humor

Is Yours the Mother of All Fights?

/ helbergfarmstories / Leave a comment

Mom was creative, outgoing, and seemed to find the fun in everything.  Her sense-of-humor was beyond reproach!  My little sister (yes, the same one I share the farm with now) and I fought like cats and dogs constantly!  One day, Mom stepped into one of our blow-outs and handed each of us a butter knife.

butter-knife Now, for those of you that do not know your way around a kitchen, a butter knife is just that – a blade no sharper than to cut butter.  WE FREAKED OUT – mom just handed each of us a knife!  What were we supposed to do with it?

When she put them in our hands she yelled:

“Now try to kill each other!”

In a very firm voice, I must say!  We just stood there looking at the knives and looking at her, then back at each other.  She started mumbling something under her breath, turned and walked out of the room.  We were still standing there mortified!

Mom gave us each a knife – MOM GAVE US EACH A KNIFE – WHAT??  After what felt like an eternity, we sat down right where we were standing.  Knives still in hand we glanced at them and then to each other.  This whole shocking situation must have gone on for at least an hour.

Then, as we sisters always did, we scooted closer to one another.  We began questioning what was wrong with mom, and just what were we supposed to do with these knives?  We were, in fact, only about 5 and 7 years old at the time – what were we going to do with any kind of knife?

Well, Mom, the smartie that she was, knew that we never really wanted to kill each other, but she was fed up with our fighting.  Pulling out a real possibility of damage caused the two sisters to band together (she was so smart) to solve our dilemma.

The thing about the two of us that disturbed mom is how we could be so mean to each other, but should an outside source attack one or the other, we immediately bonded together against the foe!  She and her siblings were never like that, so she just could not fathom why we could not play nice with each other.  We remained this way until…oh wait, we still do it on occasion!?

However, no matter how many times we fought, bit, punched, or ran off on one another; mom managed to flip it into a her vs. us situation.  She had this fantastic way of defusing any issue.  To this day, whenever my sister and I have any issues we cannot resolve; one or the other of us will hold up our fisted hand like we still have that butter knife in it and wave it at the other.  Within seconds neither of us can stop laughing.  This small memory of our mother still calms any of our tense circumstances.

We have also created a new stress-relief moment….75¢… that is all either of us needs to say, at any given bad moment, to result in instant smiling relief (want to know why, read my past blog: https://helbergfarmstories.com/2017/01/25/2295/ ).

Mom embedded many outstanding mom-isms into us as we grew.  A great many times we had no clue, at the time, what was happening.  Now, as we are old enough to understand all the true meanings of her methods, I am in awe of her!  How did she manage to stay sane with all of us wack-jobs around her?  How did she manage to not only keep her humorous nature but somehow instill it into her children?  What an amazing woman she was!  Thank you mom!!

thank-you-heart

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ARE YOU ALWAYS LOOKING FOR MORE?

/ helbergfarmstories / 5 Comments

I grew up on a farm, moved to the big city of Denver for 20 years, then choose to move back to farm life in 2000. City life is (and was) great fun – however – just not for me. I found I was always looking for more.
I do not hate big city life; there is much to be had there. It is still a lot of fun to go back and see all the unique things it offers – museums – zoos – specialty shows (Stock Show just came through) – and all the little out-of-the-way spots I know. The problem, the thrill is gone.
Don’t get me wrong; I loved living in Denver when I was young and unattached. My gal pals and I used to go out every weekend. Dancing and shooting pool were my most favorite activities back then. I was pretty good at both (ok, maybe not so much on the dancing side – but I did win a lot of trophies for shooting pool.) The stories I could tell of those younger days, but then I don’t want to keep you up at night.

pool-trophy

My thrill now is the farm and all the wonders it shows me. I was watering in the greenhouse yesterday and found a baby Praying Mantis – WOW! Here I thought it was too early for my cuties to be out and about? She was very tiny – but alive and well. We do not heat the whole greenhouse in the winter, just a part of the herbs and our ever-bearing strawberries. She was playing in with the strawberries (smart girl!).

bb-praying-mantis
The latest newbie came in an email I received from Farmers Almanac is regarding today – Groundhogs day. There is a special section that states this day was originally called Candlemas Day – this is something new to me:

For as the sun shines on Candlemas Day,
So far the snow will swirl until May;
For as the snow blows on Candlemas Day,
So far will the sun shine before May.

