Anniversary--74 years

June 7th, 1939.  It was a nice sunny day in SD, comfortably warm.  Two young people, ages 24 & 25, at the end of the depression, get married at her parents home at Crow Lake.  The families of both of them are present.  He wore a 3 piece double breasted navy suit, and she wore the gown she had made, a floor length  light lacy blue fabric with short puffy sleeves with  a robins egg's blue satin under slip, making the lace stand out.  Today, 74 years later, here they are together with old friends, reminiscing about the days gone by.

Horse Radish Party

Today we had a small group come to our farm, and we had a Horse Radish Party....Sound like fun??  It starts with digging horseradish roots, some very deep roots, out of wet soil, dug by the 3 guys at the party.  The roots move on to the 4 gals, starting with hoses of water to get the first mud, moving on through lots of pans of water. Now everyone gets into the act, including our 8 year old grandson...lots of scrubbing, lots of water changes.   After about 4 hours, we moved on to the grinding.  Grind first through a coarse grinder, then thru a grinder to make it finely ground.  By now the fumes are starting to get to everyone, we move the work table out of the garage entirely, to the outside.  We grind for awhile, the burgers and brats are on the grill, and we take short break for a potluck lunch.  Back to the grinders, and we grind for a couple more hours, filling ALL the jars we have, plus freezer bags.  The fumes rise up even with little SD breeze we had, but in particular it send fumes to the grinders and those filling the jars.  The jars are filled with the horseradish and white vinegar to cover.  We ran out of jars and froze pint bags of ground horseradish as well.  The final count is 47 pints!!  That is a LOT of horseradish, considering it takes less than a tablespoon for most people on their hamburger!  We did have a good time, sinuses are cleaned and drained, eyes are steaming, but we got it done!!  Time for coffee!!   Note below all the pans of the root.

Great Grandson Shaden

This is Great Grandson Shaden, age 4 months, in the tractor with his Daddy.

Spring IS coming to SD

Spring IS coming to SD….April 27, 2013.  Here are the signs.

**Two nice days in a row, no wind, mild temps, in the 70’s.  Our new little calves are enjoying these days.  Now the rest of cows need to take advantage of this weather.

**Another sign of Spring…Farm and Consignment sales.  Roger’s Dad loved going to sales, and Roger has the fever as well.  Now if he could just get a job going to sales for people, bidding with someone else’s dollar….dream job for someone close to retirement!  He has been to 2 sales in the last two days.  I said to him this AM as he left…”Have fun!”  He said, “I will!”

**Yesterday I was in Mitchell, and while there, went to the car wash, got in line at 1:47.  I was 10^th in line.  I worked my way slowly to the front, but the line never got shorter than 10 vehicles while I was there.  In front of me, some town cars (not so dirty as mine) and definitely dirty farm pickups.  One pickup (truck to you CA people)  was red and the only way I deciphered that was by the cab of the pickup.  The red across the top gave the color away!!  One hour after I got in line, I was in the car wash.  I got the works, even though our road is still soft, and any little shower will make driving it a mess again.  But for the time being, I have a rather good looking car. 

**Another sign of SD Spring..3 HS graduation invitations, one college grad invite, all in different towns!

**I also took a couple of pictures of my garden, from the same viewpoint as last week.  If you look very carefully in the foreground you can see the horseradish peeking thru last year’s  foliage, and there are also winter onions in the first raised bed.  I can quit buying onions…we eat a lot of them.   The bed behind still is snow covered.  Not very exciting yet, I will keep you updated.

Our Great Grandson at age 3 months.

He weighs 17 pounds, and is sitting in a rocking chair made my by Grandfather Ellsworth Workman

 and given to me in 1944.  Isn't he cute?!

Five Generations

We are a lucky family to have the following five generations for this picture.

The first generation, Belle and Jim, are 98 years old.

Behind left is Kim, Jim & Belle's granddaughter;  Kim's daughter Amy with her son, Shaden James;

 and Myrna, daughter of Jim and Belle.

Photo was taken by Allison, another granddaughter of Jim & Belle's, and owner of Twisted Wire Design.

Grandpa Jim & his Farmall Tractors

This is a new wall hanging for Mom and Dad's rooms.    I was thrilled to find this, it so well represents the farm where we grew up.

Dad looked at it, and said….”A Farmall…..it says C, but it looks like an H!”    

I loved the remark.   Still has the farmer in him!

We had geese, chickens, dogs, we milked cows and our swing was north of the house in the old pine tree….that tree was there when we moved to this farm when I was 5 or 6 years old.   And of course, we had red Farmall tractors.    (We had no silos and our barn had an addition on each side, not just one.)

I hope this brings back memories for my 98 year old parents, it did for me.

 

Great Grand Son

Our first Great Grand Son

Shaden James.

Here he is, 4 days old.

Isnt' he just the cutest?

