I've Gone Country A blog about a city girl learning a whole new world

Last month I had a post asking for prayer about getting some goats into mexico.   There was a family that was trying to get the goats to the village area where they are missionaries.  They were still trying to get permission up to 10 days ago.

They were not able to take the goats over the border.  Except for one.  She had to find a home in the states for the others.  Indeed the goats found a great new owner who loves them and is taking good care of them.

Shelly is very attached to her goats, and if you remember she was taking them so that she could help supply the village with goat milk and goat cheese.  Needless to say she was very disappointed.

However, later she learned that it is actually better for the goats to come from the area they will be living.  In the part of Mexico that they are in, the climate is a big difference from where the goats originated from.  If the goats had gotten to make the journey, it is most likely they would have died off.

When she learned about this, she said it felt as if she had been spared the pain of watching that happen.  So far the only goat that was able to cross the border is doing fine.  When the missionary couple can afford it, they will purchase goats there.  In hopes that they will still be able to do as they had planned with helping the village people.

Thank you for your prayers concerning the matter, and please continue to pray for Shelly, her family  the village people and for the ability to buy the goats they will need.

Just thought you would like to know…the rest of the story.

Can you spell…..WOW…..

Look at that HAIR!

This is my baby sister and my niece Minnie.  At Christmas they had matching hair streaks.  Not sure what they call this in particular…but some of the hair attachments like Minnie is wearing are called “bling strings”.

And …WOW…today my niece had on some neat  feather earrings.

Last week I attended her spelling bee.   The students participating were from the 4th-8th grades, there were approximately 15 students.

Minnie is a 4th grader and came in 2nd!  We were sooooo excited.       She placed next to an 8th grader.  I was impressed that the eighth grader came up to her after the event and congratulated her.  She also encouraged Amelia to continue entering future spelling bees.

Today was a Regional Spelling Bee.  The students were from the 3rd-8th grade.

I believe there were 17 students and she came in 4th!   Once again we were soooooo excited!

Some of the words I remember that  she had to spell were: cauliflower, democracy and physique…there were a lot of others.

I even had to think  twice about some of the words.

The word she missed was Ramada.  I know she will never miss that word again.  And I can pretty much promise you that she won’t EVER want to stay at a Ramada Inn either.

Of course she would have loved to have won today, and was disappointed that she didn’t.  However, it is that kind of determination that has gotten her this far.

Minnie is a great student and she reads all the time.  She started reading billboards when she was just a little girl in her car seat.

These two spelling bees, are the only ones she has ever entered.

Now that is something to …WOW… about.

Before we left the building today, she had a new study book of words.  Ironically the 8th grader from last week gave Minnie her book.  This was her last year to be able to compete.  Once again she encouraged Amelia to continue on.  I didn’t hear the words kindness, maturity or encouragement spelled out…but I saw them in action.

Hmmm for some reason…I think I will be going to more of these next year!

CONGRATULATIONS MINNIE….we are very proud of YOU!

….WOW….

I have been going through my pictures and cataloging them.   What a big mess.  I thought having lots of prints were hard to sort and do something with.  Digital photos are good and bad.  It would help if I had just had half a clue as to what I was doing on a computer.  I find it amazing that something can just “disappear”.   I mean one minute you are working on something and it vanishes…ok…so maybe I clicked something and then it vanished…but anyway I tried to unclick…or use the back arrow or whatever…and NO…it is GONE.

At least with printed pictures….you might set them down somewhere, but you would eventually find a HUGE stack of pictures.   NOT so with the digital. UGH>>>ARGH>>>

Breathe deep….count to 10….ok….

These pictures were taken back in 2008 when we went to the Kentucky State Fair, I believe.  We were able to see lots of contest for pies and cookies and cakes and jams and there were quilts and lot of art pieces.  It was really neat.

They had this display set up and I thought it was so creative.

This is a cowgirl made completely out of balloons. Neat Huh?

But that wasn’t all…they had a whole little ranch made out of balloons….Cowboys complete with ropes, hats and boots all of balloons.  Horses, cactus and even the split rail fence was made with balloons.

My husband is such a “GOOD SPORT”.  He is very secure in his masculinity….so he appeases me with such silly things as this.

This one however, pushed the envelope.  I had read about seeing the “biggest dog” in the world in the pamphlet we had.  It was to show at a certain time.  I wanted to see it sooooooo bad.  Billy was like…You know it’s not for real.  I said “sure it is” it says right here….