I do not know where this little quote came from (folklore they say) but I just fell in love with it. This is part of the fun of living on a small farm. I get to take a moment and enjoy these little oddities. I took a moment to do some digging and found that this is a traditional Christian festival that commemorated the ritual purification of Mary forty days after Jesus’ birth. I am a Christian, and I never knew this. Without the internet and the wonderful people at Farmers Almanac, I might never have known this!
The farm has so much to offer, and there is something new at least once a week (sometimes once a day). This date – February 2nd – will now hold a stronger meaning for me. When my January’s get to overloaded (like this last one has been), I will make it a point to place the phrase “Candlemas” on my calendars. This will be my hint to myself to seek out something out-of-the-norm new. So here are some more bits of obscure facts I found for this day:
• It is also called the Festival Day of the Candles, from the past when there was no electric for lighting. A year’s supply of candles was blessed on this day for the church.
• Candles, symbolic for Christians, are to remind us of Jesus – The light of the world.
• Midpoint of winter – half way between the spring and winter equinoxes.
• Folklore again, stated the Christmas season lasted 40-days – until February 2nd.
• Another lovely old saying: “The Snowdrop (we have these on the farm), in the purest white array, First rears her head on Candlemas Day.”

snowdrop-flowers-2

• This is also the day for you procrastinators to put away your Christmas ornaments.

The next one’s to look forward to will be Valentine’s day (yes, I do know about this one) and Kissing Friday (see, here’s another I know nothing of – gasp!), alas, this one ended in the 1940’s boo hoo!

prarie-dogs-kissing

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HOW TO SAVE MONEY AND NOT KNOW IT?

/ helbergfarmstories / 10 Comments

I found out a nice little secret idea. Forget about it! Yep, this is my secret to saving money. Here’s the story:
In 2014 most of you read that we had the house fire. During the months that followed, tons of wonderful people (a bunch that we didn’t even know?!) were sharing things with us. They gave us clothes, toys, furniture, money and gift cards. Well, we were getting so many gift cards that I had to come up with some type of organization system for them. Some needed to be used up immediately after the fire (clothes, grooming supplies, etc.) but some would not be used until we had our home back (food, namely for the pantry and freezer. My method was to put them all in a small metal box that a friend gave me for crafting. It was about the size of a 3×5 index card. I purchased an index card alphabet file and stuck it in the box. Now I could place each of the cards under the appropriate section – smart right…maybe?!