December 2012

We had a great holiday.  We spent Christmas Eve with my 97 year old parents, taking goodies and a soup supper. Part of our family and niece Allison with her family were there.   We read the Christmas story, and the little kids filled the stable with the figurines.   The next day, our family of 19 gathered at our house for more good food, games and gifts.    We are looking forward to a great 2013! 

 

Roger, Myrna and their seven grandchildren.

 

Alex is the youngest.

Allison and Blake with Grandma Belle.

         Mike, Kay and family with Grandma Belle and Grandpa Jim

                                        Alyssa and Amy, the oldest grandchild.

Winter

No matter what, even though you know winter is coming, one does not seem to be prepared.  It is always a surprise when the first snow comes!

The first real snow came on Saturday, lots of big flakes, wet and drippy, falling down.  Pretty, unless you were driving.  Snow continued, then some wind last night and today, Sunday. We stayed cozied up in the house today.   It has cleared off now and the sun came peeking out.  Time to get outside and give the feeder calves some hay bales, as the bunk is full of snow, and it will have to be cleaned out before running the silage into the bunks.

The wind had blown the snow right through their yard, though, so no drifts for them to walk around.  The calves have the blizzard look, snow on their faces and over their backs.  I could not see the cows, they are hunkered down on the south side of the shelterbelt in the pasture that connects to the feed yard.

As I said, I was not prepared for winter, had to go to the basement to look for boots, scarves, found a pair of mittens on the porch, left by a deer hunter, I think. While I was out watching gates, I scooped off the step, where the snow comes around the house and fills up in front of the door.

Winter is here!

Grandma Belle and Amy

97 year old Belle with her Great Grand Daughter Amy,

giving Amy a quilt for her baby...to be born January, 2013.

Belle made the nursery rhyme embroidered squares in the 30's

when she was in High School.  This summer, she put them together

with mitered corners.  Amy was thrilled.  We are looking 

forward to a five generation picture in 2013.

Deer Season in SD

Opening Deer Season in SD....Three bucks harvested from our place....a few more trees are saved from the ravages of winter feeding by them.

 Jason got his the 2nd day

Alex sat with his Dad for hours in the tree stand to get this one

Mike got the 3rd one.

Family Pheasant Hunting

A good day at our farm in South Dakota.  All four of our children were here for opening pheasant hunting, along with a daughter-in-law and three of our grandchildren.  They got their limit, had great fun visiting and playing cards after good venison chili made by Troy.  We will hunt again tomorrow.

Wind in South Dakota

Would be remiss if I did not write about the wind October 17^th and 18^th.

I cannot ever remember the wind blowing this hard.  At least 50 MPH, with gusts yesterday 60-70 MPH.

When we went to bed last night, the sounds were like the worst blizzard Roger and I had ever seen or heard.  You could just imagine snow flying around, and zero visibility.

Yet this wind is only blowing dirt.  I was in our small town yesterday at the Church, on the West side of town.  The wind is always bad there anyway, but in order to get in and out the door, someone on the inside had to hold the bar on the door while the other went out.  Our cars in the lot were moving back and forth.  We could watch them from the window.

As I left town and drove the mile north to turn east, the dirt blowing and scant visibility made me think of the books I have read of the dirty thirty’s, only this would not be close to what they endured.  

I think the temp yesterday was in the 40’s, so it was a cold wind.  I can’t imagine how much fine dirt is coming into our houses these two days.  It was bad enough with all the trucks and pups that have been going by all summer, and the increase during harvest, but this wind is driving the dust into all the nooks and crannies.  Fine layers everywhere!  I wonder about the air vents on top of the house.  Maybe the extra layers of dirt in the attic will help with insulation!!

I remember Roger’s Mom talking about the 30’s, how bad it was, how they laid wet rags on the windowsills to try to catch the dirt.  Of course, I don’t think houses then had much insulation, and their windows did not fit tight like ours should.  And from what I have read, the Dakotas were on the north side of the worst of wind and drought.

Waiting for the wind to die down in SD!!

Skunks

August 2, 2012

Last week, Roger is asleep, I can’t get to sleep.  Got up and wrote out some bills.  Windows are open, as we do almost every night, in spite of how hot it has been.  Don't have to run the air conditioner.

I smell skunk, run to the windows, crank them shut.  Look out the porch door, I see a spotted skunk prowling around the flower pots and the cement blocks we have ready for a project.

I watch thru the porch window, he looks at me with beady eyes.  I think, Can I get Roger awake and get a gun?   .Woke Roger up, but of course skunk was gone.

A night or so goes by.  This night I am sound asleep, and wake to the smell of skunk filling the bedroom, shut the window, run to the kitchen.  Too late, now the whole house is full of smell.  Besides that, the porch door window was left open.  No skunk in sight by the time I look.  Hard to go back to sleep.

Both the car and tracker were sitting outside.  I used the car the next day, skunk smell floats out of it. 

