Girls Night Out...

"Let's go to Annie with the kids on Friday.  It'll be fun! We can eat in Glasgow before the show; it's not that far and I LOVE Annie."  My cousin Beth always has the BEST ideas.  And I'm a willing sidekick. 
So off we set off with a carload of girls and her mother-in-law Earline on Friday afternoon for the show.

Maggie and I tried to take our picture on the deck to commemorate the day.

I think my arm is too short.

Beth's daughters are like bookends, age-wise and personality-wise, to Mags.  Beth's car has a built in video player and Earline brought a LOT of snacks for the car, so they were in a great mood.

(A note about the food: these little bodies didn't stop eating from the time we left Jordan until 10:30-ish when we left the theatre. Snacks all the way to Glasgow, then salad/breadsticks/pizza at Pizza Hut, more snacks on the way to Fort Peck, popcorn and drinks at the theatre, fudgesicles at intermission...makes me ill just to type it.)

After supper, we went to the campgrounds and park to run off a little steam and to check out the facilities because Earline's family is having a reunion there later in July. There's a great playground and even a kid's fishing pond near the campsites.

Beth's oldest daughter took our picture. She's a very serious little photographer and when we didn't have enough light facing the playground, we were arranged the other direction and the shot was made...

Here's the showhouse! It's a grand old building that's been very carefully preserved. I'm not sure when it was built, but the sign to follow says the theatre made a contribution to a charity in 1937, so obviously it was erected before then.  I could just walk around in there looking for an hour or three....

Look at the scrollwork and painting on that building!

In the lobby....

Under Will Roger's portrait is an old curtain/light control box with little windy levers that I wanted to turn, but resisted the urge. 

Oh, THIS is my favorite part of the whole theatre! There are BIG, autographed pictures of movie stars from the 1930's and 1940's.  They line the lobby and are in remarkable shape, considering their age. You'll recognize Shirley Temple and I can't remember if that's Hedy Lamar next to her, but they are all beautiful (or handsome...).

An old piano that still gets some use, also in the lobby.

This is a terrible picture of the stage; we sat in the upper level, but the house wasn't full so we could've sat anywhere, really.  There's something magical about the stage. 

We weren't allowed to take flash pictures during the play and I understand why, but I wish I could've had a couple shots at Ms Hannigan.

I would love to PLAY Ms. Hannigan. She's deliciously rude, and gets to do the most awful things! It's always more fun to play the villain, don't you think? And she's a villainess to aspire to, theatrically...

Concessions.  It's really the only reason we go to a show...

Here's our little group!

Can you sing the song, "Little Girls"?

Beth and I laughed all the way through that number, and vowed to learn it by heart...

No soda for Maggie. See her rosy little cheeks? Those babies were SO hot from playing, then the theatre got really warm, too.  Good thing there were fudgsicles, later.

It rained quite a bit on the way home and Maggie and I slid in (literally...the roads were muddy!) about 1:20 a.m.  It was a great evening and I'm glad we went!

Happy Father's Day, Dad

*I'd hate for my greetings to get lost in the mass of cards he recieves on the actual day....  :)

Every year I struggle to find a Father's Day card for my Dad.  There are simply no cards for cowboys who love good red wine, dark chocolate, silver bits and spurs, and border collies.  There are no cards that say, "Dad, we've sure been through some crazy spots in life, haven't we?"  There are no cards that express true admiration and love for a man who showed me that it's never too late to change, never too late to learn.  Even Leanin Tree cards don't have a greeting for dads who love us even when we mess up at the chute, hug us when they want to thump us, laugh with us when it would be too much to cry about. 

I love that I can talk to my Dad about cows, kids, worries, funny people, great food, "remember-whens" and "wonder-whats".  I love that I can pray WITH my Dad, as well as for him.  One of my most precious moments was watching him get baptised....and now I'm crying, but it's good, you know. 

I love you, Dad.  I look up to you now, like never before.  I'm so proud to call you my father.

Happy Father's Day, very late.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

A Clerk Goes West, Part 3: In which The Farmer's Wife decides to look into other occupations...

I'm sure you're wondering by now if I actually learned anything at the conference!

Well, as a matter of fact, I did.

