Humidity and bawling calves

This is what I know this morning.  In the Christmas hymn “Away in a Manger” where it says, 

The cattle are lowing

The Baby awakes

But little Lord Jesus

No crying He makes… 

The baby didn't cry because his heart stopped beating for a second… like last night when a cow somehow got past the fences and got up next to the wall beside where I was sound asleep and let out a cry that lifted me at least a foot off the bed!  

The video below is what I hear each morning.  The cowboys load up food pellets that have minerals and stuff in them and go for a drive.  They make this sound and the cows all come a running!

The second video is on my walk this morning, about a 1/2 mile from my house (I'm across from the trailer in the distance).  Listen to the cattle!  Cattle + Full Moon = little sleep!  In spite of all of this I have enjoyed each new experience.

YEP.  It happened.  This morning at 6:29am, I asked my phone what the humidity was and got this back.  "What does that even mean?" Wes and I asked each other, puzzled.  Another google search told us that the air can't hold any more moisture... it isn't raining, but it means a bad hair day for sure.

Check out my salt shaker.  The salt is stuck at the bottom! (This morning I noticed that West Jordan was at 80%!) Time to add rice to the salt shaker!

However, the humidity isn't all that bad ... I haven't used chapstick, saline or eye drops since I got here, and my skin has never looked better! The grass is still green as green and there are creeks and lakes everywhere.  The only thing missing are the mountains.

Fall

Although the grass is still way green and temps are in the upper 90's, there are signs of Fall in the air.  But you don't want to stop an pick a bouquet (like one elder did) for your wife.  They were full of ticks!

Bugs

We have a regular exterminator, so we rarely ever see bugs inside our house.  But outside my backdoor I saw this! I put a quarter there for perspective.  Was that ugly brown bug devouring that large winged insect?  No.  Google lens explained that in was a cicada shedding it's skin!  Wow!

Cows

In July we shipped cows to the feed lots, and August means we get calves from Florida (about 9000 of them).  They come in daily by the semi full.  They are old enough (they don't even look like calves) to be separated.  But they aren't happy about it.  So they do a lot of bawling.  This is what is sounded like last night at bedtime (below).

When a new load of calves arrived, I watched a half dozen cows come running.  They ran alongside the semi trailer, looking up at the calves.  They are playful, intelligent, and highly social animals.  Research done by Krista McLennan of Northampton University indicates that cows do indeed have “best friends.”

After the calves arrived, Dale Richardson (one of the cowboys) moves slowly in their pen, trying to settle them and let them get used to him.  He takes one step forward, waits, then steps one back.  A few more steps forward slowly, pauses and then steps back. The ranch insists on kindness to the animals.  

FENCES:

The work on the fences continues day by day.  Beneath all that green grass is hard limestone, so they have to use the John Deer jack hammer to chop it out.  Afterwards the elders weld the pipe and finally it gets paint.  The rest of the elders (including Elder Himle) finished the barn up, with down spouts, etc. The ranch manager told us that he will take all the missionaries he can get, as they fix things up and make things much better.  He would like to "get one missionary per acre".  Some are serving 23 months, some 18 months, some 12 months and some (like us) six months.

Sister Massey shows just how high the grass is in places.  Isn't that crazy?  We received farm fresh eggs from the The Dale and Kellie Richardson (neighbors) this week.  The sister's made rice bags to give away, delivered quilts to Youth Protection Services and Birthright, worked at the produce truck, and in the library (taking photos of obituaries to upload to findagrave).

One of the cattle shoots wouldn't open (and we were getting calves) so Elder Himle and Elder DeLos Reyes helped Elder Johnson (our electrician) troubleshoot and repair the problem.

Elder Himle and Johnson were asked to install a washer and dryer this week.  It was going in one of the hunters houses.  Wes located plumbing lines, while Johnson fished electrical.  At the end of the day, two very tired and happy elders returned home satisfied.

Pawhuska Library

Sister Johnson and I are taping obituaries onto paper and then making copies to preserve the I information.  I have uploaded over 450 obituaries to FindAGrave to date.  I figured I didn't have any relatives out here, but after a prompting I looked one of them up in Family Search and discovered he was my 5th cousin!

