After a few requests I have fixed my settings so anyone can leave me a blog comment! I would love to know who is reading especially those popping in from my Facebook link so be sure to sign your name! Happy reading and hopefully you can provide some knowledge and therapy with your comments!

Kory gave Bella a bath last night and we brought her in to snuggle and play in the basement. I was totally prepared to be eaten and have to put her directly back outside...but she was great. She was incredibly gentle and docile. We all snuggled her and she would put her head down on you and fall asleep. The girls love it.

The point is...I hate to admit it, but I really like her. (shhh, don't tell Kory)

On Saturday morning before I left to go show property I saw a guy stop in front of the house and pull way over towards the ditch. I thought he was having trouble so I stood and watched him. He got out of his car and started to walk back up the road in the direction he came from. He walked about 1/8 of a mile and picked something up in the road. I thought it was a dog at first. This guy must have hit a dog, we live in the country and there are loose dogs. As he gets closer to his car I realize he actually has a dead raccoon. WHAT? Why did he pull over? Why is he touching it? Why didn't he chuck it in the ditch? What is he doing with it? Ewe? Ewe? Ewwe?

NO, NO, For sure not, NO-- He clearly won't do that....Ahhh He IS doing that.

He gets the floor mat out of the passengers side of the car--because he cares about keeping his car CLEAN?? Opens the trunk, puts the car mat down and lays the raccoon into he trunk very carefully, touching it with both hands...UGH! I was temped to run out and offer him hand sanitizer, but since he just put a dead animal in his car he clearly would not have appreciated the gesture. I was grossed out to the max. My luck the rabid raccoon would have came alive, ate through the back seat and attacked me. Only in the Ozarks. Can you imagine what this guys wife must have thought? Unless in fact she wanted a Davey the Crockett hat for Christmas??!! Imagine Kory walking into the house with a dead raccoon he grabbed from the road? I would freak. Kory has pulled several "farmer" moments on me, but never the road kill surprise. Don't get any ideas, Love.


I showed a home and this was literally the "rug" in the living room. I am not kidding. I took this picture with my phone.


The point is...Normal feel better and better each day!

Summer has officially declared fall her favorite season. She is clearly in heaven. I caught her sleeping in the yard today several times and was slightly jealous that she was sleeping so peaceful and I was working.

While she is not running the farm, chasing her tail, or on patrol she makes quite an impressive leaf bed. She carefully nudges the leaves with her nose and digs down into the pile until she settles on the perfect spot. The cool autumn wind was blowing today, but the sun was shining enough to be 70 and warm in the sun. I considered for a moment sneaking out to lay next to her in the sun...but then I remembered she rolls in poop and decided just to sneak out and grab a few pictures. Ahh, Summer. We share a sort of love/hate relationship.

Love-
She protects the house and makes me feel safer when Korys gone.
She is the best to take camping.
She loves to run with me.
She never runs away and guards the property.
Colorado is her favorite state.
She never chews any thing up.
She seems to really like me and have no idea that I dislike her sometimes.
Is always happy were home!
She is pretty cute, I mean really.

Hate-
She rolls in poop and occasionally eats it. Who taught her that?
She stinks, even 30 seconds after a bath.
She sheds.
She slobbers.
Ticks and other bugs LOVE her.
She rolls in any mud pie or sink hole pond she can find...adding to her stench.
She nudges your leg leaving slobbery goo behind.

The point is...Its like children, I think God made them so cute on purpose--so we love them even though they drive us half mad sometimes!

• Starting Friday night
  
• 7 pm James River Womens Party (BINGO! It's a skill)
• 8 pm Kory lands and heads to church to pick up the ladies
• 10 pm family Wii time playing Mario Galaxy ( I am beginning to loath this game)
• 12:30 pm tried to conquer the Galaxy..gave up ( I officially loath this game)
• 6 am wake up call to prepare paperwork for 8am meeting
• 8 am meeting at Panera Bread to buy another duplex off Republic in SW Springfield
• 10 am a happy family moved to N. Carolina without the burden of this duplex on them
• 10:05 one step closer to where ever it is we are going I am sure!
  
• 11am I Drop Madie at Lighthouse Lanes Bowling for a birthday party
• 11:30 am meet clients to show them a house for the 3rd time
• 12:45 pm realize this is going to be a long day and call to have Kory pick Madie up
  
• 1:00 pm Kory picks Madie up at bowling alley
• 1:10 pm Kory and girls go to Kentwood a vacant property of ours to check on it
• 1:12 pm Kory steps into some sort of flea nest in yard and gets a million fleas all over him
• 1:12 pm Kory starts taking his clothes off in the driveway of Kentwood
• 1:12 pm Kory starts dancing a new jig half naked in driveway
• 1:12 pm this is very entertaining to the girls who are in the car thankfully
  
• 1:25 pm Kory takes long hot shower back at the barnhouse
• 3:25 pm I finally leave property with clients to go back to my office to write a contract!!
• 4:00 pm realize the online Real Estate site is down and will have to write it all by hand
• 4:05 pm stop crying and get busy writing it all by hand
• 5:30 pm clients sign offer and they leave my office
  
• 8:15 pm leave office after all leg and paperwork is finished
• 8:25 pm arrive home to the crew engrossed in helping Mario save the Galaxy {ugh!}
• 8:30 pm hear the above mentioned flea story and Thanked God it was not me
  
• 8:35 pm ask Kory to demonstrate the flea dance...he refuses
  
• 9:15 pm the sellers Realtor calls to say the offer has been accepted
• 9:16 pm the whole family does the ice cream and cake dance!
• 10 pm still doing house work to the back ground noise of Mario (going crazy...)
  
