Chicago

 We had invite-a-guest at church one weekend in November.  We had Tim and Sonia as guests and we enjoyed our time with them.  Christian fellowship is a true blessing.  I hope we never take it for granted, and take advantage of the opportunities that we have.

D#1 and four granddaughters invited us to ride along with them on a trip to Chicago.  We used to take our family up occasionally, and we would go up for Farm Bureau and Grain and Feed conventions.   But it has been quite a few years since we have been up to the big city.  The plan was to drive to Water Tower place, eat lunch, and then shop at the American Girl Doll store followed by the Lego store.  We ate at Wildberries Cafe, and even the young girls realized that paying $181 for lunch was expensive!  After a couple hours there, we headed down Michigan Avenue (the Magnificent Mile) to Millennium Park.  After finding the underground parking, we walked to the "Bean" ( Cloud Gate sculpture).  The granddaughters were pretty impressed with everything as this was their first time in the big city.  

The Chicago skyline reflected in the "Bean".

Then it was on to The Art Institute of Chicago, one of the oldest and largest art museums in the United States, for a little culture.  It was a free day at the Art Institute, so that saved us a lot of money!  The young girls especially wanted to see the Thorn miniature rooms and the Arms and Armor gallery.  I wanted to see some of the more famous paintings, including A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, Nighthawks, American Gothic, Song of the Lark (which we have a print of in our bedroom) and others.  I was able to make it through a majority of the galleries, but have never seen the entire collection yet.

Still Life with Dead Game, Fruits, and Vegetables in a Market

The beautiful Tiffany window.

We headed out of downtown late afternoon.  It was Veterans Day, so the traffic was not as bad as it could have been.  D#1 did a good job driving into and out of the city, and we stopped for fast food on the way home.  A good time was had by all!

Son#1 and the old farmer did some deer hunting on opening weekend.  We both passed on some shots and ended up with nothing for the freezer.  We will try again second season.  

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.             Genesis 11:15

     

Dogs

We finished harvest a week and a half ago.  It went much smoother than some.  I think we went six weeks without any major rain delays, and our breakdowns were minimal.  We had near record corn yields, and the highest whole farm soybean yield ever.  

The one breakdown that I thought would be major was when the lower gearbox on the combine unloading auger went out.  It was late afternoon and I called the service manager at the dealership.  At first he said I should drive it all the way to the dealership to work on it in the shop.  I didn't want to do that, so I talked him into having a mechanic stop by yet that evening to look at it.  He showed up around 6:30 and determined what parts he would need.  At 9:00 the next morning he was in the yard with all the parts, and by noon we were running.  I figured they wouldn't have all the parts, and that we would be down a couple days!  A very pleasant surprise indeed.  The bad news was that the parts alone cost $3500, then with service call and labor the total came to over $5000!  Right after harvest I decided to replace all of the snapping rolls.  That was another $13,000 expense.  

On our 1 hour, 40 minute drive home from our farthest away farm, we were treated to this view, which looked like the sky was on fire.

One day during harvest, the neighbors were contacting each other because two Great Pyrenees dogs had gotten away from the owner and were roaming.  My brother and nephew were back at the farm loading a steer to take to the locker, and the dogs were around the buildings.  They shut them in my barn until John could get them after work.

Most of the grandkids were able to ride with me on the combine this fall.  We've done a lot of babysitting this fall which has been fun.  Including keeping four for a whole weekend.  That brought back memories of raising our own four kids, but we have much less energy now!  I forgot what it was like to get four young kids ready for church on Sunday morning, but we made it on time!

One afternoon last week when I was doing tillage, there were two dogs bedded down in an adjacent field.  I tried to get close to them a couple times, but they would bark at me and move away.  I didn't see any collars on them.  The neighbors again were communicating as several others had seen them roaming the area for a day.  Towards evening neighbor Brent went out to the field and tried to take them some water.  They went on the move and he followed awhile, but lost them in the dark.  The next morning the County Animal Control was out looking for them, but I think they were out of the area.  We probably won't ever know if someone was missing them or if someone dumped them in the country to get rid of them. 

Last Saturday night we attended my 50 year class reunion!  It was held in Doug's Singing Shed, which was not a very far drive.  It was a really nice venue, much nicer than my shed.  Less than a quarter of my class was in attendance. We really enjoyed catching up with each other, and remembering and retelling stories.  It is hard to believe that much time has passed and I was surprised at all the old people there!  Earlier this fall we also attended the old farmer's wife's 50th class reunion in Gridley.  She had a much smaller class and I know several of them, so I enjoyed that too.

