Smithfield Scoop from Snowflake

I really have no idea what the scoop is in Smithfield right now, so I'll have to focus more on the Snowflake goings on...

First of all, thanks for the birthday wishes for me and for Dad! You are all so kind and it was fun to visit with all of you. Thanks to Emma for taking good care of Dad while I'm on vacation in Arizona :) She's doing a great job of making sure he doesn't starve or get too lonely. From what I've heard, the food has been terrific and has kept him healthy and happy and active - he's been painting up a storm and has painted the entire upstairs now!!! It will all look fresh and new and lovely when I return home (IF I return home! - it's so fun here, that I may decide to take up permanent residence in the very wonderful guest room that Jenn and Scott have made in the basement!). 

Playing with the Rs here has been delightful. They are so fun and energetic and we have found some delightful things to do together - piggy back rides, going for walks, playing chase, reading stories, etc. Quite fun! It is still warm enough for them to play in the sprinklers and harvest cherry tomatoes outside, which they do with great enthusiasm! Rosie likes to chase the large beetles in the yard and even picks them up and lets them crawl on her! The adventures never end! 

On a walk to feed the ducks

Snack time!

Funny story from this morning.... Scott was playing with Rand and put a ball up his shirt and told him he looked like Mom. Of course, Rosie wanted a baby in her shirt, too. She patted her tummy and rubbed it - SO funny! There are certainly lots of babies coming to this family! 

You are all aware of what great cooks Jenn and Scott are - The food is always delicious and the companionship very comfortable and enriching. It has been fun to hang photos on the wall, go to the lake to feed the ducks, pull the little ones in their new wagon, as well as do the normal day to day stuff. I'm grateful to the Flakes for their kindness to let me hang out and help them wait for Baby E to arrive :) Gotta love this waiting game....!

  

Flake Foursome

 First off, a huge thank you to everyone for not pestering me about when Baby Flake will arrive. (Still hasn't happened) I didn't realize how taxing those types of questions can be!! 

It has been a fairly good week. We went to the park which was a lot of fun and we played outside and ran through the sprinklers...or at least dipped our toes in the sprinklers and splashed in the resulting mud puddles! 

The highlight of the week was finding a wagon in Show Low so now we can go on longer walks!! And there is room for growth!! It is actually a steel garden cart with pneumatic wheels and we love it.

Robin has kept Grandma laughing all week. She is perfecting certain facial expressions and is getting really good at "surprised", "concerned", and "resigned". 

Rand is really into running and piggy back rides. Daddy is his best friend and he spends every minute he can in Scott's arms or on his back or lap or shoulders. 

Hope that you all have a great week. 

Flake Foursome

  We have had a blast playing with Grandma this past week.  Robin has taken it upon herself to boss her around about everything.  Robin really makes sure that Grandma knows when there is a text message on her phone. Quite cute honestly. 

We fed the ducks on Saturday which was a lot of fun.  

The twins love eating the green cherry tomatoes growing out front so I don't know that we'll ever get any ripe ones!!

Our cantaloupe has been ripening so we have been eating melon at nearly every meal.  

Hope that you all have a good week!!!

Hart Happenings

 I want to reiterate the birthday wishes for Mom.  She is the greatest and I hope she is celebrating well in Snowflake.

  Lauren, Parumpf Nevada?  That is the best name of a place I have ever heard.  It made me laugh out loud when I read that.  

  We enjoyed many of the same activities that the rest of you did these past few weeks.  The Spartan was a fun one-time event for me.  I as glad I didn't die and grateful to Thomas yelling encouragement at me and making me keep going and super grateful that there was no mud.  I was pleasantly surprised to be able to do most of the obstacles and only have to do 60 burpees.  High fives all around to those of you who enjoy doing more than one of those in your lifetime.  Joe and Thomas blew my mind and have some mad skills and endurance.  I want them on my team if we ever have to cross the plans.  They could wrestle buffalo all day and could pull our wagons instead of needing oxen or mules.  

  It was so fun to hear about JJ's birth story.  Victoria being inspired by a evangelical preacher on TV during labor was my MOST FAVORITE part.  SOOO funny!  As well as trying to find Emma.  We were all at Olive Garden but couldn't find each other.  We finally figured out she was at a different one.  No worries, we were all reunited.

  I also enjoyed listening to Joe and Ruth go at it about a proposed refinishing of Joe's fireplace.  Joe yelling for Alex to come and be on his side and even the score after Lori and Ruth ganged up on him will make me laugh for a while still.  In Ruth's defense though, everything that she touches turns out better than it was before and if it weren't for her nothing would ever get done at the Hart house because we have such a hard time actually biting the bullet and starting things.  Ruth is the best bullet-biter ever!

  It was fun to have Cam around and I know the boys in the family enjoyed getting to know him better while the girls were out to lunch.  There was a little concern when Cam ghosted Emma's texts for a while and the only text I got from Alex was "um, we lost Cam."  But he didn't stay lost and by the end of the weekend he had fit in so well he was like one of the fam.

  Thomas did an excellent job blessing JJ and it was so nice to be there and enjoy good food in such a beautiful spot.  Mom and Dad have done such a great job with their house and it feels so nice and homey inside and out.  We really love gathering there.

  Life up here is going well.  It is good to be back in our school routine.  The kids are enjoying doing their studies and really like the anatomy and history units we are doing with the Nilssons.  We managed to save a lot of the garden during the freezing temperatures and are still harvesting potatoes, blackberries, strawberries, and tomatoes.

