Halloween Flashback

I suppose since Halloween was last week I had better share our trick or treat stories before they go out of style.

While at home, the girls took off Sunday afternoon for "The Great Pumpkin Patch" in a neighboring town. Needless to say, we were a little disappointed in its greatness. We really didn't need to buy pumpkins since my parents have their own pumpkin patch and it had been picked clean of the miniature pumpkins, squash, indian corn, popcorn, and of course the gigantic pumpkins we could hardly lift.


Maddy's pumpkin she picked out at Grandma's

But, the Great Pumpkin Patch promised a petting zoo, train rides, maze, haunted house, and more. Well, we were more than disappointed. The train wasn't working and the petting zoo consisted of 2 alpacas, a pony, 3 goats, 2 rabbits, 6 ducks, and a some turkeys. We did get to check some pumpkins out on hayracks and catch a few cute snapshots of Maddy in a little truck. Did I mention the wind was blowing 40+ mph. We didn't stay too long.

Looking at the goats
I think next year we'll have to check out the pumpkin patch Jen and family visited. It looks very cool.

Madison helped me carve some pumpkins for Grandma's house Monday night. Later in the week I carved one for Melissa (she's not allowed to use sharp knives anymore)and baby Jackson who's expected around Christmas. I don't think they turned out too bad.

Getting the icky stuff out

Pumpkins for Jackson, Aunt Kelly, and Madison
And last but not least the Halloween costumes -- cutest goes to Madison in her sweet little kitty costume.

Cute little kitty and Grandpa

Shiftwork

2500 hundred acres doesn't get harvested overnight, or in a week or in even two. It takes time...and that's if everything goes your way. Mother Nature always seems to think she needs to make her presence known. Break downs will cease all activity. And of course, tractors don't drive themselves (well most don't anyway). It takes a lot of time, people, and effort to run a farm.

For most of the year, my dad takes care of business himself. Throw in the cow-calf operation and he's busy from sun up until sun down. When harvest rolls around, the crew around the Cook Farm drastically increases. And it varies from week to week. Friends, family, and seasonal help all help make sure harvest gets done.

We laugh at home because dad will sit at the kitchen table and scratch out who's going to be there the next day along with what they're going to be doing. I wish I would have gotten a photo or two of one of these lists. There's no replicating the real thing but they'd go something like this:

Dave
Doug-S
Ron-C
Kelly-C
Darryl-H
Nathan-M
Steve-T

Doesn't it kind of remind you of a batting order? And then there's the positions. Only Dad knows that those mean - Semi at home, combine, cart, Hilldale semi, Milledgeville semi, turbo-till. You don't want to be at the end of the batting order - you might get stuck with a crappy job.

We were pretty lucky to be at the top of the "batting order". Our "positions" never changed. Of course that meant that Ron spent the better part of 12 hours in the combine each day. Just like shiftwork....

Wordless Wednesday

My Ride

My job during harvest - driving the grain cart. My daylight hours were spent in the cab of this tractor.

It's not a bad job, I must admit. Follow the combine, when they need to unload, you're there and when the grain cart is full, you take it to the semi. Now, I'm not quite the speed racer as described by Farming Fabulously, but I think I do an above average job.

The great thing about my week in the tractor this year -- a new grain cart. Now there was nothing wrong with the old one, but the new one is AWESOME!



What's so darn neat about this grain cart? The video cameras! There are 2 cameras on the cart. One is at the back of the cart so you can see what's behind you. Which isn't entirely necessary when you're in the field, but when we're moving fields, its great to be able to see what's behind you on the road. The second camera is at the top of the auger spout - I can see directly into the semi when unloading. Its a little hard to get a good read on depth, but very fun to use. Not the greatest photos, but you still get the idea.

Back to Champaign

Well, obviously I didn't follow through with my attempt to keep my blog updated daily. The last week and a half flew by and we were VERY busy. There was a lot of time spent in the field, but I was able to sneak away for a trip to "The Great Pumpkin Patch" with Stacy and Maddy, had some Halloween fun and went to 2 baby showers this last weekend. There were lots of little things that happened day to day, so I'll try to recap over this next week.