Ruby Slippers and Georgia Peaches

Since February of this year, Ruby has discovered the world of pretend and dressing up. First, she liked putting hats on her head or having someone chase her with her big white bear. She’s especially fond of hats.

Sometime after Clara was born, she discovered a new world of pretending and playing. She has a set of Mickey Mouse ears. They are made of hard plastic and are on a hard plastic head band. Most days her name isn’t Ruby, but is either Gray Cat or Mickey Mouse. She loves Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Tom and Jerry. We have a few episodes of Mickey recorded and a Mickey Mouse movie. Most mornings she whispers who she is when I go in to get her. For a few weeks, we were watching Mickey Mouse and the Three Musketeers every morning. She acts out the sword fights and pretends to sing one of the songs. Along the way, she has found a stick that magically becomes a sword that she uses to fight the “bad guys”. While in town a couple of weeks ago, she and Papa Bear bought two nerf/foam swords so their play sword fighting is less dangerous for everyone involved.

(very first time wearing and seeing herself in the ears)

(Mickey Mouse visited the hay shed. Only time ears are allowed to ride in the truck.)

As for Gray Cat, he makes an appearance a few times a day too. I figured out how to make some cat ears on one of her head bands. Later on in the week Ruby became convinced that I could make her a gray cat tail too. After thinking about it for a little while, I convinced myself that I could probably make one too. After finding a little bit of fabric, some shoelaces, elastic and Velcro, we had a cat tail! Now, keeping up with the changes of Gray Cat to Mickey Mouse is much easier.

Except…

Gray Cat ears and Mickey Mouse ears are not allowed to come to town or to church. So, her character changes are much harder to “see” and harder to keep up with. Unless she tells you, which she will…loudly.

While in Walmart last week, an older woman stopped to talk to us and to look at Clara. After asking about the baby’s name, she looked at Ruby and asked her. Ruby, with a straight face and almost clear words, responded “Gray Cat”. The woman turned to me and smiled with knowing eyes, as I translated and she said “ooohhh of course, Gray Cat!” I went on to tell her that she usually goes by “Ruby”. She was a sweet older woman (maybe in her 90’s). I was happier about Ruby’s, I mean Gray Cat’s, behavior toward the woman. She usually says “No” or just looks at a stranger that tries to converse with her. (This is a vast improvement from yelling “NNNNNOOOOOO” and throwing herself in the floor or buggy. Small, little bitty, baby steps of improvement.)

Gray Cat is usually chased by Papa Brown Mouse at night. The Mickey Mouse ears are covered with brown paper and are transformed into the Jerry character from Tom and Jerry, or “Gray Cat and Brown Mouse”. He is called Papa Mouse because Ruby saw an episode where Jerry has a little gray mouse in diapers as a friend or helper. She thinks that Brown Mouse was his “Papa”.

We also have a black cape and mask. Mickey Mouse usually puts this on if she if feeling extra feisty and wants to sword fight the bad guys.

(peaking around to find the “bad guys”)

In Ruby’s world, Wooster is the Papa Brown Mouse that chases the Gray Cat. They play this game every night, or they sword fight as Mickey Mouse and the Musketeers. You just have to listen closely, observe the wardrobe changes and play right along. Until she changes….

You know it’s a good Sunday School class session when people start throwing Seinfeld quotes or Bill Cosby quotes around. Really. Does that show the depth of biblical knowledge or secularism amongst us all? Maybe. But sometimes it’s just plain fun. This past session was about Isaiah’s prophecy. I won’t get into the details, but somehow we found ourselves talking about “third person”. That, of course led to a brief line from “The Jimmy” episode of Seinfeld, (Jimmy is down!!—anyone else? No…just look it up…funny stuff) but it also got us to talking about how some kids briefly refer to themselves in the third person. Ruby is currently in that stage.

***Note: our class is actually really fun. There’s a WHOLE lot of discussion/debate…which Wooster hates; the discussion part, debating he enjoys. He prefers lecture type. He’s not what you would call a discussion-er. Marci enjoys it.***

Around January or February, Ruby decided to start referring to herself in the third person. Some statements go like this:

“Ruby put shoes on.”

“Ruby go ride in big black truck”

“Ruby no like that!”

It really doesn’t sound like Ruby but rather “Robbie”. She says it so often and at the beginning of sentences, it’s hard for the responder NOT to say “Robbie” back to her. Just like it was hard for the characters, after being around Jimmy, not to talk in third person. She also likes for you to repeat EXACTLY what she is saying or trying to say back to her. She then quietly agrees that the statement that you just said is true or that you got it right.

