Tea with the Princesses

Yesterday, the kids and I went to Miles City to have tea with the Princesses at the Ursuline Convent!

It's supposed to be for little girls, but Angus just HAD to go....because, you know, he has "handsome clothes" and any excuse to wear them is alright.  Even if he has to hang out with a bunch of chicks.

Here's a picture for Shelly, with the homecoming tiara on HRH.

We ALL dressed up.  Do you see the very fancy necklaces that Maggie and Angus made me? 

They go with everything.  :)

(You may wonder why the little faces are less than happy.  It's because we were taking up valuable time with silly pictures, when we could be headed to the tea!  So they grudgingly stood there, but they weren't happy about it.)

First princess we met?  Snow White!  AND had the bonus delight of finding cousins!  Miss Jentry found us immediately and we got to spend time with her and baby Javon.

They had all seven little dwarf beds!  There was no room to get all of them in a picture. 

Fancy cookies!  And pink lemonade...

Aren't they cute? There wasn't much left of the plate of cookies when we were done...

And Ariel, the Little Mermaid...

Okay, this is what it looked like on three floors, only even more packed in most places. Everywhere we tried to go, it was a swirling mass of little girls in princess dresses and parents.  We were completely overwhelmed!  I had no idea it would be that wild.

Angus found a sandbox by the Little Mermaid corner and he was completely happy to stay there and play in the dirt.  Next year, I think he can find something manly to do for the day, because he didn't really enjoy the whole princess experience.

Maggie came running to me, all agasp, "MOM! I found BELLE!"  and then she went back to dance and twirl.

 I took pictures of little girls that made me smile...I have no idea who they are, but isn't this the most adorable thing you've ever seen in sparkly blue harem pants?!

 And this princess cracked me up.  She was about 2 feet tall...just teensy...and VERY serious about the whole deal. 

Curtsy and then let's be moving on, Mom...no wasting time on this photo nonsense!

Tinkerbell...who isn't actually a princess, but no one cared.  She sprayed the little girls with pixie dust!

Getting fingernails painted, with sparkly polish.  They had to wait in line for this...a long line.

Princess Jasmine, who seemed to be Maggie's favorite because she had a magic carpet. (It was only magic to little girls with big imaginations.  For some, it was just a tired old rug! Maggie took it to China for noodles.)

She had purple eyeshadow and lip gloss done....

Oooooo! Pretty!

Pocahontas...

 Okay, this is for all you People of Walmart fans!  I couldn't get a great picture without being really obvious, so this was the best I could do.  In case you can't read the shirt, it says "Silence! I KEEL you!"  She looked as though she really might, too, which is ANOTHER reason I didn't want her to know I was taking her picture....

 Tired and sparkled, and ready to go to the Airport Inn for some protein and yet another party that we didn't know was going on....Martha's 60th birthday!  (Someday, a post about this waitress....she's my favorite.)

"Kevlar tutu strapped on tight!

Wand fully supercharged and safety is off."

-Amy Edwards

Once upon a time...

Isn't that how all the fairy tales start?
When I hear those words, I always want to snuggle down and listen, knowing the story will probably have a princess, a witch or evil character of some sort, a hero...generally a prince and some dreadful choice that must be made which will appear to be impossible.  And sometimes talking animals....enchantments and spells. For some reason, it's comforting to me to know all this will be following those four words. 

When I was young, I read the most fantastic things....but I was an incredibly practical child.  Can you believe that?  It's hard for me to even believe! I was very quiet, shy, a terrible bookworm, my favorite color was blue and I didn't really care for dolls or clothes or anything like that.  (My sister, the personal investigator, is always trying to figure out how I ended up being the exact and total opposite...to the core....of how I started out.)  I believed animals could talk, but the whole princess thing was lost on me.  Somewhere along the squiggly-snarled line of my life, I started embracing whimsy, so....

This morning, I watched the royal wedding.  And woke my daughter up to watch the royal wedding. And told her about the other two royal weddings I watched when I was younger.  And, yes, a tiara will be worn today to honor and commemorate the occasion. 

And the truly astonishing thing is that I do sort of find the whole thing very wonderful! 

There still are princesses!  And princes!  And they still ride off in carriages with all the pomp and fluff that they did in the fairytales I read.  There are still crowns and white gloves and titles and...yes....witches that show up in garden hats.  (Disguises, you know...)

I know there's no such thing as happily ever after.  Both of the royal weddings I watched in my youth ended sadly.  I dearly hope this one will not.

