It's all about the

Veterans on Memorial Day.  My sincere thanks to those who have served and my gratitude to those who did not come home so that we could enjoy our freedom!

The soldier third from the right with his rifle in front of him is my father-in-law.  They are excavating graves of American soldiers who were killed at the Berga section by the Nazi's when the Bergen Belsen concentraton complex was liberated.  Our family was unaware of this photo until it appeared recently in the newspapers and is from the Martin Family collection donated to the US Holocaust Museum.  My father-in-law said very little about his experiences other than mentioning to never get a tattoo to my husband because of what he saw when liberating this camp.

On another note, I am leaving tomorrow for a trip to California and that is ALL about the Train!  I've always been enamored with trains since I was a little girl and the bums would wave to me as they rode the rails when they went past the cabin we stayed at on the Mississippi river.  It looked like Such fun.  So no update for two weeks and then expect Lots of photos! Taking the Amtrak California Zephyr from Denver, Colorado to Sacramento, California.  Will visit friends and their Morgan horses!!!  California or BUST!

Cowboys Just Wanna Have Fun.....

To truly appreciate a cowboy and his hyper sense of humor, well I think you have to live with one 24/7. I once read a description of a cowboy as a "dangerous child."  Yep, that is true.

It is just non stop, when-ever and where-ever.  I knew I was in for it shortly after we were married and our first Thanksgiving Hubby threw a half-thawed turkey into bed with me at 6 a.m. and yelled, "Get UP and COOK Woman!"  A Lesser Woman would have SHOT him; a fact he fails to utterly appreciate even 37 years later.  I must tell you though, not ONE minute of that 37 years has EVER been boring.........

 

1973, me with my prize catch!  Little did I know what I was in for with his sense of humor!

As you can probably tell from the above photo, cowboys are pretty conservative in their dress.  It consists of Jeans and a Hat and of course always The Boots.  Thirty seven years later, his dress has not changed much.  Pretty basic, just the basics.  ALL of the cowboys I know look at the attire of some of the modern youth today in utter disbelief.  To them (and this includes the younger generation of cowboys, too, my own sons included) why in the world anyone would want to look like a 'Goth' or a 'Punk' is unfathomable.

           

The other day we were at Wally World, and Hubby ran into a "Good Ol' Boy" he has known for years who lives some distance southeast of North of Nowhere.  As they were talking and reminiscing, one of the local city boys walked by with a denim coat, sleeves cut out, biker chains everywhere, enough piercings to attract lightning, and to top it off, a 'Spike' haircut sprayed orange sticking up to give the kid a height of 7' 10".

You KNOW this kid, you've seen him.  Several times.

           

Suddenly, as they are talking, Good Ol' Boy interrupts the conversation, stares intently at the above young man, sniffs, wipes a tear from his eyes and says, "Sorry I got sentimental on yah.  I made love once to a chicken and I THINK that might be my son."  We LOST it! and We are still crackin' up!

 

 A Polish Chicken - wanna see some beautiful crazy birds?  I found him here:

http://www.polishchooks.com/index.html

You Know You've Had Fun

When your mother gets your ready for bed and tells you in the bathtub, "Munchin, you've got lollipop and sunscreen stuck in your Hair!"  (Thanks to #2 Son for sharing this with me! This was after they spent the day putting in the garden.)


North of Nowhere is experiencing a WET and COLD spring, certainly one of the coldest we've had!

We've gone from this on May 12th to this only eight days later..........

The temperature has been very cool, however.  We've never got much above 60 degrees yet which is keeping the grass growth down.  So cool, in fact, we bought more pellets for the pellet stove as we are still using heat!  However, the predictions are for 85 degrees on Thursday.

 

Odie, our Cremello Morgan stallion.

And HOW muddy has it been at North of Nowhere.  Well if you are a White Horse, you are not very clean, at all........

But we have Canadian Geese who successfully hatched their young in all that snow and now are waddling around with their goslings, I saw the Sand Hill Crane pass through briefly two days ago, and my hens are threatening to start setting.  Yep, in spite of it's best efforts, I do believe we will have Summer in Wyoming!

Sometimes Too Much of a Good Thing is

Well, just too much of a good thing!  We just had 6" of snow at North of Nowhere -- yes SNOW on May 12th.

