, and well JH you are mentally demanding, but that's okay, because while somedays I am ready to ship you off to Aunt O or your 'other' momma, MelB, it is pretty great having someone in the house who thinks like I do. I love to be able to communicate 'like a girl' with you. Very rarely do you need the detailed instructions that the guys need. You just get it. Thank goodness. I feel blessed that while The Farmer has 'his boys' I got to have my girl. Even though my girl wouldn't be caught dead in a dress or playing with dolls, I still look forward to the day when we will be BFF'S, like I am with my mom and grandma. I know that we will be that way since none of us have sisters, these intergenerational 'friendships' are the greatest blessings in my life.
I love your compassion. You feel so deeply for so many things, most of them are four legged, but that's okay. You have the most beautiful blue eyes, you remind me of your great grandpa Garrett, yours are the same color as his and just bright.
You are growing into such a great young woman, while I desperately will miss the little girl that stole our hearts, I do definitely look forward to the woman who I know will always be my girl. I love you sis.
Getting ready to have 'birthday supper' with my household to celebrate a decade of 'The Cattle Whisperer,
From Tulip~
KH
:)

PS--this was my 200th post, kinda exciting, had I realized it, I would have planned something cool, sigh, well, keep reading, maybe I will do something at the next milestone! <3>