Senior Center

I did a presentation at the Senior Citizens Center on the beautiful state of Utah this week.  It reminded me of the vastness and variety and beauty. of our state!!  They loved hearing about it.

INCOMING MISSIONARIES

We also got a new couple from Orem (The Dabbs).  On Monday we cleaned and scoured the place they were moving into.  Clean bath towels were placed in the freshly scrubbed bathroom, kitchen cabinets cleaned out, etc.  They arrived on Tuesday evening.

We all got together for dinner (a few nights) this week. 

It was my turn to submit what we have been doing to the Farmland Reserve Newsletter.  I added pictures and this also:

Ranch 1:1. And lo and behold the elders were commanded to fix the barns, for the elements had played havoc on them and there was much damage and the doors would no longer close and the rains did pour down upon the wood inside and it became rotten.

Ranch 1:2. And the elders reasoned among themselves saying, “We do not know how to build a barn, for there are no barns in the city from whence we came.”

Ranch 1:3. And the elders scratched their heads and their eyes did roll, but they spake amongst themselves saying, “I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded.” And they did repair the barn and the doors and the fences.

Ranch 1:4  And they were commanded to build fences, and to chop the ground and to weld.  And it was said throughout the land that never were fences constructed after such a fine manner.  And the burns on their arms did heal themselves quickly from the sparks of their torch.

Ranch 1:5. And the women did also toil and labor in the Sooner vineyard, each using the talents which God had given them.  And some did paint, or minister to others.  Some did create beautiful quilts which were pleasing to the eye.  Others did make rice bags.  Massive amounts of records and hundreds of obituaries went up to the cloud (FindAGrave and FamilySearch), that lives on both sides of the grave might be blessed.  

Ranch 1:6. And there was joy in the Kingdom of Sooner for the sisters and elders did pray for each others success daily and refrain from cussing.  And though they were wet and filthy and fatigued, they did diligently continue the work one day after the next.  And there was joy.

The END

IF you have read the far, you are probably exhausted now.  I will end with this, which my sister in law Barb has in her house.

Senior NINJA WARRIORS!!!

American Ninja Warrior features hundreds of competitors attempting to complete series of obstacle courses of increasing difficulty in various cities across the United States, in hopes of advancing to the national finals on the Las Vegas Strip and becoming the season's "American Ninja Warrior.

The Senior Ninja Warriors feature thousands of senior missionaries attempting to complete a series of tasks of increasing difficulty in various missions across the church, in hopes of advancing and blessing the lives of others and becoming the best Senior Ninja missionary possible! 

We had a lot to do this week.  The sister's started painting succor rod fences on Monday morning.  We did this by dipping our mitts into paint and then coating the fence surface grey.  Part of the project required us to wade through deep grass, as we worked to cover every part of the fence (post, conjunction, rods).  There was a lot of fence and each time we were blessed with a breeze, we lifted our heads and thanked the Lord.  We began around 6:30a.m. and finished up around 10:00am.  Hot and sweaty, I wiped the paint from my arms and could hear my mother saying,  "Many hands make light work".

The elders have just about finished up the barn, sealed all the holes in the roof and built another huge door and put it on rollers.  The inside has been transformed, they put angle iron around each pillar and cemented around where the pillars had rotted out.  You can see where they replaced rotted wood by the lighter color in the rafters.  Then they used a tractor to grade the floor.  

Our next task (for the sisters) was to clean the Hunter's Lodge and fix it up a bit.  Sounds simple enough, right?  Not so!  The lodge had three bathrooms and I was charged with cleaning the worst one.  The rusty ring around the back of this toilet shows the color of the tub and toilet bowl.  Hard water stained and rusty, required me to use feet (shoes) in the tub and used my larger muscle group to scrub (and scrub and scrub). A pumice stone in the toilet bowl worked wonders (don't worry, I was wearing gloves).  In the end I was victorious over the rust! (A true Warrior, showing courage in the face of thick, stubborn rust deposits that have probably been there for decades!)

