Painting the Garage

Last week we spent a few extra days at our family farm before our family reunion.  We thought painting the garage might be just the right sort of family project for us.  This is a one car garage with an additional room that was originally a summer kitchen for the house.  Mostly it has been used for storage, although Hank and Rod lived in it a while during college.  It had been so long since it had been painted that most of the paint was already off due to weathering. 

Peter and Cordell putting on primer. 

Don't you hate it when the annoying photographer makes you interrupt your painting to pose for a picture?

This only looks like Walter is not working.  I assure that he had the hardest (and dirtiest!) job with scraping the paint and dodging the bees.

Smile!

It's finished!  This is the front.  I personally love the doors.  

And this is the back side.  We chose blue and white to match the house.

This is the house Pam grew up in.  I spent many hours petting cats on that front porch!

Not many houses can boast of having such a pretty outhouse, and it still gets some occasional use too!

Posted by P

We have footings!

It was very exciting to get home from our family reunion in Indiana to see the progress that had been made while we were gone.

This is our garage...

The house is taking shape!

                                      
                                           Doesn't look much like our future bedroom, but it is.

This certainly reminds me of the wise man in Luke who dug deep to lay a foundation on the rock, so that when the rains, winds, and floods could not shake it.  Of course, the context is not only that a wise person would do this in the building process, but a wise person not only hears God's word, but also does it in his journey through life. (Luke 6:46-49)

Posted by Pam

Ground Breaking!

I thought it would be fun to look back at some pictures of getting our house site ready.  These pictures are from tearing down the old garage and stables.  Notice the concrete pad in the more recent pictures.

 In this picture you can see the back side of our camper.

Most of this work was done last spring.

Now fastforwarding to today.

 Setting the stakes for the house site.  The concrete pad will be broken up and will eventually be our front yard.

 The first scoop of dirt!

  At the end of the day there were 3 large dirt piles,

which turn out to be just right for Ryan and Max to climb on...

Yes, a NEW post....

      So sorry for not posting anything new since February.  We will be amazed if anyone out there is even still reading this blog!  But, this is just as much for us as for you, our readers.


      The problem with trying to catch you up since our posts in February is that we were already so far behind that we aren't even going to attempt it now, save some sparodic events that we just can't overlook.   Suffice it to say that we were busy, we were incredibly grateful for the mild winter, and we were far more blessed than we deserve.  We also have a treasure trove of memories (most of them even good!) of 5 people living in a camper/trailer compound of sorts.


     This is a great time to start posting again as the work begins on our new house.  Stay tuned for details!


      

First Lego League Robotics

In December, both Cordell and Ryan were able to compete with the Rolla Regional Robotics Teams in the First Lego League in Mountain Home, Arkansas. This involves building and programming a Mind Storm robot, and strategizing missions to gain the most points during two and a half minutes of competition.

The judges also talked to the team members about all aspects of their project and were on the lookout for signs of team work and good sportmanship.

In addition, each team must complete research on how robotics can be used in keeping food safe, this year's theme. Cordell's team, The Green Team, chose cheese to research and gave a 5 minute presentation to the judges giving lots of info about cheese, how it is made, and what steps are taken to prevent contamination from the farm to the table. They were the "Cheese Heads"!

The Cheese Heads scored 3rd in the competition for points, won the "Core Values" award for strong team work, and will advance to the state level competition in Little Rock, Arkansas, in February! Great Job Green Team!

This picture shows the board competition between the robots. Here Cordell is facing his brother, Ryan's team in a head to head trial. Needless to say, it becomes a rather intense few minutes!

Ryan's team, "The Red Team" chose to research eggs for their food safety topic. Here they are preparing for their 5 minute skit for the judges. They came up with the acronym "CLUCK" to protect eggs.

C hill the egg at collection and keep it cold.

L eave egg in shell until ready to use.

U tensils clean and never mix with raw / cooked.

C ook it completely.

K eep it hot until it's eaten

They ended the skit with a very cute song about Salmonella, set to the tune of "Interjections!" It really wowed the judges!

The "Chicken Heads", as they were fondly known, were the First Place tournament Winners with the highest consistent board score, best robot design, and highest marks for their research project. They also advance to Little Rock in February!

WAY TO GO RED TEAM!

School House Rocks LIVE! Jr.

Remember the School House Rocks cartoons that interrupted your Saturday morning cartoons? If you said yes, then you are probably showing your age like I (Pam) am! Cordell and Ryan were in Fine Linen Drama's production of School House Rocks LIVE! Jr. in October.

Here is the blue group singing a great song, but I have already forgotten which one it was. Maybe the "Do the Circulation" ? This is why it is always better to post about these things right after they happen instead of waiting 4 months!

Remember this one? "I'm just a bill, yes I'm only a bill, and I'm sitting here on Capitol Hill" Well it's a long long journey to the capitol city, it's a long, long wait while I'm sitting in committee, but I know I'll be a law someday!"

"Interplanet Janet she's a galaxy girl, a solar system Ms. from a future world. She travels like a rocket with her comet team, and there's never been a planet Janet hasn't seen..."

"Conjunction Junction, what's your function? Hooking up words and phrases and clauses. Conjuction Junction, how's that function? I got three favorite cars that get most of my job done..." Yes, that is Cordell in the hat.

"Oh yeah!"

The Preamble

"In 1787 I'm told, our founding fathers all sat down, and wrote a list of principles that's known the world around. The USA was just starting out, a whole brand new country, and so our people spelled it out. They wanted a land of liberty. We the people, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." Ryan is the tall one in the picture below.

"Three is a magic number. 3,6,9, 12, 15,18,21,24,27,30!"

"Interjections (Hey!) show excitement (Ouch!) or emotion (Yow!)

They're generally set apart from a sentence by an exclamtion point,

or by a comma if the feeling's not too strong...."

New Faces on the Farm...

This is Max, Ryan's puppy. He actually was born in September, but I liked this picture of him asleep under the Christmas tree.Max is about 4 months old in this picture with Ryan.
Here is our new Angus bull, Brutus. He is about 6 years old, and we are hoping the cows will think he is a good addition to the farm!

This is Darcy, a 20 yr. old Tennessee Walking Horse. Walter's cousin is letting us try him out to see if we like him. So far he seems pretty mellow and doesn't mind our inexperience too much.