It's a Wordless Wednesday 1st Birthday

Our youngest niece turned 1 less than a week ago.   Little Sissy and Cousin E are only 7 months apart so I hope they will be the best of friends growing up.  

We celebrated Cousin E's birthday in conjunction with her brother's 3rd birthday as their birthdays are only a few weeks apart.  Her brother, Cousin N, requested pumpkin pie instead of birthday cake for their party so of course their mother obliged.  She wasn't quite sure how Cousin E would like pumpkin pie.  

I'll let you be the judge...

 

 

This post is linked to A Beautiful Mess

The Magic of Christmas at the pig pen

So I did some Christmas shopping last night because I had a free shipping code for American Girl.  Even though I started buying gifts a few months ago, I can't believe it is already November and Thanksgiving is a few weeks away and Christmas is only a little over a month away. 

As I did my online shopping last night, I couldn't help but wonder how many more years Big Sissy would believe in all of the "magic" of Christmas.  As a second grader, she is reaching the age where kids talk about everything and start to question many things in their life as they are very inquisitive. 

My mother-in-law warned me today that this might be our last year of her believing in the "magic."  The thought of that is very depressing to me.  Although she is 8, she will always be my Little Girl and I want her to stay a little girl for as long as possible so I will do my best to keep the "magic" alive for her, Bubby, and Little Sissy for many years to come. 

How do you keep the "magic" alive at your house?

It's finally over

Well my six straight weeks of travel with multiple nights away from home each week has finally come to an end, but not without a few casualties.

We are all still alive, but my house, specifically my kitchen table, has seen much better days.  All of our mail and other odds and ends are stacked on top of each other waiting for me to take care of them next week.

Two weeks ago after spending the entire week in Chicago for a work meeting, I came home on Friday afternoon with a fever.  Thankfully Big Sissy saved the day by taking care of me and Little Sissy on Friday night until The Farmer and Bubby got home.  It's amazing what an almost 8 year old can do when their mommy is sick.  The next day, I was diagnosed with strep throat which is never fun for an adult or a kid. 

Bubby and The Farmer battled a fever off and on over the weekend, but everyone returned to work and school on Monday except for me.  I needed one more day to recover.  Unfortunately, when I woke up on Tuesday morning, my eye was glued shut so I had to make another trip to the doctor because I had pink eye. 

And as you know when it rains, it pours...

Because Tuesday night I ended up at the doctor again with Big Sissy and Bubby.  They were both diagnosed with strep throat.  And on Wednesday, The Farmer fell victim to strep throat.  The only blessing in all of this is that somehow Little Sissy stayed healthy. 

Well two weeks later, we are all finally doing better and I am slowly but surely returning to blogging.  Now, I just have to find my kitchen table. 

Wordless Wednesday - Yummy, yummy in our tummies

October is National Pork Month or Porktober.

We always eat a  lot of pork at our house, but we have been trying new recipes this month to broaden our pork recipe collection.

Thanks to some yummy recipes from Amy's Dinner and GOODeness Gracious, we have found too keeper recipes.  Be sure to check them out...



The Best Porkchops from GOODEness Gracious

Beer Braised Baby Backs

I hope your family enjoys these recipes as much as mine!

Linked to Wordless Wednesday at The Snyder 5 and A Beautiful Mess. 

Halloween Craft Time at the pig pen

Not that I have a lot of spare time as a full-time working momma and a Real Farmwife of America, but in the spare time that I do have, I try to do as much as I can.  One of the organizations that I belong to is Extension Homemakers.  This is a nation-wide organization.  In our state it is facilitated by the Extension Service through Purdue University who also facilitates all 4-H activities.  

When I married The Farmer, I joined his mother's club.  (This made my Gramma very happy as she had been a very active member in the county where I grew up.)  The members of our club range from age 33 to 80 so there are a lot of good stories and memories shared by our members at our meetings and we always have fun.  Our club is very big on community service and we are always doing something to give back to others.  

Any way at our last meeting, my mother-in-law and I decided to do a craft lesson for all of members.  After seeing it on Katie at On the Banks of Squaw Creek's blog, we decided to have everyone make a toilet paper pumpkin.  I had never seen these before Katie's blog, but they are super cute and super easy to make so be sure to check it out.  You can make these pumpkins as simple or fancy as you want, so it was the perfect craft for our club.  

Now we always have some kids running around during our meeting including my 3 so we decided to take a craft for the kids to do ... wedding bell ghosts.  We found this is some magazine, but I can't remember which one so I'm sorry I can't link you to their website, but basically you need white tissue paper wedding bells, black construction paper, cheesecloth, and glue.

After assembling each bell, you cut out 2 eyes and a mouth with the black construction paper.

Then glue them to the bell.

Then take a piece of cheesecloth and run the string at the top of the bell through the cheesecloth.

Now you have the perfect Halloween ghost.

 

 BOO!

 

What a difference a week makes...

What a difference a week makes...

Last Sunday, the 3 kids, myself, and my mother-in-law ventured out to Kelsay Farms to Experience the Farm thanks to tickets that Amy and Liz from 2 Maids a Milking and Kelsay Farms gave us.

You may be wondering why we would want to Experience the Farm when we live on a farm.  Well much to Bubby's excitement, Kelsay Farms is a dairy farm which means they raise cows.  Although we love being pig farmers, we love dairy products especially milk, cheese, and ice cream at this pig pen so we wanted to see the cows of course.

So why does a week make a difference?  Well last Sunday, Fall weather was definitely here.  We wore several layers, scarves, and even took hats and gloves for our adventure last Sunday.  As I sit here today, I would think it was still summer if we didn't have a combine running today on our family farm as it is over 80 degrees probably 20 degrees warmer than last Sunday.  So either way, fall or summer temperatures, we would all recommend that you visit Kelsay Farms this October and Experience the Farm. 

Bubby's favorite part was visiting with the cows and the milking parlor tour.  Big Sissy loved the 5 acre corn maze and bale mountain, and Little Sissy loved the Moo Choo Express.  My favorite part was just seeing the smiles on my kids faces and having a fun family day.