Christmas Videos

I know its way past Christmas but Emily had these videos of us singing and making music... so I thought I would share.

Plus, I want to post again and I don't have anything very exciting to share :)







We enjoy making our own brand of music.

Emily took short videos of caroling and singing during the nativity but since she was singing along she suggested I don't post them.

She also videoed the men of the family singing the soprano recitations movements 14-16 of Handel's Messiah but I will spare you.  The fact that last year when I posted I got the following comment from Tom: "expect to hear from our lawyers" might be related.

PS.  Anyone driving to Utah from anywhere back east this spring? and have room for a couple farm implements?  Jared's research on line found that "vintage" tractor parts are most easily found in the 13 original colonies and surrounding areas... or as Bethanie likes to call them, the Amish.  And Amish don't ship :(

Holidays 2015

I didn't take many pictures during the holidays this year.  I'm really sad I didn't get any of the ice skating :(

We left in a snowstorm... it was really bad.  The only good driving was through Moab, Farmington (we took the southern route), and then from Abiquiu home.

We were stopped for an accident ahead of us for quite a while and Emily got out with Daisy to throw the ball... she came back in rather wet :)

It was a long scary/snowy drive . The story has been told enough times so so here are the highlights.

• Daisy ripped her foot pads running for the ball on asphalt.  Didn't think about how bad it might be on her pads since the parking lot was full of snow!  Poor thing limped around after that.
• We drove on snowfilled backroads to get around the accident mentioned above and passed a jeep which had gone off into the ditch.  The hood was level with the road.  Talk about stressful driving!
• Aaron drove the last hours from Farmington (I couldn't handle it anymore) and once we started over the mountains through Cuba NM, Emily started calling out the curves from the backseat (R3!, L2!, R1!... I helped with L-3!,R-2!, etc.).  She also kept us appraised of the current elevation.
• I kept saying during that drive over the mountains "Everything will be fine once we get to Abiquiu!" Its the begining of a quote from Willow that I apparently quote incorrectly (just looked it up) but it was still funny.  Yes, quite funny.

These are my pictures of the Nativity Amy put together with singing and fun times.

Not sure what Daisy was supposed to be... a sheep?

Mary riding on the donkey.

Andrew would jump up and come down posed like this saying "I'm a star!" while waggling his head.  It was quite entertaining.

There was lots of singing...

I love the music that happens while we are there. This is the only video I took.

Emily has another good one of us singing Joy in the Morning.

We went to the nature center one afternoon and the microscope was a big hit.

Amy got a picture of Andrew sticking his eye in there.  It was pretty funny!

They have a really nice place for bird watching over the canyon.  Apparently they get a bunch of night visitors such as foxes and I can't remember which type of wild cat...

The poop drawer was very popular!

This was our spread for New Years Eve... Without Emily there (she and Aaron went back early so Aaron could work and Ems could get back to milking) it was fairly toned down :)

Typically we do the big spread on New Years Day but since Bethanie and family had to leave we decided to do it a day earlier.

We tried out Angela's Christmas present puzzle table a couple of times... I do like doing puzzles!  And so does Amy... I think :)

And for some reason I took a picture of Gage playing on Amy's new tablet she got for Christmas.

It was a good holiday season with family especially since I mostly relaxed. Sorry I didn't help with the cinnamon rolls Bethanie and Jenny but they shore tasted great!

Christmas December 2015

It seems a couple members of our family are trying to post more often, me included.  I decided I should get a January one out... mostly cuz I have some ramping up to Christmas pictures I thought I might share.

First our tree.  Amy and Sarah got us all tree permits so we all went out to cut them down.

Daisy is ready to go...

I didn't get any pictures of us out there, but here is our tree...

there is a bit of an optical illusion going on.. how big is the tree?

It was pretty big, Emily and I decided we wanted to go wide this year just because we could... The sheets were to catch the pitch dripping.

One Sunday Amy wanted family pictures (Shown in her Christmas letter and blog) so Emily and Aaron tried to get in on the action...

They are not very good at it.. :)

Different groups of us went down at different times to see the sights on Temple Square...

 Millie is Clark and Joanna's cute little girl.  Amy babysits her a few times a week..

 This was the candy display at Macy's... it was fun to look at but really we just wanted to eat it!

 Joseph Smith Memorial Building...

 Trying out the big chairs!

They have a pretty cool display of Creches around the world but I only got a couple pictures...

Told Gage to sing with them.

I think this picture is from Thanksgiving when we went down with Nathan and family... this is the only picture I took then.

This year Emily wanted to celebrate Hanukkah (fire!) so Aaron made us a nice Menorah.  I had been looking to buy a menorah but couldn't find a nice one quick enough and then it was Sunday... now we have our very own unique candle holder :)

Yes, Aaron and Ems were playing "Away in a Manger" in front of the Christmas tree standing over our Menorah.  We pride ourselves on our diversity.

Funny story, Hanukkah only lasted about 3 days in our house,.. then we skipped to the end.

Since Amy is the choir director, Emily said we needed to have a choir party and eat posole so I made posole out of our field corn which was way fun!

Next time though I won't pick off the tip of each individual corn seed.  It is supposed to help them "bloom" in the soup while they cook (pop open and spread out) but less than 50% did so. They taste the same bloomed or not so next time I won't bother.