Just recently she used the pronoun “I” when referring to herself. It was a proud moment for all of us. But, I’ll miss “Robbie” when it’s gone.

I love him…this is why.

They are good friends.

Best friends.

He works hard.

But he plays too.

And he’s really pretty to boot. J

He’s a good friend, he’s a best friend.

I know…I was shocked too.

That was probably the fastest three months of my life. We didn’t have a doctor visit this month so we aren’t too sure how much Clara weighs. We know she’s gaining because she has little rolls on her ankles that weren’t there last month. Bless her. She’s still as sweet as ever. She smiles and coos all the time now…unless it’s between the hours of 5pm and 9pm. She fusses a little during that time. And she fusses when she’s by herself. She likes to have a few people around. She has found her hands and likes to suck on her knuckles or swat at things close by. Sometimes she gets a grasp on a toy and can’t figure out how to release it.

She likes taking a bath and this month had her first bath with Ruby. It’s much easier to do both of them at the same time. Of course, it doesn’t take too long to give Clara a bath, so Ruby only has to share for a few minutes.

More 3 Month Pictures…Please don’t copy.

Bless her bones. Her hair is untamable most of the time. She loves making little spit bubbles and likes looking at toys. She’s definitely a thinker.

Here’s a quick update on everyone.

Ruby has been doing a tumbling class. Today was the last class for the summer. I loved the teacher/instructor. She is very calm and patient with each little student. When we first signed up online, her class was going to have 14 little two and three year olds. They quickly broke that class up into two different classes. On average, her class had about 5 kids each session. The instructor’s 12 year old daughter was the helper for each class. She was very good at herding the little kitties about the tumbling mat. 🙂 The first two sessions, I stayed really close to the mat and gave little reminders to Ruby about where to stand or to look at the teacher. She did very well considering she’s never been in an active class and never knowing the instructor (In her Sunday School class, she has always known her teacher, it’s pretty structured and there are toys to play with.) The gym that we were at is air conditioned and is WIDE OPEN. There is just a little tumbling mat on the floor. The little routine is the same each time. The kids gather on the floor around the teacher in a cute little circle where they wait for others to arrive. Once the clock reaches 9am, the instructor starts a little song and each student passes around the stuffed animal for the day. The stuff animals they have used have been: butterfly, giraffe, bumble bee, and a gray cat. They say “Ruby has the butterfly, she spins it around and passes it down. What do you think about that?” It’s a rhetorical question. They don’t have a reply. The little cuties just sit and smile. Out of the group, Ruby was the youngest at 2 1/2. The others were three or near four years old. She might have been the youngest, but she was the most enthusiastic. She tried very hard. From all the activities, she loved doing the animal moves or automotive moves the best. The moves she does the most at home are moving like a kangaroo and a spinning around like a helicopter.  However, a motorcycle sometimes makes an appearance during the day. On the last day of the class, only three little girls were present. They got to do a little obstacle course. First, the girls had to go down the “cheese wedge”, then across the beam and they finished out on the trampoline. Ms. Krista, the instructor, would tell or show the girls what to do at each station. The funniest part was watching the girls roll down the wedge. No one was really good at it. Ruby was the funniest. The instructor was brilliant for putting her last. Ruby needed all the instruction and observation she could get and still had a hard time figuring out how to roll down the wedge. At first, she had a hard time taking turns and was excited to get on the wedge. She also liked to look over if I was moving around or videoing her.

Herding cats, would be a better statement to describe the class. From the same little girl that has to go to the bathroom at the same time every session, to the little boy with different “owies”, the instructor had her hands full. Ruby’s most favorite part of the class was getting a sticker. She always put it on her cheek. Everyone else put theirs on their hand. She’s a leader not a follower. 🙂

Clara is doing very well. She is a very sweet, cuddly baby. Ruby was always high maintenance and let her feelings be known very loudly and very often. Some people say that Clara seems easier because she is the second born and we aren’t as uptight. I whole heartily disagree. Ruby has always been loud, stubborn and very independent. She hated being covered up, strapped in, cuddled, swaddled, hard time calming down, hated bathes, etc. This second kid just goes with the flow. And truth be told she does a good bit of sitting by herself because of her overly dramatic and high maintenance older sister. True story.  Clara is on a schedule and Ruby is on a completely different schedule. The only similarities between the two are: they go to bed at night around the same time and they have the same parents. That’s about it. It’s going to be a interesting 16 or 18 more years at the Wooster house. Right now, Clara is sleeping and Ruby, aka Mickey Mouse, is playing with a balloon that I blow up and she promptly lets all the air out while screaming for joy at the top of her lungs.