Here, in no particular order, is a listing of some of my lessons:

1. How to determine if a closed session in a public meeting is necessary and how to kick your chairman in the shins, politely, and stop him from closing the meeting illegally. (Some of you may think I'm just looking for any reason to kick the chairman. You wouldn't be entirely off-base, but in this case, it's to save our board from a law suit.)

2. How to take information from the last 10 years' Trustees Fiinancial Summaries and put them in circle and bar graphs so the average school board member or taxpayer can see the trends and breakdowns. Actually, I'm a pretty visual person and this was an exciting workshop because now I have tools to draw myself a picture.

3. There are those who can't be trusted. I'm speaking in particular of the L.M. of the U. who STOLE content from my blog about school clerk experiences.  Took it without advance permission or notice, mind you, and then READ IT OUT LOUD to an entire workshop, which I was attending.  Yes. I'm formulating retaliation.  It will be hard to pull off, because he was just promoted to President of MASBO, but sweeter because of his stature, don't you think?

There are those who can't be trusted.

4. I learned that there are many, many tiny little schools in the state; I'm not the only one. And I learned that we all face the same problems: We end up being responsible for things we aren't supposed to be and we have no administration to back us up. After this particular workshop, which a clerk who had recently been "let go" from her job put on, I went back to my room and cried. Maybe I was just tired, but I was worried, too.  

5.  Convention food, no matter how hard they try to make it good, is bad. But if a dear friend finds out you are suffering, they may send room service in the form of a 10 oz chocolate cheesecake and save you from certain emaciation and possible death.  I lost 3 lbs at the convention, but it would've been WAY more if Annie hadn't called that little present in for me.  (Anne, I love you. But you knew that already, didn't you?!)

6. I love school clerks of all shapes and sizes.  They are good people. And they are brave.  Let's just say, if I had had any doubts about their courage, it was all erased during karaoke night.

7. How to file ARRA reports. (American Recovery and Restoration Act...I think.) It's a little present from the Obama administration....I get to report quarterly how many jobs I created or saved with the bucks they trickled down into the schools. I have to apply for the money, tell precisely how I used the money, bleed the money through the books, etc. etc. Nobody is impressed. Nobody really understands the process. Not even the Office of Public Instruction, bless their hearts, but they keep taking the questions and calls... 

8. I'm not really school clerk material. I'll NEVER get that nifty little clerk of the year pin and check they hand out every year at the conference. I wear the wrong things (cowboy boots) and laugh a little too freely, am rather easily confused with numbers and don't get all excited about new filing systems. I'm okay with that, and just feel privileged to be included in this group. Like my friend said, "There's 350 of the same kind of people here, and then there's you," or something along those lines.  

The really interesting stuff will not be published here, due to the little rule of the organization: What happens at MASBO, stays at MASBO! (That's why you won't see any actual pictures of the people at the conference. THAT and as you've already learned, there are those who can't be trusted.)

    

A Clerk Goes West, Part 2: Is there a map for this room?

Since I was at this conference on scholarship (meaning I was one of the poorest schools in the state and the organization took pity on me) I anticipated a broom closet with a bed. Really.  And, here's the funny thing about low expectations: I would've been good with that, just so long as I got to come to the whole shooting match!

At the front desk, they checked me in, showed me on the map my room location and sent me off down the longest hall I've ever encountered.  Just when I thought it was getting closer to my room, the hall would take another jog and keep going. (This greatly enhanced the whole "broom closet with a bed" idea, of course.)

When at last, 2 miles later, I reached room 167 of Grouse Mountain Lodge, I unsuccessfully tried the magnetic key card, sorta panicked, then read the directions and finally entered the most beautiful hotel room I've ever had the privilege of seeing. (I should point out that I've lived a pretty sheltered, simple life. Shocking to you, I'm sure....)

It had a hallway, for heaven's sake, with a little table and lamp! What hotel room has a hallway?

I was positive I had the wrong room. This was obviously for the President of the organization and not the scholarship recipient. But I was going to keep looking, before I got kicked out!

A tiny little living room area, next to the kitchenette. I didn't take a picture of the flat screen t.v. mounted on the wall in the sitting area, but there was one and I wondered how I was supposed to watch it from bed. 

