40 Years

 Yesterday I wore a brown pin striped suit, matching vest, light brown tie with small pink flowers on it, and brown Florsheim wingtip shoes to church.  The first time I wore this outfit was 40 years ago today to a wedding in Gridley.  The then "young" farmers' wedding!  The wife of my youth has put up with me for a long time, and we are still in love and enjoying each others company.  I have been blessed with a helpmate and companion that overlooks my many faults, sometimes even laughs at my jokes (mostly groans), and puts up with my strange ways.  As Brother Edwin said, "for better or for worse"!  We've had the blessing of raising a wonderful family together and now enjoying our grandchildren.  I'm hoping we have another 30 or so years left to go.

The first Friday in June, Daughter #2 and S-I-L closed on their house in Eureka.  That weekend and the following week I spent most of my time cleaning out, trimming trees and bushes, removing overgrown trees, removing brush and weeds, hauling trash, spraying foundation for insects, painting, and helping with plumbing and wiring.  By the next Friday the house was greatly transformed and we left for Grabill to help load the U Haul for the move back.  Matt and I, with Nathan's help loaded the house into the truck Friday night, and by mid-morning Saturday we were on the road back to Illinois.  We had a lot of help unloading Saturday evening, and they were settled enough to be able to spend the night in the house and get ready for church in the morning.  We stopped at Shelton's in Covington to buy some fireworks on the way to Indiana per Logan's request.  We were early enough before the 4th that the warehouse was full of more fireworks than I have seen in my life!

Real Estate Agent Ron and myself had been looking for houses for them since around Christmas.  There are very few houses on the market right now in our area.  If a house in their price range big enough for their family came on the market, it was sold within days.  Ron and Daughter #2 were constantly monitoring the internet and informing us of any possibilities.  Ron and I would then look at them.  Nothing came available that we thought would be good for them.  Finally in late April, Ron noticed that his neighbor, a widow, had a dumpster in her driveway and was cleaning out.  She told him she was indeed putting her house on the market in May so she could downsize.  She gave us permission to tour the house early, and we both saw that this house would work for their family and was in their price range.  It needed a lot of cleanup and updating, but we saw good potential.  D#2 and S-I-L made an offer, sight unseen, and she accepted it.  It never even made it on the market.  I was a little nervous that they wouldn't like the house, but when they finally saw it, I think they were favorable.  And with all the work that everyone has put into it, I think the value has already dramatically increased!

On the Saturday of Father's Day weekend, we drove to Monticello for Cailer and Mady's wedding at Allerton Park.  It was a beautiful day for an outdoor wedding, and the service was nice.  We had a little trouble finding the place in the park were the wedding was, but we had allowed plenty of time.  The reception was also outdoors at a farm estate north of Mahomet.  Mady's parents own a Chick-fil-A, so the reception was catered by Chick-fil-A.  That is also were the couple met while both were working there.  Congrats to the young couple!

Father's Day, after church, we were at home with most of our kids and grandkids.  And with a pile of food, including baby back ribs, barbecued brisket, and fresh cherry pie!  It was all good.  We inherited a trampoline through the move, and the grandkids were enjoying it.

We've only had 1.5 tenths of an inch of rain since Mother's Day, so we are very dry and the crops are stressed.  I think they say this is shaping up to be the driest June on record in central Illinois.  Because of the drought, the humidity has been low and we haven't had too many extremely hot days so its been rather comfortable to work.  I have watered the garden some and tried to haul water to the sweet corn patch.  I have also watered some of the smaller fruit trees.

And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.                             Isaiah 58:11

                                        

May

 We drove out to Burlington and back on the first Saturday to see our new grandson.  He is a cute and good baby, and we had a nice drive.We got back in the evening in time to attend a testimony, followed by a baptism on Sunday. It was a blessing to be there, and we need more of these!  In the evening we had family birthday parties for two granddaughters.

Saturday evening of Mother's Day weekend, we went to bed with the windows open.  A storm rolled through in the night, so I woke up and shut the windows.  After the storm passed it was stuffy in the bedroom, so I opened the windows again.  Awhile later I was again waken by a second wave of storm moving through.  Again I got up and shut the windows.  I woke up to a stuffy room again after the second storm passed, so I got up again and opened the windows.  It was a fitful night.  It turns out that that is the last measurable rain that we have had.  The storms had some wind that did a little damage, that included blowing down one of my shed doors.

The next Saturday evening was Cliff''s graduation party.  The weather was beautiful, so the party was mostly in the garage and outside.  Because it was so nice out, everyone, including out of town family stayed around a long time visiting.  It was a nice time.  Congrats to Cliff. 

When my Grandpa bought our farm in 1927, the house and buildings were back a long lane.  He wanted to move the farmstead down to the road.  One of the first things he did was hand dig a well where the new building site would be.  During the record heat and drought of the 30's, that hand dug well never ran dry.  The oldest farmer often told us the story how neighbors would come and ask Grandpa if they could get water from his well (theirs dried up) during those years.  He never turned anyone away.  The last couple of years, I noticed that the poured concrete cap was cracking and settling.  This spring it had obviously settled more and a chunk broke and fell into the well. It had become dangerous. So Nephew Troy brought the LT backhoe down and we removed the cap.  The top two feet of bricks had caved into the well, probably due to freezing and thawing over the years.  I put a sump pump down into the well and pumped as much water out as I could, then filled the hole with yellow clay.  The well didn't quite last 100 years, and I'm glad the oldest farmer wasn't around to see us fill it in.

On Memorial Day, we gathered at Firefly Woods to do some hiking and creek wading.  They are having some of the biggest and oldest trees logged off for cash, so we hiked some of the logging trails to see their work.  Then with Prairie Creek low because of no rain, we let the kids spend time in the water.  I was surprised to see the number and size of fish in the creek.  After wading, we had a picnic snack before departing.

For all the wells which his father's servants had digged in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines had stopped them, and filled them with earth.                   Genesis 26:15