Speaking of sleeping…..it was mentioned somewhere up there….Clara is sleeping through the night. Ruby was sleeping through the night by 3 weeks. Clara had a harder time but by five weeks she was sleeping through the night. Our definition of sleeping through the night is any where from 5 and half hours to 6 and a half hours. Now at three months, she is sleeping a solid 6 and half hours straight. She eats at 6 am and then goes right back to sleep without fussing and I wake her back up at 10 am. She’s awake until 12pm, fusses a little, then takes a nap from 12pm to 2pm. She eats again and then is up for the rest of the day. She’ll take little cat naps here and there. She eats at 2pm and 6pm. She has a fussy time around 8pm but is done by 9pm. She eats for the final time around 10pm. Like with Ruby, she gets a bottle of my breast milk after she eats at 10pm. (I make tons of milk in the morning and it tapers off by the evening. So I pump my own milk in the morning time and she gets a supplemental bottle after she eats at 10pm, so we know she is full for the night.)

Clara is getting better and better at making eye contact. She is also finding her little voice and you can get a good smile or little chuckle out of her. All of a sudden she’s holding her head up and likes sitting up like a big girl. She can’t sit up for very long periods of time and tires out easily. Her hair still sticks straight up on her head. Her hair is getting lighter and lighter. She still has very light eyebrows. Her eyes are a blue/green/hazel color. Babies eyes can change color from 6months to a year.

Clara at 2monts

As for the grown up here, we are making it. Since April, Wooster has not slowed down. Note to self: Having a newborn during the months of April-October on a large working farm is not a good time. In two weeks, Wooster has worked 190  hours. April was all about planting. May is cultivating, fertilizing, dammar diking, planting soybeans and more fertilizing. June is all about wheat harvest, fertilizing, spraying, and sprinklers. July is all about catching up from the spring and June rainfalls with fertilizing, sprinklers and spraying that couldn’t get done back in June. These last few weeks of July they are focusing on sprinkler/pivot maintenance and getting the bins ready for corn harvest, spraying and other odds and ends. He is gone every morning by 6:15 and tries to make it home by 10pm. He does not eat lunch at home. I pack his breakfast/lunch/snacks every day. We see him periodically on some days. We will pack up in the truck and go sit in the field he is working in, make a visit to the shop, or go sit at a hay shed. Sometimes we take cookies, popsicles or cool cokes.

With all that farm work, people around here refer to the wives as “summer widows”. The days are long and everyone counts down until the harvest in October. Our harvest will be late this year. (They were about 3 weeks behind in getting the corn in the ground because of the snow and cold temps in April.) With 5,000 acres at our farm here in Byers ( 12,000 or so more over at Greensburg), the guys have a good bit to do everyday.

As with me, I am focusing on keeping everyone on schedule, food made, house work done, clothes for people to wear, diapers changed and entertainment for a 2 year old and 3 month old.  And we just started our preschool homeschool two weeks ago. So, really not much going on at all. 🙂

Mickey Mouse aka Ruby visits Papa Bear at the hay shed

Wooster and Ruby sharing a freezy pop a the hay shed

Georgia Girl…errr Mickey Mouse at the hay shed. Grain cart in the background.

Clara visits the shop.

Ruby tries riding a scooter at the shop

spraying

We visited the “big big pool” (as Ruby calls it) one Sunday afternoon. We had about a 2 hour break between going to church and Wooster going back to work. Ruby was excited about going. Clara and I hung out in the shade. She doesn’t flip over yet, but we were super cautious about leaving her on a chair. One of us stayed right with her the whole time. Ruby spent most of the time in the pool with Wooster. The first hour, she played around the big green frog slide. She couldn’t work up her nerve to slide down  it. She and Wooster worked on walking around in the water, twirling and jumping off the side of the pool. It was the first time that Ruby has ever been in water up to her chest. We both thought she did well. There was another little girl, maybe five years old, that stayed around them the whole time. She liked to swim under water and “goose” Wooster on the leg. You can see that on one of the videos. And bless Wooster and his farmer’s tan. Amen. 🙂

