Odd jobs

Dad went up the Bradford farm to load trucks of grain today, so I was home and did odd jobs.  In fact, most of these jobs were for myself rather than the farm.  It was a rather boring day and I had a difficult time keeping myself busy because it was just warm enough to make weed-pulling impossible in some places.  I'll try again tomorrow, but I will be going up to do odd jobs at Bradford tomorrow.  Nothing special to report, I'm afraid. Weeding and chores.

Exciting News!

This morning started as any other, I went out to do chores.  When dad came over, we went out armed with shovel and spade and waged war on the Canadian thistles growing en masse around one of the barnyards.  When I came back, I went to get a drink.  I checked my phone as usual, and saw the voicemail icon.

I GOT AN INTERVIEW WITH THE LARSEN TRACTOR MUSEUM IN LINCOLN, NEBRASKA!

This was the application that I had only two days to work on, yet managed to get submitted on the deadline.  I will be heading to Lincoln this weekend probably for a Tuesday interview.  Luckily I have a friend who lives close to campus, so I have a place to stay and a guide to help orient me with the place.  I'm hoping to visit the museum on Monday as some prep work for the interview.

The rest of the day was spent grinding corn while dad used the tub grinder to chop hay.  We were completely out of both, so we couldn't feed the cattle until late this afternoon.  It was such a great day!  I'll keep ya'll posted!

Epic Fail

So, I have obviously not been keeping up with this blog over the last few days.  My days have been filled with feeding cattle as needed and field work at the Bradford farm.  I have formed a special attachment to the Case IH 2x2 and the field cultivator, as this is has been my sole activity over the last three days.  The cultivator is large implement that spans probably 30 feet with small shovels that dig into the earth a few inches to break up the surface.  Attached to the front is a harrow that further smooths out the ground.  Because Bradford got a decent amount of rain last week, it was too wet for us to plant until yesterday.  By cultivating the field, we broke up the soil enabling it to dry faster as well as preventing the ground to dry into a hard lump, making it easier to bring the planter through the field.  Dad has been planting the soybeans while I do the field work.  I would suspect he is nearly done (probably working on it as we speak to finish) and then we can plant the corn.  I don't know how many acres I haven't done, but I would guess at over 100 in the last three days.  It's been productive, though sitting in the tractor cab gets monotonous.  It does provide some opportunity to reflect on life, though I'll admit, because I tend to do that frequently throughout my day and in conversations with friends, I have been vegging out in the tractor.  Regardless, though, things are going well and I have been content with the things I think about whether in or out of the tractor.  I suppose I had better not promise to be more diligent with the blog because after working between 9-11 hours, blogging is about the last thing I want to do.  I will blog when I can, but that's the best I can do at the moment.

Planting Soybeans

On this gloriously sunshine-y with a reasonable wind, I, Margaret Spiegel, planted about 12 acres of soybeans!  I directly contributed to our family's income for the year (in more than just the indirect grunt work capacity).  Dad broke the field in for me, rode two rounds with me to ensure I had no questions, and then I was off by myself.  It really isn't so difficult.  I haven't planted any corn yet, the ground is too wet, but I'll probably get to plant more beans up at the Bradford farm tomorrow.  I may also learn to disk, so that will be exciting.  While dad finished planting this afternoon, I distributed salt blocks to both houses for the water conditioner and to as many animal pens as we had blocks for.  I also picked up all the marking flags we set out to divide the corn ground from the bean ground.  We are officially done planting at the Henry County farm!  The rest of the day was spent mowing my lawn while I waited for dad to return from hauling the planter up the Bradford farm.  We fed the south yard this evening as well as the cattle over at home, but we really focused on finishing planting the beans here today.  Yay for one farm being planted!

Working in the Cemetery

Today after chores I helped my mom weed-eat and mow the township cemetery right up the road from my house.  We finally got into the field, so we have officially started bean planting!  I helped load up the planter hoppers once and then moved the hayrack with the rest of the seed to the next field over.  It was a productive day, beautiful and sunny, but not much to report otherwise.

Yesterday and Today

Yesterday was an incredibly long day, which made me feel less-than-inclined to blog.  My apologies.  Yesterday morning, my parents, aunt, and I went to the USDA office to sign our contracts for the farm program.  No one necessarily explained much to me, but even just seeing the process was useful.  It was also a different situation because we are actually getting three new farm numbers which will change the equation entirely besides the new farm bill passing (or not passing) Congress this year, so it seemed best that I wait until next year to have everything explained because everything will change after this year anyway.  Because it was drizzling most of the morning, dad and I came back and did bookkeeping.  The rain finally cleared off in the afternoon, so after we moved the bean planter from the Bradford farm to the home place, we fed the cattle.  We also cut the stitches out of the steer who had the rectal prolapse.  He seems to be doing much better, so that is good.