Two beds with three pillows each....I was in heaven, thinking about it! (I love pillows and think there should be no less than three per person. Finally! A hotel that understands that!) AND at least one of those pillows was feather. I don't mean to go on and on about them, but it was a big deal to me...

There was an armoire with ANOTHER t.v. ! Problem solved.  Who has ever heard of a hotel room with TWO televisions? Not me. 

You can see my little dining room table right next to the very best part of the whole room: the dressing table.  You know I'm a big fan of old movies and one of the things I secretly desire is a dressing table where I might put on my make-up and perfume in high heels and a feather edged robe.  Just like Rita Hayworth.  If ONLY I had a feather edged robe....

No feather edged robe, but there were two amazing terrycloth robes in the hall closet.  Yes! It's true! I've never stayed in a hotel with complimentary white terrycloth robes, but I've always wanted to.  That seems the height of luxury.  And, after experiencing it, I can say it truly is pretty wonderful.

When I went to register for the conference, I did ask the organization's director if I was supposed to be in that room, because it was so grand.  Linda Brannon, whom I adore more than French Roast coffee, looked rather startled and said, "Oh no! I thought I had them put you in a loft room!"

The loft rooms, from what I understood, were even better.

I hastened to assure her that my room was better than I'd ever stayed in and if it was all the same, I'd just stay there. 

Can you believe that?

To be continued...

A Clerk Goes West, Part 1: From the train window

I was expecting something a little more grand, at the train station. I don't know why; Montana isn't really known for grandeur in its little towns, just in its glorious scenery.

First of all, I was the only one at the train station. And when I say I was the only one, that is an actual, factual statement.  After I'd been there about 10 minutes, two men working for Burlington Northern drifted in to the building, but other than that, I was the only body there. 

I LOVED the keep out/caution signs on the door next to the vintage candy machine in the waiting room! You can't read it, sadly, but the sign warns you of "asbestosis dust".

These waiting room chairs were vintage, too.  The word that pops to mind is "groovy".

(I bought a People magazine for the trip...shameless trash, really, and read it in about 20 minutes in the train station. Everything I didn't want to know about Gary Coleman and fashion don'ts...)

Across the room from my groovy orange seats, toward the tracks.

The train had uniformed conductors, with little hats and waistcoats and everything.  I wanted to hug the one who welcomed me to the train.  One of the BN workers told him that this was my first train ride and to take good care of me, and he certainly did.  He checked on me every stop and encouraged me to go get some food in the lounge car, which I eventually did, so he could relax a little.

First scenery out my window near Glasgow where I got on the train.  I was in the seats that had a northern exposure, and just couldn't stop looking at the most beautiful state in the most beautiful country in the world.  I had forgotten how incredibly breathtaking my state is. I'm so proud to be from Montana.

Malta, MT....these pictures are for Country Wife, because these are her old stomping grounds.  Several MASBO-ians had boarded in Malta the day before I did, including my friend the Lord Master of the Universe President Elect of our organization. (He told me later that his crowd had cocktails, thanks to the Malta business manager who had apparently spent time on the train in the past and knew the ropes.)

Love those groovy seats....

You can't see this very well, but the upstairs windows have been painted with various scenes, some of which appeared rather risque.  And the Mint Bar. I want to say (with no statistics to back me up) that probably one town out of ten in Montana has a Mint Bar. 

Right outside of Malta.  It's looking just gorgeous from all the rain.

In Havre, MT, we had a service stop to refuel, pick up chicken dinners and allow all the smokers a sanity break.  Anytime the train slowed a bit, the smokers jumped up from their seats and started pacing toward the lower level of the car, just in case THIS was the smoking break.  Incidentally, Amtrak is really strict with their anti-smoking policy. On the trip home, a smoker who tried to sneak a light was caught and over the intercom we were cautioned that anyone caught smoking on the train was escorted off at the next station to be met by law enforcement. 

The Hi-line has the most huge fields of farming that I've ever seen.  There was no way to capture it in photos, but I was able to take pictures of some of the grainaries.  Here in Cohagen, we might have 4 or 5 grainaries in a row.  On the Hi-line, there will be two rows of 7 or 8 grainaries.  It's stunning, how much grain is produced in north central Montana.

