Baby, it's not cold enough outside.

As you may remember, I'm not much for cold and snow and ice....but at the moment, I could really go for a hard freeze.  Yes, I'm really enjoying the spring-like temperatures the mid-west has been enjoying this January but I'm beginning to see the need for a true winter. We've only had 2 or 3 seriously cold days & only 2 dustings of snow.  Not nearly enough to kill all the creepy crawlies around here.

 This morning I pulled a fat tick off one of our farm cats while we waited for the school bus to come.  I've found a few stray fleas on Lilly and Buddy at bath time of late.  There was a wood roach scampering about  this morning.  In January we should be free of bugs & creepy crawlies but instead, they seem to be living the high life.  Maybe not a margaritas pool side high life, but most definitely better than the rotting in a block of ice life they're used to in January.   Personally, I'd prefer to send them back to their block of ice before our summer is one long battle of the bug.

If we don't get a few weeks of serious cold we're going to face a plague of biblical proportions come summer.  The FarmHands will be anemic from all the mosquito bites.  Cookouts will be made a near impossibility by the swarms of black flies vying for our dinners.  So, even though I am normally anti-winter, in this instance I am changing my stance.

Bring on the snow, please.  I'm ready.

Because I know you're been waiting in breathless impatience.

They're here.  My new camera & my USB modem have finally made their grand appearances leaving me free to blog from the arm chair by my fireplace & take pictures of everything in sight.  Now I can quit stalking UPS and Walmart's tracking site.  I can rest knowing my camera is no longer gathering dust in a warehouse in Kentucky.  Aren't you relived?

Now if only I could figure out how to make all of this new equipment work correctly.  I'm getting there. Slowly but surely.

Last weekend we had a massive down pour after the FarmHands went to bed.  Husband and I were watching television when we heard a rhythmic, "ping, ping, ping."  Water was dripping onto the top of the fire box in the fireplace.  I was not happy.  The next morning I called our roofer & told him what was going on & he said he'd be there as soon as he could to fix it.  Between times, Husband and I decided to have the chimney removed all together to prevent future leaks.  Being just a metal pipe & not a brick chimney, it wasn't that involved a process.  That means we are currently without a functioning fireplace.  The plan is to replace what was using a large amount of wood for blessed little heat with a propane insert or even just a gas log.  That is yet to be determined.  Until then I'm praying we don't have any kind of storms that could knock out our power leaving us heatless in the middle of nowhere.

Anyone out there know anything about fireplace inserts?

Lord, give me patience because if you give me strength I just might beat someone to death.

That's how the past week has been for me.  I've been at my whit's end.  I told Princess I didn't think I had a rope left to be at the end of.  But I'm much better now.

It's amazing what a few decent nights of sleep will do for a girl.  Bitsy, for some unknown reason, started sleeping through the night in her own bed.  Until now (at 4 1/2 years old) she would still wake up once in the night & try to get in bed with me.  This week it seems to have stopped.  I'm not holding my breath because we've been through this a few times before, but I'm really hoping it's a permanent change.

QM is here for a visit.  She brought HT's toddler bed up for Bitsy.  The bed Bitsy's been sleeping in has been passed down through all 3 of the older FarmHands so it's seen better days.  Much better days.  HT moved up into a big boy bed because, as he told me, he's now grown up (at the ripe age of 5).  I'm hoping this new, red, Lightning McQueen bed will help Bitsy stick with her new found ability to sleep soundly.

In other news, I have discovered I'm not a huge fan of online shopping.  If I purchase something I want it in hand now.  I've ordered a new camera & a USB modem for the new lap top & I've spent all week stalking my orders on line.  One item was in Indiana 2 days ago- about 1 1/2 hours drive from my house.  The next day it was in southern Kentucky, 3 hours away.  QM could have picked it up on her way here.  Grrrr.  When I asked about it at Walmart today they told me it would be here, "later today or tomorrow."  I'm trying not to pull my hair out.

Speaking of hair (nice segue, huh?) I got it cut today.  Unfortunately the girl who's been cutting my hair for the last year wasn't at the salon today.  I use the term 'salon' loosely as I get my hair cut at Walmart (what can't you do at Walmart?).  It's not that it's a bad place, it's just that the turn over rate is insane.  Just when I find a stylist I like, she's gone.  I have GOT to find a beauty shop I like & can stick with for more than 2 months.  My last one shut down her shop to go work at a bank....3 years ago.  I fear it's a losing battle.