The next evening, Saturday, we went to the Bull Riding at Desparado Days in Kimball, the guy who told Roger where to park said…”You hit a skunk on the way in, didn’t you?”

We bring up the live animal traps, and set 3 of them…one right in front of the house, between front and back steps, the other two on west and north side of garage.

Next AM, a cat only.    Smell lingers a little outdoors today.   Catch an occasional cat.

Now we are to Wednesday AM the next week.  I wake up about 4:30 AM, watch taped Olympics, windows are open.  Roger gets up at 5:30, and skunk smell starts its penetration.

Sure enough, a skunk in the trap in front of the house.  Roger is leaving for a sale, I implore him to get rid of the skunk before he goes.  He does not want to start his day smelling like a skunk, but he fetches his 12 foot wire with a hook, and drags the trap down to the calf yard.  It was still dark.  At 8:30, I go check the trap, curious…is it a big skunk, or a smaller spotted one that I saw?  THE TRAP IS EMPTY!!  The door is still tightly latched, the entire screen on this trap is 1 inch by 1 ½ inches.

That night,still Wednesday, we set the traps again.  I toss and turn, remembering the spotted skunks that daughter Kim had in her house, wondering if I have any small entry places around my house. Checked before I went to bed, and released 2 of our wild/tame cats. Reset the traps.  We don’t think it will come back tonight, since it was caught just this AM.

Roger goes to bed, he has an early meeting Thursday.  Before I can get to bed,  I smell skunk, take a peek, there is a skunk in the garage trap.  Wake Roger up anyway.  He says,  “It can’t get out of that trap, the screens are even smaller..they are 1 inch square.”

Thursday AM, Roger dresses for skunk job, and sure enough, THE TRAP IS EMPTY again! 

Conclusion, but not the end of the story:  This must be a young civet cat, and we now think it is getting out BETWEEN the sprung down catch door and the side of the trap, again, I measured, there is only 1 inch of space, but the space is about 12 inches long.   A 12 by 1 inch space??  They must be like a rat, if they can get their head thru a space, then the body will follow.

Will set again tonight, with gun by the door!  Wish us luck!!

The saga will continue, hopefully with better results.

Wish us luck,

From the Smelly Farm!

Hot Peppers

Very windy and hot in SD today.  At 5 PM, it was 98 degrees.  Taking out what little moisture we had left.

I dried hot peppers today.   I have red jalapeno peppers, they are about 2 ½ inches long and green habanera peppers, fatter and about 3 ¼ inches.  The peppers are in a raised bed with some onions, and are really dry now.  It was hard to keep this bed moist, as it is not very deep.

One of the jalapeno peppers, dried, equals a scant teaspoon.  I have used some in cooking, and one is a great plenty for our taste buds.

I did get a little smarter this week when doing this, tho.  I used rubber gloves when cutting and handling the little buggers.

Last week after I cut and filled the dehydrator, my fingers were hot and tingled all day and into the next.

Every time the next week when I licked my fingers for some reason or other, they still were giving off hot vibes.

Don’t lick your fingers, you say.  You might be surprised just how often a person does that.

Pepper aficionados  out there, which are hotter---habanera or jalapeno, or are their many things that would make the heat…moisture, variety, etc?  I got both of these from a greenhouse this spring.

Anyway, I will think of this hot South Dakota summer this winter when cooking with my hot peppers.

the Grass is Greener

The grass is greener on the other side of the fence, at least our cows would like to think so.  They are not smart enough to know the next pasture tastes just like the one they are in. 

We went out this AM to drive some wooden posts to reinforce the fence on the road side.

The cows got excited, thought we were taking them out….No, cows, get back, let us through the gate.

Hubby walked ahead to decide where he wanted the posts.  I drove the pickup with the post pounder behind.  I have done this before, so I know how close I need to be to the fence.

I watch carefully, getting in position, then I see that the “holder” of the posts is going to hit one of the fence posts.  I back up, drive ahead…Nope, still going to hit it.  Back up, try again…..Nope….Back up, try again…Nope…And I can see that now the post hole digger, and the rear fender are almost touching the barb wire fence.   (Now I know all of you people that so expertly back up big trailers and trucks are chuckling.  I know you have to think backwards when you back up, but I can never compute that in my brain!!) 

So  I beep the horn, and Hubby is quite a bit farther up the fence line….Well, I don’t have to tell you what he said….He walked back, had me back up again, just a little, then he moved the post hole holder IN, (where it should have been anyway, but I did not say that!!)

On to the pounder job, we put in about 10 or so posts, the ground is really hard driving, even with this automatic machine.  Good thing we do not have to do it with a post hole digger.

I drove the pounder home, Hubby stayed to staple the wire to the fence.

To the Cows….just a little harder now to bend the fence over when you reach thru the fence!

All’s well that ends well!!