Training

Just a bit of a visual to describe what's going on in our household these days. Germs and funny stories ("Eck deid meent pee on de camino [the area rug with roads painted on it] parkje!") abound.

Anna at one

Anna turned one year old this week (on the 22nd). This post will be a bit of a photo dump, as they say, of what she's up to at this stage in her busy life.

A few highlights in words as well:

Eating: Pretty much everything, but especially loves cheese. She also drinks mama milk 4-5 times a day and nothing during the night (hooray!). She's pretty small, but at 10 months she was at least on the height/weight chart for her age.

Sleeping: From 7.30pm to 6am quite well, usually a nap from 9.00am to 10.15 or 10.30, and if we're lucky, another half or one hour in the early afternoon. Altogether we're quite relieved that she sleeps so well - the early months didn't suggest it would turn out this way! The photo above shows Anna with her birthday quilt from Oma Harder (idea comes from here).

Movement: Anna is one fast and efficient crawler, as well as "walker" while holding on to something (like a table, couch, chair, etc). She, however, wants to go much faster and further, so we end up being her mule for much of the day. Lately she's tested balancing just on her own feet and even taking a step or two before collapsing in a heap of excitement.

Voice: The new favorite form of communication is screeching - out of excitement, indignation, boredom, you're-forgetting-about-me-for-two-seconds-fear, and other. Anna is very, very vocal. She makes animal sounds/squeeks when she sees one of the barn cats or any animal in a book.

Sibling: Jonathan and Anna often play very well, very amusingly together. They are close enough in age (19 months apart) to have similar play interests even now: hide and seek, wrestling, pulling off each others' socks, rolling around, and pushing toy tractors. And then their similar interests become a problem, since J. inevitably wants, no, needs exactly what Anna has. Up until now he could usually get it with impunity (unless Mama Bear was around), but just this week Anna bit him in response. It was darkly amusing to witness. Jonathan is still the one person with whom Anna will easily pull out her belly laugh, in response to just about anything he does, especially if he's throwing something.

   

Play: Anna doesn't have much fear when it comes to getting up on things (like the trike), and loves to be in motion....

...or figuring out how it works.

The leaves have been an exciting play thing this fall for the kids,

as are clothes pins.

When tomato season was in full swing, Anna and Jonathan would both eat half of the picked tomatoes before I could bring them inside. Recently Anna found some in the fridge door and attacked it.

Here is Oma with Anna's birthday quilt.

Anna loves to look at picture books - much earlier than Jonathan did. Here she's wearing her beautiful sweater made by Barbara Nelson Gingerich.

The book under examination is a Bible story book in Low German, which was a gift from Helga Fehr and family in Bolivia.

At the piano. And when she's at the piano, no one else is allowed to touch the keys.

And here are a few of my favorite photos from cleaning up leaves one beautiful fall afternoon.

(the Gator belongs to the folks whose yard we're renting - we're that lucky!)

Birthday party

Hard as it is to imagine, our little baby is going to be one year old next week! We were lucky enough to have both sets of (her) grandparents close by, and so celebrated Anna's birthday on Sunday. Here are a few photos from the special day.

Anna is a worker, always wanting to do something with her hands - take apart, put together, make sounds, etc. She isn't walking yet, but seems to be always standing.

Not the greatest family photo of all time (in fact, might just make it onto this crazy site).

I still can't believe this happened, but Anna got her own full-fledged piece of cake, complete with about 1/2 cup of flaming pink frosting. She can't quite believe, either, that she just ate all that.

Anna has a penchant for lifting her legs rather gracefully from time to time. Had she been born into a Russian family 20 years ago, I'm sure she'd have been put in the Olympic gymnastic or Moscow ballet program. But here she is, destined to be a table-top dancer. Or rather, a farmer. With Grandma Schrock and Opa Harder.

All the attention on Anna (at least for a few moments) was a bit hard on Jonathan. Here he is, coping. With both his and Anna's new 4-wheelers, I might add.

Once done eating, the kiddies moved into the living room, and demonstrated once again how well they do actually play together. For now, Jonathan is usually the antagonist (see evidence above), but we're pretty sure it will become pretty even before too long.

And by the end of a good evening, just plumb tuckered out.

Wisconsin

Last week Ramont's parents arrived from Harrisonburg, VA to spend almost a week with us. The time with them was so good, though a bit too short, in part because we took a road trip in the middle of their visit. For the weekend we drove six hours with them to northern Wisconsin to visit Ramont's grandmother and aunt and uncle. Grandma Schrock will turn 93 the day after our Jonathan turns 3 (in March), and is still living in their original farm house. The photos here show some views of it from a tractor/wagon tour of the farm and woods we took one beautiful, cold autumn morning - led by Ramont's aunt Rita.

Attention Russian Mennonites: does this not look like a scene straight out of And When They Shall Ask?

(whew, no bandits in those woods.)

Finished!

Last week my dad and Ramont finished combining - about a month earlier than usual (thanks to the ongoing drought over much of the U.S.). Overall things went very well, with higher than expected yields, and with little trouble on most of the equipment (the trucks, well, that's another story). The photo above shows the last rows on the last field - beans near Butterfield. If one could zoom in, you would see Opa driving, Oma serving mate, and Jonathan sitting on the floor between them with big eyes taking it all in.


The photos below are in somewhat random order (since it takes so long to get them all how I want them). Here Jonathan logs the miles on his wheels.

My mom and I (and the kids) brought most noon meals out to the field. This was always a highlight of our day, for various reasons. Jonathan was usually too distracted to eat, and usually got at least one round in the combine before going home to a nap with sweet dreams of driving large farm equipment.

Jonathan waits patiently for his ride.

The last field, with three drivers.

Dad, figuring it all out.

Anna also enjoyed all the outdoor time.

I got to take a few loads to the elevator, and luckily didn't get stuck in the cab this year and have to climb out of the window while at the elevator.

A rare terere break on the yard, while combining beans on the home place.

Lunch an a very windy day, near Delft. The van provided a good wind shelter when necessary.

What kept 'em going.

Combining at the home place.

Ramont waits for a fill.

Waiting at the elevator (in the yellow cab truck) east of Mountain Lake.

Making plans.

Jonathan going for a ride with Opa.

And Anna searches the sky for rain.

Harvest has begun (sneak preview)

(In the combine with Opa - a daily dream come true.)