gift-cards

It has been almost three years since that fire. When I was cleaning some stuff up, I found the box. First instinct was to shake it (have no clue why I did that – duh!) and it made noise, so I opened it. The individual file cards were still in there, so I decided to check it one more time. SURPRISE….two Safeway grocery cards!! WOO HOO – even better was when I called on them to find out they had not lost any value! We started the first of our new year with $150 to spend on groceries – yea!!!
Once upon a time, I carried a Safeway savings card, but for the life of me could not find it now (figures). We got to the store and the first thing I did was sign up for a new card – machine was broken (figures again – yes, I am giggling at myself now). The nice lady in the booth did tell me that the card would work just fine but to try to register on the machine next time I come in. Now, I remember thinking to myself “Sure I will – not – I very seldom go to Safeway to shop since it is more expensive UNLESS you have their card – which I hate deeply!”
I took the card, caught up with my sister and grandson, and we continued to shop. The cart kept getting more and more full – got me a bit worried. We could not afford $300 worth of food at that moment and really did not need that much. Our last stop was at the deli at which point my sister and I decided; there was enough food in the cart to not hit up the deli.
Time for the damages!
My sister and grandson were unloading while I grabbed my new Club Card and the two gift cards. I also took out my checkbook waiting to see how bad the damages were. The cashier kept sliding foods; the little dinger kept dinging, the total kept growing on the screen. I had shown her the new club card and the two gift cards before she started, now she was asking for them.
She scanned the first – $50 off. Then the second $100 off. Then the club card…the dinger kept dinging. The noises stopped, and she announced to me:
“Your total is .75¢.”
I am sure the look on my face was shocking enough to scare a ghost – I thought I heard her wrong, so I said: “HOW MUCH?” (yes, my voice did get louder here!) To which she replied the same –
“Your total is .75¢.” (This time with a really big grin on her face!)
I stood there stunned for a moment, then glanced over at my sister who was now starting to giggle a bit. I calmly dug into my purse and pulled out a one dollar bill and handed it to the cashier. The gal waiting in line behind me leaned over and said: “Can I shop with you next time?” At this point, we were all laughing. Two more people behind her also requested to shop with me.
So now, the family pick-me-up motto for this year is “only 75 cents, ” and anytime we feel a bit stressed, one of us will look at the other, say “only 75 cents,” and start laughing! Over $200 worth of groceries for .75¢ – can’t beat that way to save!
Well, I have told my sister that I am going to try this for 2017 Christmas time. I am going to pick up a gift card (Walmart too) and every time I shop in that store, add $10-$20 to the card. Then just shove it back into my purse for “saving” purposes. I will try to remember to share with you, toward the end of this year, if this worked or not. Wish me luck! I don’t think it will be as nice a surprise as this Safeway visit was, but it may just make my Christmas shopping easier!
( I got the idea to share this story with you from a fellow blogger’s 2016 resolution: https://achatovercoffee.com/2016/12/31/new-years-goals-stash-some-cash/ She also has a pretty good sense of humor and shares some great ideas on her home improvements. Check her out if you get a minute!)
merry-christmas    to me in 2017???

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I LIVE IN THE PROJECTS – but not in the projects.

/ helbergfarmstories / 6 Comments

Let me clarify the title of this wicked blog:
• How many projects do you have going on right now?
• How many projects are you making plans to try to accomplish with the next 12 months (sometime in 2017)?
• How many projects did you plan a year ago this time, but suddenly it was 12/31/16 and didn’t get them done?
I too live in my projects. Sometimes I have a hard time sleeping because I cannot shut down the stupid hamster on the wheel called “my mind” at night. Yes, it is a hamster on a wheel because that sucker just keeps going around and around on things.

female-on-a-wheel-like-hamster

I have tried multiple ways to get it to stop at night;
• I keep a notepad/journal at my bedside so I can write them all down. Now, I was once told that by doing this I would then mentally release and allow it to flow out of my head. Reason being that it was now down on paper – permanent (so to speak) and I could let go. Ya, sure!? All this did was keep me up longer writing details of the project then, inevitably, coming up with new ideas off the original.
• I gave up on things like counting sheep because they just made me think of something that needed to get done in one of the critter pens.
• Over-the-counter sleep aids. Once in a blue moon, they do help me but most times not.
• A very good friend told me to picture a “purple cow.” Since this is not a normal color for a cow (but wouldn’t that be fun to see?!), you actually have to concentrate on it. IT WORKED – for a bit anyway. Then I started picturing that purple cow on my handmade cards with some great humorous statement about it. Then was the idea of a knit critter for kids of a purple cow with really long legs. Blew it again!

purple-cow

On average, I get about 4 to 6 hours of sleep a night. This is nothing new for me, as I did this a lot when I was younger. However, back then I was also working three jobs and taking part-time classes for business. I didn’t have any time for extra sleep back then. (Having a child that required special surgeries every year for 20 years didn’t help much either.)

