When all is said and done... You look back!

Yes, I'm having flashbacks of last week's party-putting-together... Here are some pics from the trip we made to pick up the pumpkins for the pumpkin toss. ^_^
Count them: 21. That's right! A local farm DONATED twenty-one #2 pumpkins to our party for the pumpkin toss. =D Yet another reason to go to the small farm stores in your area. You can usually work some sort of a deal (the original deal that I worked was $2 a pumpkin, but when I went to pick them up, they said that they were going to give them to us!). And small farms are run by humans. Not some freakishly controlling, money monger, greedy CEO. So, lesson of this paragraph - support your local farmers. =)

The back seat of the car. More pumpkins! And cider too! =D (and gym bag and booster seat...)

Hoe Down!

Hoe Down/Harvest Party!

Setting up!

Must move towards the light!

My little brother. =)

O_o

*reverent silence

Bonfire!

We even had live music! =D

Dancing!

Ooh! Pretty lights!

This isn't what it looks like... ;)

More dancing!

In the barn

Some of our musicians

The Virginia Reel

Laura, our dance caller and music supplier, was running late, but, thank goodness, some people had brought their instruments, so we impromtued the first couple dances. =)

We even had a full moon!

There was so much food!

Playing in the loft!

At the end of the party... =(

Fire!!!

Wow! What an evening! This whole party was the brainchild of a drive home from ECD one evening at the beginning of the summer. We were thinking that a harvest party would be fun, and we just ran with it! =D My parents were excited to host the party at our house, so we even had a great farm location (complete with farm atmosphere)!

Unfortunately, the week leading up to the event, the forecast started out as showers on Saturday, Oct. 3 (the day of the party) then changed to thunder showers. We were all praying really hard that we could not have any rain on the event... Saturday morning was cloudy and overcast but in the afternoon, it cleared up, we had sunshine and blue skies! That night we even had a full moon to complete the whole experience! =D

Another unfortunately... I was getting migranes almost every other day leading up to the Harvest Party... To give you some backround, I had fallen off a horse the week before and made my neck, head and back go out of alignment which leads to migranes. >_<>

So, all things summed up, I want to do this again next year! =D

PS- Most pictures made possible by Daniel S. and Nathan B. Thank you!

Arg! This be a pirate ball! P-)

Finally! I'm getting the "prime selection" of pictures from the Pirate Ball from Sept! Wow... can't you tell that I've been super busy lately... Can't you tell that they're siblings?

this is what you were greeted with when you enterd the party ship! Arg... I can't talk pirate...

Me and a very good friend! <3

Someone got a little too creative with the knife on that poor melon! =D

Pirate lasses! P-)

Please meet Chris the parakeet! He was very popular that evening

Fort Stevens Civil War Reenactment

Finally! Pictures from the Civil War Reenactment! =D
Civil War, please meet 21st century technology. What's wrong here? ;)

Adorable kid was sitting in front of me! Took the most of the opportunity! I think he wants to be with the big boys on the battle field...

Barking orders to the Confederates

shooting at the confederates

*respectful silence please*

O_o I like!

Playing Taps

Part of the Union army

Aww!

The Confederate Army coming into camp to disband

Here's the Union!

Part of one of the camps. The whole thing was huge!

Disbanding the Union. Their disbanding was much more orderly than the Confederates...

Ha! I got you! and you didn't see me!

Dancing Demo! the virginia reel. Why the funny face, David?

As promised!

Just as I promised! Pictures of the newest member of our farm!!! You just want to kiss her! She's so cute! <3

The difference between the April baby and the new baby. Wow, they grow fast!

Mama and baby looking into the sunset! I still want to kiss her!

I believe that it's a mystery!