This looked like a feedlot for horses....there were several hundred head, here.  This is just a small portion of them.  After discussion with my husband, we decided it was, indeed a feedlot for horses, since there are no more slaughter plants in the US and they were going to be transported to Canada for that purpose.  That's an issue for another post, highly controversial and frustrating.

I think this was Shelby, MT.  Typical little high plains town....(If you are an Ian Tyson fan, he sings a song entitled "Little High Plains Town" that encapsulates the flavor of these places perfectly.)

Maggie wanted to see some pictures of the seats. Lots and lots of room and very comfortable.  It wasn't squeaky clean, but it was better than I'd anticipated. 

Charolais cows....(pronounced "shar-LAY")

I think they look like big white sheep, here.  They are a decent breed, big boned and heavy, but they're white and I just can't get past that whole color thing.  You'd think I'd like them for their French-ness, wouldn't you?

Typical reservation place.  This one is actually not as bad as some we passed. 

Smelter just outside of Browning.  It's an intriguing shape and I had no idea what it was until I showed Wayland the picture. 

Right outside of Browning, we start getting into the Rocky Mountains, and my heart starts beating faster....

Something about the mountains makes me feel safe, while the prairie makes me feel free. It's an odd thing, in Montana, that the country is so big it makes a person feel like a speck of dust in it, but also very blessed for having been given the gift of experiencing it.

East Glacier depot....you can see that the architecture starts getting more lodge-y and tourist-y.  From here on out, everything was log. 

A resort on the edge of East Glacier....

I stopped taking pictures for awhile, because we went through quite a few tunnels and snow sheds and were getting close to Whitefish.

The train ride was really fun and I'm sort of glad I was travelling alone so I could just soak up the scenery and the characters travelling with me.

Seated right in front of me was a lady from central Michigan who was on her way to Seattle to watch her daughter graduate from college.  This lady worked in a tractor seat factory, oddly enough, and had never been west of Michigan....she grew up in Tennessee and thought she knew mountains.  When we hit the Rockies, her little jaw fell open and I don't think it closed until Whitefish.  She was also a smoker and had been on the train for 2 days, so she was just about to go nuts, I think.

Across from me was a couple of older folks also on their way to Seattle and they read, quietly, the entire time, never looking up except when the dining car person came around for dinner reservations. One time, the little husband made the mistake of asking his wife how her book was (which happened to be the third book in a trilogy) and she started in on a detailed re-telling, from the very first book.  I kept sneaking peeks at them during this literary diatribe and his head was up and nodding, but I could see that his eyes were not focusing and he was just out waiting her, bless his heart! She had started with the first book when they boarded in Wisconsin, apparently, and had been reading round the clock. My hat is off to her; I thought I was a reader, but she makes me look like a novice.

The man seated behind the elderly couple was a very loud, sloppy, stinky businessman who proclaimed his connections and influence to anyone who walked by. I'm guessing he was in his mid to late 60's and he informed us all that he'd been born into a U.S. Senator's family and was name dropping like crazy, trying to impress us.  The tractor seat lady rolled her eyes and whispered information to me about his previous stories, which were shocking if one chose to believe them.  He stopped and talked to me for about 15 minutes after spying my UTHSC sweatshirt, extolling the glories of Texas. He disboarded in Whitefish, too, and I was terrified he'd come to the Grouse Mountain Lodge for three days, but he wanted to find a Super 8.  Apparently he was banking per diem money from his big shot oil job....

When I arrived in Whitefish (WFH on the boarding pass), I met up with a group of clerks who had boarded in Wolf Point and we rode to the Lodge together.  We staggered to the shuttle bus with our big honking suitcases and carry-ons and collapsed, excited to see our lodgings.

To be continued.... 

All Aboard!

Tomorrow I leave for a school business officials' conference in Whitefish, MT.  It's about as far west in Montana as I can go and still stay in the state.  AND I get to take the train to get there!

This is an exciting first-time on a train for me....how sad is that?! We have to drive an hour and a half to get to the station in Glasgow, then the train takes me along the Hi-Line of Montana, through big, big farming and reservations to the Rocky Mountains, through the corner of Glacier Park and deposits me in Whitefish at 9:00 p.m. 

