Enjoying Life

There's not much rhyme or reason to this post, but I had some good pictures that I wanted to share of us just enjoying life...so here goes!

We have some friends with creekfront property that let us come down and swim. The creek moves enough that you can float down on tubes and then walk back up to go again. It's alot of fun, especially when it's 99 degrees!

The Gold Dust Twins

Dan the Man

R.G. standing straight and tall, as usual.

Mommy and Sammy.

My sweetie.

Matthew the Miserable. He doesn't like swimming in cool water, so he blew up rafts for everyone instead....which made him sick and gave him a headache.

Joey loved that the water was only waist deep.


Well, he was here a minute ago!

Rachel with her deflated float.

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The Dischers sent down some birthday presents, and I thought y'all would like to see the ugly underbelly of the Frodge clan...

Actually, this was a wonderful present. Rachel loves glass dolls!

You can't actually see what Aunt Beth sent Sam, so I'll just fill you in. Sam is holding an electric toothbrush, which he adores. She also sent him some Tom's of Maine natural toothpaste. So, what's the big deal? Well, see that package beside Sam, it's filled with gummy candy shaped like fast food...you know, gummy french fries, gummy hamburgers, gummy coke bottles.

HE LOVED IT.

This one is even funnier. Poor Joey didn't even get a toothbrush, but he did get bubble gum shaped like balogna and hot dogs. (It tasted like bubble gum, not balogna and hot dogs).

You can see from the look on his face that

HE LOVED IT.

I guess the irony of Tom's of Maine natural toothpaste in the same present as junky candy cracked both me and Beth up. Aunt Beth knows that she is the "fun aunt" and I think she works on keeping up her reputation.

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I thought this picture was sweet.

Robert loves to cook breakfast. I love that he loves to cook breakfast.

That's all for today. So long from the Millers!

posted by Mama

Exciting Garden Pictures!!!!!!!

Yes, folks, I have some boring garden pictures to show off. I just changed the title so my so-called-friends and family would actually take the time to look at my boring pictures.



Our garden is doing better than we expected. We have very hard clay for soil, and it needs humus added to it to keep it from packing up tight around our little plants' roots. We were able to get cow manure, leaves, and the litter from our chicken pen into three of the gardens, but one of the gardens-- you know, the one way down at the bottom of the hill that no one pays attention to--it didn't get anything, not even one shovelful of manure. It's doing its best in this 97 degree Arkansas summer heat, and we are getting lots of squash and zucchini out of it (I think squash and zucchini would grow on a four lane highway).



The other gardens--you know, the ones that get showered with attention and get weeded, watered, and manured (is that even a word?)--are doing pretty respectably considering this is our first real garden here.



Anyway, we're pretty happy with the results, and we thought we'd share a little bit of our joy with you.





Also, if you persevere to the end, there is a story in pictures of our not-so-little-baby Sam.

I am desperately awaiting home-grown tomatoes!



Our first broccoli head...well not really our first, those were greedily consumed by our rotten chickens.

Some of the "We Grow Anywhere" zucchini

The cabbage heads are huge! We are thrilled with how they're doing and can't wait to make lacto-fermented saurkraut.

This is the (weedy) cabbage patch. We probably have 30-35 heads.

We planted cucumbers soooo late, but they're doing really well.

Our onions. We have red and white.

EVIDENCE. CRIME SCENE. DO NOT CROSS YELLOW TAPE.

The chickens have excellent taste. As soon as a tomato even thinks about turning yellow, they are johnny-on-the-spot pecking away at it.

By the way, the date on my camera is obviously wrong. It was probably 40 degrees on that date.

Jalapenos.

I don't believe my keyboard has the capability to put a tilda above the "n" in jalapenos, so y'all will just have to pretend it's there.

I think this is a poblano pepper.

Unscathed tomatoes.

We had just picked the collards, squash, banana peppers and zucchini and then I remembered to take pictures, so here the left out veggies are.

Also, we just finished picking green beans. They're doing very well, and we are enjoying them immensely!

Sam -- the Sad, Sleepy Boy.


Meet Sam. Sam is sad. He's sad because he has to take a ...shhh... a nap.

Sam tries. He tries hard. He tries oh-so-hard not to take a nap.

Sam is wearing down. He cannot hold on. It is too hard. The pillow is too soft.

Sam has failed. The job was too hard for this little almost-three-year old. He thinks this job is better for Joey.

Meet Sam. Sam had a good nap. He had a good nap and a change of clothes. Life is better when Sam has a nap.

FOR ALL OF US!

More Visitors!