It tasted awesome if I do say so myself :) Most choir people who tried it that night enjoyed it as well, along with the sour cream and cheese. Amy's rolls got et up too.

I didn't appreciate posole/hominy that much growing up. I know, New Mexican blasphemy! but I did grow to love it as an adult and now it tastes like home. Let me tell you, nothing tastes like posole from your own corn.

We also got quite a bit of snow leading up to the holidays which required breaking out the tractor to do tractory things.

 Two different days, same big tractor...

Now Jared has a log he attaches to the back and heads out to the field to push snow around.  It must be fun because he keeps doing it!  He also got the cub (the medium tractor) up and running so he could move it to the front yard and put lights on it.  It's still proudly sitting out where all can see!

I have a few Christmas pictures but I will change the title to this post and put those in the next post.

Homestead buildings

This is our redneck back yard.  Our 3 outbuildings (OB) are OB1 (large shed with hay loft on the left), OB2 (milking barn/shed) and OB3 (goat shed).  Can you see Emily?

You guys have seen the milking barn (OB2) in the background of other pictures but this is from the other direction.  You can see the goat shed (OB3) up against OB2...  The goats don't like it when it snows, or rains, or any kind of moisture falls...

Jared built both of these last year.  The front of the OB3 swings up and attaches to bolts that hold it open during the summer.

Since we have a milking barn, or Milkhouse you might say, I had to get this heater for Emily :)

This falls project was making a new fowl house after we lost a chicken to a predator... we think it was a skunk.  Jared spent alot of time on it and it is very well made.

Gage took up my suggestion to decorate it after I painted it (he's imitating the rooster head he drew).

Home Depot had a selection of little paints in their oops pile so I got a bunch of different colors...

Since the girls aren't laying for the winter yet we don't know which color they like best :)... the tan color inside was the first coat of paint I put down with blue the second coat (both colors from Home Depot oops pile).  Didn't have quite enough paint or time to do the entire inside.  Maybe in the summer when it is warm and will dry fast I can get the rest.

Aaron electrified the fowl house for us... meaning he put a light in there and a plug in strip.

Here he is fixing the light sensor for the automatic door opener.

Originally it was supposed to hold the ducks too cuz they can get very loud at night yelling at the cats or anything else they see and think might be a predator.  Our poor neighbors.  But ducks are so messy and our neighbors keep their windows closed during the winter... so we've just let them do their thing.  Perhaps that will change over the summer.

After Jared dug a trench from the house out to the yard light with an offshoot to OB1, Aaron updated the plug on the yard light and electrified OB1 with a light and plug in.  Jared also dug a trench to the milking barn but Aaron still needs to connect the lines.  We have solar lights in OB2 and OB3 but it would be nice to plug heaters into the barn rather than using an extension cord from the yard light.

When we were keeping little Buttons from impregnating his sister before he got old enough to fix, Emily penned off an area and Aaron made this little shelter for him.

Eventually both baby goats were placed in there to try and wean them.  Tulip would sidle over and let them drink through the fence so Aaron had to put mesh around the pen at udder height.  He called it an Udder Guard :).   Those babies wouldn't get weaned (Tulip didn't stop them from nursing whenever we let them out to play) and they were starting to outgrow the shelter (especially with two of them in there).  So eventually (with the help of the internet) I sewed an udder guard Tulip now wears...

This isn't a building but here was my first attempt.

It worked until right before milking time when the babies got it off and drained Tulip in 10 minutes (the time between Aaron checking to see if it was still on and Emily going out to milk).  So that night Aaron and I went to Home Depot and got some more strapping and made a better one. Home Depot only carries black or orange strapping :(...

I took these pictures one night when Ems asked me to milk, that's why the lighting is so bad. Only one solar light in the milking barn.

On Tulip (actually taken after I had milked).

 And this is unsnapped and ready to be milked (its symmetrical so the other side looks the same)...

Its only failed twice... once when it wasn't done up properly and secondly when one of Tulips teats was accidentally left out of the canvas bag. Its a little jerry rigged up by her front legs cuz I thought one strap around her neck would stay up but it really needs two, one on each side.

A couple of other pictures I took that night so you can see the milking barn.

 Daisy is shore she will eventually catch the mice that live under the shelves/milking stands/bins and tries to find/catch them during milking time.. Funny story, Emily left the door to the barn open one Saturday morning for the cats and just a couple hours later we see BJ sauntering by his sister with a mouse in his mouth.  He's earning his keep! Daisy... not so much.

Spots was mad I was taking too long to give her treats and so wouldn't put her head down by me :)

Jared has been working on a long shed to house the tractors.  He found 30-35 feet long telephone poles for sale on KSL.  Jared's poor little truck was pretty loaded down!  But he had taken his chain saw and cut them there before loading them up.  This is the picture Jared took to show how he had engineered tipping it up all by himself.

Kinda dangerous but we rednecks live for danger.

I was worried that the poles weren't buried deep enough (I know, weird) so Jared kindly pulled it back down and dug out the holes a bit more... then we poured concrete around 'em.  Hopefully that will do it...

We need more poles but haven't figured out a better way to transport them.  Those things are long and HEAVY!  Plus, there are other winter things Jared is working on... such as fixing the tractors so they run :)

To end, I will share a short video of Emily breaking the ice she got off of the stock tank in one sheet... love that sound.