Baby girls at the Woodin Nickel

May 23 2010 Our new arrivals are PINK!
Lots of new Flowers!
Yesterday in the early morning hours Sugar finally had her foal. She is a beautiful buckskin filly with light colored eyes. We have named her Rose -n- Nickel and call her Rose or Rosy . We have had several visitors to see the new arrival and have loved showing her off. Rose is very calm and will come up to you for a little pet and a love. She loves to lick Stiles hands and makes her Momma a bit crazy, as all children do. She of course was born on the coldest day in all of the month of may and we spent quite a bit of time and effort to get her and her momma moved into the barn and out of the cold wind, rain and snow! Today it was a bit warmer and we let the two of them out on the football field for a chance to enjoy some sunshine and a bit of exercise and fresh grass. Rose immediately took off and ran the length of the football field and her mom was right there with her trying to keep her away from the rest of us.
Today While we were gone to church our White goat named Iris had 2 doe lings! We are so excited to have all these new little girls running around here. We named the baby goats. Jasmine and Daisy. William is thrilled with the baby goats and tries to pick them up like he does the cat. It is great fun just to watch William with the goats. It amazes me how fast those animals are up on their feet and running around. The first few hours on wobbly legs is so precious and fleeting. So now that you have been briefed on the Livestock report I’ll try to fill you in on the rest of things going on around here.
This is the last week of school. And we are all excited. I think that when I pull out my new summer chore list for my kids some of that excitement might die a little. In the mean time I am counting down the days when a 6 am alarm means I am getting up because I WANT to be up that early, not because I HAVE to be up that early. I am anxious for a less structured day and bedtime to be whenever I think it should be a good idea. Ask me again in 3 weeks and school in September will be looking REALLY NICE!
Stiles had a solo in the school music concert. He did very well. There were quite a few youth from our ward who had large parts and I really enjoyed listening to all of them. They all did really well. This week we also had our pack night. It was a talent show. Stiles showed off his plants and told about them. He even threw in some knock knock jokes and funny little puns. Afterwards many people asked if he could come over and plant their gardens for them. Stiles was pleased as could be with himself and his talent. It was fun to see all the other boys show their talents as well.
Marcus continues to amaze me with his new found ability to read and read well. He is reading everything he can get in front of his eyes and I am loving every minute of it.
Erica had kindergarten graduation this week. She received a certificate for completing 1 yr of Kindergarten.( apparently WE enrolled her in a two year program) But she sang the songs well and was So happy that her mom and Grandma were there to watch her. William however was NOT happy about being at the ceremony and was making life very miserable. In fact he has become such an independent little guy Jon and I are in agreement that we would rather take all 5 kids at once over William when it comes to having to try and sit still for longer than 10 minutes. Church is a trading game for us. William gets passed back and forth all through the meeting usually at about 10 minute intervals. Today Jon had him during the sacrament part of the meeting and Will managed to spill two cups of Water all over Jon before Jon was able to take the sacrament. It was NOT a very spiritual experience for Jon. Covered in Water and trying to Hold William while passing the tray to Marcus who is not paying attention at all. We will just say that William likes to go to nursery where He can run and play and be loud. We Love it too.
Wyatt has not made the transition from wiggly inch worm to crawling baby but I am sure that this report will change very soon. We are no Longer nursing and he has definitely plumped up a bit since he is getting more than enough to eat with the formula. Still no sign of sleeping through the night but we wouldn’t expect a restful night for the next decade of our lives anyway.
The snowstorm on Saturday made me very glad that I was feeling sick for most of May and that all of my plants were tucked away in the green house and that I was feeling to crappy to think that it would be a good idea to move them into the garden plot. However I did get the garden all lined out and fenced off so as to keep the chickens out of the Garden and hopefully the kids will not walk on the planting beds and the fence will keep them with in the confines of the garden for longer periods of time when it comes time to pull weeds. When it comes to feeling sick I am felling much better. It took a while though. I was wondering if maybe my gall bladder had died, or maybe I had juiardia, or perhaps an ulcer, I even took TWO Pregnancy tests!( (go ahead and Laugh but they were both negative) But in the end I think that my body has fought off whatever it was that was making me feel rather yucky and gross.
Jon has been up in the night every night for many weeks checking on the pregnant animals in the afore mentioned livestock report. He has been very tired and a bit bellyaching about how hard it is to get up a couple times in the night…….I gave him NO sympathy. NONE NADA ZIP! But you have never seen a more excited guy than Jon is about our new horse. HE is SOOOO tickled Pink! Sometimes I think he is more jazzed about the horse than he was about his own kids but I know that is not true. HE is such a good dad and I am lucky to have him. (whew now maybe I can be a bit off the hook when Fathers day comes around) Wait…I didn’t get anything extra special for Mothers day…I am totally off the hook! Just kidding.

Love Monica and the crazy Monkeys at the Woodin Nickel

the Hoover Dam!

Dear MJ and the rest of my devoted readers (all two of you)!

