At the Speed of Life

Life is truly speeding by. We've been super-busy here the last two months. So I suppose it's time for a little update for those of you who follow along in order to keep in touch. I've touched on some of the things going on in my previous posts, but here's a more accurate list.

3 colors of daylilies are surviving and blooming despite the drought

My husband has been on business trips to Las Vegas, New York, and California. He even got to stay at the historic Hotel Del Coronado. (Soon he will spend another week in California and Boston.) He still travels to Indianapolis a fair bit to the interoperability lab that he is responsible for, and his internship program started and is in full swing too, so he's been teaching. He's also been hiring folks like crazy, even meeting with potential new employees on weekends. 

He's not all about work though, at least not work that he gets paid for. He lifted and threw lots of hay bales when we hayed. (I drove the truck and stacked bales in the barn.) He did some more clearing with his flail mower and got the tractor stuck on the slope behind the dam (so I towed him over the cusp of the hill with the four wheel drive truck and a logging chain.) He installed new posts, stretched woven wire fencing, and hung gates in our goat pen. He also bought a used paddle boat and repaired it. He helped our neighbors put up their hay. And lastly, he had some friends over to fish in our pond and caught a lot of largemouth bass and big blue gill. 

Here's my son with the microphone explaining his code to the crowd
at the exhibition contest at the end of the Lego robotics camp.

My oldest was in a week long sailing day camp at the Lake Monroe Sailing Association. This meant that the other children and I to spend 2 hours in the car each day to get him there and back, despite the mother of one of his friends driving the last leg of the trip each day. He also participated in a two day Lego Robotics camp, (pictures here) and got a tour of a large data center. And, of course, he helped my husband with the fencing project, and putting up our neighbor's hay.

What else has been going on in the last two months? I've mentioned some of it in bits and pieces, but here's a more complete list. We traveled (in shifts, due to the haying in progress) to Kentucky for the First Communion of one of my Goddaughters. We got two baby goats and started bottle feeding them. Our old goat did not take to them. My in-laws visited for a three day weekend. Then my parents spent four days here. We attended a chalk art event and a fine arts fair. We celebrated Mother's Day, Father's Day, my youngest son's third birthday, and our sixteenth wedding anniversary. We went boating on our pond twice. 

This squirrel hung in various death-like positions
in the miserable heat one day.

We continue to suffer through a long drought, as I mentioned earlier. The last week has been in the 100's each day! So we've been toting extra water to the animals and to the potted plants. Our neighbor's pond has gone dry (ours is doing well) and the papers are reporting on local wells drying up (our has held up so far.)

This week the goats were weaned. My husband continues to try to get our older doe acclimated to the new doelings. (She's biting them now instead of ramming and butting.) We had a trash compactor delivered on Monday. My husband installed it, and it's nice not to have the empty space for it under the countertop. 

Some of us made the trek to the family reunion for my side of the family this weekend. My father is visiting through the Fourth of July. And we are helping with moving a few of my uncle's things from his old nursing home to his new one.

And then, of course there are the usual and ongoing things that kept us busy too.  There was the daily laundry, dishes, diapering, cleaning, child tending, goat feeding/care, etc.. There were the weekly music lessons, grocery shopping runs, recycling and trash drop-offs. There was the monthly water softener filling. There were our six month dental appointments, our yearly vision exams and violin lease renewal, etc. etc. And I feel sure I am leaving a few things out. But you get the picture. Life is rushing along.

Oh, and I'm nearly at my free photo posting limit on Blogger. I'll have to rectify that soon, as pictures are my thing.