  Jack turned 12 on Friday.  Thanks for all the calls and well wishes.  We are so glad he is part of our family.  He celebrated by going to a trampoline park, a round of golf with Dad, a soccer game and then pizza and frozen yogurt.  It was quite the day!

  Thanks for being such a great family!  We are crazy about all of you!

Nilsson News

 Hi all!  First off, Happy Birthday to the best mom in the entire world!!!!! 

Our watermelons took a long time to get ripe this year, but now they are the tasty treat that we remember!

We picked 80 watermelon before the freeze hit!  In total for the year, we probably had close to 100 melons!

While we were at the Hart's, Addy discovered a baby vole and the kids absolutely fell in love with it!  Don't be deceived by the cuteness factor, these guys can cause some serious damage in your lawn and garden!

Mummification experiment for human anatomy

It has also been quite awhile for us since we last posted.  We have greatly enjoyed spending time with our wonderful family, YOU!  It was a treat to have Emma bring Cameron a couple weeks ago and we are so grateful he survived us!  He is a very nice fellow and we highly approve!  We had a wonderful time running the "Spartan" with you and it was pretty intense at times.  Can't wait to do another, hopefully next year.  Meeting baby JJ was the highlight for sure!  I loved hanging out with the girls to hear Victoria's birth story and all I have to say is she is a champ!  Thomas did a wonderful job blessing the cute little guy and we loved being there.  We sure missed the Flakes but are looking forward to their news within the next few weeks.  On Monday, after all these events, we decided to take our kids, along with mom, dad and Becca, up to Pickleville Playhouse.  The show was another TJ Davis original called the Fickle Family Fortune and it was hilarious!  It brought back good old memories from when Elise and Thomas performed there.  On our way home, we headed directly into a huge storm that was blowing in from Canada.  The winds reached 40 mph with 60 mph gusts.  Lightening and rain and cold hit.  It was crazy!  We had to harvest all our watermelons, cucumbers, peppers and what tomatoes we could.  We had already harvested and froze all our corn so we only had to cover our tomatoes and hoped for the best.  The temps were supposed to drop to 27 degrees!  We think most our tomatoes survived and we are hoping to get a larger harvest for canning.

Yesterday, we decided to set up our watermelon stand.  The kids were excited and Emerson even put out some of his mini pumpkins he grew.  The customers were slow at first but then they started to stop by.  They sold about 30 of the melons so far.

A few weeks ago, we had our jack gelded (I can't remember if I wrote about that already?).  We have had so many problems with with the birthing situation and everyone I talk to says it stems from our jack.  He is now retired and we have other great plans for him.  While we were down in Utah, we went and looked at a small herd that a fellow is selling.  His jack amazing!  Tiny with perfect conformation and tempermant.  The four jennies were pretty cute and one in particular looked like a grown version of Ginger.  If we end up purchasing them, they will join our farm in early spring.  We are also looking forward to having a spotted jr. jack join our farm in November.  We won't be able to breed with him for another year and a half but we are excited for these changes and hopefully they will bring positive results.

We started school this week and so far, so good!  On Wednesdays we meet with the Harts for a little homeschool co-op and this year we are excited to be studying human anatomy and physiology as well as U.S. history.  Good times!

Manning Moments

 Well this past week was sure delightful. Nick went to his happy place in Parumpf Nevada for advanced handgun training. He is basically a navy seal. Anyway, while he was gone we got to have a party with my favorite people! We went up to Grandma and Grandpa's on Thursday and Friday. Then we went back down for the baby shower which was so fun! Victoria is so funny and one of my favorites for sure. She is a stellar mom and I love seeing how smitten Thomas is with his little boy! Happy times! It was fun to hang out at Joe's house the rest of the day and then head up to Grandma's house the next day for the blessing. What a great day that was. One of the best baby blessings I have ever heard. Cameron was so fun to have around. What a good sport he is! 

It was wonderful to see Nick again and he had a wonderful time on his trip. The boys are learning constantly and keep us laughing and pulling our hair out at the same time. Chet's speech impediments are adorable. Today at church he said, "hing hong at turt." 

We sure love you and can't wait to see you all again. So excited to Jenn and can't wait to hear news from her!

Flake Foursome

 Sorry that it has been a couple of weeks since we last posted.  The days seem to fly by recently.  

We did have a bit of a cold snap these last few days but nothing like Idaho and Utah!  We got down to 40 or so.  It did a little bit of damage to the garden but nothing too bad. 

As for the kids, they are so fun!! Robin is still working on getting her bottom tooth in so she still has a lopsided grin.  They are both learning to communicate in their own way.  Robin has now started saying (with attitude) "Mom. Mom. Mom." Then she'll point at something or show me something. It is adorable.  Rand's favorite new word is "snack" which he uses for meals, snacks and anything food related.  

Rand has become quite the climber.  The other day we found him on the kitchen table.  The joke is that he will either give me a heart attack or put me into labor.  

We have finished eating our garden watermelon which we will miss greatly.  Now our cantaloupe are ripening which is a treat.  Things seem to be winding down in the garden but we are still holding out hope for some good garden tomatoes.  

That is all that we have to report for the last couple of weeks.  No baby yet but we'll keep you in the loop. Hope that you all have a great week!!!