multiple-tasker

So this year, just as the last ump-teen million, I have set myself some project goals for 2017. A brief part of that list follows:
1. Start seeds for this year’s gardens – greenhouse and outdoor.
2. Get the rest of the greenhouse cleaned up and ready to go for plants by March.
3. Get the outdoor gardens cleaned up and ready for plants by June.
4. Start new plots in the back yard (there hasn’t been a lawn back there ever, so we decided this year we were going to set up several vertical gardens. The whole area gets a ton of sun.).
5. Fix (maybe replace if we can afford it) the chicken roof. Stupid winds-from-hell took out a large section of the sheet metal. Think it’s in Kansas with Dorothy now?
6. Clean up and expand the chicken coop. We have the west side of the barn vacant. It used to house our goats, but since we do not have goats anymore; now would be a good time to put it to use again.
7. Cover the north exterior chicken pen with plastic (hard greenhouse pieces we have and then some 6-mil plastic for the sides that we can roll up and down as weather regulates.
8. Get my yarn projects under control and organized. Right now they are all stuffed in large plastic bags. Kinda hard to sell what you can’t find! One of my “night ideas” is to build a special wall in my crafting room to hold all of these in compartments and hooks (furry hat on a post, extras in the box or crate above on a shelf, etc., etc. etc…). However, it will take a full wall to show all of these in their individual categories.
9. #8 then took me into this one: Re-organize my craft room. It can look so pretty; then I get into a project like Christmas Cards and wow – I can demolish the room in one afternoon. I pull out everything for an “ordinary” card making session; then I get a dangerous idea. Something will pop into my hamster brain again, and I’m off! Pulling extras out of drawers and setting up more equipment (yep – have tons of that too: cutters, colors, designers and designing boards you name it, pretty sure I have it). It’s a disaster in there more than pretty.
This is only part of my list. Maybe one of my goals should have been slowing down some, or get more sleep?

wierd-cat-sleeping

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(Just out of curiosity, how many projects do you have going on or are planning on for this year?)

DO YOU HAVE ENOUGH DAYS IN YOUR MONTH?

/ helbergfarmstories / 5 Comments

Me – never enough! I always start out with the best of intentions – 1st of the month, I have plans, I have goals – FANTASTIC – I’m ready!! Then by about the 5th of the month (sometimes as early as the 2nd), the month figures out “Hee, hee, it’s Rachel trying to be organized again – let’s get her!” Then it all blows up.

silly-planner

puppy counts as baby!

This being a new year and the first month of the new year, silly me decided to make “better planning and organization” my main resolution for 2017. Very silly me! I swear that all my loved ones up in heaven are sitting around laughing at me and thinking up ways to mess up my plans. Pretty sure I heard one of them laughing just last night before bed!?
So these are my new resolutions for 2017:
1. No deadlines – at least none that I will state out loud. This way, not even I will know what I am doing until it is done!
2. No goals. Nope, not a one! I have tons in my head that I would love to see reached (read a book a week, make more cards, so they will be ready for the occasion instead of last minute rushing – easy right?), but I dare not share them out loud. Maybe I will try to sneak them into my nightly journal instead of actually “saying” them and see if the spies will leave them alone?
Simple right? Not!! It is already two weeks into the new year, and I have had to run around doing unexpected things since the very first day of the month. No planning, no way. The unexpected deep freeze caused a bunch of vehicle switching, and (of course) a new battery in my Subaru. It is the newest, nicest yet the battery is shot – only three years old?? Once replaced ($170 later – ouch) I realized that my sweet grandson was playing with the dope light (oops, sorry – dome light) over his seat and had it switched on. Exactly when he made these changes, hmmm, I guess about three months ago. Jerk! Funny how a little thing like that can completely ruin a car battery – grrr.
We have also received about 5 million (ok, not that much but it is more than 20) gardening/seed/plant catalogs just since the first. I am a bit relieved on this since, two years ago. They started sending them back before Halloween? Pretty sure that was a “duh” moment for them because most people tend to (I do) lose things over the holidays. Sending them out before the first of the year would be stupid – to me.

