Busy Steve

Steve's been might busy here lately. I thought I'd post an update and let him adjust it as he wishes when he gets a chance.

He and his Dad got fencing put up fencing around our would-be vegetable garden. Last spring, Steve had rented an auger to drill holes for the main fence posts, and those posts have been standing as sentinels around the garden for the better part of a year. Now the posts have wire fencing running around them. It looks really sharp. The men bought barbed wire to put around the top. I'm hoping it gets left by the wayside. Otherwise, Steve gets to run Paul to the emergency room the first time he tries to scale the fence.

Our tractor has been broken for a couple of weeks. Steve had the starter rebuilt, but that didn't solve the problem. In the meantime, he used the Jeep to tow the wagon around for putting up the fencing.

Steve borrowed our neighbor's tractor so he could mow the lawn. I came home from work and saw him riding on their tractor. I think I mumbled to the kids, "Wow, that tractor is a lot bigger than I thought. It's much bigger than ours. Steve is really flying along on it, and it sure looks like a smoother ride for him. Rats. Steve's going to start looking for a bigger tractor."

The next evening Steve said, "So, I've been looking at bigger tractors online..."
"Is this a purchase we need to make this year?"
"No."
"Very good. Tell me about what you've been looking at."

Then on Sunday afternoon, he figured out what was wrong with our old Kubota tractor. He came into the kitchen with a semi-crazed look in his eye and said, "It was the ground wire!" Then he tossed the faulty wire on the kitchen table in front of me. He had tested the engine using our recently returned jumper cables, and sure enough it started up when he jumped the grounding cable. The fix was something small and foolishly simple.

I was having trouble reading Steve's mood, so I cautiously asked him, "Are you happy or angry?"
He answered, "Yes."

The secret life of toddlers

Paul's problems solving skills are getting increasingly frightening. Yesterday he saw me step up on a step stool to close some windows upstairs. He thought that was pretty cool, and started climbing up too. He started to whine when I folded up the step stool, but then I told him that I was taking it downstairs, and he could come downstairs too. "Okay!"

I set the step stool up by the counter, and Paul quickly clambered up.
First he found a knife. "No no, Paul. No touch."
Then he started playing with the toaster, "No no, Paul. That's not a toy."
Then he grabbed one of the empty beer bottles that was drying on the counter for Steve's beer making bottle collection, saying "Paul want beard bottle."
"No no, Paul."
Then he reached up into the cupboard and pulled out a glass. "Hi Paul, give that to Mommy. No wait! Give that to mommy GENTLY."
Then he reached up into the cupboard and pulled out a large plastic mug. "Wow, Paul. Did you do that all yourself?"

Then he got down and pushed the step stool over so that it was in front of the sink. Then he learned how to turn on the kitchen sink. He proceeded to entertain himself on the step stool, with the big cup and the water for the better part of an hour. He practiced drinking from the open cup. The water eventually got hot. (Though we have the water heater set so that he can't scald himself.) Then he started calling the hot water his coffee.

I also noticed yesterday, that his Thomas the Tank Engine decals were down from the wall in his bedroom. They had been up out of his reach because he was slowly destroying them. I hadn't gotten the decals down for him. I decided it was unlikely that Steve had gotten them down for him. Then I realized that we had moved the somewhat rickety old children's table under the decals and thrown a sheet over it for a tent.

I can't believe he didn't break the whole thing.
Yikes.

Julia is doing okay. She's had a fever this week and is on antibiotic. I think the teeth in her upper gums are on the move and are leading to sinus and ear troubles.

And Then There Were Eight...

In spite of the cold, damp weather on Saturday, we were able to process 18 of our old hens. Thanks so much to my folks and the Andersons for coming over and helping us in this endeavor. We got started about 9am on Saturday and were nearly done cleaning up by 5pm, so that's actually pretty darn good.
I'm trying something a little different this year. We intentionally left 8 of the hens, and Dad & I are rushing to build a mini-coop next to the main coop to house them. The thought is, I really like my fresh eggs, and I really don't like having to wait until Aug/Sept. to start getting them again. The main reason we've been getting rid of all 0f 'em is to keep the 2 generations from mixing. There can be some disease issues that might cause us to lose some of the young ones if we were to mix 'em. So by making this second coop, we'll be able to move the old ones out of the main coop into the mini-coop, allowing the new ones to have the main coop (after we clean it out, of course). So once again we find ourselves under-the-gun and rushing to something coop-related before the week-old chicks outgrow their current digs in the brooder box. So if you're bored this weekend and wanna come help, we'll be working on the coop and attempting to string most of the fence for the garden. It should be a fun time and the weather looks to be a lot nicer than this past weekend, so come on out.

