A Look Back at 2009

Hi, it’s me, Clyde, the goat. I’ve been a little skittish around the humans, so they thought they’d try and include me in the Christmas letter this year. I figured since I’m probably a descendant of a goat who was at the first Christmas that I’d give it a try. I’m new to the family this year. They got me this summer to replace their first pygmy goat who was a birthday present. I guess he died. Don’t ask. Anyway, since I’m new I’ll just tell you what I know.

Pat is around quite a bit, but he’s always busy. He spends a lot of time in the shop and a lot of time in the skid loader. When he’s not working on something he’s out and about at meetings for the fire department and the local grain elevator. I don’t think he sleeps much.

Becky is usually gone, it seems. She’s always carting the kids somewhere or she’s off to class. She’s also been putting in time at the local high school helping in the math classroom and recently she started substitute teaching. On weekends she’s usually busy with church stuff. She’s on the board of Ed., so she’s been busy with Sunday school and she’s also taken on the high school youth group. She and Pat are heading to New Orleans for the youth gathering next July.

Cole, 3 ½, started preschool this year. He’s gone two mornings a week. He seems to like it, but only ever talks about playing and having snack. One day I heard him proclaim “I had snack and I was a pig!” Later I saw him running around with pig ears. I just assumed he was a pig because he had too much snack! He really likes me, but I usually run off because he just likes to chase me. I often hear him bleating like I do, though!

Tate, 17 mos, is busy as ever. He’s always on the go, now that he knows how to walk and climb. He had to have some physical therapy to get moving, but the therapist said he was a great little worker. Every time she’d show him something he’d start doing it the very next day. Now he’s starting to say some words and he loves to pick on Cole. Those two have very different personalities.

The family has also been through a lot of pet changes this year. Before I came along, they got a new dog. Juno, a red husky mix, joined the family in January after Calvin got hit by the milk truck. Roy the cat is still around and of course, so are the cows. When I first came, I lived with the chickens and geese, but the chickens disappeared shortly after I arrived, and the geese disappeared just a couple of weeks ago. Now I live with the steers and thoroughly enjoy eating heifer feed.

The other big news is my family is famous! This picture was submitted to awkwardfamilyphotos.com and they are putting it in their book (due out in spring). Not only that, but when the authors were interviewed on Rachael Ray, this picture was on the show! Don’t worry, Tate still has his fingers, but beware of camels!

Have a very merry Christmas! Clyde and the family, Pat, Becky, Cole, and Tate

Going Crazy

I may need to be committed if I don't get out of this house soon. The kids are busy with their billions of new toys, but if I have to listen to one more thing beep or hear "NOOOOO, that's mine!" again, I'm going to lose it. I need to get out of this house. I made it to town yesterday to get some milk (ironic since we have a tank full sitting just across the yard, but anywho). The plan was to leave for my parents' house tonight after Cole's Christmas program. Only now we aren't even going to make it to the program. I'm disappointed. Cole won't notice the difference. We didn't get more snow today, just freezing rain and now wind. We sent our hired man home early since he said the road was blowing shut. I'm done with winter. Unfortunately, with all this snow we have we won't see grass again until July. Ugh.

Merry Christmas

From my family to yours, I hope you have a blessed Christmas!

Merry Christmas Eve

I lied. It's snowing. A LOT and it's still coming down. Granted so far it's only been about 6 inches, but that's plenty. Normally we do Christmas Eve with my in-laws after church. This year, there will be no church and we were going to do gifts at lunch time instead so my sister-in-law could make it here and home again before the wind picked up. Instead Pat and his dad are hauling snow before we get another foot and it makes things a whole lot harder to clean up. So Christmas this year certainly won't be what I had planned.

On a positive note, it really is pretty and the boys, Cole in particular, have had a blast playing in it. Cole likes to go shoveling. It's not good snowman snow but we should have a really nice pile for sledding when it's all over with!

Cole going shoveling, as he says.

Tate enjoying the snowflakes.

He's standing, not sitting.

Tate showing me how he feels about having to put on all his snow gear.

Moving snow.

Cole going down the slide.

Have a merry Christmas! Sing some carols for me because I doubt there will be church around here tomorrow either. At least the world will look clean and new for Jesus' birthday!

Murhpy's Law

It's not going to snow. Why, you ask? They postponed our Christmas Eve children's program at church. All my calves are bedded in and the sick calf started drinking again today. I took the garbage out and the pail of kitchen scraps. I ran to town and got an extra gallon of milk. So it's not going to snow, at least not until we want to leave Friday afternoon.

On a more random side note, we had chili for dinner. I think it's going to become the latest in natural hair styling aids.

See?

Denialism

I've been reading this book, Denialism, by Michael Specter. I saw him on the Daily Show and thought it looked interesting. First off, the guy is a science and technology writer, so it's not an easy read. It is interesting though. I've read 3 chapters so far (a chapter is like 40-50 pages). We all know I'm not big on organics and I vaccinate my children. The book is basically about how fear of the unknown and irrational thinking is hindering critical progress.

I've finished the chapter on immunizations. I guess if I had an autistic child, it would be nice to have something tangible to blame, but in truth time and money would be better spent in promising research to find a treatment or cure than spent in lawsuits trying to find something to blame.

I've also finished the chapter on organics and natural foods. Since we all know how I feel about organics, I'll leave you with just two thought. It's impossible to guess how many doses of genetically engineered food Americans have eaten, but it is possible to know how many of those got sick from it: zero. Thousands of people die from taking aspirin and hundreds have drowned in their bathtubs, yet aspirin sales aren't suffering and people still bathe. People also have no problem with genetically engineered medical treatments, but when it comes to food that's a no no.