pic of pile of garden mags

Trying to figure out and map what we would like to grow and where this year has been a nightmare. My grandson (whom I have custody of) is ADHD/Autistic and has major abandonment issues. His mother is moving again. This started up all of his inner demons again, which just love to take out their anger on me.
You know, I have always considered myself pretty tough, tough skinned too; but when he starts falling apart, so do I. Trying to plan or organize anything during these moments is a challenge, to say the least. I did get him to help me for a while cleaning out his older books and toys. Then he got bored, and I had to finish on my own (sometimes that is best cuz I got to throughout some extra stuff. Oh, and we do not “throw” out, we actually give them to local charities). Then I switched to my craft room (total disaster due to the last minute Christmas card fiasco.) which, again, he loves to start helping but then gets bored and leaves stuff incomplete. Grandma picks up – but grandma’s getting tired of it now that he is eight years old!
My final woo hoo for the start of this month is our new addition – a boxer puppy. My sister has always wanted a boxer, and I just happened across a Facebook posting from a friend on a couple of babies his boxers had about Halloween. One of them was even brindle in color (her fav also), a boy (again fav), so we decided to get him. The current dog is wonderful. She was a pound hound and has done fabulously protecting me through the fire mess and my six consecutive surgeries. The problem with her was when we got her they told us she had bruised her foot – but should be fine in a little while. Three years later and she is worse. We believe she was hit by a car, left to heal on her own instead of being cared for by a vet, then dumped at the pound with lies on her well-being. She has been the most aggressive dog we have ever had. This is good and bad. Her aggression sometimes is too much, and it scares me. Anyway, she is doing worse. Can hardly get up on a warm day and almost not at all on a cold one. She is losing bladder control too, and I hate to see any animal suffer. So this was another reason for getting the puppy.
The timing for potty training a puppy could not have been worse! The big giant pansy (another of her favs) doesn’t want to go outside when it’s cold – boo hoo. So, I have been trying to do this on my own – ha ha. The gods are laughing at me really hard now! On the few 50+ degree days we have had, he will follow me outside, but refuses to be out there alone – great! Oh, and she got to name him. After several days deliberation and many ideas from friends, she shouted it out at him one morning when he was missing the potty pad…”You little Wiener Pig, knock it off!” So, his name is now officially Wiener Pig. Fully name if he is ok, just PIG when I get mad at him (most of the time). “Pig, get out of there. Pig stop it. Pig – NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!!!”
Can’t wait to see what wonders the rest of this year brings.

12-2-16-new-addition-to-family

Wiener Pig

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ARE YOU AN AVID LEARNER (or obsessed as I am)?

/ helbergfarmstories / 4 Comments

In keeping with last new year resolution – more fun shall be added to this, 2017, year as well.  So, this is my first writing spill for the new year – hope you like it!

*************************************************************************************

Well, the holidays were a blast but over way too fast.  The new year started out with discovering that my car needed a new battery…ON THE COLDEST FRICKEN DAY OF THE YEAR!!  So, now I am thinking this will be a year of “be prepared” situations.  The problem is, how do you prepare for what you don’t even know is coming your way?  I got out my crystal ball (ya, like I have one?) and discovered the following about myself.

crazy-crystal-ball

I was never a Girl Scout.  My thing was 4-H, and they are basically for farmers, creators, crafters, gardeners, artists, and taught very little in the way of preparedness.  Since that time (let’s just say it was a while ago), I have become a bit of a prepper by choice.  We (my sister and I) do the following:

  1. Try to grow most of our own food.
  2. Reuse, repurpose, recycle just about everything.
  3. Use natural and sustainable growing, farming methods.
  4. Learn every kind of craft we can get our hands into. The things we don’t know, my cousin in WI is pickup (she is so creative – even made her own bentwood chairs a few years back, now she’s into metal and welding – how fun is that?).  Our long range plans are that one day she will be here on the farm with us.  So double bonus!
  5. We can:
  6. Fish
  7. Hunt
  8. Camp out
  9. Could probably butcher just about anything for food.
  10. Process foods by canning, dehydrating, drying, freezing, and we are now getting into oven canning (too cool!).
  11. And the best thing – barter!

The best is barter!  We connect with those that can do things we cannot, or do not like to, do.  Absolutely love to share stuff!  It can be everything from my knitted stuffs, our canned stuffs, part of our side of grass fed beef, recipes, to even poo and wood chips for composting piles (yes, we have an abundance of both!).  In return, we get things like our hunting friends may share part of their kill.  Seeds are always exchanged.  Crafting techniques, (my friends Judy and Carrie are much better at sewing than I am so I will always get into what they are working on) and we will try just about anything once – twice if we like it.

