Matthew is really busy getting ready for planting season. His work hours have gone from 7am to 7pm. He is getting home around 7:15 or 7:30. They will begin planting corn on April 2nd. If we didn’t get rain last Monday, they were going to start irrigating the wheat circles. But we got about 1″ of rain on Monday and have rain in the forecast for the rest of the week. They are busy getting the sprinklers back in working order and getting the planter set up. They are changing out the end guns on the sprinklers and getting the engines ready for long hours of running. When planting starts on April 2nd, he will be working until 9/10/11 o’clock. He will not be doing the actual planting. He does “support”. The other guy that works at our farm is really good at setting up the planter and planting. He has many years of planting experience. Matthew will be running the generators to the fields to move the pivots, running seed to the planter when it gets low, running liquid fertilizer tanks to the fields, setting up pivots for irrigating planted fields, etc. After April, they will have a “quieter” time in mid May by getting ready for the wheat harvest by cleaning out bins, maintenance, and some irrigating (just depends on the spring rain fall). In June he will be busy with irrigating, cultivating, fertilizing, wheat harvest, planting soybeans/milo and other maintenance. They will be going long and hard during June, July and August. Last year he didn’t have an off day from Father’s Day in June until the end of August, when we came home.
We are expecting him to be working longer hours this new season. The main farm bought 10 more circles during the winter. They still have the same amount of people working, so they will be working longer and into the night. We don’t know how often Matthew will be working over there or if he will at all. The farm now has about 13,000 working acres this new season. We have 4,000 over here in Byers and the farm at Greensburg now has 9,000. Our farm runs two workers daily with a third that come comes from Greensburg to help out during the rush. Over at the Greensburg farm they have about 8 to 10 workers that do the “farming”. One of those guys main jobs is to do the spraying during the planting and growing season. They also have a full time mechanic for the tractors/trucks. There are three main truck drivers for the farm. All they do is drive trucks—hay trucks, feed trucks and cattle trucks. They also have two “cowboys” that work with the cattle during the winter/spring. When their cattle numbers get lower, one of the cowboys will be doing the rodeo circuit soon with his own stock . The other “cowboy” will be used wherever he is needed. They are still dropping babies, so he’ll be doing that for a while and branding. The farm also has a hay broker and assistant. The broker buys, sells and trades the hay and straw for the farm. He is also the guy that decides when to cut or “swathe” the hay and he runs the hay crew. The assistant helps fill orders, loads the trucks/unloads the trucks. He also has his pilots license and will fly the broker to and from places to buy hay. But all those people help out wherever they are told at any time. Everyone is used everywhere at any time, except for the drivers; they always drive the trucks.
With all that said, the time is starting to speed up and the guys are really busy getting everything started. Here’s a picture of what Matthew usually looks like when getting home. This was a pretty clean day. Today when I last saw him he had oil up both arms. Also attached is a picture of Matthew working on a generator trailer. The ladder is balanced in the back of the truck so he can reach the end guns/nozzles on the sprinkler in the background. You will see a faint line running horizontal through the picture. That is the electric fence that goes around the circle. That particular circle still has cows. When the cows are finished there, the fence will be taken down and the stalks will get chopped. All of that will happen during April.
Matthew is a great worker and has had two raises in less than a year. He was offered a new work truck again, but declined and opted for new mud tires for his current truck. I am very proud of him. 🙂
Ruby is doing well. She still only has four teeth, but I’m pretty sure she is getting more as we speak. She is obsessed with the neighbor’s dogs and makes a beeline there when ever she gets a chance to go outside. She also loves the music on the weather channel. She rocks out on “local on the eights’. Sometimes she will hold on to something and head bang like a 90’s rock star. It’s pretty funny. She is also obsessed with a giant sized horse sign in town. She starts yelling every time she spots it. She also loves riding in the buggy at Wal-Mart. She doesn’t ride in the kid seat, but stands up in the larger part. She sings songs to people and waves. Her little personality has really started to shine in the last few months. She says “Where did it go?’ “Do it again” “Here you go.” “mama” and “bye bye” She signs: please, bread, water, and all done.” She sometimes will say “all done” when she signs. She knows the letter sounds for V and B consistently. She has also became independent and wants to learn how to do many things by herself. It is fun to help her learn along the way. She has been a joy to be around and I am very grateful that I get to be home with her.
I have been sewing a lot since living here. I basically didn’t use my sewing machine for eight years and then moving here, long hours by myself/with Ruby, has made me a little more crafty. I’ve made Ruby four/five dresses, made some curtains, hair bows, a quiet book for Ruby, four/five shower presents, a couple of t-shirt skirts for myself (they were really simple, easy and are really comfy) and just recently finished a little quilt. The quilt didn’t turn out as good I hoped, but I still gave it away. My intent is for it to be used on the ground, so it didn’t really matter if the lines weren’t that straight right? At least that’s what I told myself.
I’ve also been reading a lot, working out and learning my new camera I got last month. I keep pretty busy. I read a book called Large Family Logistics that has helped me become a better home manager. I highly recommend it.
I have my “town day” on Thursdays. I go to town, do my errands and walk in the park. One lap around is one mile. I usually try to get in about 3 miles. Sometimes there are other moms that meet me there but sometimes I am alone with Ruby. In the last eight weeks I’ve been going to town two days a week; my regular town day and on Wednesdays for the bible study. We are doing the same James study y’all are doing. We skipped one week for a “spring break”, finished the last session last week, and will have a wrap up party next week. There were two options for the bible study; one on Monday nights or Wednesday mornings. The Wednesday mornings has childcare, so all of us stay at home moms are in the Wednesday mornings. One thing I like about it is that the childcare workers are paid from 8:30 to 12pm. They get there early to set up, are there for the small group leaders kids (because they get there about 30min early) and are there for the small leaders to clean up. Our bible study is from 9:30 to about 11:15. The time gives us all time to stand and talk or not have to rush to get through things. The child care workers are paid from a special offering. The church took up a special offering the whole month of May. Instead of people giving in honor of someone, organ fund, putting flowers in the front, they were asked to give to the “Mother’s Fund”. I think they got about 10-12,000 dollars that month. So, child care is paid from that. I thought it was a good idea. One stay at home mom, and former teacher, keeps the “olders” (ages 3-9) and a homeschool teenager and older women keep the “littles” (birth to 2). It has worked out really well.