Since it isn't an easy read, I was going to skip the chapter called Era of Echinacea, but I think it has been the most interesting thus far. It's basically that there has been no evidence that vitamins, supplements, etc. do any good and are actually more likely to do harm. In a country where over-eating is killing us, it's not that we aren't getting nutrients in our diet. So basically there is no miracle cure-all and we're back to diet and exercise. Darn huh? It also mentioned the millions of dollars of research money that has been wasted to test these dead ends, knowing full well from the start that the research was likely to show nothing.

The chapter I've started now is on race, which is a topic nobody wants to touch. I haven't gotten very far yet, but I'll leave you with this thought. I read this somewhere, but can't remember where. Shouldn't we teach our children to embrace and understand our differences rather than try to convince them that we are all the same?

O Christmas Tree! Part Deux

This is the ornament that started it all. This was one of my favorites growing up. I mean, look at how cute I am!

The first Christmas, each of the boys has a Hallmark ornament with their picture.
Cole 2006

Cole 2007

Tate's first Christmas 2008

Cole colored his own last year, 2008.

Tate 2009

Cole 2009. A funny story, he wanted me to do the dots, but he had this huge glob of paint at the bottom. When we hung them, Cole hung his on the bottom and of course Tate went for it as soon as his back was turned and smeared the giant glob. Cole was just fuming!

O Christmas Tree!

I'm stealing this post idea from my cousin, Wendy. I've always loved Christmas traditions. I made my parents trudge through the Christmas tree farm every year because I refused to have a fake tree. My parents went fake, but I still make Pat get a real tree. We cheated a couple of years and bought one from the grocery store, but 3 of the 5 years we've gone out and cut one. I'm not so picky about the variety of tree. Growing up it was a Scotch pine, not a white one like my dad claimed. We alternate between firs and spruce. This year we went with a spruce thinking it would hinder Tate. It hasn't. Anywho, decorating this year was a lot of fun. Cole asked a lot of questions and it was fun to tell him the history behind the ornaments. We've never had a fancy coordinated tree. Growing up it was always full of handmade ornaments from school and teacher gifts. Now, I know where nearly every ornament on our tree came from. Here are just a few faves.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think my Grandpa N made these.

I got this one in Switzerland back in high school. It's hand painted.

We couldn't have a tree without tractors on it. This year Cole hung most of them on the bottom and Tate has had a blast taking them off.

According to my dad, when he and my mom got married, they were dirt poor. So for their first Christmas they cut a flower from a Kleenex box and hung it on their tree. Cheesy tradition, but K and I both have one on our trees.

This was the house I grew up in.

From our honeymoon in Mexico.

Tate's preemie nukkers. Cole had an identical one, but he outgrew it before we brought him home. I love remembering how small they were and how far they've come.

Stay tuned for part 2: the boys picture ornaments!

A Boy of the Cloth

I started cloth diapering back in July. It's an idea I'd toyed with for a while, but got terribly overwhelmed every time I looked at them online. I finally saw someone who used them and decided to give it a try. I found a friend willing to sell me hers. If I had had to buy them new, I would have never done it. It's a huge investment up front. I lucked out and got 25 diapers and inserts for $100! I honestly felt guilty paying that little. I had to buy new covers. I didn't like the slip on covers so I bought the Cool-A-Baby covers off of ebay. They worked fine until Tate started moving. Then the velcro adjustments started chaffing his legs. I finally broke down and bought the spendy covers, 6 of them. But those came in cute designs, like this cow print!

Let me say this, I am not an environmentalist. I don't do organic or natural crap. I do cloth diapers simply for the cost savings. The fact that I don't throw disposable in the landfill is just a bonus. I don't especially enjoy hosing poop out of a diaper, but who does? I won't look down on you for using disposables, because frankly, there are days I wish I did and sometimes do. So, I'm not a huge advocate for cloth diapers, but I really don't mind it. I really like not having to buy diapers all the time and in a strange way, I actually enjoy diaper laundry. Not so much the dirty smell, but I love how they come out clean and fresh. Somedays I wish I could crawl in the washer with a little biz and come out as bright as they do, but that's another post :)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Yes, I realize it is mid December. We had such a great Thanksgiving, it deserves its own post, not a bulleted update. We traveled 7 hours (5 according to map quest, the one time they are under on time) to my sister's. We had a good time. My whole family was there. We had a delicious meal that I didn't have to cook! We did a little shopping, online and in store. We even had time for bowling before we ventured home. We took our sweet time (10 hours) getting home. We stopped and did some shopping and ate non-fast food. It was a great getaway, and even Pat didn't complain too much.

Coley's first time bowling.

Coley and Tova Wii jousting. Tate is trying to play too.

Ok, I got the hint

Alright already! Here's a post. I've got plenty of them done in my brain, so hopefully I'll get some typed up soon. That should happen this weekend since I'll be procrastinating working on my finals.

If I was a/an _____, I’d be ______
TV show: Community
Song: Redneck Girl
Movie: Rudy
Book: Harry Potter
TV character: Annie from Community
City: some small town in the midwest
Verb: run
Color: Royal Blue
Animal: Puppy
Emotion: overwhelmed
Article of clothing: bra
Flavor: vanilla
Food: mashed potatoes
Vice: the internet
Plant: tulips
Mythological animal: Phoenix
Letter: B
Inanimate object: school
Scent: clean baby
Season: spring
Fruit: honeycrisp apples