Welcome to FarmWife 2.0

I am finally entering the 21st century.  I have a laptop.  No, I am not blogging from it as it's only equipped with an Ethernet port and we are still on dial-up.  Newegg.com is sending me do-hicky to allow me to plug my new toy into the phone line & blog from the comfort of my couch instead of from the antique desk chair of butt agony where I currently reside.  Until then, it's just a really expensive toy for playing majong.

I'm also awaiting delivery of my new camera so's I can get back to posting pictures of the back of people's heads.  Excited, aren't you?  A slight upgrade from the 8 year old Kodak 3 megapixel I was using, our new camera is a 16.1 Mp Sony with 10x optical zoom.  Still a point & shoot, but totally enough for me.  Unlike the Queen Mother, I am not a portrait photographer...unless of course my new camera has a portrait setting- then watch out, Annie Lebowitz.  I'm going to be the next big thing in fashion & celebrity art photography.  Just as soon as I'm done taking pictures of my blue roof.

In the meantime I'm waiting for the temperatures to reach 35 degrees so we can get out of this house.  No, we've not been trapped here long, really only today, but the sheet of ice outside makes me a bit crazy.  It's not a heavy ice.  It's more like a Krispy Creme glaze.  But it's just enough to keep us all crammed in the living room together for hours on end.  At least we have a DVR full of movies & Firefly episodes.

Irrefutable Proof That Evolution is an Impossibility

My children are still alive.

According to the theory of evolution, creatures will adapt to their surroundings & circumstances over generations.  Unfortunately, no one has told the FarmHands this.

The way I see it, self preservation should be the strongest of all evolutionary instincts.  My children are completely devoid of it.  Not only do they like to do dangerous & irresponsible things day in & day out, but they have also failed to learn to avoid the most dangerous of all nature's living creatures:  PMS Mom.

Women have been suffering from PMS since shortly after the Fall of Man (or would have been if Eve had ever had time to menstruate instead of giving birth to the entire population of mankind).  All children should have developed an inner alarm that goes off as soon as Mom's hormones begin to fluctuate.  My kids have developed one, but it appears to work in reverse.

You see, as soon as PMS rears it's ugly, malformed, malevolent head, my children all lose their ever loving minds.  Instead of becoming complacent, calm, and obedient (as any self preservation instinct in good working order would) they go completely bananas.  The more overwrought I get, the worse their behavior becomes.  The bickering turns to full on fist fights.  The volume kicks up to decibels just under those produced at major international air ports.   The fun & giggles turns into complete mob mentality hysteria.  In short, they all go insane.

And me?  I'm left a twitching, blubbering mess on the floor of the shower (think every drug withdraw scene in every movie you've ever seen).

Should my children ever go Stepford on me just as I being the downward spiral into mood swings, night sweats, headaches, fatigue, and cramps, I might rethink my stance on evolution...but for now, I'm still not buying it.

Someday they'll give me grand kids. Someday they'll give me grand kids.

"I am hoping your silence since then is simply because you've been too busy doing things like going to Church, breaking up Farmhand brawls, and feeding your menagerie, and NOT due to the fact that the 'Hands revolted and committed a cannibalistic act..." -Kork in the comments on the post below


Fear not, Kork.  My children have not resorted to cannibalism.  Yet.  "Everything in this room is eatable, even *I'm* eatable! But that is called 'cannibalism,' my dear children, and is in fact frowned upon in most societies. "


Although I'm beginning to understand why animals eat their young (the title is my new mantra).  I understand Martin Luther King Jr. did great things for the civil rights movement in our country, but why must my children stay home from school just because he was born?  Couldn't they celebrate his life's achievements better if they were in an integrated school system instead of arguing in my living room?


Today, while cooking corn on the cob for their lunch, my microwave died.  Kaput.  Nothing.  Zilch.  It simply ceased to function.  Now this appliance is around 2 years old, so I am less than happy.  In this day & age, a microwave is a necessary piece of kitchen equipment.  I was prepared to hop in the van, head to town and purchase a replacement.  There are very few things I can do entirely without.  A microwave is one of them.  Especially with four perpetually hungry children in my house.


Husband was a bit calmer & said to wait & we could go to town in the morning while the FarmHands were at school to get one.  As I was looking on line at what Walmart had to offer, I hear him say, "It's really not a necessity.  People got along just fine before microwaves were invented."  I answered back, "Yeah, and they got along fine without air conditioning, too, but I'm not trying that."  He tried (jokingly, I think) to convince me to wait until our normal trip to town on Friday to get a replacement.  As you can imagine, that suggestion was not met with enthusiasm.


So now I am frantically searching for the perfect replacement & hoping I don't have to do this again next year.


