Randomness

We have more and more leaves falling in the back yard, which means bigger and bigger leaf piles. More often than not, Caleb and Sarah can't wait until the pile gets really big, so we end up with a medium size pile. The kids haven't quite mastered the fine art of jumping into the leaves.  Instead, they back up, run with all they've got and plop down right down in the middle to start the madness:

Sarah is trying to figure out which direction to go first.  Apparantly, all the leaves left her in a state of temporary confusion.

Making it rain leaves with floods of giggles to follow.

LEAF FIGHT!!!  (You can see Sarah Kathryn in the background...she opted for the peace and quite of the sandbox.)

What a cutie.  Much sweeter than the thug pose from last time!  (Papa Loren insists that Sarah will have a career in security someday because of her thug picture...she just might!)



When Sarah Kathryn went home, it was time for a combine ride and then to help Josh move the tractor and wagons from farm to farm.  Here we are in the car waiting for Josh to arrive so we can take him back for another peice of equipment.  The kids, needless to say, were not very amused with the idea of waiting in the car.



One one-hour combine ride, two car rides and a tractor ride later, we were finally ready to start watching the unloading.  Caleb is watching the corn come out of the gravity wagon, up the augar and into the bin. 

But watching corn move up an augar is entertaining for only so long.  After a few minutes, he decided that practicing his Xtreme Fourwheeling stunts was more exciting.  How many years until he wins a medal in the Xtreme Sports Olympics?

The fourwheeler stunts finally got to Caleb.  (Either that, or this is the spike that Caleb asks for every night after his bath.)

After all the excitement of the afternoon before, we woke up early the next morning to baby chicks.  Sarah enjoyed getting acquainted with the three babies who were ready for their trip to the heat lamp in the hog house.



Here is our incubator setup.  The eggs at the back of the incubator (top of the picture) are the eggs that are still incubating and will hatch within the next few days.  The eggs in the front container (bottom of the picture) are eggs that have little cracks in them from the chicks starting to hatch.  We have to separate them out from the incubating eggs because when the chicks hatch, they move around so much they damage the other eggs.  This way, the babies are controlled.  The dish in the middle of the incubator is a new baby.  This particular chick had been trying to hatch for almost two days, but its shell had kind of gooped up and hardened.  So I performed what I like to call a chicketomy and here it is.  Its about ten minutes old in this picture and will stay in the incubator just until it dries off and is ready for the trip to the heat lamp in the hog house, about three or four hours.