I got hooked on this type of life years ago by accident.  Way back in the early 80’s I was more of a read-a-holic than I am now.  I came across a book called:

FOXFIRE by Eliot Wigginton, George P. Reynolds, and Kaye Carver Collins

foxfire-books-on-amazon

I do not usually promote books, but when I do it is because I love them or find them useful (I have more how-to’s than anything, and I do not own a single romance novel – boo hoo, hee hee. The very first one immediately hooked me. I went on to purchase the whole series (now up to 12 plus some anniversary additions) as each new one was published.

The way to explain how important I found these books, is to let you know that they were the first replacements I purchased for myself after our fire took everything. If you are into doing anything in a self-sufficient manner, I strongly recommend that you go to your local library and request the very first one. It explains how they all came about(Spoiler alert: It started as a way for a big-city teacher to reach his Appalachian class.). You may also want to be prepared for some fun and wild reading as parts of the book are written how the people of the area speak (or as best as they could reproduce it for the book).

Like I said – I got hooked.It is very detailed, includes numerous pictures, and is a major how-to on almost everything you could need to survive on your own or in a small community.

The only way to survive, thrive and become self-sufficient, in my opinion, is to connect with others. It may sound wrong but, if you think about it, there will always be something someone else has or can do that you may want or need. Even though I love to do tons of stuff myself, I cannot do it all (shocker I know!).I count on others to barter, share, swap, exchange (whatever you want to call it) to get by. However, I think we are exceptionally lucky that we have made connections with the same type of wacky sense of humor people that we are! This way, when times get rough (and they always do), someone in the group will always find something to laugh about!

little-girls-laughing

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WHAT’S YOUR CHRISTMAS LIKE?

/ helbergfarmstories / 12 Comments

Hi, Ho All!  And a very Merry Christmas to you.

So, what’s on your agenda for Christmas?  We are traveling to Aurora (for those of you not of this area – it is a suburb of Denver – bigger than Denver now I think?) to spend a night with our other sister and her husband.  This night of Christmas Eve will be the first time we have ALL gotten together for Christmas, on Christmas, in about ten years.  It seems there was always someone working or something messing up the plans.  Since it falls on Saturday and Sunday this year – wooo hooo!

The festivities will include:

  • Drinking beer and setting up stuff.
  • Eating food created by all the families and friends.
  • Drinking beer and sharing the funnies from 2016.
  • Laughing, LAUGHing, and then more LAUGHING (it is a MUST every Christmas!)
  • Drinking beer and yelling at the kids to settle down (ya, like that’s gonna happen?!)
  • Trying to keep the kiddos busy until it is time to open presents (yes, we do it on Christmas Eve – however, also on Christmas day …the ones that Santa brings are on Christmas day).
  • Drinking beer – always before calling relatives, it’s a must!
  • Calling out-of-state relatives and sharing fun memories of winters and Christmas past.
  • Drinking beer while eating.
  • Torture the kids by telling them we will open presents when the 15 minutes is up (note: we started the 15-minute countdown about 60 minutes ago – hee hee)
  • Drinking beer and moving to a fun present opening spot (preferably one good for pics too for me)
  • Open presents. Now this part REALLY drives the kids nuts.  We do name exchange with the adults, and they must wait until the said adult has opened the present, I have gotten a picture, and then they get to open something. (ok, more giggling here is required!)
  • Drinking beer – to steady the camera of course!
  • All presents to family and friends are opened, now it’s time for the kids to play and adults to laugh and talk more. Sometimes we do games.  Usually dice games (we love Yahtzee!!).
  • Drinking more beer while eating more food – gather strength to say bye to friends and family for the night. It maybe another year before we get to see them all again – boo hoo hoo!
  • The food starts to disappear into to-go containers as the crowd starts to dwindle. Eventually, we will all drift off to sleep on a piece of furniture (or maybe the floor since her downstairs level has a heated floor – niiice!!!).
  • The next morning consists of Coffee, a homemade special breakfast, packing up the goodies and heading home.

Once home, chores must be accomplished first (at which point the animals all make it a moment to let us know that they know we were gone!  Pecking, squawking, biting…the norm.), then into the house to see what Santa has delivered.