There are many who scoff today's event...mumbling and grumbling about it, upset that their regularly scheduled programming has been interrupted and stating that all the money put toward the wedding could've been used for some other purpose that would save countries and feed the hungry.  Of course.  But here's my thing: we are daily bombarded with news of war, famine, disasters that boggle our minds, crime and awfulness that I don't want to write of.  Today, there was a prince who married a girl who may someday be his queen.  They are young and beautiful and happy, and they rode to the castle in a carriage drawn by white horses.  And for an hour or so, I was about 6 years old, believing that there would be a happily ever after. I really needed that.

Once upon a time...

*Incidentally, tomorrow Maggie and I will be going to Miles City for High Tea with the Princesses, a special time that little girls can go in their fanciest dresses and do girly things for awhile at the Ursuline Convent.  Even dance with their favorite fairytale princess!  I don't know who's more excited, her or me....we're both going to wear our prettiest dresses and be as elegant as we can be.  I'm getting tummy tickles just thinking of it!

Ten reasons it's great to be a stay-at-home mom

10. When you dress up to go to “the office”, it usually means you are wearing your daughter’s plastic tiara or a very special sticker on your sweatshirt.

9. Coffee doesn’t have to wait for a break!

8. Exalted Keeper of the Potato Chips and Chocolate….with great power comes great responsibility.

7. Theoretically, you can take a shower any time of the day. I said “theoretically”…stop laughing.

6. There’s time to do vacuum cleaner karaoke to “Kokomo” between rooms.

5. Happy hour can start at 4:00 if you need it to….usually preceded by Unhappy Hour.

4. If the kids have a great new Disney movie and you have a basket of clothes to fold, you’re all booked solid for the next two hours.

3. Workout clothes, all day. (Just in case the urge to do aerobic sweeping strikes you or SHAPE magazine drops by unexpectedly for a random reader photo shoot. Hey, a girl can dream, right?!)

2. Dr. Suess, anytime, anywhere.

1. Sticky kisses and the proclamation that “You’re the best mom, EVER!”

It started out as a joke...

when my sister-in-law Pam, who knows how touchy I am about possibly being white trailer trash on the prairie, got us pink flamingos for Christmas one year. 

We put them around our mailbox.

You know...because if you're going to redneck out, you want the whole world to know.

We realized they needed to become a permanent fixture when our UPS and FedEx packages started showing up with little handdrawn roadmaps that said, "Turn S at pnk flmgos".

This winter was hard on them.  They were drifted under, then plowed over and smashed.  When the snow melted, we missed seeing them and decided that they needed to be replaced.

They're back!

And they're BIGGER.  And BRIGHTER. (As if that was possible...)

This picture was for Patricia, at Pollywog Creek, who lives in the land of real flamingos and alligators...

Montana swampland.

 Aren't they crazy fun?  Tacky as the day is long, if you turn south when you see them on the Two Furrow, you'll end up at the white trash trailer on the prairie.  We can sit on the 1950's metal lawn chairs and drink Bud Light from a can, eat Cheetos and talk about tornado sightings...

Easter Eggs

I've found that trying to blog about any holiday is just completely overwhelming to me, and instead of great epic posts, I just put my blog to rest until I'm quite sure the holiday has passed, hope that no one noticed, and continue on as though everything is normal. 

So I'm not going to go through a big long, moment-by-moment post full of heartwarming family pictures and stories.  But I love the Easter egg dying.  (Or "coloring" as we now have to call it, because Angus was horrified that eggs had to die for Easter.  It was distressing to no end for my tenderhearted little man, so now we color the eggs.)

Ready to get the job done...poor Angus has his mother's un-photo-genetics.

Concentrating....

 Yup.  It's blue alright! (After that, he just started grabbing cups and dropping eggs in them. 

We had to wait in line for the blue.  And orange. 

Maggie, instructing me in the proper techniques to achieve ultimate coloration. 

It worked!

 I really like the clear coffee cups for the colors...so vivid and deep.

Angus ended up with all his eggs, part of the Farmer's, part of mine and a couple extras. 

He was fast.  And not concerned in the least with perfect hue.

 Maggie took her time and made works of art....

My Mom brought these beautiful tulips! They looked great with my red kitchen walls.  So bright and fresh...

NOW can we brand her?

The OC herd doubled in size, last night a little after midnight!

Some of you have been reading the Chronicles long enough that you remember Daisy, my first bum calf here at the ranch.  For those new readers, here's a condensed version of the story...

Daisy was out of a two year old heifer that died from infection, we think.  She (Daisy) was a strong, big heifer calf that the guys could get grafted on to a cow, so she became my bum calf.  Most bums are puny, big bellied and, quite frankly, turn out sort of ugly and worthless.  Daisy was atypical, and turned into a really nice little heifer...not by anything I did, that's for sure. 