Who ever thought of small appliances as disposable deserves to have every one of the tiny beasts in their home catch on fire at the same instant.  (Maybe that's going a bit far, but I'm deep in the throws of a wicked bad case of PMS & any kindness I've ever felt toward my fellow humans has been buried under an avalanche of hormones.  I'll apologize later.)

Send help, they're all starving.

I did not go to the grocery yesterday. In fact, Husband is going to bring home a gallon of milk after work tonight so we don't have to grocery shop until Sunday afternoon.  Do you have any idea what this means?  It means my children might actually starve to death in the interim.

Yes, we're down to a single frozen pizza (as opposed to the two or three that are normally there). We're completely out of apples.  We only have 2/3s of a box of Gogurt left in the freezer.  There's less than a cup of pancake syrup in the bottle.  We may even run out of Pop Tarts before the day is over.  As you can tell, the situation is rather dire.  As you can also tell, we're totally health nuts when it comes to what we eat (yes, I am a giant liar).

Forget the pounds & pounds & pounds of freshly butchered pork in the freezers. Forget the cans & cans of veggies in the pantry.  Forget the 2 loaves of whole wheat bread in the bread box.  We're running low on chocolate chip granola bars!

My poor children.  I hope they make it through the night.  At least there's still microwave pop corn....like 25 bags of the stuff.  Remind me not to put it on my shopping list.

Oh, I'm sleeping my life away, looking for a better way, for me.

I'm not sure if it's the total lack of sunlight today or the constant cold drizzle of rain or the running done the past two days or simply unjustifiable laziness, but I've done nothing but sleep all day today.

Maybe I'm catching up on all the sleep I missed out getting up at 6:30 in the morning all through Christmas break to tell the FarmHands to quite down & stay in their rooms until after daylight.

Or maybe I'm coming down with something horrible like Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or debilitating anemia or mononucleosis. 

Or possibly I just really needed a nap........or two.......or three.  Or an uninterrupted night sleep.  Or a month or two of hibernation.  Or one of those suspended animation chambers they put people in on science fiction movies.

But one thing I'm positive of.  I need to wake the heck up!

The FarmHands just walked in the door, so I don't think I have any other options at this point.  Maybe a shower, some loud music (OK Go doing the Muppet Show Theme seems like a good idea), and a few jumping jacks will do it.  Guess I should really do the jumping jacks before the shower.

Working Mother Takes College Course (gasp!)

As you might recall, I have recently found a new vocation- a calling as it were- a desire to fill the stomachs of children with mystery meat.  I am a lunch lady.

To be entirely honest, I'm only a substitute lunch lady & I've only subbed twice thus far....but I'm really hoping to get to work more as the year goes on....and flu season gets into full swing.  Not that I'm wishing the flu on anyone, but if they do get it, I hope I get to fill in for them.

What I'm really hoping is that this every now & again gig will turn into full time work at some point.  But for that to happen I must be certified in Food Sanitation & Safety.  That means I have to take a class.  An actual college course.  Well, sort of.  If you can call a 4 day class with a total of 1 credit hour a college class.  But it does meet at the college & I am technically a student of the college, so that counts, right?

So now, not only am I employed, but I am also a student.  Go me.  I think.

Ohhhh, pretty.

I'm a sucker for new pretty things.  Don't believe me?  Go check out my Pinterest boards.  A few days ago I realized I couldn't get into my Blogger Dashboard.  I was informed by the text across the top of the page that refused to load that my browser was out of date.  The next day Facebook told me the same thing.

Hurrah, I thought, I now get to spend hours upon hours downloading new software for a browser that locks up on me on a regular basis.  After polling my Facebook friends, I decided to go with Google Chrome instead...and now everything is new & pretty...Even my blog post page!

But even newer and prettier is....drum roll please....an award!!  Canningmama (another mom of four going in circles just like yours truly) had nominated me for a super cute award & I get to share the love.  I love to share the love.  Before I go any further, a huge 'thank you' is due to Canningmama, so...THANK YOU, CANNINGMAMA!

Here's the deets:

• Attach said award to your blog 
• Tell folks 10 things about yourself that they may not know. 
• Nominate 6 other bloggers for the award.

By the time you stumble over here, I'm hoping I've got the award neatly posted in my sidebar...if not, just give me a minute, would ya'?!  Geesh, you all are pushy.

And now for the 10 things about me....Um....well....I'm pretty sure you know it all by now, so if these are repeats, I offer my sincerest apologies.