In late April, some of Robert's family came out to Arkansas for the wedding of Robert's cousin. While they were here, we invited them over for a cookout.

Meet The Hosts

The grill king and his wife

Let the bluegrass begin! Meet Robert's cousin, Daniel. He loves playing banjo, but doesn't get to play with others very often.

Meet Robert's son, R.G. Since we moved away from the Country Cousins, he hasn't had much chance to play with others, either.

It was a match made in heaven.

They played....

...and they played...

and they played.

(Matthew looks a little tired of it, don't you think!)

Robert's mom (in a rare moment of silliness) with her sister, Cathy.

Robert's Mom and her brother, Jimmy.

Robert's sister, Tonya, with Rachel.

Enjoying the hamburgers and everything that went with them!

Benny feeding his cousin, Glynna.

The younger folks got kicked outside to the picnic table.

Later, Jason and Ashley and Savannah graced us with their presence!

...and they played.

Random Pictures

Here are some random pictures taken throughout the last month. Unfortunately, our camera is not working properly, so I'm not sure how many more posts will include pictures. Hope you enjoy the following!

Daniel and Samuel watering the pigs.

I know this isn't the best quality, but it's such a sweet picture that I just had to post it.

R.G. showing off his truck. You know when someone shows you their homely grandbaby and thinks they're just the cutest kid in the world, and you don't know how to respond honestly? That's kind of how I feel when R.G. talks glowingly of his beloved truck...what CAN you say???

Here's Matthew politely posing for a picture because his mama requested it.

Rachel and Samuel playing Ring-Around-The-Rosie.



MAKING A PARACHUTE

Equipped with a trash bag, twine and a metal hook for ballast, the boys attempt to make a parachute.

Benny gives it a try first, throwing it as high as he could into the air, hoping the trash bag will fill with air and float down.

Andrew-trying to hide a smile-is next to make an attempt.

Daniel realizes he needs to get the bag higher in the air, so up to the top of the shed he goes.

Ahhh, finally success!

...or maybe not.

Check Out This Blog!

My sister's family has designed a blog for their house that they are trying to sell. I'm sharing the link with the hope that the Lord will bring this information to just the right buyers!

http://floridacountryhouse.blogspot.com/

Even if you're not looking to buy a cute cottage in Florida, it's still fun to get a tour of the Discher's home!

Visitors

We had visitors this past week. Two of Robert's aunts came all the way from East Tennessee just to visit us, and we thoroughly enjoyed it! Aunt Rosie cooked, Aunt Patsy cleaned, and they both spoiled the kids rotten!


Joey saw everyone else taking pictures, so he decided to build himself a camera out of legos. It was the real deal to him!

Aunt Patsy. She gave Daniel alot of helpful ideas for the garden.

Aunt Rosie cooking a monster pot of spaghetti for supper.


Patsy with Benny.

Rosie and R.G. share the same birthday...separated by just a few years!

They also told stories of their childhood growing up in East Tennessee in the 1940's. Stories that were good for our children to hear, like carrying buckets of water from the not-very-close creek every morning before school. They spent their early years as a family of ten in a two room house with a wood-burning stove, no running water and an outhouse.

The Aunts told of slaughtering their animals and using EVERYTHING that came of the animal. "Mama didn't waste nothin", Aunt Rosie told us. They made head cheese (ugggh) and all those other...um...delicacies that come from not wasting anything!

Aunt Rosie remembered bath night -- with the water being heated in a huge cast-iron kettle outside then being brought in by the bucketful to a big metal washtub inside.

Aunt Patsy helped Daniel in the garden, giving him some pointers on hoeing around the plants. They were very complimentary of our garden, but when Daniel asked how it compared to their childhood gardens in size, they both chuckled. Like most everyone else in a rural area back in the 40's, they grew a huge garden, and of course canned all their own vegetables.

The most interesting thing that I noticed about these conversations was that both Aunts spoke with fond memories of those days. They were certainly difficult times, no one would ever deny that, but it was just life, and life is often hard.

When I compare our lives today to those just 60 years earlier, I am taken aback by how much easier it is now. Even in our "unusual" living quarters, we have a pretty easy life...electricity, hot and cold running water, modern appliances, vehicles, internet, cell phones, cheap and plentiful food, and the list could go on.

I look around outside and realize that I live on the prettiest piece of land I could ever imagine. My kids get to work and run and play without worries of traffic or neighbors, we have the ability to raise our own food and hunt on our own land. We are so very blessed and so very happy. Our life might be a little harder that the average person's today, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. We are smack-dab in the middle of God's perfect will for our family and I wouldn't change that for anything.