And ye shall be holy men unto me: neither shall ye eat any flesh that is torn of beasts in the field; ye shall cast it to the dogs.                                                Exodus 22:31

September

 We spent some time one Saturday setting Son#1's plow.  The alfalfa was pretty tall, but the plow made it through.  We think we have it set pretty close to where we want it and it was doing a pretty good job.

We started harvest mid-September.  The corn is drying down very slowly, so we've only picked a couple of fields.  The beans are mostly dry, but with a lot of green stems yet.  It makes for slow harvest, but we are making good progress on them.  After the first full day of corn harvest, we parked the equipment and I snapped this picture.

I was doing some cleanup around the buildings and spraying some weeds one day when I stepped into an old calf hut.  My dad had built two pull together calf huts shortly after he got married and painted them white.  On the inside back wall of one of them he painted a love note for my mom.  I knew it was there, but forgot about it.  Barely visible, it was a good reminder of their long marriage ( 71&1/2 years) and their enduring love.

D#1 will turn 40 in a couple of months, and Bob turned 40 already.  They decided to throw themselves a birthday party out at Firefly Woods.  They called it an over/under party.  It was a beautiful evening, and since we weren't too busy in the field yet, we were able to spend the evening with them.  People came from miles around to attend.  The pasture and trails were mowed, so I was able to do a little exploring before it got dark.  It was a fun time and all the kids seemed to enjoy it as well as the adults.

Nephew Neil , wife Kim, and family built a new pizza parlor from scratch in Mahomet.  They imported a brick pizza oven from Italy and make their dough fresh.  We were invited to the soft opening on a Saturday night and drove down to try out the pizza.  Great pizza, great atmosphere, and a really nice building with indoor and outdoor spaces!  But it sure looks like a lot of work to this old farmer!  We hope we can get back and try some of their other food.  Congrats and best wishes to them.

And if thou bring an oblation of a meat offering baken in the oven, it shall be unleavened cakes of fine flour mingled with oil, or unleavened wafers anointed with oil.                                                                 Leviticus 2:4

Sylvania

  On the day home from Alaska, I feverishly paid all bills that had backed up, and tried to catch up on everything else.  Then the next day, I left on another vacation.  Son#1, Son-in-law#2, three grandsons, and myself headed North to Sylvania Wilderness for a canoe camping and fishing trip.  I had never been there before, so I was excited for the experience.  Sylvania is a scaled down version of the BWCA, only in the U.P.  We arrived up north in the evening and spent the night in a motel.  In the morning we stopped at the outfitters and picked up paddles and life vests.  The canoes were already at the entry point.  The route to our campsite (Ermine 1) on Mountain Lake had only one portage, so we made good time arriving around noon.  After lunch, we finished setting up camp for our three night stay.  It sprinkled on us off and on most of the time we were there, but we had rain gear so it didn't disrupt us too much.  It was cool, but we still had some nice weather at times.  The fishermen we met on our way in said fishing was poor, so we didn't try too hard.

 

Isaac loaned us his bug tent (along with a lot of other gear), so we spent a lot of time in it when it was drizzling or buggy. I expected a mosquito problem, but they really didn't bother us much.

The boys enjoyed playing around and with the campfire.  They were able to go swimming one warm, sunny afternoon, and they spent a lot of time catching and playing with frogs.

We spent some time exploring in the woods, exploring a nearby island, and hiking across a nearby portage.  We found a patch of wild raspberries that the boys picked.  There was a pair of swans on Mountain Lake, and a loon family that swam by every morning and evening. Over the four days that we were here, I saw more loons than I ever did in the BWCA.  We were able to watch a nice sunset one evening when it was clear.

 

It was sprinkling on us the morning we packed up and broke camp.  It rained on us as we paddled all the way out.  We wore them out, but I think the boys enjoyed the trip.  We stopped back at the outfitters and returned our gear, and bought souvenirs for the boys.  Then we headed home with a van full of wet and dirty gear.  We had a good trip home, and I think the boys would like to go back again next year.  Maybe next time the fishing and weather will cooperate a little better.