Yes, I admit it, we're crazy. This spring we (my family) got over 100. Yes, read it again, almost 150 chickens for meat. Imagine me coming home from work (the horse ranch and day camps) and all that cute little peeping sounds coming from a warm corner in the garage. I was just a little overwhelmed... ;) Well, that was early summer, and now they (the chicks) are no longer chicks. =( and resemble small chickens. I believe that they are at least single serving size by now. Anywho... Over the last couple of days we have lost about 9 or more chickens to some mysterious something! The doomed select (That's what I'll call it for now until we figure more out) are very lethargic, sleepy, no appetite, but they drink normally, they keep their feather fluffed as if they are cold, and don't run around like the healthy ones. Yesterday morning we lost 4 in the morning and 3 more later that day. On the previous days we had lost about 2-3... The only thing that we could come up was Avian TB and your chickens are either immune to it, or not... and there's practically nothing to be done about it. Apparently, it can take months even years before your poor little chicken succombs to the disease after you start to see symtoms, and either your chicken is immune to it or it isn't. Judging from the death count - we've only lost the Rhode Island roosters that we got. (We got 2 different kinds of chickens for meat the RIR and Red Broilers). The disease is also to infect your flock if they are stressed in any sort of way. We have just come out of a 100 degree spell, which stressed them quite a bit!

Anyway, that is my post for the day. I might go out and help my brother fill in the bunker that he relinquished for the cause of burying the dead birds. (Or I might not...)

Time Does Fly...

It feels like yesturday I was looking at the calender thinking how long and wonderful summer was going to be. Let's just say I blinked before I could catch myself. I thought that I would have all the time in the world to get some reading done, sewing projects completed, craft room organized again (honestly, you can never organize things enough!), complete all the requirements on my NARHA certification... yeah, the workshop/training session is only a couple weeks away, and I don't even really know where to begin... I've read the horsemanship manual through level 3, but Level 4 is huge... I need to become a member, get 25 hours of teaching in (I probably won't even be able to get 5...), and so much more! What happened to my summer?! Oh, yeah... I've been camp counselor, gardening, traveling, quilting, etc... The camp counselor thing has taken up 4 weeks so far and I have another to go... But I wouldn't trade the time spent for anything else.

I've thoroughly enjoyed every moment of the camp counselor thing (and I have my share of stories, believe me! =D) Like in the camp from last week, one of the boys was commenting on how he's at a highschool reading level. So, being homeschooled, I had to ask him what he's read that places him in that level. He named some books off but all of them were contemorary/modern novels that I wouldn't really count as anything worth reading (like The Davinci Code, which was one of the books that he named off). I asked if he had read any Homer, Dickens, Austen, Emmerson, Steinbeck etc. (I've read these authors and more in a lit class that I took from an amazing teacher. Go read some classics and original works! You'll be amazed at some of the treasures that you can find in them!) The little boy said that he hadn't read any of those (My bad! He's in the public school system. Not to really dis on the public schools, but you lower your standards when it comes to whatever comes out of those prison cells)... So I said that he wasn't really in the "highschool level" (Publis schools... what legacy is America leaving her children? Not a good one). We started mildly arguing about it (leave it to me to make anything an arguement... bad habit...) and he finally said "Okay, I'll be the big person here and not argue with you." Ouch. He's going to be entering middle school very soon. Let's just say that I was dying from laughter from that!

We're getting all growed up...

Wow... lots of milestones this year for many of my friends and me... Graduation, getting engaged/married, etc. But none of it has really hit me until this morning when I was sitting in the pew listening to a friend (who I've grown up my whole life!) who was preaching. My aunt was sitting next to me and she was welling up. I almost did too. We've all come so far, yet it feels like yesterday I was making mud pies in the back yard with him. *sniff, sniff* This is when you start to ask yourself: Do I really want to grow up and deal with all the nasty things in the world of adults? With being an adult you have more responibilities yet more freedom. More severe trials yet more satifaction from reaching your goal. I guess we all have to step up to the plate and take a swing at things eventually. You might not hit it the first time around, but you will have more chances someday.