1. I am horrifically afraid of rats and roaches.  I once ran screaming from my dorm room because a roach crawled across the floor.  My roommate had to kill it & show proof of death before I'd come out of the hallway.
2. I nearly named Lilly May 'Asta' after the fox terrier from the Thin Man films.  Asta is the reason I've always wanted a fox terrier so I thought it appropriate.  On our way to pick up Lilly, I told Husband and the three oldest FarmHands my plan.  A 4 year old BabyGirl immediately piped in with, "Oooh, and we can call her 'Ass' for short!"  It didn't take long for me to decide to go with 'Lilly May' instead. 
3. If you ask me who my best friend is my first answer will probably not be, "Husband."  I know many women who claim their husbands as their best friends.  I'm not one of them.  Art holds that position hands down.  She has since the moment we were no longer roommates back in July/August of 1996 (it was part of our roommate agreement that we could not be best friends while living together).
4. I'm mildly addicted to word search puzzles.  I can go years without doing one, but as soon as I have a  word search book in my possession, nothing else in life matters.  Not food, or sleep, or even HGTV.
5. When I was 8 years old I was in a fashion show for a local children's boutique with Bubba and Princess.  I was jealous of another girl who got to carry a red parasol.  Later I went to grade school with her & we still talk on Facebook regularly.  
6. I really want to be a full time lunch lady next year at the FarmHands' school.
7. 5 months after getting a new washer & dryer, I still look for loads of laundry to wash just so I can play with my 'new' toy.
8. I suspect the word 'karaoke' is Japanese for, "Proving once again that no one sings as wonderfully in real life as they do in the shower."
9. I really hate beans.  I mean REALLY hate them.
10. I'm a 35 year old mother of 4 & I catch myself wondering what Doctor Who is up to right now.

OK, that's enough of that.  Now for the sharing of the love.  My nominees for the Kreativ Blogger Award are:

Ordinary Sarah at Ordinary Days (yes, I know her name is not really Ordinary Sarah, but I cannot help but think of her with that title.  I love it.)

Kitty at Tikki Trips (she doesn't post often, but when she does it makes me happy...plus, I know her in real life.)

My Lovely English friend Sarah at The Secret Life of an Unknown Housewife  (she sings, she dances, she draws...well, one out of three isn't bad.  In reality, she does make some beautiful art and she RAN a MARATHON!)

Miss Layla at Wish Fulfillment Every Day (again, I know her in real life and she cracks me up even when she's having her guts repeatedly removed & examined.)

Mama Brown at the Brown Family Sound Off  (yikes, I know a lot of people in real life.  Mama & her Brownies keep me grounded & remind me what's really important in life.)

And finally, My dear cousin Inkling who's currently hanging out at her public blog (she makes me think, even when I don't want to and she reads real books!  Like ones without pictures!  Even NON-fiction.  That alone deserves an award.)

Now I shall send you out into the world to share the love.

On Anniversaries and Dry Wall

I've been so infatuated with Pinterest that I missed my very own Blogoversary on the 5th. I've been filling the Interwebs with my prattle for a full 6 years & 2 days. I've had followers come & go. I've had Spammers fill my comments with Viagra ads. I've had luls in my posting. I've posted 4 times in a single day. But I'm still here. If you decide to take a stroll through my archives -Long ago & Farm Away on the side bar- you'll find posts that make it look like I began blogging on January 6th. Do not be fooled. They were post-dated Memes.

I also missed Lilly May's 6th birthday (which was also on the 5th). Luckily, being a Wirehaired Fox Terrier, she hasn't noticed. Amazingly enough, she also didn't complain about being overlooked at Christmas. What can I say? She's wonderfully well mannered when it comes to gifts.

Last week, when we had our new roof put on, I lost my master bath skylight. It's made me rather depressed. When we first looked at the model home I was immediately drawn to a few things: the open great room, the kitchen at the front of the house with an island, the walk-in pantry, the walk-in master closet, the fire place in the corner of the living room, the linen closet in the master bath, and the skylight.

When we realized we had to replace the roof, I knew that meant I'd be losing my brightly lit bathroom. Husband was worried it would eventually leak & we'd have to do major repairs to replace sections of a metal roof. In the end, it's a good thing we did remove it. When the crew was working on the roof, Husband discovered water stains in the attic around the skylight.

It's removal has left a big patch of green drywall exposed on our bathroom ceiling. Husband's been spackling & sanding all week. This weekend he gets to try his hand at texturizing it so it matches the rest of the drywall. I'm a bit nervous about handing him a plastic bag & expecting him to get all artistic. He's a dyed in the wool farm boy after all....but I'm holding out hope that he'll discover a new side of himself. Oh, and his stitches come out today!

Until then I'm afraid we're all going to drown in dry wall dust. Where's a door to door vacuum sales man when you need one?

Oh Pinterest, How I love thee....