And it came to pass, as Aaron spake unto the whole congregation of the children of Israel, that they looked toward the wilderness, and, behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud.             Exodus 16:10

    

Alaska 2

 As often happens, we left on vacation just ahead of the sweet corn being ready.  Our trip lasted three weeks, so even though I planted several varieties over several planting dates, we missed the season.  Our children, family, and friends got to take advantage of our fresh sweet corn.  Our kids and grand-kids all got in on the action of picking, shucking, processing, freezing, and eating while we were gone.  The day we got back home, I scoured the patch and found enough residual ears that were not yet too hard so that I got to eat five ears!  But then there were none.  Fortunately, Tom's patch was later than ours and he graciously allowed me to pick some of his corn.  So, I did get to eat my fill of fresh, local sweet corn for several days.

We met up with my siblings and their spouses, and our tour guide at our hotel in downtown Fairbanks. A couple of us went out to eat at Big Daddy's BBQ restaurant that evening, and did a little walking tour in the downtown plaza area.  In the morning we joined the whole tour group and loaded the tour bus for the first leg of the tour.  We stopped to see the pipeline, and stopped at the Cultural and Visitors Center.

We had a wide range of food during our tour, including at a crepe place in Fairbanks, Thai food from a food truck in Denali, the dining car on the train, a food vendor at a street market in Anchorage, and Lodge food. 

 We did some sightseeing and shopping on our way to Denali National Park, including a stop at the Santa Claus House in North Pole, Alaska.  We spent two nights at a lodge in Denali and took a park tour, did some hiking, souvenir shopping, and had some educational programs.  It was cloudy and rainy, so we didn't get to see the mountain again. We hopped on the Alaskan Railroad and took the scenic trip to Talkeetna in an observation car.  The scenery was beautiful on this portion of the trip.  We saw more than what you can see from the highway.

     

We spent a night in Anchorage, and visited the Ulu factory.  We walked to the river and watched people salmon fishing and did some shopping.  We also stopped at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center.  We didn't see as much wildlife as we would have liked, but over the course of our travels, we did see some.  Some in the wild, and some at the conservation center.

Our first view of wildlife!

On our way to Whittier, we drove through a  2 1/2 mile long tunnel that was one way and also had railroad tracks down the middle of the road. Each half hour they switched directions to drive though it.  We waited about twenty minutes before we could enter.  In Whittier, we boarded our cruise ship, the Holland American "Noordam".  We had never been on a cruise before, so it was all new to us.  We had a very nice stateroom, and enjoyed all the good food they serve.  The employees were mostly foreigners, and very attentive and friendly.  We got to know some of them on a first name basis.  

We stopped in Glacier Bay National Park, Skagway, Juneau, and Ketchikan as we cruised the Inside Passage.  At Glacier Bay, the boat stopped in front of several glaciers and there were Park Ranger led programs on the decks.  At each stop, I tried to do some hiking and exploring around town.  In Skagway, three of us rented e-bikes and did a four hour, twenty mile sightseeing trip to Dyea, the Chilkoot Trail trailhead, the Gold Rush Cemetery, and Reid Falls.  I also checked out the Gold Rush National Park visitors center, and the Chilkoot Trail headquarters.  We did a short hike on the Chilkoot, and I hope to backpack it some day 😉.    In Juneau we took a bus tour around town and then to Mendenhall Glacier where we hiked to Nugget Falls.  At Ketchikan we hiked the Salmon Trail, walked down Creek Street, and saw some Totem poles.

  

While on the ship, we spent a lot of time outside on the decks looking for wildlife.  We saw several whales on several different days, but none very close up.  We saw a grizzly bear and her cub on a distant beach through binoculars, but not close enough for a good picture.  We also saw otters and sea lions.

The ship also had educational programs, travelogues, singing entertainment, and a couple comedians.  Most of the time while traveling the Inside Passage there were snow capped mountains in view.  Sometimes we were looking at fog shrouded mountains, and other times the sun setting behind them.  There was always something beautiful to look at. 

 

We docked in Vancouver harbor on a Sunday morning and disembarked.  We were bussed through downtown and out to the airport.  We went through customs, and then had lunch in the airport and visited until our flight back to Chicago boarded.  We had a good flight to Chicago, took the tram and found our car in the long term parking lot, and drove safely home. God blessed us with a safe, enjoyable, and special trip.  I'm ready to go back.  

"Once you've been to Alaska, you never come all the way back." 

For the goodman is not at home, he is gone a long journey:                       Psalm 7:19