I can take three bags to check and two bags besides my purse as carry-ons. How in the world would I lug that much wardrobe around? Really, I need a porter to travel with me...

The age-old question for women is:

"What to pack?"

It's supposed to be stinking cold, there this week...highs of 55 and 65 degrees.  But it may also have a heat wave on Friday.  (Of course...) So.....mukluks and sandals. Tricky, that.

As excited as I am to go on the train, I'm already worrying about all my babies and the Farmer. Does anyone but me have that "if I leave, mayhem and illness will ensue, death-threatening situations that obviously wouldn't occur with the simple presence of me" feeling?  I'm pretty confident the kids will be alright, but I almost have panic attacks thinking about my dog. Everyone watches out for the kids, but they may not see Molly lying under the tire in the shade.....I couldn't stand it.

We went to the grocery store and laid in a pile of quick-to-prepare junk food, so they won't starve.  Frozen pizza, chicken nuggets, Eggos, potpies, chips, cereal....I can hardly stand to type it!  There are some bribe foods, too, just in case the Farmer gets desperate for cooperation.  (That's terrible parenting, we know, but desperate times call for desperate measures....)

My friend Anne (of the tulip post) wants me to take pictures of the train ride and post them, so I'll attempt to do so Wednesday morning, if all the electronics behave for me!

Now, off to pack...something. 

Dear Annie,

I have to get something off my chest and I hope you'll accept it with your usual grace and humor. It's been something I've wanted to tell you for a long time, but have never worked up the courage until now....

I really, really, really, really dislike tulips. 

(Illustration 1.)

They take advantage of color-starved, house-bound, winter-depressed people and bloom for about a week, maybe two if the conditions are pristine.  Then they hang around too long like second-cousins-once-removed from California. I can't cut them back because *gasp* they wouldn't have enough nutrients to bloom next year, so they flop around in my flower beds staying obstinately greenish until July.  (See illustration 2.)

I know you adore them and want to plant them by the truckloads.  I know they make you happy and remind you of home in Idaho.  And I'm good with that.  But I really and truly despise these wretched plants.  I'd give you mine if I could ever remember where they are, come September!

Anyway, I hope we can still be friends.

xoxoxoxo

MJ

More garden dirt...

First, a couple updates for my garden geek friends who truly and actually care about this stuff....
(Yes! They wait for these updates and comment as soon as they get them! Bless their frazzled little hearts....)

The yarrow seeds have not sprouted.
You read that right...have NOT sprouted.  Which baffles me beyond anything, because the seeds from the wicked plants in my flower beds where I DON'T want them have come in like a carpet in my lawn.

Fontie, I'm working on a picture of the hairy-legged weed.  It's not easy to capture the nuances of such a beast in a manner worthy of its reputation. 

In other garden news:

I have World! Champion! Dandelions!  They are so big in one bed that I contemplated having the Farmer take my picture with one, like those old ads you see in Gurney's catalogs where Grandpa G. Whillikers is holding a 10 lb tomato. (Below is an example...actual image from Gurney's catalog)

I resisted the temptation to have that picture taken in sensitivity to my in-laws who already suffer enough having me in the family without their good gardening reputation ruined by association.

I gave my kids seeds to plant, this spring, in the hopes that they'd:

A. leave MY expensive seeds alone, or

B. grow something that would make them want to garden for the rest of their lives.

Angus had peas. He dug a hole about 2 inches deep and 3 inches in diameter, dumped the ENTIRE packet of seeds in it (no amount of pleading could dissuade him) and covered them up with his little spade.

They are growing. In a big old pea wad, but they are growing! 

My friend Denise sent me gladiola bulbs! I've never planted glads before, but doesn't it just sound joyful to say, "You should SEE my glads!" ? (There was no good way to punctuate that...)

I planted zinnias in a flower bed that had previously held sunflowers and now have a dilemma....zinnia seedlings APPARENTLY look exactly like sunflower seedlings! Which brings me to a point that has driven me crazy since I started trying to grow things.  Does anyone besides me think it's absolutely pointless for seed companies to print that little picture of what your seedling will look like when it sprouts? They all look the same when they have two leaves! Seriously.  Go grab a couple seed packets and take a look. 