My grandson has not been at his best this year, especially in the last month.  I have warned him that Santa does not like this, to which he replied: “I’m not sure I believe in Santa anymore?!”  To which I responded with – “Oh, really?  So I can send him a letter that you do not need anything or maybe just some coal for the outdoor cooker this year since you don’t believe?”  He immediately reneged on his previous statement…hmmmm?!?  So, I may have to find or make some small boxes and put a chunk of coal in each one.  Then lovingly place them under the tree – hee hee, yes, this warms my heart!

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ONE AND ALL!

(My Christmas cacti are bloomin fools this year!)

DON’T LOOK AT IT – DON’T LOOK AT IT – DON’T LOOK AT IT!

/ helbergfarmstories / 6 Comments

What is the first thing you do when you get into your vehicle to go somewhere. My habit is to turn on the radio.  Two reasons for this: 1) It sets my pace for the day – good music = great day. 2) To check who is singing and the name of the song, in case I want to buy it. See, I have this fun new car with fun new features. One of them is this great “info” dash reader. Here is a pic from this morning:

12-8-16-dash-info-14-degrees

So, here’s how the fun techno works.  The bottom is the name of the song – OK.  The middle is the singer or group – OK.  Above that is the radio station (KOSI plays 24/7 Christmas music starting about Thanksgiving) – OK.  Now the top line is where I need to “not” look.

My clock (says 8:15) is off.  I hate daylight savings time changes, and I always have to drag out my instruction manual to figure out how to make the stupid 1-hour changes twice a year…so I just don’t!  The time this morning was actually 7:15 a.m.

The top middle is how many miles I can drive before I run out of gas – I really like this one!  The cute little gas tank (every newer car has this one) tells me which side of the car my cap is on.  This is a good thing because our vehicles are different, and yes, sometimes I forget what I am driving.

The helpful yellow “I” tells me to check my “engine info.”  All I have to do is click a switch, and it tells me things like “low on washer fluid” which just so happens to be what it is trying to tell me now, but I am ignoring it.

Then we come to the culprit of my “don’t look” title – TEMPERATURE!  Yep, it says negative 12 degrees.  OOOUUUCCCHHH!!!  Now I love snow, so fun to play in and we can always use the moisture.  However, cold and I are no longer friends.  I expect that beastie to show up around February, but not in December.  Not here in the northeastern Colorado plains in December.  Our norm is around 35-65 depending on Mother Nature. Today I think Jack Frost has hog-tied Mom Nature just to remind me I have several fake joints (JERK!).

So, as of this morning, I am trying to train this “old dog” to do a new trick – Don’t Look, don’t look, don’t look at the dash in the morning.  Maybe I will make that in the winter?

I enjoy cooler weather much more than hotter weather; however, I draw the line at minus numbers. A crisp fall air, a couple of feet of snow – no big deal. But the negatives are just as bad as the over 80’s in the summer to me. Can only put so much extra on, or take so much off to help my body adjust. When it gets to these types of temps, I’m screwed all day.

I even thought I just stick a small piece of electrical or duct tape over that tiny area just to fool myself into believing it is not what it is. Maybe that will work?

laugh-so-hard-sign

(then they froze – LMAO!)

AM I REALLY THANKFUL FOR THIS?