Being that we were on vacation…he agreed that he would go to the showing of the biggest dog in the world with me.  SERIOUSLY…I was SOOOOO disappointed.  It was this pretend dog.

Needless to say, I didn’t beg to see anything else.  I obviously was not a good picker outer.

I ABSOLUTELY love rocking chairs (and swings).  This one was a great one.  It had the smoothest rock…which is very important.  And it was made to look really rustic with real hide.  So, I had to give it a few minutes of trying out….Ah…that took all the built up aggravation from the  pretend dog all away.

Billy was able to check in on the bee hive stuff.  They had a full display showing how it all worked.  Lots of honey to taste, it was really cool.

They had one of those rock climbing walls, I started up it  I wanted to ring the bell at the top.  Then I turned around to look at Billy…he was a dot on the ground….and I lost my nerve and came down.   Bummer….why didn’t I just go a little more….I was almost there.  Next time, I’m going to ring that bell!  Our friend on my right…stayed the course…he rang that bell!

Billy has a stomach of IRON….he can ride anything.  He loves it…look at the look on his face….he was so excited.

We saw lots of animals…actually on my last post the pigs were from this trip.  This horse was really cute.

But he was even cuter when you could see how small he was, especially next to Billy.

We had a great trip…except for seeing that silly dog.

I was going through some old pictures I had taken.  Some of these pictures are several years old, but they are cute.

Hey everyone!

This blog sure is going great isn’t it! Who knew what a photographer my mom was. I’m impressed!

I’m here for less fun matters though I’m afraid.

There is a bill in congress called SOPA which stands for Stop Online Piracy Act.

That all sounds well and good but it’s not honest.  What the bill really does is it gives the US Government a blank check to close any site at any time.

The same type policy that created “the great firewall of China”. It introduces a censored internet for America.

SOPA is an all encompassing entity to the point that it includes almost any site where people can post their own things.

That means from Facebook, to Twitter, to even a humble blog like my mothers.

This means that the government can and will enforce the law very selectively, which is the entire danger of the bill: it’s a blank check.

They can remove wikileaks because some article they link to has “copyrighted material”, or take down the site of a political watchdog group because “one of their videos has copyright music playing in the background”.

The lack of due process also allows the possibility that if a site hosts something the government doesn’t agree with, they can just block it from anyone in America seeing it.

This is a very serious and dangerous bill.  If this passes we are handing over our individual freedoms even more.

Guys, this should scare you. It’s a scary thing. Government censorship on a massive scale in AMERICA.  This on the heels of the indefinite detention act, we will soon have less freedoms than the average Chinese citizen.

Call or write your congressman, tell your friends, do something, but the time is now to take a stand.

-Garrett

In a past post I spoke about our how we  combine our cows every now and then with our neighbors cows.  Well, it is our neighbor who bought the… BULL… and they have shared him with us.

I like to name every critter that comes along our path so I started calling him Ferdinand.  He seems very gentle…yet I know…that you still have to be extremely cautious with any animal, especially a bull.

I give him his space, but I have been able to enjoy catching a few good pictures of him.  I watched a clip of an old Ferdinand the bull cartoon made by Disney on you tube.  It was cute.  And yes, I think that our Ferdinand is similar….although he doesn’t go so far as smell the flowers.  He is very  “Masculine”  and he loves his wives.

Isn’t that the sweetest face ever!  Now I think he truly looks like he should be called Ferdinand.

This is a precious picture.  The cow he is flirting with is Clementine.  Clementine had it rough before we got her.  We purchased her from my brother, but there was a time she was with another family and she experienced some trauma.  When my brother got her back she was very withdrawn.  They loved her and she got better.  When we brought her to our pasture she was expecting and before long she gave us our first calf.  Ironically it was born on my brother and sister in laws anniversary.  I thought that was cool.  She settled into our pasture very nicely, it was as if she got a new chance at life.  She actually acts as if she owns the place.  Well, that is until Ferdinand comes along.  Then she acts all shy and sheepish.

This picture was taken only a few minutes after we combined our cows after they had been separated for a few months.  She was VERY glad to see him.  He was Very glad to see her too.  I sat and watched how they re-aquainted themselves with one another.  It was down right cute.