So now I can't pluck all the rotten sunflower seedlings out until I know for SURE they are rotten sunflower seedlings....probably when they bolt to 5 feet high in a week.  And then I'm not sure I'll have the heart to by then.

We've had so much rain in the last couple weeks that it's been pretty easy gardening.  It's so damp that I found a slug, for the very first time ever! Maggie thought he was a naked snail, which technically he was.  After all the horrors I've read about what snails can do to plants, I cheerfully squooshed him and it must've deterred all his slimy little friends from living here because I haven't seen another one.

My pergola went up last night! We still have to add the wood for shade slats, but the structure is up and I'm so excited!

That's all the dirt from the garden at the Chronicles. 

Stay tuned for more scintillating posts....

Cow Tales

We've been doing little cow projects this last week, like branding the 16 pairs of late calvers.  We did those 16 with just the Farmer, his father and me and it was surprisingly calm and uneventful. (Translation: I didn't get yelled at.)  After we finished, we dispersed the cows and calves to the different pastures they belong.  My father-in-law hauled 8 pair to the Jacobsen place with a horse trailer (2 loads) and the assistance of the little bosses, Maggie and Angus.  The Farmer and I trailed the other pairs north to Thelma's.

*Little note, here.  Pastures are named for the people who USED to own them. Or for what grows in them.  Or for a land feature. 

Anyway, the bunch we were trailing took off confidently to the north, at a good clip.  When they got to the first gate (not the one they needed to go through) the lead cow pulled up and looked at me with that "Open the dang gate, already! We're here!" look and I had to deny her. She was extremely disgusted and with great reluctance turned to the west where the right gate was.  And appeared to pout a little the rest of the trip. 

In the next pasture, we encountered a cow-eating salt trough that had been tipped upside down to keep the water out.  One cow could NOT stop looking at it, circling gingerly with her calf, nose pointed at the salt trough, ears forward.  She was convinced it was gonna "get her".  It was just wrong and she knew it. 

At the next gate, it was as though we had given them a break off the freeway at a rest area.  But when they got through that gate, they were close to the pasture they needed to be in and finally staggered up to the final gate with a whole lot less ginger than they'd started out with.

Last night, we moved the yearling heifers to thier breeding pasture.  As I've mentioned before, anything to do with yearling heifers is like junior high girls....extreme.  High speed or dead stop.  They don't just slightly turn, they do a 180 degree turn.  And whatever the FIRST heifer does, they ALL do. 

They are in good shape and they should be....all the green grass they can eat in a day and mild weather (for cows).  I was excited that we couldn't pick Daisy, my yearling bum, out of the herd! She fits right in, which is amazing. 

Once those girls were moved, we went back and sorted off the little bulls that will join them today to (as Maggie puts it) "get married".  Maggie is completely mystified as to why we don't have a bull for each heifer.  How does THAT work? She already knows quite a bit about the birds and the bees at age 5, but she still thinks it's a bit unfair that there's only one bull for 30 heifers. 

So this is Daisy's big moment.  If she doesn't breed up, she's down the road and that's the end of the OC herd for a while.  Pray that she's alluring.  And fertile.  (It's terrible to have one heifer that carries the brand. And she won't even GET her brand until we're SURE she's bred.)

And finally, my two bum calves for this year, Cosmo and Linnie are doing just fine.  The Farmer and I had to doctor them this last week for scours, give them the Ivermectin treatment and put fly-tags in their ears.  The Farmer got Linnie's tag a little close to the end of her ear, on the same side as the number tag, and she has a goofy, loppy-eared look now.  It makes me laugh every time I see her, but she's embarrassed and feels silly. 

That's about all the cow news you can handle...and more. 

Adventures on the high seas....or plains....

This week is vacation Bible school week in Jordan for the kids and I, and the theme is nautical! God was watching out for our VBS crew, because the prom theme this spring was ALSO nautical and we snagged all the decorations to use. The church has a big old cardboard ship in the santuary, now, and nets and fish tacked up all over the place. 