/ helbergfarmstories / 4 Comments
  1. 1. MY HEALTH: Who am I kidding – it sucks! My sister has started with the nick-name of Bionic Woman – ha ha ha – not funny! Almost all of my major joints (shoulders, knees) have been replaced with metal, plastic, and pins. My grandson gets a huge kick out of the knees when they pop out of joint (yes it hurts). You can see and feel it, and it goes “thunk” when it pops back in. He gets a great giggle out of it.
  2. MY FAMILY: They are all still here – THAT’S A GOOD THING MARTHA!! I am glad for that – I think? I have not been picked on for a while, makes me worry. One of our biggest family motto’s is: If we don’t pick on you, we don’t like you. It’s true. We grew up with very humorous, sarcastic parents and it rubbed off on all of us. Every year for Christmas, someone gets something that is a slam.
  3. MY FRIENDS: Actually, I feel sorry for them. We treat most of them AS family, so they get the same bashing – woo hoo! I hope they all know that we are always there the minute they need anything! They have been there for us during our darkest hours, and I would not trade them for anything in the world (oh man, got sappy when I was not going to do it – grr hee hee)
  4. MY FINANCES: hahahahahahahahahahahaha…AND THAT’S ALL I HAVE TO SAY ABOUT THAT!
  5. OUR LIFE ON THE FARM: Where do I start? Oh yes – here goes:
    a. The break in one of our hydrant lines that has apparently been leaking for over a year now. At least we did figure out when one it was and that it was happening:
    b. The coyotes that just absconded with 3 of our chickens (so I guess they get Thanksgiving Dinner too – jerks!).
    c. The chickens that are molting. Down to about two eggs a day from, what was, about a dozen a day. Hey, at least we are still getting them!
    d. The freezer full of meat. This was due to the generosity of Sida. Side-a-beef that is. He was the property of the guy that leases our big field. He had come of age (and size) that it was time to provide for those that provided for him. Grass and grain fed. All natural. Yummy!
    e. The mild weather – NOT! This just is not right. Eighty degrees yesterday?? This is not my wonderful fall! This is also making everything really dry – double grr! By this time of year, we should have had at least a couple of rain or snow falls. Our rain barrels are empty.

Well, that about covers it for this Thanksgiving. Can’t wait to see what the new year will bring – OH JOY!

jim-carrey-happy-dance

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WHY ARE THERE NO THANKSGIVING SONGS?

/ helbergfarmstories / 4 Comments

I have been digging around, and this is all I found:

1. Food, Glorious Food from the movie Oliver (yes – they consider this a TG song??)
2. Count Your Blessing Instead of Sheep – from the movie White Christmas (Christmas – Hello!?)
3. Funny Thanksgiving Song “Thanksgiving Overture” (done to William Tell Overture – it is funny!)
4. Thanksgiving Prayer by Johnny Cash (this one is a REAL TG song – yeah!!)
5. Thanksgiving Song by Mary Chapin Carpenter (love this one – beautiful!!)
6. My Favorite Things – by Julie Andres from the Sound of Music movie (sort of counts?)
7. Over the River and Through the Woods. Some try to say this is a TG song, sorry but I really think this one is more of a Christmas (especially since they use the words “Merry Christmas” in the song – DUH!)
8. This is a true Thanksgiving song and happens to be one of my favorites: Thanksgiving Song by Adam Sandler.
9. What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong. This is also one of my favs, but I use it in many, many more circumstances than just Thanksgiving.

Well, you can only listen to these few songs so many times before you crack! So I am turning to old-fashioned Christmas songs to go with it. These together make me smile and bring back some really wonderful memories.

our-wild-turkey

(Wild Turkey that visited us earlier this year – hope you can see him on the fence?  He is kind of like Where’s Waldo in this pic – hee hee.)

our-turkey-whiskey

(This is our fat bird “Whiskey,” and no he will not be on the menu. He follows me everywhere, and I named him – idiot me!)

I remember helping dad with so many great yummies. Peeling grapes (I hated it), then cutting them in half to go into the fruit salad. We had to open them up back then because there was no such thing as a “seedless grape” – CRAZY I KNOW, BUT TRUE!!?? The fruit salad was always my favorite because I would sample the fruit as it was being cut into tiny pieces. Dad would shoot me a glare every now-and-then, but it would turn into a smile with a “Cut that out” attached to it.
We always had a variety of food, and there were always the potluck’s that came from other family and friends. See, this was also a HUGE football day back then so all the family and closest friends came over. I think it was mainly because of 3 things:

1. All the men fit into our huge living room.
2. All the women fit into our huge kitchen.
3. All the kids had the farm, barns, animals to mess with and kept them away from the parents.

Worked out perfect for all involved!

nice-fall-centerpiece

SO BRING IT ON THANKSGIVING!! I have a lot to be thankful for this year!

 

(Side thought: Has anyone else ever read Stephen King’s The Dead Zone?  What are your thoughts on it?)

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