Rice Cereal

         Now that Evan is four months old, he gets to try his first taste of something other than milk.  Before he gets started he is very clean.

        Learning to open our mouth and swallow can be challenging.

       The end product is one messy baby.  It's a good time for a bath!

Picking Corn

        Evan & I had a beautiful view from the cab of the tractor the other day.   Derick had two people with semi trailers helping him haul the last of the corn to the elevator, so we ran the grain cart. 



         Evan was a trooper in the cab all afternoon and part of the evening.  He only got fussy once when he was getting hungry, which was amazing after a crabby morning.  We have an outside loving boy.  Who needs baby toys when you can watch corn being picked and the wildlife that scares up.  I will have to say bunnies are not that smart.  Run away from the combine instead of in front of it.

        We only got to unload on the go once since the rows were too short in the back field with ditches.  I have a feeling now that Derick knows we can do it, he will utilize us more next year.  Most of the time we shuttled grain from the combine to the semi tractors by the road. 

         It's hard work helping mommy drive the tractor. 

         By the end of harvest season the combine is getting really dirty.  After today it's back to the shed until another fall comes around.

        We did get the chance to ride in the combine a couple rounds.  I bet Evan will be happy to be out of the Baby Bjorn for awhile.

Baby Koopmann

        My cousin and his wife are expecting their first precious bundle at the end of December.  Boy or girl nobody knows, but this darling baby quilt can go either way.   

        This quilt was made from some oink-a-doodle-moo fabric line that was out last fall. 

         I love how the cow, horse from picture above, and barn are framed in their square. 

      The lighter blue fabric has baby chicks with chicken scratches while the darker blue fabric has different colored horse hoof prints.  I feel in love these prints online, but it took me a long time to figure out how I exactly wanted to put them together.  I'm very pleased with how it turned out. 

        For the backing I used some extra squares from the front mixed with a gray & shimmery print.  It's almost pretty enough to be the front except the quilting doesn't line up with the squares. 

Baby Blue

        I heard the word SNOW the other day.  Time to make Evan a warm hat for all those cold and windy days ahead of us.  This quick cap took around an hour from start to finish.  My baby makes it look good!

 

Harvest

        In little over a week Derick was able to start and finish the 2014 soybean harvest.  This year was filled with it's share of surprises due to the very wet summer and fall we are having.  In late summer sudden death syndrome started appearing in soybean fields across the area.  At a distance it appeared the beans were turning early, but what was actually happening was the plants were dying prematurely causing some of the pods to not fully develop.  We knew it would affect yields.  Field averages ranged from 65 to 40 bushels per acre with some spots hitting as high as 95, but others only getting up to 29.  This year's best field was rolling ground on the backside of the golf course where water was able to shed easily and sudden death syndrome stayed away. 

      Evan had his fair share of first, too.  His first Caterpillar ride strapped to the front of Momma as we pulled Daddy out in the combine.  Later in the week he helped drive the cabless tractor as we pulled the semi out in a different field.  Since Derick couldn't park the semi in the field he had to cart all the beans out.  Literally going over the river and through the woods....but no grandmothers house at the end of the road.  Everyday he helps shuttle daddy back and forth between fields during the day and home again in the evenings.  Needless to say the Baby Bjorn carrier we are borrowing from my aunt has been a lifesaver when getting in and out of equipment.  Maybe once harvest is over we can work on a daytime schedule, as for now naps and bottles are squeezed in wherever we happen to be.