May 8-20

Day 455-468
The irony of life shows up once in a while to keep everyone humble, I think. Last Saturday the boys were out to farm, and they were brave enough to let their Dad drive the car. Now how about that? I wouldn't have done that yet, but they were willing to have a go, and said they were brave enough. That was how I felt about teaching the kids to drive!
We are putting seeds in the ground and running into the usual break downs, and glitches, but all in all, it is going quite well. The weather is always a factor, and some inexperience is slowing up the procedure, but it is OK. On Friday I was helping Chris load the seeder, and his comment was that it felt good to be doing it, he missed farming last year. I was worried that Glenn would feel frustrated about not being able to get in and do it, but he is OK with being the consultant for now. He is getting tanned, and I see him standing up at the implements to see what is going on. We had a head scratching session on Sunday with Dale. He was going to spray, and it gave trouble. We couldn't figure out what was wrong. We cleaned the filter, and he said it was full of minnows. Hmmm.... that's not right. The pond filter had a hole in the bottom, and sucked a bunch in. He cleaned that out, but still couldn't get the right pressure to spray. What the heck... I took Glenn out to the field, and we scratched our heads, opened and closed valves, cleaned the filter again, and still nothing. Finally, Glenn says, "Bring me a nozzle." We had the wrong size nozzle up, so we changed them and away Dale went. Man, what a day!
Jackie and Johnny came on Sunday too, and helped clear the garden. I don't know how it will go, but we needed to beat back some of the weeds anyway. My new weed whacker couldn't handle the bigger stuff, so Johnny grabbed my old scythe, and proceeded to clear it out. I couldn't believe he would actually know how to use it, and the second thing was that the scythe would actually still cut anything. Anyway, they got through the jungle, and I got the lawn mower started and hooked up to the yard sprayer. We got it sprayed and will have it tilled on the weekend. Then we can decide if it is in shape for gardening or if we should just summerfallow this year. It was a busy weekend.
People are happy to hear that Glenn is so interested in the happenings on the farm. He is still pretty limited, but man, I can see him making tremendous effort, and it is good for his head to think about all the stuff the boys are asking him about. I have a hard time remembering to get him to exercise, but he gets a workout anyway. His speech is getting better, but he needs to speak slowly, and when he has something to say he just goes. Unfortunately, we usually have to get him to start again, but that is happening less often too. Some of that also depends on how tired you are when he starts talking. The more tired I am, the less I can understand him the first time. We are also not using the feeding tube any more. I don't know when the doctor will take it out, but he is doing well without the supplement. He is still a bit slow when he eats, and when there are distractions he has more trouble, but if it's just us, he almost keeps up to me.
We took Shirley out for supper on her birthday, and Glenn had a veal cutlet meal. He pretty well cleaned his plate. I would really like to get him out more now, so when seeding is over, we will probably go to visit people more.
Well, I'm sure I've forgotten something, but am at work, so I really should go.
'Til next time,
Louise