Look how sweet.  This is one of our neighbors cows.  She was blessed with twins over the summer.  This is not the clearest picture, but one of the few that I was able to get of all three of them.  Ferdinand ended up giving us two sets of twins this summer.  We actually had twins when Chuck was born.  However, our twin didn’t survive.    Both sets were boys.   All of them have good dispositions, which I am so thankful for.  One of our friends said he has been around cows his whole life and has never had a set of twins.

All our girls hopefully will deliver this spring or early summer.  I cannot wait!

Meanwhile we are enjoying the ones we have, including sweet Ferdinand.

I have tried to get into the habit of taking my camera most everywhere I go.  In doing that, I have been able to snap a few shots that I think are neat.

Like this old barn.  I have passed it many times.  In the summer it is covered up with fresh green growth and is hard to see.   You can really see the structure now.  I think it has so much character.

I passed by these beautiful horses when I took a shortcut on a road that I wasn’t familiar with….ended up not being a shortcut….but the view was worth it!

I don’t know what it is about old barns and buildings.  I just always think….if these walls could talk, what neat stories they could tell.

When I saw this church, it was the week before Christmas.  I remember thinking how special it was this year to have Christmas fall on Sunday!  It just seemed to add that extra special touch to be able to celebrate Jesus’ birthday on a Sunday.  A day we already set aside to honor and praise Him.

On January the 11th of 2005 my mother passed away.  It seemed every holiday after that was so hard to go through without her.  However, I remember that first Christmas, we were trying to make a new normal.  I remember waking up that morning with such a flood of emotions.  All of a sudden my Spirit was lifted as I thought about her getting to celebrate her first Christmas in heaven.  I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of special celebration the angels would hold for Christmas Morning in Heaven.

What kind of beautiful music the angels would be singing.  Better than any Christmas music we have ever heard on earth.  The beauty of heaven…. sparkling in the Light of Christ.  More beautiful than any Christmas light display we could ever envision.

I love to hear the song “I can only imagine” by Mercy Me….. It really says it all……I can only imagine….what it will be like.

Luke 2:13 Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel,praising God and saying,

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests.”  And that was just a glimpse of the angels celebrating when they came to tell the shepherds!

Yes….it must be a wonderful celebration indeed!

So when I saw this precious country church with its beautiful stained glass windows and….

its beautiful steeple….it just touched my heart.

The weather is… well…winter weather.  It seems like all the Tractors are in hibernation.  They are waiting for spring, probably as eagerly as we are!

When I looked around, I noticed that tractors come in different colors.  I suppose I never really thought about it.  I began to take pics whenever I would see one.  I have only just begun.  There are soooo many shapes, sizes and colors!  Here are just a few.

Now…that is a purty tractor!

This is a favorite cookie around our house.  They are simple to make and taste better than they look.  I am going to call them cowgirl cookies because, let’s just say the name our kids named them is not very appealing.  You may call them whatever you like!

The Recipe:

2 Cups Sugar

2 Tablespoons Cocoa

1/2 Cup Milk

1/2 Cup Butter or Margarine

1/2 Cup Peanut Butter

2 Cups Uncooked rolled Oats

1 Teaspoon Vanilla

(Go ahead and place two sheets of wax paper or foil about the size of two cookies sheet pans on the counter before you start cooking.  I usually have everything pre measured and ready to go when I make these.  It makes it a lot easier and I think they set up better if you make sure you really boil it for a full two minutes and quickly add rest of ingredients when you take it off the heat.  I drop them by the spoonful immediately.)

Melt in boiler 1/2 Cup Butter or margarine and add 1/2 Cup Milk.  Stir in 2 Cups sugar and 2 Tablespoons Cocoa.  Stir well, turn heat to low or medium low; cook until it starts to boil.  Stir it constantly as it boils.  BOIL A FULL 2 MINUTES.  REMOVE FROM STOVE.  Now add 1/2 Cup Peanut Butter stirring well and then add 2 Cups rolled Oats.  Stir until really well mixed.  Add 1 Teaspoon Vanilla…stir.

Now…Drop onto wax paper or onto foil.  I drop them by the teaspoon, you can make them as big as you like.

Let them set at room temperature until they are firm.

Ok…so I usually try one…just to make sure they have set up enough to put on a plate!

Hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

It seems sometimes like the animals talk among themselves.  I guess I have watched too many Disney movies!

I hear that they are back….

Well, it’s about time!

I am going to act as if I didn’t even know they were gone.

Well you can act like that if you want…..but we did miss them.

We all missed them….and that’s the truth!