Coaxing…but not having it

Kicking and Twirling

Shady Baby

Twirling

In true two-year old fashion, Ruby decided she LOVED the frog slide and wanted to slide down it about 15 minutes before we had to leave. 🙂

Annnddd we are starting up again. I was horrible last year. This blog is usually on my “goal” list every new year. I go back and forth every month on trying to decide what to make public and what not to make public us and our lives and what not to let people know. Quite frankly, I’m tired of sending out emails and attachments. I somehow end up leaving someone out or not including something in one email and including it in someone else’s email. So hopefully, people can visit here and see R and C’s progress. I’ll also try to post some videos. I’ll have to figure that one out along the way.

Seriously. I’m gonna try to get better with the whole blog. I’m hoping that my new computer/internet will help me with motivation. We got the new computer on Sunday and the internet hotspot didn’t work. I had to go to town on Tuesday and get a new sims card. Now we are off and running. Next on the agenda is to transfer the data from the old to the new. I have to take it on Thursday to get that done.
But enought of the techie talk. Let’s get to the good stuff. Updates!

Sorry…again. This update will not include pictures. I have to get my pics back from the old….transfers….data usage…blah..blah..blah…

Ruby: We have eight teeth now. No molars. So she’s still on the mush. She eats at 11am, 4:30, and 10pm. No snacks or drinks/juice, only water. She is doing well. Still have a blocked tear duct. We go tomorrow to a well baby visit. She has a shot to finish out her shots for the next year. We’ll do that shot at the health department.
She currently LOVES American flags and stars. Everytime she spots/finds/sees/brings an American flag, she wants the adult to sing “You’re a Grand Old Flag” and for a star it is “twinkle, twinkle little star.” She also loves tractors, trucks and cars.
She is doing really well with her fine motor skills. She is currently using crayons and markers of all sizes.. We have assigned areas where she can color/draw. Her sessions rarely last more than 10 minutes. I’ve made some cute rollups that hold the crayons and markers. She is getting better at not being frustrated when pulling them out of the holder. She can feed herself using her hands and a fork, but is working on using a spoon. She hates drinking out of a cup, and loves using straws.
For communication: “here you go”, “all done” (though not clearly…but we get her meaning), “ooohhhhh woooow”, “it’s dark in here” (from a book she LOVES), “mama”, “bye bye”, “bread”, some like “what’s that?”…..are her most used phrases. She doesn’t really say individual words. She signs: please, bread, all done… She receptivly or understands most questions or requests. She can find her name in a group of color words. She can find the words…blue, red, yellow and purple in the same group. She can find the color blue and purple. she identifies by sound: b, g, s, w, v. If the adult asks “where is the….” for most letter sounds, she can find the corresponding letter. As of right now, she is not concerned with numbers and has no interest in them. She pretends to count but it sounds like “ga, gaa,gaaa” as she slowly touches something. She will receptivly find a square and circle. She is working on figuring out what hole certain shapes fit into on some toys. The most difficult for her is the rhombus (diamond). For gross motor skills she is working on jumping and hopping. She has just figured out she can walk/run. We are also working on riding a tricycle.
She has recently been able to “blow kisses”, lean in for a kiss, turn lights on and off, say “shhhh”–but it is more like a blow with her finger up near her mouth.
She is making the change from two naps to one. Some days she sleeps hard for both naps…and other days she plays by herself for one of the two. (as of right now during this writing…her first nap….she is banging on the wall and yelling…and singing)

Bible study is over, so we are now going to a little free wade pool on Tuesday afternoons with the mom group. She is working on not going up and taking something that others are not currently playing with (but have set down to get something else for the little game they are playing). She is also figuring out how to get in an out of the wade pool. She spends most of her time throwing pool toys back into the water.
All in all, she is progressing nicely and works hard everyday to figure something out.

Wheat harvest has come and gone. It was one of the earliest ones in a long time. They are planting milo and soybeans over the top. Matthew is working hard on fertizlier and chemigation. I think it’s his least favorite thing to do. He leaves early, gets in really late (after 10pm), and leaves again to go check on systems…last night he was in the bed at 2:00am and up again at 6am. We need rain, but he would still have to do fertilizer. He is worn out most of the time. We are looking forward to some “down” time of August…right before harvest.

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.

What I’m trying to do is a blog post from my new word and new computer….I don’t know if it will work. I’m not gonna up load pictures to this one….sorry.