A Long, Long Post

I have a fan-girl crush for the Fab Four Tribute Band, 

I admit it. 

Here they are, Paul, George, Ringo and John. 

They just played a song with pink guitars and drumsticks, 

as a benefit for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer 

Foundation. 

Those guitars were auctioned off after this pose by 

"Ed Sullivan" who introduces them each show, and provides 

comedy relief.  (George Trullinger). 

"Ed" managed to get nearly $6000.00 for those 

instruments. 

We got to sit in the front row, but sadly, 

we missed the backstage "meet and greet" for 

which I had passes, as I did not remember the correct 

time. 

We were dead center, on top of it.  

While I wouldn't want to always sit in the front row, inches from the stage, it was 

a blast for one night. 

We were encouraged to stand for

about 4 songs.  Here's Chris (and everyone else) leaning on the edge of the stage, 

watching.  He was not familiar with Beatle's music, but recognized 3 songs. 

It was his first concert. 

Here's Doug Couture as George, during the Sgt. Pepper segment. 

Doug was subbing for Gavin Pring, who is the "regular" George, 

and was out for surgery. 

Doug was amazing. 

(fan girl sigh) 

My fave, Ron McNeil as John Lennon. 

Neil Candelora as Paul McCartney. 

Amazing Erik Fidel as Ringo Starr. 

As if the concert wasn't enough... I had put in a full day at the Ag Hall on Friday, 

and then we had THIS on Saturday morning: 

Oh. My. Gosh. 

They didn't stop for two hours.  That's birthday girl Paiton in the black shirt, and the cheetah pants, ever the fashionista. 

It was The Birthday Party.  It was at the Ag Hall. 

This is about it for pictures, I was so busy I did not get but about ten. 

Jax was in there somewhere, he was actually celebrating his birthday, and Paiton's is tomorrow, they were born one year apart, three days apart, and everyone thinks they are twins. 

We went to school in the Island Creek schoolhouse, and the kids learned about the Good Ole Days. 

Then we did chores the old way, fed the chickens, and learned about bees. 

We literally ran through the farmhouse (too risky!). 

Then it was time for a train ride.  Here I stop to pat myself on the 

back.  I got into the train, and tried to start it. 

HAHAHAHA. 

Nothing. 

I called Judy, who was there on a Saturday. 

She had just given two rides to the other birthday party that had been going on. 

There was a dead pause after I said 

"I can't get it started".  

Then a big laugh.

"I have the key!"

She jumped into our golf cart and ran it down to me, and 

off we went, no problem. 

My son rode around four times with me, at the back of the train... and told me 

yesterday that I went VERY slowly.  I laughed, because I know I slow to nothing on the trestle (scary) and going out of the tunnel now there is a new tie, and we were told to go slowly over it while it settles.  I err on the side of caution.

Anyway, the thing of which I am MOST proud is the fact that 

after the party, I managed to drive around and park the train in the tunnel 

ALL BY MYSELF.  

I got it centered and got the tunnel gates shut ALL BY MYSELF. 

First time. 

I don't even have ONE picture. 

My favorite song, Revolution. 

Sorry, had to put this in. 

The dogs were so glad to see Chris, they love him. 

They love ALL the grands. 

We did a TON of this, in between everything else. 

Chris took Lil, while I handled Jes. 

There are a ton more pictures from the weekend and today, so I'll save some 

for tomorrow... but I guess everyone is aware that KC is 

in Royals fever again, for the second October. 

Here's our Sheets boys (Keith's daughter, Amber, and Jesse)

Jace, Hayden and Carson

Go, Royals!!!

High Humidity!

Pitiful, huh?  Remember when I cleaned it out and put straw in there?  To prevent weeds???

HAHAHA. 

Part of the corner where I started.  It used to be that the 

weeds would come right out... but not these. 

I took Chris into the old henyard, and we could hardly get in the gate.  We couldn't even try to go in the little henyard. 

We think that the tree may have fallen on the fence, but we did not take time to walk around on the pasture side to see if it had. 

Tomorrow when we go out, I'll walk down to the pasture and take a look.  We need to get the gate operational again, and we need to cut down the saplings you see in this picture. 

Trust me... Chris has figured out how to use the big cutters.  That's a TREE he's working on, and he got almost all of it out. 

You can see that we have our work cut out for us. 

You can see that we have created many piles that will have to be hauled away.  Sometimes I wish we had left the tractor and cart out there... I could have loaded this little by little and hauled it down to the brush pile in the pasture... but I am not sure what we are going to do with all of it.

I have hauled larger branches down, and that's tree at the end of all those piles on the right of the picture above. 

We have probably ten saplings to cut down tomorrow, and we'll surely haul them down to the brush pile by hand.  We do expect storms tonight.. but so far, we have had only a light rain.  

Every little bit of moisture is welcome to help me pull those darn weeds.  

Christopher is going to weed eat the flower bed as I stand by him tomorrow... to try to get a start on it... then I'll just plug away. 

I could not get into the henspa yard... but look how it has grown up!  

UGH!  

We are working tomorrow, in between the raindrops. 

Happy Independence Day!

Friday morning, Keith and Brandon left for Tucson, Arizona, and the University of Arizona baseball camp. They took the VW Bug, my transportation, to save on gas costs... leaving me the van and truck. I had forgotten how much gas it took to run the bigger vehicles!

Grandsons Chris and Nathan came up for the weekend to celebrate our Independence Day, and help around Calamity Acres. We had a picnic with my brother and sister in law, and in the late evening, shot off our legal fireworks in the "front" yard, where they would not bother the animals. Though it stormed Friday night, the clouds held their rain and we had a mild, windy fourth.