Have you ever been in a store, and the Dr Peppers were on sale? well that means there are NONE left, or worse, there are a few left adn they are in the VERY back. you cant reach them. not even if you stand on the bottom shelf. Sure, you could walk to the other side of the store and get a broom or mop to pull them down, BUT what if someone managed to snag the last two while you were gone? There is NOTHING on this isle to reach up in there with....
Thats when a kid comes in handy. You pick them up and shove them up in there.
And have THEM push the bottles down to you....
I almost blogged on Friday, but was too lazy to upload pictures. then again on Saturday, but that was a BUSY day. and yesterday was an amazing day - I just didnt have time :)
Lets see, BR took off Thursday and we drove a few hours to pick up the kids 4-H project, Bunnies.. or Rabbits as they are properly called. I think I got gyped, but everyone seems to think it will be okay. I was under the impression that californians had black ears, tails, feet and noses, these are grey. I still want a true black buck to breed to the 2 does I got. I also need another doe. But one of the does I have is due anyday now. So we will see what she has.
We are doing meat pens. Thats where you breed on Dec 17, get the babies, and pick out 3 that are as identicale as you can get. you show those 3. they need to be uniform in color, body size, weight, and meat production. Since I have to have 2 pens, I need to hedge my bets with 3 does. Incase one or more doesnt produce, or we have crappy litters.
Anyway, we also went and got Rayley some new boots. hers were too little. Her prefered choices were pink, then purple, then blue, yellow, green, and if I could find pink camoflauge that would trump them all.
this is what I found.
Bow got a new cowboy hat, which I dont have a picture of him in yet. but he also got to ride the mechanical bull at the store!
When we got home we had to finish up the rabbit pens, which meant ME getting inside a 2 ft box and stapiling wire up in there. Not as easy as it sounds. But I reckon if it will hold me, it will hold them. Plus, we had to move around some stuff at the hog pen, and go get some hay from the horse barn. When we were leaving to get that, Bowdrie had walked around to the other side of the truck, while I got some stuff off the back. I heard the door slam and him holler, not a blood curdiling scream, but a mad holler. I walked around to see what was wrong, fiquring he had shut the door on accident and couldnt open it. well, he had. ON his hand. his entire hand was in the door. By the time I got around there BR and all the kids were there. Bow was trying to pull his hand out. he wasnt hurting. YET. it didnt take but a second after we opened the door for him to start screamin. Once we got him calmed down and fiqured out nothing was broken he was good to go. He toted his ice pack around like a baby, laying his hand in it. But it wasnt long before he forgot about that too, so he could help give the rabbits hay and feed and water the hogs.
On Friday Rayley wore this:
They wear their school shirts on Fridays and so every week she tries to wear a differnt outfit but the same shirt. She is running out of ways to wear it..
On Saturday our church had a youth rodeo. So I took the kids to it. Rayley finally got to wear her new boots, she was VERY proud of them. She thought her daddy and I did a perfect job of picking them out.
The boys played football all evening- waiting on the rodeo to start, I had went early to help volunteer. They were soaking wet before it even started, and it was a chilly night. We finally got our winter weather- at least for a week. But they never slowed down.
So far all 3 of the oldest have managed to get wet as can be at the church. Rayley fell in to the creek/drain a few weeks ago. I reckon she wanted to baptize herself.
RFDTV was there, to record the service on Sunday and the youth rodeo on Saturday. They will be airing sometime in December, so if you get the channel, look for Jasper County Cowboy Church.
Its funny, noone was extra dressed up, and honestly noone paid the least bit of attention to the cameras. that tells you alot about the mindset of the people that are members there. They are just downhome people and dont get starstuck easily.
Sunday was a wonderful service. of course before we left my kids got into the cake that my Sister in Law had sent over here the night before. I really had forgotten all about it, and it was a half of a halloween cake. meaning BLACK icing. So they were dyed black. Bow got it ALL over him. and the boys and Rayleys lips were black. It took lots of scrubbing to get them half way normal. I told them to avoid the cameras at ALL costs!
It was amazing and uplifting. And we had a baptism service, where 16 or 17 people were baptized, including Brett and I. It was around 50* but the water was warm, which was nice. We were soaking wet, and went strait home for warm showers, since it was a spur of the moment thing and we were not prepared by bringing extra clothes.
This is what Bow does during church. He loves to go, and will help me carry the chairs to the arena, then helps me set them up, while all the other kids run off to play before services. He wants me to get settled in so he can get started playin!
these are from a few weeks ago. but same thing.. LOL
This is the stage that the church band plays on, Pastor Brady is on the far left.
and an RFDTV camera.
If you are looking for a church, and have just never felt comfertable in one, or always felt you were being judged, try finding a cowboy church. You dont have to be a cowboy, or even halfway rural to go, its just laid back and enjoyable. If the one you find is half as good as mine, you will wonder what took you so long to join. I have been to lots of churches in my life, and just never felt I was getting Gods word, or felt I was being judged constantly. The total opposite was true when I stepped foot in that arena. And lots of them are actually held in buildings, not everyone does theres in the middle of a Rodeo Arena. Or if you are not sure you want to go to one strait off, try finding them on RFDTV, they feature a differnt church each week.
After church was over, we came home, did a few chores, and the kids asked if they could play chess. I told them I didnt care, BUT, there were 2 rules. one, they had to include Rayley, and help her learn how. and two, they couldnt scream and holler at Bow, they just had to deal with him.
They played a few games, the winner would play the kid left out. and about the 3rd time Brett and Matt played, Brett hollered "you cant do that!" Matt said "yeah- I can." I fiqured I was fixing to have to stop an argument, so I hollered out my new 'shutup'. "yall read Psalms 39"
"Mom" Brett says "I'm not being rude or mean, I meant to say 'please dont do that' "
Matt asked him "why"
"cause if you do that, the game is over!- "(meaning Matt had whooped him) "lets change the rules a little"
Matt declined, and I also forbid it. He was ticked cause Matt had beat him 3 times in a row in less than 5 minutes.
They did help Rayley. she doesnt quite get it yet, but will soon enough, the boys were about her age when they learned. Of course, I am sure that my kids are the only ones that make Chess into a contact sport. And now with Bow around, he ends up hitting, biting, screaming, stealing peices, and terrorizing them. He doesnt understand that he cant play.
We still dont have any baby bunnies, I wonder if the breeder didnt get the week wrong.
I reckon I am gonna stop typin now. My wrist is hurting- I have some kind of a cyst on it, and it hurts to type much. Its nothing serious I'm sure, I fiqure its a ganglion or what ever type cyst, I just havent had the nerve to put a huge book on it and hit it with a hammer to desolve it. Plus, I need to get a few things done, I was asked on Friday to take over volunteer coordinator for Rayleys schools PTA. I said yes, since the two postitions I have on Bretts and Matts boards are not very time consuming.
But here are a few more pics from the Women in the Outdoors event.
This is the skulls of two gators, one died of natural causes and was about 12 foot long, the other died from lead poisoning (he was shot) and was a little smaller.
Notice the black/brown spots? those are 'war wounds' bruising from fights, that is in the bone, they are loose places, kinda weird.
and of course the teeth upclose. the teeth are really weird to feel. like hollow peices of plastic.
and of me holdin the gator again. :)
I had a picture of one about 15 feet off shore, but you couldnt see him. just his head was sticking out. he was about 10 feet from where the airboat was parked.
Here is Bow waterin the hogs a few months ago. He LOVES to go down and mess around with the animals.
