Instead of celebrating the Fourth of July on the actual day, a Monday, we scheduled our festivities for the day before, Sunday, July 3. We originally had planned on going down to the dam and swimming, but when Sunday arrived, we decided against that idea. The sky was overcast and a chilly wind was blowing, making the day way too cold for swimming. We decided to have a fire in the backyard. The only problem was that the past couple of days had been rainy, so there was hardly any dry fuel. Undaunted, Dad and the boys made the best of the situation. They each gathered sticks, hay and anything else they thought would burn. Then, they carefully set up their individual fire starters around a tree stump. Using his book The American Boy’s Handy Book, by Daniel Carter Beard, Caleb tried a new way to start a fire by making a log-cabin style fire starter with his sticks. Aiden heaped his sticks together into one hastily made pile, and Dad used his usual tepee style. Then they competed to see if any of them could light their fire with one match. None of them managed to start their fires with one match, but in the end, Dad had used the fewest matches. Aiden had much better success with his fire after Dad helped him set it up the proper way, but Caleb eventually was forced to give up on his intended fire. As we sat around the fire in our jackets, we were glad we had not gone swimming. We would not have lasted over a few minutes. After the fire had successfully been started, we roasted hotdogs for supper and spent the rest of the evening lighting off fireworks.

A couple of weeks ago, our Lamancha goat had two kids. Back in the spring, Mom and Dad bought her from a place in Exeter with Kailey’s big buck. Since she had been kept with the buck at her former home, we suspected that she might have kids. Mom and Kailey had moved Lala into the barn several days before, so she was staying with the little calf in his pen. The kids came unexpectedly, but entirely healthy and without any problems. Once they had arrived, Dad checked Lala out and found that she had very little milk. Since Mom and Kailey were already feeding the calf, they simply added on the two little bucks. Combined with their own mother’s milk, they are flourishing and becoming very rambunctious.

Because of the wonderful weather for the past few weeks, work on the house was postponed during that time. The warm weather meant that fences needed to be put up, animals needed to be moved, hay needed to be cut and baled, the garden needed to be weeded, and numerous other projects were waiting to be finished. However, with all of the busyness around us, progress has finally been made this past week. Our dining room and kitchen windows were installed. Because we are putting an addition onto the back of the house, there will be no windows in the living room. Most of the light will be coming from the dining room window on the south side of the house. Consequently, the dining room window is almost as long as the wall.

One project that has long needed to be done was tagging the lambs. Since some of them are almost as big as their mothers by now, Dad decided to wean the rams. Dad and the boys worked together to bring all the sheep up to the catch pen and separate them off. Then, they worked quickly and tagged each of the lambs. It would have been an easier job to do when the lambs were younger, but it took longer than planned to get around to it. Since the lambs and their mothers were already separated, Mom used the opportunity to milk a couple of sheep. Between two sheep, she had enough milk to make a batch of sheep milk soap. Another job that we completed was cutting and baling hay. Last year Dad planted the hayfield where a cornfield originally sat. Now that this is in its second year and we have been blessed with rain, the grass is thick and luscious. During this cutting, we have learned how many times hay machinery can break down and how much patience it requires. Kailey immensely enjoyed driving the van for the first time, and by the time all the hay was in, she had driven quite a bit. Everyone went along to help in one way or another. Once Dad had coaxed enough hay for a trailer load out of the stubborn machinery, everything was put up quickly. Our second cutting of hay went up much faster and the machinery did not break down half so many times as the first round. By then everyone had figured out how to do their job even faster, so the hay was put up much quicker than before.

Although these past few summer months have been extremely busy, they have also been productive months. As we are entering fall, we look forward to soon being in the house. We are eager to continue canning our garden produce, and we look forward to the cooler weather that fall brings.