My father-in-law and I disagreed about keeping her.  She was out of a two-year old, and we generally don't keep those calves, because they're not as vigorous or big.  Her dam died after a pulling, two definite signs of weak traits in a cow.  She was a bum, for heaven's sake, and bums never turn out to anything. 

She kept making the cut....first, to be kept as a yearling, then to be bred, preg-tested and she came out bred...barely (not bred by many days, so she was expected to calve late), and made the winter without losing the calf.  She was only distinguishable, size and profile wise, by her OC tag....held her own against cow-raised calves. 

My brand is on the right side of the cow and the Langs Fork brand is on the left side.  All our equipment is set up for branding on the left.  And, as my father-in-law pointed out, at each sorting and saving, she might go down the road, so we really didn't need to brand her. 

NOW we can brand her!  She's not going anywhere, except out to the pasture with her calf.

I was the night calver last night, and at the midnight check, I saw that she had the bubble out (amniotic sac), so knew I needed to keep an eye on her.  It's not good to hover, so I went back to the shop for an hour and trotted back out, holding my breath. 

A perfect, strong heifer calf, already cleaned off!

She had her by herself, no pulling.
She cleaned her off and bedded her down in a pile of straw.
When I checked again at 3 a.m., the calf was up and sucking for all she was worth....

I can't express to you how excited I am!
And didn't realize I'd been holding my breath for two years over this little cow...
I've been smiling since 1 a.m....really.

Now, I want you to meet Rose (Rosie)!  Maggie named her the minute we had the ultrasound results.

Isn't she perfect? Go ahead...you can clap and smile... 

And here's Miss Daisy, good little mama cow....she didn't mind me coming in and taking pictures, but she wasn't really encouraging me to come any closer.  She sure cleaned that baby off nicely....coat all fluffed and dry.  I'm so proud of her.

Already exploring the world!  I think she'll do...

So there you go....a Farmer's Wife birth announcement!

STILL smiling....

Classic Movies for Beginners, Part 1

Homer left a very sweet comment on the purse blog about me looking like Holly Golightly (from Breakfast at Tiffany's), which I considered the highest of compliments.  And it sparked a conversation with my friend Shelly about classic movies.  She said she hadn't seen many and I offered to mentor her...a fun proposition for both of us. 

She asked for a list!
Big mistake, Shelly, very big mistake...

Here's my beginner's list:

• Breakfast at Tiffany's
• How to Marry a Millionare
• Pillow Talk
• An Affair to Remember (This should be at the top of the list, really...)
• Casablanca
• Sabrina (the original, NOT the remake)
• Thoroughly Modern Millie (Just for the sheer fun of it!  A lesser known Julie Andrews movie...)
• Young at Heart (Frank Sinatra/Doris Day...*sigh*)
• Houseboat
• The Quiet Man
•  African Queen
• The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
• The Sons of Katie Elder
• Arsenic and Old Lace
• Gone With The Wind (Although, Scarlett in the BOOK is not the same as Scarlett in this movie!)

What would you add to the list?
Have you seen most of these movies?

Lil and Will

You saw a little bit of my bum calves in the post about Sue, but this time they get the spotlight....

If you've been reading the Chronicles for awhile, you know that all my bums are named with flower names.  I can't remember, really, why I set this as a parameter for names except that I was very botanically inclined a few years ago and probably had flower brain.  It's worked great, except the bull calves tend to get sort of odd names because there aren't a lot of masculine sounding flower names.  Last year, Cosmo...this year, Sweet William.

He has SUCH a bully-boy head!  And do you see his pink nose?  What a sad story...
The reason he's a bum is that his mom, during one of the terrible snow storms right after he was born, froze two of her teats off.  Of course, it was very, very painful for her and besides that, rendered her with less ability to sustain Will.  We brought him in after realizing he was just going to starve if he stayed with her.

Now, one of the hardest things...for me, anyway....was that she really did want her baby.  When we went out and loaded him in the Honda, she was so distressed.  She ran from calf to calf, looking for him.  Even typing this, I'm crying, because she didn't understand, you know?  Even though I knew we HAD to, my mama heart hurt for her. 

And it turns out that Sweet William's nose froze in that same storm.  So a couple of days ago, when I was feeding him, the end of it...the skin....came off as he was bumping around looking for more bottle.  It's getting better, but you know how very tender the new skin is and it hurts him, I can tell, when he feeds.  But he's a sweet natured little thing...so grateful for the food....that he heartily empties the bottle and I tell him what a brave baby he is.  (He doesn't care.  He just wants more.  But I feel better.)

So that's Sweet William's story. He's a love.

My father-in-law wants very much to graft him on another cow, but I really think it's a little late.