I will admit to a certain level of skepticism. When I first heard of 'blogging' I assumed it was a universe full of deluded 30 year old Star Trek enthusiasts living in their mother's basements writing about the time space continuum. And then I started one. I didn't want to join Facebook but I finally gave in & 3.7 seconds later I was a full blown junky. The thought of Tweeting nearly made me break out in hives & while not a true Twitter addict, I do enjoy a jaunt through the trends every now & then.

And now it's Pinterest. I tired to load it a few months back to no avail (Dial-up, my old frenemy) and thought nothing of it afterwards. Just a few days ago something I read sparked my interest & I thought I'd give it a second chance. That was nearly ruined by a 2 day wait for an invitation (WHAT?! Why must one be invited to a virtual cork board?). But now I am in....and I may never come out.

Everything in the world can be mine with a pin. I currently own a Victorian dress complete with bustle, an orange mini pull behind camper, and a fabulous blue glass tile backsplash. I've rekindled my love of graphic lettering. I'm considering selling a kidney to fund my new European-esque wardrobe. Oh, and I need a ceramic garden stool because I'm sure the FarmHands & our pack of wild dogs will respect it & leave it totally intact.

Yup, Pinterest & I will be the best of friends....until Husband realizes I haven't cooked a meal in weeks & the children have no clean underpants. Then I will have to ground myself.

On the First Day of Christmas....

Instead of song birds in fruit bearing trees, young women milking bovine, European royalty jumping around like grasshoppers, and a troupe of piccolo players, I got sick kids. And to make things super fun, they didn't all get sick at once. The spread it out over the first week of their Christmas break. #1 Son got started a day early missing the last day of school when he vomited All. Over. My. Bathroom. But I already told you about that.

BabyGirl picked it up the first day of their vacation with a sore throat & vomiting. Since Doc was about to leave the office for days on end, he gave us a script without the strep culture just to be on the safe side & save me a trip to the ER over the holidays. Too bad we still had to go...but that's for later in the post.

B.B. puked Christmas Eve morning & again Christmas morning preventing us from going to church on Christmas day. He complained of a sore throat on & off for 24 hours. By the time the weekend was over, I had worn 3 pairs of pajamas & no "real" clothing. What's the point of dressing when you're laying around for hours on end, watching House Hunters on an endless loop of HGTV, and living off Chex Mix and Poor Man's Toffee?

Bitsy rounded us out by running a fever & having a sore throat Monday & Tuesday keeping the two of us housebound while everyone else went to Little BIL & Aunt Cher's for lunch. By Wednesday, everyone was finally feeling better just in time for rain & rain & more rain.

Thursday the roofers showed up. Two high strung dogs plus half a dozen Mennonite men on the roof plus four nosy kids equals entirely too much going on for one FarmWife to deal with. So I kenneled up the dogs who were trying their hardest to coax the men off the roof so they could be summarily eaten, plopped the FarmHands down in front of the television, and proceeded to undress my Christmas tree.

By Friday, we were officially de-Christmased, it was warm enough to throw the FarmHands outside, & Bitsy had a WIC appointment, so the monotony was finally broken. The roof was finished that afternoon much to the dogs' delight.

On Saturday everyone came by to see our new lid. MIL & SIL came first followed by Uncle E, J, & Beffie. Uncle E gave Husband some drywall tips before he got started on the bathroom ceiling (I lost my skylight in getting my new roof....I am still in mourning, but fully understand the need for it's departure). Then Busha & Bucka came by very proud of Husband for, "Finally putting a roof over our Granddaughter's head." Little BIL & Aunt Cher stopped by on their way out to lunch with MIL & FIL. Everyone seems to like the new change.

Saturday afternoon Husband was putting the flashing up behind the gutters when he came in the house. "Um, come look at this, FarmWife. Do you think I need stitches?" His had slipped while sliding flashing into place & he cut his hand on the new roof. He had a 2 inch gash on his right hand across the knuckle at the base of his middle finger. One frantic hunt for a sitter, and a quick trip to the ER & he is now the proud owner of his first ever stitches. Four in total that earned him a hand full of stickers from the ER nurse & large strawberry milkshake from me. He was very brave.

Tomorrow our "normal" life resumes. I'm ready for it. Today I've battled allergies and a massive headache along with children in serious need of more structure than I'm willing to give. Husband's feeling lousy as well & I'm hoping it's just a bug & not infection in his hand. I'm keeping a close eye on it & him & if things are the same in the morning, Doc will be getting a New Year's visit from the FarmFamily Patriarch.

Happy stinking New Year.

Oh, and incidentally, I've finally joined the movement that is Pinterest. You can find me here if you like. Let me know if you pin. I'm just getting started & haven't quite got the hang of it. I'd love some ideas & input.