Today I really only worked in the afternoon because my best friend from high school visited with her two-year-old son.  They both love the farm and he got to sit on the tractor with me (while it was off because machines still scare him) and he saw the animals.  It was a great morning!  This afternoon I refilled the oats in the feedhouse while dad ground corn.  We also sorted cattle.  There were several larger steers we moved into a different pen and sorted out two more replacement heifers.  It was nice to see the sun all day long.  I know we needed the rain, but we have gotten 5 inches over the last 9 days, so it was nice to have sunshine today.

Sunday Catch-Up Day

I hope none of you have been concerned of my absence the last few days.  There was work to be done, opportunities to seize, and friends to host.  I'll try to brief in my summary.

Thursday:  This year's seasons seemed to have skipped from winter to summer without offering too much of a spring.  With typical summer humidity and temperatures reaching into the low 80s, it was quite a day to be working outside.  I actually spent most of the morning indoors working on an application for a position in Nebraska.  There is a tractor museum in Lincoln searching for a manager, and I thought to ought to try for it.  Unfortunately, I saw the job posting on Wednesday evening (May 2) and the application materials were due Friday (May 4).  This explains why I asked my dad for the morning off to begin working on the application.  After getting the application finished, dad and I worked on putting in a tile line in our calf pasture all afternoon into early evening.  I didn't get in from work until 7 p.m. and spent the next six hours trying to hammer out a cover letter and finesse my resume.  The process did not go well.  Fortunately for me, I had great support from a friend who helped me think out what it was I wanted to say.

Friday:  Well, Friday morning was spent in much the same way as Thursday morning, particularly because I didn't have the cover letter finished yet.  After chores, I came straight back to my computer and did more edits, with my final submission happening before noon (thank goodness!).  The rest of the day was spent cleaning my house since I was expecting a few friends to arrive late in the afternoon.  The remainder of our soybean order was also delivered, so I helped unload those bags while waiting for my floors to dry.

This weekend was spent entertaining friends and doing lawn work, so overall, very good!  While productivity hasn't happened as it ought to, it was nice to see my friends and relax, particularly after the unexpected stress of that job application.  We shall see what happens.  I will not torment you with any kind of introspective analysis this Sunday.  Instead, I will catch up in my house while I wait for this rain to pass by.

Two Rainy Days

The last two days have had at least a few hours of a respectable drizzle.  This morning this "respectable drizzle" was quite substantial for a little while, but we really did need the rain, so I don't imagine anyone is really complaining just yet.  While it would be nice if we could get into the field to finish planting our corn and start the soybeans, we can be comforted in knowing there is enough moisture in the ground to sustain the seeds.  The good thing about rainy/muddy days is that we can catch up on other projects.  Yesterday morning, mom and I took the three cull ewes to Tampico to sell.  This establishment doesn't have a livestock auction like the sale barn we use for our cattle.  Instead, we call ahead of time, list the number of animals we are bringing, and we will get the market price for those animals on the specific drop-off day.  We have until 10:30 a.m. to get our animals to the drop-off point because a semi comes to pick up the animals and ships them to marketplace (probably a slaughterhouse somewhere, though I don't know where).  After I got back, I helped dad feed and bed the stock cows and then we worked on the skidloader again.  The Big Mac skidloader is officially in running condition after being out of commission for several weeks!  After dinner yesterday, dad and I went to Stark County to sign up for the government program we have been a part of for the last ten years.  We also went up to the Bradford farm to check how much rain it got (.6).  When we got back from our errand, we treated all the lambs for overeating and we wormed the weaned lambs.  Dad caught the weaned lambs while I handed him the medicine, but I got to catch all the younger lambs.  I can actually catch lambs; it's the grown ewes I still have trouble with.

Today, we fed the south and west yard in the rain, then worked on our spray coup in the machine shed.  We had to replace the gas tank because water leaked in if it sits outside in the rain.  It wasn't as painful as it could have been, though dad did have to chisel through a few of the bolts because we couldn't get the socket wrench around them.  After dinner and short siesta, we went down the road to buy the bolts, nuts, and washers we needed for the coup.  We also had one of our 55 gallon oil drums refilled with high transmission oil.  When we came back, dad finished replacing the gas tank while I started reorganizing one of the many tool boxes in the machine shed.  I could spend a week straight in that shed sorting bolts, nuts, washers, etc., and not even make a dent in the sheer amount of stuff in there.  I think dad wants me to organize the work bench and the tool boxes as one of my projects.  I'll certainly try, but it will be quite a task.  I was thinking, when I was little I LOVED sorting bolts.  I actually really loved going with dad when he bought bolts and nuts because they were shiny and pretty and it was a very satisfying, tactile experience to reach into the bins and run your fingers around the hardware.  I sure was a weird kid.  We also moved Big Mac to the other farm, cleared a path in the cattle yard so the rain could drain and fed the feeders.  Then we mixed feed for those feeders for tomorrow morning.  Despite the rainy start, the afternoon was sunny.  It definitely felt like early summer today with all the...lovely humidity (in case you didn't catch the sarcasm, I'm NOT a fan of high humidity).  It's supposed to rain late tonight and possibly tomorrow again, so we'll see if we sort bolts tomorrow.