Perhaps I'm saying that because I adore him.

And then, there's Lily....

Oh, my.

What a little firecracker!

Miss Lily has a less dramatic story, but no less sad, in a way.

She was a twin.  The cow had two heifer calves and liked the other one better.  In fact, didn't like Lily at all.

I can't imagine it!  She's lovely!  All long legs and bright eyes and perky ears...and a "look at ME" attitude!

Lily charmed me, immediately, because she was going to have it her way, right away.  No shilly-shally, no dilly-dally. 

 Also, to the dismay of my father-in-law, we bonded very quickly.  He did try to graft her to another cow, but when she'd hear me talking, walking to the house, there'd be a frantic "Maaaaaaaahhhh!", and that was a bit off-putting for the cow. 

I've been reminded, over and over this spring, that bums are worth $350 right now.  Yes, I know. 

They could be sold and not messed with, twice or three times a day.  Yes. I know that, too.

They're taking up space in the barn and we'll have to move them here to my house which will be a hassle.  Yes, I know that as well. 

Could YOU sell these two?

*As a post script....here are my helpers, in the morning.  Both of them are less than impressed with the whole process and would vote "SALE!" if given the choice.  Fortunately, they have no such privilege...

True Confession #322

I missed the 80's. 

I don't MISS the 80's; I MISSED them.

And I don't know how, because I really should've at least noticed they were happening, being 9-17 years of age at the time.  One would think a little bit of the culture would've penetrated my life, but I'm starting to realize that MY 1980s were not my peers' 1980s.  A fact that has been pointed out and lamented by at least two of my friends, Alice and L.M. of the U. 

Apparently, it was a fun time, with great music and movies, and to an extent, fashion.
(I'm skeptical about the fashion.  Example below...)

 

Conversations with one of them about what I missed generally goes a little bit like this:

L: Do you remember the movie, "Breakfast Club" where Emilio Esteves said...(fill in the blank, here)

M: I didn't see that movie!  What was it about?

L: (Stunned silence, then recovering...) You had to have seen that movie.  EVERYONE saw that movie.  Even my mom.  You just forgot. 

M: No, I KNOW I didn't see that movie. I've heard of it, though....

L: What year did you graduate?

M: 1989...now what's so great about the movie?

L: (Emphatically) You HAVE to watch it.  I'm not going to tell you, but you HAVE to watch it. It's been on TBS for 15 years...you HAD to have seen it!

M: We don't have t.v.  Do you think it would be on NetFlix?

L: I'm sure it is. HOW can you NOT have seen The Breakfast Club?

M: I missed the 80's. 

I missed most of the music.  While other kids my age were listening to Warrant and Whitesnake, I was listening to the soundtrack of the musical Phantom of the Opera and classic Amy Grant.  I was exposed to the music, because of school dances and stereos blasting in the dorm, but I sure didn't listen to it on purpose.

I missed a LOT of the movies.  For one thing, to see a newly released movie, us Jordan kids had to drive 82 miles to Miles City.  Didn't happen a lot for me, because I had jobs in high school and was involved in extra-curricular stuff on the weekends.  I saw Karate Kid, Footloose and The Man From Snowy River...those count, right? 

I completely...COMPLETELY....missed the fashion boat.  Not that I'm sad about that, but I missed it big time.  Fashion trends are about 5-8 years behind, in this area, and I was probably about 2 more years behind.  I never got my bangs big, never ended up wearing leg warmers, never bought the clunky, cool baubles, never really figured out the leggings/tunic with a skinny belt look.  I was pathetically out of step with styles. 

The good news is that everything old is new again!  The styles are back, the music is retro and coolish, the movies are all nostalgic for my peer group, so they're out on DVDs and cheap. So I'm trying to play catch up, a little. 

I'm listening to 80's cheesy music, when I can stand it. It's funny how dramatic the lyrics are!  "I'd LIE for you, I'd DIE for you..."  Oh, please...!  But it's fun, in an overdone sort of way.

I'm watching movies that Alice and L.M. of the U. recommend. Sometimes.  I'm trying!  In between my British PBS Masterpiece series and Marilyn Monroe flicks, I try to get a little Pretty Woman or Lucas.  It's challenging.  And sort of work, to be honest with you.  But I hope to be able to carry on a conversation about some of those movies without causing heart failure for my friends at my lack of "culture".

I draw the line at recreating and wearing 1980's fashion.  I just cannot go there, and I really think none of you should either.  I beg of you not to wear leggings and tunics, implore you to stay away from big, permed hair....and DON'T, for the luvva Mike, put a comb in your back pocket!  Banana clips...yikes!

So, now you know.
Isn't that sad?  A whole decade....ppppffffttt!