Julia at 9 months

Julia got her nine month well-baby checkup yesterday. Thanks to the Albrights for watching Paul for me so that he didn't have to come with us to the doctor's office.

Julia weighed in at 19.5 lbs, which is only up about half a pound from three months ago. She is still slightly over the 50% mark. And she had been eating like crazy here lately.

Her height has jumped up to 27.25 inches. And her head circumference is 17.25 inches.

Developmentally she seemed to be right on target, which is always good to hear. I mentioned that she seems to be displaying some separation anxiety, and the doctor said that is normal for this age too. Paul was just so darned independent, that I'm not quite sure what to do with a clingy baby.

Which is not to say that she lacks daring. We have three low and carpeted steps between our office and nursery. She has climbed up them all by herself twice now. She has also sort of rolled sideways down them once while I was watching her brother. whoopsi. She didn't cry over it, but she didn't laugh either. She's getting quicker about crawling across the floor, and more opinionated about what she wants. And we're overdue to switch her to her 12 month clothing. Her babbling sounds more and more like she wants to carry on a conversation. She's up to two teeth, and this week she got her first zweiback toast. She really really liked it.

Paul is doing well too, although he's hard to handle since he's been cooped up inside with the cold weather. He's counting, which is very exciting. The other day he counted correctly up to 13. Then things got a little messy.
"...thirteen, sixteen, nineteen, sixteen, one-teen, sixteen, one-teen, sixteen..."

Happy Easter!

It would seem Paul is finally old enough to color eggs. I have to say that I was skeptical of how well he would do, but Sarah wanted to give it a try. So she cooked up a dozen of our brown eggs, had Paul don his "painting shirt" (aka, one of my old shirts), covered most of the kitchen in newspaper, and made a go of it. Paul actually did very well. He obviously had issue understanding the need to keep the different spoons in their own color cup and not mix them. And on a couple of occasions he was a little less than gentle with the eggs. But all in all he did really well. His biggest hangup was when we ran out of eggs, so I suppose that's a good thing. The other thing we were concerned with was whether he would throw a fit when we wanted to crack & eat the eggs. But when we showed him how to do, we had trouble getting him to stop. He would've tried to crack and de-shell all of 'em at once, if we would've let him. So Paul proved me wrong, thankfully, and we all had a good time.
Thanks to the Focht's for having us over for a wonderful Easter supper after church. Its always good to enjoy such a special holiday like Easter with good friends & family. All of us here on the Kuhlman Farm wish you and yours all the blessings & hope of Easter!

Spring '07 Chicken Processing Party

That's right...its time again to bid adieu to another flock of chickens (or at least most of 'em) here at the Kuhlman Farm. With the new flock arriving Wednesday afternoon, we've gotta make room...as they say, out with the old and in with the new. And what better timing than tax weekend to motivate certain ones of you that might otherwise be able to hide your aggression. We're planning to get started around 9:30am this Saturday (Apr. 14), rain or shine, here at the Kuhlman Farm, and lunch will be provided (not chicken). As always, whoever comes to help will receive a Kuhlman chicken (already processed) as a thank you for the help. So come one, come all, and tell your friends. We're hoping to get about 18-20 of 'em processed before suppertime Saturday so we'll need all the help we can get. Also, please let me know if you'll be here for lunch so we can make sure we've got enough food for everyone. We look forward to seeing a good number of you out here on Saturday for the fun and frivolity.

First Week Done

I've officially completed my first week at my new company, and so far I'm rather pleased. I've managed to get my new computers and get them setup (mostly). I've pretty much memorized my new commute, all 10 minutes of it. I was even able to go home for lunch a couple times and still make it back in less than an hour. Pretty sweet. As I've said before, these are some of the best engineers I've ever worked with, so that helps make the work exciting. And I've even managed to make myself somewhat useful in the very first week of work, which is saying something since I didn't even have a computer till halfway through Tues. So I think I'm like it here....