I have the drama portion of the program and have elaborate sets and action that changes DAILY.  Today is a Bible times house, tomorrow a ship with water all around, the next day a Biblical city and so forth.  It's great fun for the kids, but always a little dicey for the person setting up because I'm never really sure the ship will hold together through four groups or that the walls will stay up.

I don't have a helper this year, unless someone shows up from Michigan or Iowa or someplace, so it will be tricky to do.  But, it's not like I'm putting on a Broadway play or anything, so it doesn't have to be professional!

Please pray for our little VBS if you get a chance, today.  Especially that I'll make it to town without mishap, because it rained ALL NIGHT, 4/10ths of an inch at 5 a.m.! A blessing for the crops and grass, a serious challenge for someone driving in mud to town.....

Thoughts on weeds....

Yes, you can tell from the title of the post this is going to be an absolutely riveting piece of writing.  Well, actually, it's better than you might imagine.....(Sara H., put down your coffee.)

I have weeds with hairy legs. 

They DO!

I don't have any idea what sort of weeds they are, but they are bountiful and sly and I've been pulling them by the truckload. 

They hide in amongst the daylilies and the iris and try to masquerade as such.  In some spots I can't see them very well, but I can feel their stems and that's how I figured out they have hairy legs.  It makes me feel better about ripping them out of the ground to know this; I feel I'm sparing them some embarrassing moments in the horticultural arena.  They hang out with the smooth stalked daylillies, who are elegant and grass-like.  They rub shoulders with the stately iris, efficient and strong. 

Of course, I think they are sort of like the people of Walmart and don't really care how they look, as long as they get a good deal on soil and water. 

Weeding with children is tricky, because they want to "help".  Kids are absolutely indiscriminate when weeding....if it's green, they pull it. 

Which reminds me of the time Karen Yost asked me to weed her daisy patch and I ignorantly pulled every single plant out, thinking I was doing the best weeding job ever.  (I was 22 at the time and didn't know a daisy from a dandelion. How sad is that?) Karen graciously forgave me, saying that she was getting tired of those daisies anyway, but I still apologize to her every spring and wake up in the middle of the night with weeding nightmares from the incident.....

Some weeds are just well-meaning flowers that happily seed and sow on any quarter-sized patch of soil.  These are the tough weeds for anyone who has ever struggled to try to get anything to grow.  I still have a horrible time pulling them, but they will take advantage of a sentimental garden.  Pretty soon, they will have overtaken every bed, like little colonies of cheerful pirates.  Plants as pirates....bet you never put the two things together, huh?!

Weeding is contemplative work, so I've been thinking of this post for quite a while.  And now I have to get back to the philosophical task....

Since the rain...

One of my very favorite recording artists of all time is Ian Tyson.  He sings real, true western cowboy songs....not redneck songs, not purtineer-pop songs, not whoopie-tie-eye-aye chuckwagon songs, but authentic cowboy music. 

He sings a song called "Since the Rain" from I Outgrew The Wagon album that starts out like this:

Since the rain

Things look so much better.

Since the rain

Honey, you should see it now...

That song has been dancing through my head for the last couple days.  It's glorious green, as far as my eyes can see and when I walk through the prairie bunch grasses, there are hundreds of tiny little flowers popping up.  This is the time to see Montana.  She's putting on quite a show, this spring. 

Yesterday, the kids and I spent most of the day outside, planting/unplanting and playing.  I got all my greenhouse plants plunked somewhere and a bunch of seeds scattered.  After a quick inventory, I seem to have too much oregano and not enough basil, too many tomatos and not enough pepper plants, too much flax and not enough daisies.  And the infamous white ghost iris is looking glamorous and stately, despite the wind. 

Here are some pictures from our yard. 

Anyone want a kitten? The white one is a male, the black one is female, both are kid-proof...

My beautiful stepping stone from Lori at Altered Glass!

Everybody's crazy bout a sharp-dressed man....

I don't know if you can read it, but his Wolverine underpants say, "I've got your back!"

Garden Ghosts

I have no idea where the white iris came from.  And I've never been fond of white flowers, other than daisies, because they almost always look dirty and ragged in my garden.  But aren't these just breath-taking?