Month: June 2009
-
Driving Lessons
Kids that live on a ranch learn how to drive a stick shift. Driving lessons for ranch kids happen real early. It’s just a tradition, I guess. Our son was about five when he first learned on an old Dodge pickup. Once they learn, they help drive equipment back and forth or a pickup and…
-
Play Dirt
Dirt and boys they just go together. When our son was a toddler, his idea of hitting pay dirt was getting to play with it. His fascination for fine dry soil started a dirt-kicking phase. It all began when he followed me under the slat-covered porch one day to clean out all the debris that…
-
A Horseshoe Takes the Cake
In honor of our wedding anniversary this week, I decided to share a wedding story. When I tell people about the custom-made wedding cake top we had, they have to follow me to the gun cabinet to see it because that’s where it stays now. I wanted something western looking instead of the standard wedding…
-
Planting a Lot of Work
On Saturday June 6th the whole family helped put the garden in. It may sound insane to wait so long to plant a garden but the general rule in the higher elevations of the Black Hills and especially the Custer area, is not to plant anything at least until June first. Late frosts are not…
-
Moving the Heifers
Since my husband and I moved our heifer calves in the fall for the winter months, he’s been planning, worrying and wondering how we’re going to get them loaded to take to summer range. Without having been loaded much, everything we try to get them to do is difficult. Friday, my husband, son and I…
-
Kid Therapy
I’ve been sending my kids to therapy regularly for a long time now. I’ve insisted on it since they were babies. After spending too many consecutive days indoors, my kids will relapse in behavior; a sign that they need some therapy. Like a woman waiting too long before re-dying her hair, their behavior becomes very…
-
Give Me a Line
Of all my husband’s lines, my favorite is the one that pertains to doing laundry. It’s my four-strand Binford clothes line that he made for me. I consider myself somewhat of an expert on line-drying clothes. Years of learning my lesson the hard way with clotheslines have helped to develop the line-drying criteria and etiquette…
-
Moving Cows to Summer Range
Sunday was a long day at our place. The whole family saddled up to move cows onto summer range. My husband and son rode off in one direction and my daughter and I headed in another to get cows gathered up and we all met with everything we gathered up at the pasture’s water tanks…