New Year's Resolutions (No Wonder We Are Tired)

The Farmer and I are coming up a bit blank on this annual question of New Year's Resolutions. Or rather, our goals for the year, as resolutions seems to be a recipe for disaster. I know they'll be broken by Sunday - tops - and so let's instead think of the things we want to accomplish this year. And yes, some sound an awful lot like a resolution. Potato...Potahto.

We are coming up blank because...well...we are tired.

Because this is what happened with our resolutions last year.

We bought a house.

We renovated said house.

We eloped.

And then we have our day jobs.

One of us farmed.

The other one recruited and traveled.

Oh, how'd that photo get in there?!?!??!?!!!

Don't tell The Farmer this was the day he was doing some big dirty icky job in the sleeting rain. 

Instead remind him I'm usually driving from high school to high school, seeking out Starbucks along the way, answering questions about how The College went co-ed in the late 1960s, so yes, we have boys. 

But as I look back on this past year, when I'm tired I try to remember...

We bought a house.

View from the road.

We renovated said house.

The original front entry. Inviting, yes?

The "new" front door.

Staining the doors was quite a project. Good thing The Farmer loves me.

Prepping for the new front porch.

Moving in the door!

Don't notice that it's not yet stained. We had to take it down right after we put it up.

The end result (OK, not really...we're going to wrap the porch to the side door next spring.)

The view from the old master bedroom (now the new front entrance).

This would have been the view from the entrance if we had only moved the front door. Thank goodness we decided the open plan bathroom was a bit much for a first impression.

The view from the entrance...a work in progress.

Drywall!

The new view from the new entrance (aka the old master bedroom). The beams denote the former walls.

Everyone wants carpet in the kitchen. And the refrigerator in the middle of the room. 

Down came the refrigerator wall.

We decided the carpet had to go too. Along with the pink/gray fan wallpaper.

Mummified in preparation for the messy drywallers.

The new kitchen!

Complete with all new appliances (that was a fun day at Home Depot).

The old view from the dining room. The yellow/green wall through the doorway is location of the new front door. 

That carpet had to go too (along with a few walls).

More drywall.

And the new (messy...someone should have moved that blanket before taking this photo) view from the same location (sorta) as the first photo.

The fireplace in the dining room. Before.

The in-progress view of the dining room from another angle. I'm standing where a wall used to be.

Flooring...because the old cork floor under the carpet just wouldn't cut it.

Note the new window frames too.

The old formal dining room, complete with pink carpet. And nowhere near the kitchen.

If anyone wants some pink carpet, we still have a remnant available. The Farmer will deliver.

My new office and craft room.

I've already removed the stickers from the floor mats. 

The left bookcase holds all my genealogy stuff...for my two other blogs.

A second fireplace in the massive living room. (It went away.)

The old front entrance is in the upper right corner.

We didn't like that carpet either.

We added a wall. The window through the doorway is my new office.

We painted. A lot.

Floors make the room.

And all new furniture to round things out. (More on the GDP of the window curtains later.)

The old master bath. This is a relative term, as you can see.  It was located behind the glass block half-wall you can see in the entry "before" photos.

Note the new front door behind the wall frame. The bathroom is in approximately the same location, merely "flipped".

The Farmer insisted on the jacuzzi.

I didn't argue.

Fun with tile.

The end result. 

Don't ask about the shower doors either. That was another GDP story for another time.

We saved two of the blue tiles from the upstairs bath. Why? I'm not sure. 

This bathroom is actually to scale. It is as small as it looks.

Fun with power tools. 

Yes, the tiny bathroom had a false wall. We had to keep the wall (plumbing ran along the base of the wall) but added a nook for storage. 

Still small, but much better. 

I don't miss the blue tile. At all.

One of us farmed.

We recruited and traveled.

(Photo deleted to protect the innocent.)

And most importantly...

We eloped.

What more could you ask for?

Well, if you have to ask...

A closet.

And these tiles in the middle of my bedroom floor to move.

And a finished laundry room.

It's a "choose your favorite color" laundry room!

Still in progress, but toned WAAAAAAY down.

I guess those are my New Year's Resolutions for 2013.

Pretty simple, I guess.

Oh.

And to have a successful one year anniversary party with family and friends.

Because we did elope. And a few people want to celebrate. 

And see the house we bought. And renovated.

Come see us soon!

160 Cows...and Six Deer

A common question when you live on a farm, I've realized, is "Do you have any pets?" I'm not sure why this is, other than people associate "farm" with "animals". And in our case, yes, we have animals...but they are not pets.