The OX has finally been pulled out of the mire. The hole were the septic tank is housed is now all buried and the ground is being settled back into place. As I was about to sigh a HUGE sigh of relief I fell very sick and spent 8 days not far from my bathroom extremely grateful that it was now working properly and I could flush, shower and wash when ever fancy struck me. I spent much time in bed and Jon was very supportive and did not mumble about how the maid, cook and nanny had taken a leave of absence without proper notification. I was even sick in bed all day on my birthday. My children informed me on this day that they could not sort their laundry in the downstairs laundry room because there was a large and very dirty puddle in that room. And sure enough the kitchen “stuff” was not making it all the way out of the house by way of the plumbing system. Our Neighbor Jim Sant, came to the rescue…AGAIN. And got rid of the stinky offending water…AGAIN. I guess that was a very nice birthday present. So I THINK that our Mire is now mostly cleaned up and the OX is back in the Pasture…just waiting… to get back into the mire. My experience is that the Ox will get back into the mire just when it really isn’t convenient.
So I had a Birthday. I turned 16. And I laid in bed or was being very friendly with my commode, not to be confused with comrade. At dinner that day which Jon lovingly purchased from Papa Murphys and put in the Oven all by himself…I said “Now that I am 16 and I can date maybe Jon can take me on a few dates.” to which Jon instantly replied “You know the Prophet said that you should only go on group dates and wait until you are older for exclusive one on one dating. So I guess I can’t take you on a date unless it is a group date.” So I suppose that since we are always with a large group I am ALWAYS on a group date!
Wyatt is very close to being purposely mobile. He is up on all fours often and spins circles like a top. He usually is stuck in back-up mode but I can see that he is going to switch gears here soon before I am ready for it and THEN I an in TROUBLE!.
I took Stiles to the Dentist…$$$$$$$$. Yep there goes his mission fund! And the Dentist told me that if I didn’t have a piggy bank to pay the orthodontist I had better get one started. This is the 3rd Dentist to give me such distressing news. So I guess I will try to believe them.
Erica has a tooth that just keeps on hanging on. Jon tried to pull it out but the only results was a screaming daughter and some blood in her mouth. And since the tooth was not fully extracted the promise of ice cream was not brought to a reality. Erica is ready for school to be out. Mostly she is looking forward to the end of school parties. I am looking forward to not needing to do her hair for her every morning. Because of course I never get it how she wanted it done!
Hunter is trying really hard to talk. He is adding about a word a day. The words he is adding are not full of great diction, syntax, and diphthongs. But I have a better idea as to what Hunter is trying to tell me. I have a meeting with the school district at the beginning of next week to start the paperwork process of getting some intervening help. I got his testing scores back from his evaluation and he was in the 1% for every part of speech that you could be in. I just sat there thinking to myself “well I could have told the evaluators that! Then we didn’t have to waste a whole afternoon. If a Kid does not talk at all…doesn’t that mean that everyone else who does talk, talks better than him?” But as Hunter is trying to make Language work for him I am so grateful that it seems like words are beginning to make sense for him. Before it just seemed like he was not making that connection.
William is being much better about staying off of the road. Jon and I still watch him like a hawk though. Will is picking up a few works and is totally adorable when he says “UH-OH” He says this a lot. Like yesterday when I found that he had taken half a pitcher of RED Kool-aid into his bed room where there is White Carpet that I very Recently cleaned and then spilled every last drop of the Cherry flavored drink…Who even manufactures White carpet??? It should only be sold to the people who have been contracted to build temples. It should not be available to the common village idiot! Mom, How soon can I borrow your rug doctor again?
Marcus is shooting up like a weed. I can hardly believe how tall he has got since spring break. His reading skills are awesome too thanks to the teachers at Tyhee. Reading Scriptures with him is very enjoyable now and we can tell that his confidence is growing daily with his reading skills. He use to get so frustrated if he didn’t know a word that he didn’t even want to try. Now I am impressed with the words that are flowing out of his mouth.
The irrigation water is available for our use. We have MANY MANY MANY broken pipes. Something to do with having a Baby right before hunting season and then of course the afore mentioned season did not result in proper winterization of irrigation lines and the Cold Idaho Weather does VERY mean things to such systems. Not to mention the horses can do lots of damage to the lines as well, and I will not rule out my kids as a contributing factor to the amount of repair that needs to be done. One of the first areas of repair that HAD to be addressed was our Head gate. Last year Fort Hall Irrigation District changed the head gate above us and cause much and many issues with the water. Just when we thought we had figured out the precise amount of water we needed then things would get all flooded and wash out, or dry up and stop the pump. We decided that if our Head gate by our pump was in better condition that we would have less stress and mess. We had in place just a dirt dam with a little culvert built in. SO since Jon has a concrete mixer we decided to fix the gate in a very permanent fashion. It felt like we were trying to reconstruct the Hoover Dam! Jon and I worked Hard all day and into the night on Saturday to get it finished before the water came down the canal. Stiles was a great help and worked his little tail off. Then as we were about finished with pouring the cement the cement mixer lid flipped over on top of Stiles and I. I took most of the force on my back but it caught Stiles right across the top of the head. We were very blessed that he was not seriously injured. Jon had his back to us pouring the cement, from buckets that we had been filling, into the forms. The Motor to the mixer was running and it is QUITE LOUD. I had to scream for Jon to look and see the predicament we were in Stiles was laying on the ground holding his head and I was trying for all I was worth to push the cement mixer lid back up off of me. Since there was very little cement left in the mixer I was able to get the lid off of me and get the mixer back upright. Stiles was not bleeding which I am sure was a miracle and as we were checking him over he said “Can I be done now? I just want to go inside!” We told him that yes of course he could be done and yes he could go inside. WE finished our new cement Gate/dam and now just have to finish putting together the rest of the pipes at the pump that we took apart for our dam building project and then many pipes to be fixed are on the to do list.
The Garden has been roto tilled for the second time and We have started to build a fence around it to deter the Chickens from eating anything we decide to plant. I hope to get many seeds in the ground this week. We shall see what really gets accomplished at a later date.
We are still waiting for a baby horse Jon is getting tired of getting up and checking the barn every two hours in the night. I do not feel too much sympathy for him. It has been rare in the past 9 years that I had the privilege of sleeping all through the night. We are also expecting one of the goats to have her Kids anytime too. We think she might have as many as three Kids. The poor goats and The poor horse look so miserable. And with all of the laying Hens running around the yard it is a wonder that the whole place is not dripping with estrogen! Jon goes out to the barn and the Pasture and asks “HOW are all my girls doing?” He has over 60 of them! All different shapes too!
So how does a Duck drown? We found one of our ducks has drowned in the water trough…Now you may say that that sounds like a very dumb duck, but also in the trough was a great big Chicken that has drown also. Our theory is the duck was going for a paddle and the Chicken was stupid and thought perhaps she could do the same thing. Well chickens DO NOT have webbed feet and they do not float. We think that in self preservation that the Chicken tried to get on top of the duck to save itself and drown the duck then drown itself.
Just a few more serious thoughts. Since the Passing of Tyrell and Rose’s little boy, Levi, I think about how we are all tried and tested in so many different ways I reflected quite a bit about how when I have gone through my trials and have felt the strength of others through their prayers offered in my behalf it is truly a humbling experience. As I sat in the church at Levi’s funeral and saw much of the family assembled there and knew of the eternal bonds within our family and I thought about all of the rest of my family and Jon’s family who were not physically with me in that meeting and of their love and support of me and my family, and I was truly humbled again. Forever Families are real. They are so precious and I am so blessed to be part of such a loving family who has great faith and strength. And I want to thank all of you for your love and support of me and my family and for the prayers you have offered in my behalf. They have blessed my life and fortified my faith in such ways that you can never know and I can never express. I only hope that somehow, in some way I can return the favor. This church is true. It is through trials that we grow and find joy in this journey. I know that it is hard and that there are many things I do not understand, but I know that Jesus is my Savior and that President Monsen is His prophet. I know there is real power in prayer.

