Moosey’s training seems to be benefiting from me not working. Her attention span is finally getting long enough to listen to commands I am trying to teach her. She is growing so fast, at 13 weeks she is a solid 29 pounds! Her latest accomplishment is learning to roll over. Sit, lie down, come here, and fetch are mostly mastered but stay and walking on a leash still need some work. Oh, and she figured out how to get things off the top of her kennel/the kitchen table, not sure how I feel about that new trick.
My garden is growing very well too. I have even gotten some pretty bouquets from the perennials Jane gave us from her farm. Everything else is a good sized sprout but no blooms yet because they got started so late. We should have some great flowers the start of September! I had hopes of selling some flowers at the farmers market. That is looking less promising at this point in time but maybe in the future will work better. Oh well, this was supposed to be a learning experience after all. We are going to have plenty of variety once they are all up. I think I am most excited about the sunflowers and pumpkins. I planted seven kinds of pumpkins and 4 kinds of sunflowers. I am also excited that the water system Dusty built for me is working out great; it makes it super easy to move hoses from one row to another.
Dusty is a crazy farming machine and he can be all the time now that he is completely done with grad school. I am considering calling him Master Dusty from here on out. We went to Pullman this Thursday for his defense of his research. He did great passing all required elements and now can say he is totally finished with class work at WSU. He is so thrilled to “just” be a farmer. While most people might take this as an insult, Dusty has wanted to get to this point since he was about ten years old. Now that Dusty is on the farm full time he is working more hours than I can count each week. I am glad when he keeps his work day under 12 hours. I don’t know many other professions besides ag. where people put in 12-16 hour work days for a month or more straight. I know if my dad reads this he will tell me “Deadliest Catch does that!” I have put in my fair share of long hours grading or getting school stuff ready, but like most jobs it doesn’t go on day after day like farm work. After watching the guys work I can say I fully understand the phrase “make hay while the sun shines.”
The guys are excited because the crops are looking more hopeful than recent years past. They have also picked up more leases on land which will help support the addition of us to the farm. Some of the new land is very hilly, so the guys are looking into buying a new hillside combine that will be safer and handle better on the steep terrain. I can tell Dusty is very excited at the thought of a new toy to tinker. Now if you ever thought cars were expensive go look up the cost for a brand NEW combine, it will blow your mind! Once you see the tag on one of those you will understand why the guys are looking at well used machines.
I won’t encourage you to look at the costs of farming for too long though, if you do you may end up frustrated for farmers. Sometimes it just makes me so mad thinking about how hard the guys (like most farmers) work for pennies in return, costs are ridiculous and returns can be so low. Sometimes the media portrays farms in the worst way. They makes it seem like farmers are all out there spraying chemicals on anything that moves just for fun, not thinking about the consequences at all. There is the added perspective that farmers are all trying to steal money from the government and take unnecessary subsidies. If you know Tim and Dusty, then you know that is not at all how they live. All the while our culture (myself included) is paying millions to people in the entertainment/sports industries. When I really think about things, it just doesn’t seem make any sense to me. Dusty doesn’t do his job for the money and I am willing to support him in doing whatever he loves regardless of finances, but I do wish that it would be easier for him. I am very thankful to have a husband that I know can work that hard and persists through challenges of broken equipment. Dusty’s work ethic is impressive on any scale. But I am glad that he doesn’t work ALL the time so we have can make room in our calendar for fun too.
We spent last Sunday at my parents’ cabin! I had gone out to the lake with my dad Friday afternoon and spent the day at the new big boat. Then Saturday we took dad’s other boat across the lake to our cabin. Lexi and her boyfriend Chris were already there so we hung out on the dock until the clouds rolled in a bit too much for our sunning desires. I was very excited to see Dusty Sunday morning but I think my dad was even more appreciative to have his help. While I sat on tried to get my little lab Moosey to swim (she hates it, how weird is that? But my mom's one pound puff of a puppy loves it!) Dusty helped my dad build a boat lift. Dusty did take a break to get in and swim, he likes it just a little bit more than Moosey. Maybe we should get her a little puppy life vest so she can match Dusty. Then I won’t have to worry about either of them swimming like a rock. I don’t think it will be too much of a problem as both of them would prefer to have their feet on the land rather than in the water. All in all it was a really fun day at the lake.
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