Only a small amount of rust remains on the wall and around the drain (my legs didn't reach that high). We hung curtains, scrubbed out the kitchen vacuumed and decorated (and the elders helped us on the hard stuff)

One of the biggest challenges this week for Elder Himle was removing the bark from the pillars on this porch (the insects were burrowing into it).  Getting the bark off was no easy task.  He came home with sawdust crusted arms (sweat + dust = near cement).  I suggested that he go outside and brush off and he informed me that it wasn't coming off... so off to the shower!

Varnishing is all that is left to complete.

We served at Christ's cupboard (distributing food to the needy) two mornings this week. One of the sisters gave swimming lessons to the McClain girls (who up to now were terrified of water).  The girls are no longer afraid.  So service looks different from one person to another.

A pastor invited us to sing at his church with his congregation last night and enjoy pot luck afterwards).   None of us-- and I mean none of us are stellar singers, but the significance of being invited was humbling and we are looking forward to getting to know a few in the community.  I took this small video (after noticing others in their congregation doing the same).

In two weeks, one of the couples return home to Pocatello Idaho.  We will miss them.  Another couple is coming in a few days.  So on Monday we sisters will clean the hunters lodge (where the new couple will stay) until their new place is vacated.

Signs

I've talked about signs before, and here are a few more that I took from my car.

Coming Up

In September, Dave Anderson is coming up and will sing and entertain on three separate nights for the Cedar Vale Kansas community (night one), the cowboys and friends in the community on the other nights.  We are excited and looking forward to giving back through this friend of one of the missionary couples.  So many different ways to serve!

God comforts and blesses me daily through the creation.  I love him and I know he is aware of me!

 

Library, Rhee Drummond Lodge, visitors and the Celestial Barn

Wind and water are hard on things out here. Elder Himle, De Los Reyes and Runnells have spent weeks shoring up a barn just outside of Pawhuska. (and literally saving it from falling down). Elder Johnson is trying to figure out why the electrical isn't working.  He took one of the light receptacles down and discovered that the mud daubers had completely filled it with mud which shorted out the electrical! He had to pull new wire!  

While the elders fixed the roof, the sisters painted the stalls, leaving our houses at 6:00am so we could beat the heat. Ten gallons later we completed what we affectionately call our "Celestial Barn"... after all, the profits for the ranch are used to build temples.

This is a before picture

This is after scraping and still painting

Plenty of things besides Mud daubers around!

Wes and Jose prepare to hang a door. Below is a mud dauber nest.

The sisters got pretty creative and this is how sister Runnells handled protecting her shoes.

Our kids surprised us on the way home from Palmyra and Nauvoo and we got to spend one blissful day with them.  We took them to the Tall Grass Prairie and saw thousand of bison, then bought and sampled delicious pastries at the Pioneer Mercantile, and finally went to Rhee Drummonds Lodge.

There were a few questions while the grandkids were here, like "Grandma, which hot is hot!"

How the bathroom looks in a missionary apartment! The youngest asked me why I wasn't using my master bath. I told her that this WAS the only bath.

Swinging bridge (below).  Our grandson Porter towers above us!  How could he grow so fast in just 3 months!?

We loved the entertainment!

Arm wrestling with grandpa

Bareback riding on the front

Touring the Drummond Lodge

At the Drummond lodge (10 miles from where we live) we were invited to snoop and peak-- so we did.  We snooped all the drawers and closets

Austin pretends to wash his hair. Makelle decided that "making herself at home" probably meant trying the tub out.

Now that is a kitchen!  I don't think you will run out of dishes here!

Plenty of tongs!

Wes and granddaughter Kaitlyn on the deck, which had a beautiful view

People lounging and enjoying the view

Wes, Partrick, Kaitlyn Makelle and Shannon

View from the deck

Sister Johnson and I will be photographing and uploading obituaries (that start in the 1960's) to Find A Grave going forward.  The librarian welcomes our services and can't say enough about us.  This wasn't always the case as people around here had bad impressions about what "Mormons" were.  Slowly, opinions are changing.

Shidler Cemetery monuments are different than what we normally see at home 

Baby Turkey vulture in the airplane hanger near our home (the tiny dot on the left is its eye)
Large milkweed bugs on a pod (above) and a rabid Wolf Spider (below) Which doesn't bite and is named for the erratic way it runs.  Very respectable in size.