• 10:15 pm pray with the girls and tuck them in
• 10:45 pm still doing house work...realize I have not seen Kory in a while
• 10:46 pm find Kory sleeping in bed (weird?)
• 11:45 pm head hits pillow thanking God for a successful day of selling and buying a house!
• 6:20 am wake up to prep for Sunday School lesson
• 6:40 am - 7:45 am Chaos
  
• 8:00 am arrive at church
• 8:30 am watch Kory teach and operate in his gift with the Jr High crowd (he's so cute)
• 10 am attend Realife Jr high Service
• 11:30 am attend Big church with kids in tow so they don't have to be in childcare all day
• 12:45 pm families favorite dinner of stake and taters hits table
• 2:15 pm I lay down for a well deserved nap with the window open and fan on (ahhhhhh)
• 3:45 pm up and getting everyone ready to leave for Life Group
• 4:10 pm it dawns on me I have no snack to bring to share....
  
• 4:15 pm settle on 3 bags of microwave popcorn (I can't always be the best snack bringer)
• 4:30 pm Life Group starts and we relax and enjoy the company
• 7:15 pm home
• 7:30 pm cheese, crackers and lunch meat for dinner (impressive huh!)
• 8:30 pm celebrate yesterdays victory again with root beer floats (double impressive)
  
• 9:00 pm tuck kids in with the guilty feeling I should have had them in bed an hour ago
• 9:15-11:30 pm catch up on everything from dust bunnies to the new carpool schedule
• 11:30 pm start writing this post even though I should be in bed
• 11:35 pm notice Kory is missing again (did not go looking for him this time)
  
• 11:45 pm computer crashes and I lose EVERYTHING I've written....
• 11:46 pm after repenting start writing this post again
• 12:11 pm Sunday finished
  

The point is...Looking at this on paper----No wonder I feel like a wet noodle most of the time.

My girlfriend Heather has a slight obsession with her bird and hummingbird feeders. She even subscribes to Birds and Blooms. Well I have mocked her, pointed and laughed, even chanted the occasional... crazy bird lady in her direction. The time has come to eat crow (no offense to crows) and apologize.
Until a few days ago I had no idea how lovely bird watching could be. We were at Heather's house for dinner and the beauty of the dozen or so hummingbirds we saw completely convinced me that I needed to be the next bird lady and get some feeders.
We put up two regular seed feeders and just got our hummingbird feeder up on Tuesday. Apparently if you feed them they will come! We have been discovered! They come by 2's and even sometimes 3's. It is very exciting to sit really still on the couch and be so close to them buzzing around right outside the window. This hummingbird guy even posed for a few pictures! He has a really pretty bright red throat.



The point is...The BarnHouse is host to more of God's creatures than I would sometimes like to admit. We have seen snakes, lizards, giant spiders, wild turkeys, deer, armadillo, raccoon, random dogs and cats, possums, geese, turtles, nasty killer man eating mosquitoes, stinky gerbils, frogs, and all the other "normal" yard animals. No one will even notice the bird migration into our yard!

Madie: Come quick Mom I found something.

Me: Madie get away from that dog poop.

Madie: Mom!!!...the poop is moving!

Our passion for all things gross and slimy has brought us to discover a new species of snail. As far as I can tell this is an undiscovered morphing HUGE snail.
Kory was taking the rugged mountain path to whom no one in the world knows where and we found this hidden lake at the top of a mountain trail. It was one of those paths that no one finds or dare travel, but we charged on even though my inner voice was screaming--DANGER bears ahead.
On our hike we did not meet any bears, but the killer huge snails were everywhere. They were as long or longer than Madie's foot and as big around as a brat. We discovered green ones, black ones and even green ones with black spots--or were they black ones with green spots? It was a great find and the girls LOVED them. Maybe even the highlight of our trip!

The point is...In a rare Survivor Man moment I did pick one up to take a nibble! Anything for the shot right?

Do you have any clue how much I love to talk? Well if you do, then you will have some inkling of how hard this little Meme is going to be for me....but I am always up for a challenge, so here goes:

1. Where is your cell phone? hand

2. Your significant other? clouds

3. Your hair? dry

4. Your mother? toofar (thats one word right?)

5. Your father? heaven

6. Your favorite thing? peace

7. Your dream last night? blank

8. Your favorite drink? smoothie

9. Your dream/goal? pursuing

10. The room you’re in? dining

11. Your church? meaningful

12. Your fear? unfounded

13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? serving

14. Where were you last night? barnhouse

15. What you’re not? perfect

16. Muffin? top!

17. One of your wish list items? wisdom

18. Where you grew up? Iowa

19. The last thing you did? dishwasher

20. What are you wearing? PJs

21. Your TV? AnimalPlanet

22. Your pets? multiplying

23. Your computer? priceless

24. Your life? blessed

25. Your mood? lazy

26. Missing someone? everyday

27. Your car? dirty

28. Something you’re not wearing? make-up

29. Favorite store? bargain

30. Your summer? Non-stop

31. Like(love) someone? absolutely

32. Your favorite color? sunset

33. Last time you laughed so hard you cried? tubing (H!)

34. Last time you cleaned out your fridge? forgettable?

35. Who will repost this? hmmmmmm....

The point is...I feel the almost irresistible urge to clarify a few of these, but I will refrain lest I defeat the purpose of the Meme. Repost on your blog or in an email so I can read your one worders~