Logan the Sky Angel Cowboy

This video had me in tears! What a wonderful and sweet boy! I just thought I would share this moving clip- at least it was very moving for me! It is such a simple message, but SO powerful! Especially coming from a young soul.

Incase you haven't seen this before, Logan is a 13 year-old boy who lives on a ranch in a very small town in Nebraska. Logan listens to Christian Radio station 89.3FM KSBJ which broadcasts from Houston, TX. Sky Angel is the family-safe satellite broadcasting service. Logan called the radio station distraught because he had to take down a calf . His words have wisdom beyond his years.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCdZwitrNoY

Pigs, Pigs, Pigs!

The night of January 23rd, Lyle worked another usual late night on the farm. I finally called and wished him a good night and decided to go to bed around 11:00, leaving his supper in the microwave anticipating that he would be in shortly. I woke up at 2:30 am and found that he still wasn't sleeping next to me yet. He actually wasn't to be found anywhere in the house! I was half asleep and I called him somewhat in a panic asking, "Hey are you ok? Where are you?" Lyle happily replied, "Yup! I'm just looking at a bunch of baby pigs right now!" August and Katie arrived here late that night to help out with wiring the electiricty for more lights and outlets in the farrowing house- which we greatly appreciated! August and Lyle stayed out to make sure the delivery went well. So here are some pictures of the cute little creatures! :

It has been too cold to take Elsie out to see all of them yet, but Uncle Augie brought one in the house yesterday morning to warm up a little more in the bathroom. Here are her first pictures with one of the baby pigs. Not the usual farm scenery but we're use to having livestock in the bathroom :-)

A Busy 2009 Already!

Just keeping you up to speed with what we've been up to since the new year began!
Elsie's new favorite bathtub toy!

Little Elsie has just been the happiest baby lately! She has just been talking and walking (along and between furniture) more and more! Her new favorite thing is to smack her tongue against the roof of her mouth sort of "mocking" the sound of a kiss. It is too funny! She has been adding "mama" "baba" and "duhduh" to her vocabulary :-). Isn't it funny how you get excited about those little sounds? haha. We are having so much fun watching her grow- it seems like everyday she does something new! She has also been able to stand on her own for about 10-15 seconds before falling which is an improvement from 2 seconds :-) She has been doing wonderful though and we thank God everyday for our active, healthy, beautiful little girl! Here are some recent photos I took for her "7 month" pictures.













I started back to school last week. I have a feeling it won't be my favorite semester- at least compared to an awesome semester this last fall! In a way it is my own fault since I put off a few gen. ed. requirements until the last semester. I am taking "Africa" and "Environment and Technology." I am sure I will learn a lot, but I just feel sort of like an outsider since I've been so used to having teaching classes full of familiar faces and friends. I am also taking two literacy classes, one being a language development class which is actually kind of interesting because I am able to apply it at home with Elsie and her own oral language development. The other class is an Assessment and Evaluation of Literacy class where I will be doing a field experience with struggling readers and write a lot of lesson plans to assess their reading and writing abilities. It seems like it will be tough and a lot of work, but again I think it will be a good learning experience. All of my college friends are student teaching right now, so I do feel a little alone in all of my classes! I am just hoping that all will go well and I will get through it!


Lyle is of course keeping busy on the farm and at work. It is nice because we've been able to see him more this week. Deere's hasn't been making him work as much overtime now, so he is able to come home shortly after I come home from school. He is waiting patiently for a nice litter of pigs. Over break Alex and him built a farrowing building that looks really great- they put a lot of late nights in! Pat and Lyle worked on putting insulation in the farrowing building the other night until about 3:30 in the morning just getting ready to keep those piglets warm. I just keep hoping that all his hard work will pay off and one of these days we will have a nice litter for him! The sheep are doing well and we've got a lot of cute little lambs up there jumpin around!