It is so muddy, that today when Hubby went to change the tire on his feed truck, his handyman jack sank clean under the mud!  He had to pull it out with a tractor!  Now that's muddy.....

I stayed home from work today as the roads this a.m. were not so good as you can imagine.  I spent ALL day sewing.  Hmmmmmmm, maybe I'll retire and do that every day :)  But it wouldn't pay me enough to support my fabric habit (all you quilters will understand this!).

Grass will be very good this year, tall and deep when it warms up which it is suppose to starting next week.  The last year it was this wet as 1995 and when I turned out my bum lambs I could not find them for a week in the tall grass!  I threatened to duct tape bicycle flags to their tails!  No lambs anymore but the calves will gain good.

The Things a Mother Learns - Years AFTER!!!!

Happy Mother's Day to all of you Mothers out there!

 Four Generations, my mother, myself, #2 Son and #1 Granddaughter

I have several stories to tell about mothers - first my own mother and my favorite memory of her.   My mom was a great mom, a real 'fifties' stay at home mom, but she was not outdoors-y or a horse woman.  Not at all, not even a little.  And she did not know what to do with me, her only daughter who got her first pony at age seven and literally LIVED with horses after that.  I think she despaired I would ever marry (but look WHO I married and where I live now!).  The spring I was twelve, I broke my first young horse by myself.  Things went along smoothly until one wet spring day as I was climbing up bareback on my pony, a cat ran under her belly and she spooked.  Well I came off into that wet sloppy goop manure-y dirt around the barn and as luck would have, landed in the deepest part of it.  I went under--completely UNDER.  The only thing left white on me when I came up for air was my eyeballs.  Well I knew I couldn't go into the house like that, so I rang the doorbell.  And the look on my mother's face when she saw me, well it was Priceless! I can still see that look all these years later. (She made me strip naked on the porch and we lived in town!!!!)  Happy Mom's Day, Mom!  I haven't been THAT dirty since!

 

A few years later, with first pony, first son, and Hubby.

Now for a warning for all you young mothers out there.  Take a good look at that sweet little innocent face, because you are going to find out things that were not sweet nor innocent as you get older about your children.  It's just going to come up casually in the course of conversation about 'remember when'!! Trust me, it's gonna happen.  Like why did Number 1 Son come home with no eyebrows one summer night right after he graduated (Answer: because in his drunken stupor he had BURNED them off trying to eat a flaming roasted marshmellow).  YIKES!!

 

#2 Son on the tractor about the time of THEE pizza delivery episode.

And then we have #2 Son, the model citizen (not!), who recently revealed they had gotten the pizza delivery guy drunk one night in college when he delivered the pizza.  And of course, subsequently, the poor guy got fired!  Holy Cow!  Somewhere out there is a 30 something homeless dude living under a house constructed of Domino Pizza Boxes.  

I'm sooooooo proud.  And darn glad you both are PAST your teen-age years and Dad & I survived! Whoo Hoo!

MOM

Seriously? This is Global Warming In Action?

Dear Mr. Weatherman:
I really felt I have been patient with you this year as we suffered through winter.  Then Spring arrived and in spite of your dire predictions of Global Warming the past several years along with the impending drought and grasshoppers, I thought we had a serious shot at a nice green spring.

I've been very very patient the last few weeks especially after the 65 mph winds you sent the other day which blew everything on the North of Nowhere Farm that either wasn't nailed down or weighed less than 50 pounds over to the east fence line.   Then this morning, May 6th, we woke up to THIS:


Two inches of the white stuff and it was cold.  Have you not heard that people are calving and lambing?  That some of us were (notice the past tense) planning on putting out tomato plants or actually trying to grow something?

So what's up with this?  Is Global Warming over and we are now living in the Land of the Frozen?  Down to a two week growing season?  You just DID this very same thing on April 30th.  Could that not have been our last snow for the season?  When is the next one? July 4th?  Are we to snowmobile on Memorial Day?  Do you think I can take the Global Warming thing seriously after this?  You are a sadistic old curmudgeon, sir.

Really, this was uncalled for and most unkind.  I'm looking for my rope........

How to Have a Perfect Birthday

 First, you are just turning two years old.

Invite some good friends

Eat your Backyardigan cake with ice cream

Open your presents

Jump with Your Friends

AND PLEASE!! Do NOT Touch the Worm because he is Icky.