I love you all!
Love Monica and the rest of the Dam building Woodin nickel dwellers

getting the ox out of the mire

Hello to all of my Family. May 2 2010
I am still band from using MY bathroom all though the two other potties and all other plumbing is not off limits. The Tank has been found and yes it was directly under a huge pine tree. The roots had destroyed the lid to the tank and a new lid still needs to be fashioned on the to do list for this week. The said tank in question had not been pumped in oh EVER. We even called some of the previous owners of the house and learned that they had no idea that there was a second tank underneath that beautiful tree. Hence a need to clean out the drain field pipes. President Loveland was very understanding and asked us not to destroy too much of his grain field. We were treading very lightly and managed to find that the job was not done “according to the law” the first time it was done…no surprises there, we are out in the county… SO we have just about cleared the drain field lines of yucky black stuff and we have big plans to put the drain field back to it’s original state with a bunch more gravel and big promises to pump the tank regularly so as not to have the sludge pile up. It took a bunch of crap for 30+ years… I think once we get it back together and throw the dirt back on it I might enjoy looking out the windows… The guy in our ward who pumped out tanks told us that when he went to dump the stuff at the plant that there were A LOT of toys and asked us if we wanted them back… We said NO THANKS and told him he could keep the toys as a tip…WILLIAM! I think this week we might actually get the ox OUT of the mire! But I am not going to hold my breath.
There is not much more to report on. The woes of our septic system has been heavy on our minds and I am not recalling much other interesting things to tell. However Erica has announced that she is “No longer a Kindergartener.” I confess I was concerned with her declaration seeing how we have decided that it is in her best interests to repeat Kindergarten next year. She then Proclaimed that she “Is a first grader in Training!” What ever makes your boat float kid. I’m happy to go along with it.
We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of a new foal. The Foal was due today and we have been checking the mare every few hours for the past three days. With all of Murphy’s luck that baby horse will want to come at 3 am on the coldest of all the nights we will have this spring… That is what our baby goats did last spring. Coldest night when all of the other nights around it were almost pleasant. But tomorrow is suppose to be a warmer day. Windy but not so rainy and cold.
The cold weather and lack of lots of sunshine has put the plants in my green house in a bit of a slow down mode. They have not grown like crazy this week. But like I said last week if anyone wants a few green plants to start their garden I could make you a sweet deal.
I love you all and miss you more.

Love Monica!