I've also come to realize when my reply is "Yes. We have 160 cows" the responses do usually include a comment on the quantity as well as "Oh...a real farm." Yes. A real farm. This is the Farmer's job. He does it 365 days a year (unfortunately, for us, at times) and we have 160 cows.

And no pets.

Well...Sorta.

Because, well, I now amend my answer with "and six deer".

They live in our yard.

The Farmer buys them carrots and apples.

I leave them the outer leaves of the lettuce head.

And we've even enabled family members...I made my sister pick up a bag of apples on her way to the house Thanksgiving because I forgot them at the store.

The Farmer was worried they would be hungry.

He should have been worried that my family would traumatize the littlest one, as my nephews spent two days with their noses pressed up to the windows to watch her every move.

Stag and Spike showed up early on and they are fairly nocturnal (hence, no photos).

They brought their girlfriend Doe one day.

And she brought her friends...Re and Mi.

And then Gretl showed up.

While they are not Dasher and Dancer, Prancer and Vixen, Comet and Cupid, Donner and Blitzen,
we do have our own Stag and Spike, Doe, Re, Mi, and Gretl.

And yes,  I love the Sound of Music.

Much to The Farmer's chagrin.

Now The Farmer frequently comes in to request a knife and he goes running out of the house. (This might worry many of you, but I assure you he's just cutting up vegetables in the garage.) He'll head off to take a shower and come back only to stare out the front window.

Can you see her come running across the driveway (just before the tree)? 

I get texts with deer reports while I'm on the road.

I get texts while I'm home asking about them.

And yesterday I sent a text "Mama put down her foot. Gretl finally ate her vegetables."

Because like any good child, she'll leave the carrots to the very last, scrounging for every last bit of apple first.

So yes, I believe we do have pets.

We just don't let them in the house.

The Obligatory Christmas Tree Post

We haven't quite moved everything into the house yet (we are still sleeping in the Penthouse above the garage) but we are ready for Christmas. And now that we have water for half the house - after six weeks without it, which is why we're a bit delayed in moving fully in - we are *this close* to sleeping over in the new house.

I told The Farmer I'm sleeping in my new bed on Christmas Eve.

I hope he joins me.

Despite our lack of 100% residency, we are ready for Christmas! Or at least we have lights on the front of the house and a tree in our dining room.

Those are the requirements, yes?

After three weeks of trying to work around the weather to go cut down a tree (aka avoid a day that was pouring rain), we resigned ourselves to letting Mother Nature win.

And we went to a tree lot.

Fortunately, our tree had just been cut the hour before, so it's almost like we cut it ourselves.

But we didn't...which means The Farmer is smiling in this picture. 

And the amount of swearing during the day was greatly diminished. 

And our angel...

She's the angel my parents bought in 1969 for their first Christmas. 

She was all they could afford.

The best part of the night was when The Farmer unwrapped her, found out who she was/where I got her, and immediately put her atop the tree.

This Is What Happens When You Email Me

I am the recipient of numerous texts that merely state "It's a boy!" or "Girl" or "Twins". You'd think I married a doctor. But no, I just married a farmer. A Farmer who probably knows more about females than I care to acknowledge. Because yes, he surrounds himself with 160 females on a daily basis.

Not all cows are named, which drives me a little bit crazy. OK...a lot bit crazy.

Why does Rolo have a name, but her friend #652 does not? And Sylvia? But no #702 beyond the numbers?

But The Farmer has started humoring me and more are getting names.

I embrace this.

I realize he is humoring me.

And revel in naming them.

Usually my reply to his texts are a suggestion of a name. One that pops into my head at the moment. And at 4:00 in the morning (The Farmer, unfortunately, ignores the clock with these texts) he - and I - are often baffled by what comes out of my head.

A number of my friend's kids have calves named after them. Andrew. Tomas. Oscar. Gerin. Zoe.

And I do too.

I once got a text that said "Girl that begins with V". My replies were all shot down (they'd already been taken, but he didn't share THAT information until later) until I enlisted the help of friends. I think we came up with Velma.

Why V? Because, despite the lack of names for some calves/cows, other family lines have rules. Letters of the alphabet. Sounds like. Goes with.

So "Me First"'s calf becomes "Elua", which is "two" in Hawaiian. Me First, by the way, always likes to be first.

And this past Friday, Wally arrived.

Why Wally?

Well, Wally - my colleague at work - had just emailed me. And so that's what popped in my head. And I was fairly certain we hadn't had a Wally just yet. 

Wally, my colleague, I don't think believes me that he now has a calf named after him.

Perhaps he will now.

Don't you wish you had emailed me last Friday afternoon?