Also, Lyle and I are sort of in the midst of trying to find a family church for us to belong to. For the past few months we've been kind of "on hold" so-to-speak in the church department. We just feel like we don't really belong anywhere right now. We haven't found that place to call home yet where we can raise our children to trust and know God, and continue our own journeys in faith. Recently though, we have been visiting Orchard Hill Church in Cedar Falls again. We have gone the past few Sundays and have enjoyed it. Elsie even enjoyed being in nursery- she didn't even crawl over to me when I went to go pick her up today which is VERY odd ;-). It is not a for sure thing that we will become members there yet since we have just begun visiting, but we are starting to really get our focus back to where it needs to be. Lyle's sister Jess and her family go there as well and she gave me some information on many bible study and fellowship opportunities as well. We just have to keep praying and relying on God to lead us in the right direction, which he will.


As Proverbs 3:5-6 tells us, "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight."


We hope that everyone has been having a wonderful 2009 so far! We will keep you all posted on what is going on in our lives :-)


Here is another verse I came across. I'm not trying to be a preacher or anything, but just incase your facing a hard time in your life right now (which I know of a few of you are right now :-) ) , here are some encouraging words from the One above :-) :

"So do not fear, for I am with you;do not be dismayed, for I am your God.I will strengthen you and help you;I will uphold you with my righteous right hand." Isaiah 41:10

Happy New Year!

Happy 2009 Everyone!

We hope everyone had a safe and fun new year! We had a little get together at our house (planned at the very last minute) and had a blast! As you can see, even miss Elsie stayed up all night! We tried over and over to get her to sleep at normal bedtime, but she must have known she was going to be missing out on all of the fun then! It is so crazy to think that this exact day last year is when I first felt Elsie kick inside me! She kicked just before the ball dropped at Time Square. Now she is doing a lot more than kicking :-) .

Lyle and I invited just a few friends and family members over to help us celebrate. I enjoyed making some treats including chex mix for the first time. Of course we had to expect Grandma Pat to surprise us all with a gift basket full of sparkling drinks, cool glasses, fun feathery masks, bead necklaces, party poppers, and silly string. We had a lot of fun with it all. Alex and Jake (a friend of Alex's who occasionally helps on the farm) especially had fun spraying both cans of silly string all over the living room at midnight. They thought it was funny until they had to clean it all up of course :-).

The new year has already been keeping us busy. Well, I should say that Lyle's days have been more full than mine. During Christmas break, Lyle started helping Grandpa John with his chores everyday, along with building a farrowing house for his hogs, keeping up with a full barn of new lambs, and doing his own daily chores. Our farmhand buddy Alex stayed with us during most of his break to help Lyle, which without him would have been impossible, but now that he is back in school Lyle has been doing it all on his own. We haven't seen a lot of him as he is back to work at Deeres and he rolls inside from the farm at least after 9:00 every night. I do admire the hard work ethic of my husband though, and am so thankful for all that he does to keep us going strong!

At times I really miss the days when I was able to go outside every day and help Lyle on the farm. It may sound silly but for the past five years we have been together, doing farm chores was always sort of our "bonding" time. It is something that I will look forward to doing again someday and involving our children with as well. For now though, I really can't complain about spending time in our warm, cozy home with our beautiful little girl.

Elsie definately has been keeping me on my toes! She is crawling EVERYWHERE! Her new favorite place to crawl is over the ledge into the kitchen and towards the dog food. She has also been standing up on any furniture she can reach and walking along towards anything she wants- especially if its food! Lately she has been saying "Da da da da" a lot. It is kind of funny because she didn't start saying it much until Lyle went back to work during the day. Coincidence or not? haha. Although today, she did actually say "ma ma" a few times. This is such a fun age watching our little girl grow into such an independent little girl already. At this rate, we are guessing she will be walking way before she turns one! Parenting is just such a wonderful thing.

We hope everyone has been enjoying their new year so far! I start back to UNI Jan 12 and hoping for a good semester. Safe and warm winter wishes to all!