Will Work for Food!

Well, it's official...Nicole and I are headed to Kona, Hawaii on January 30th for our first WWOOFing (World Wide Organization of Organic Farming) experience!! We'll be working at Earthly Delights Farm, an 8-acre organic farm with coffee, macadamia nuts, mangoes, bananas, figs, cacao (chocolate), pineapples, guava, avocados, passion fruit, bread fruit, taro, papaya, oranges and lots of greens and herbs from the gardens. We'll be working from 7am to 12:30pm 5 days a week and the rest of the time is ours to explore Hawaii! :) There's a private cabin for us to stay in and free meals. We're super excited to say the least! The things we learn about how to grow our own food and live in a more sustainable way will no doubt be useful for the rest of our lives.

Jobs with little recognition

It has always struck me odd how some of the toughest jobs out there get little to no recognition and pay the least as well. Many times they are shrugged off to those we may label as "uneducated" or "incompetent." Yet if we tried to do the job ourselves I'm afraid in most cases we would find that we couldn't do it half as well, or at all!

Today I'm giving a shout out to truckers. This last week I drove a semi for the first time hauling corn out of the fields. I only drove on the gravel roads for less than 2 miles at a time as I don't have a CDL. I never knew that all truckers without automatic shift without the clutch! This takes quite some skill and I was only dealing with 4 gears...to downshift while coming off the highway or in some of the weather conditions us normal folks wouldn't even want to drive a decked out 4-wheel drive vehicle is impressive to say the least. Here's to you truck driver, thanks for not hitting any of us while doing your job day in and day out! :)

Bbbbbrrrtthhhh

Baby Kirstyn (Kiki) has turned out to be quite the source of entertainment for us. From trying to get on her knees to crawl in her footie pj's but not finding any traction on the slick wood floor and slipping back to her army belly crawl, to her newest thrill of discovering the amazing noises she can make with her lips. Below is a sampling of her post dinner show!

Check out the video here!

http://vimeo.com/30486775

Farming, Woohoo!!

I've finally gotten to start farming! I'm having a blast getting to learn how to drive all the big equipment and learn how, what I call, industrial farming works. I feel like I'm still on vacation :) I spend most of the time driving the tractor with two wagons full of corn or soybeans into town to sell or unloading it at the farm into drying bins. I've gotten to run the combine a bit as well and drive the semi truck in the field. Nicole has gotten to come with me a few times in the tractor though it's not the most enjoyable ride with only one seat! :) The older farmers driving their loads in just look over at the young couple riding together and smile...it's pretty fun experiencing small town Iowa for a bit.

Tractor and wagons in a corn field

Combine unloading corn into the wagons

Combining corn

Professional driver! :)

Emptying the wagons

The travels begin!!

We officially left Utah on August 29th and made our way to Colorado Springs to visit Jonathan's family and meet our newest nephew, Jude Jackson. We also got to stop and have dinner with Bev and Jim, my aunt and uncle in Parker. It was such a treat to see them and enjoy some yummy home made cooking!

We had a wonderful time catching up with Jonathan's family. We enjoyed Liam showing us how high he could jump on the trampoline, hiking, rock climbing and eating delicious food!

Precious baby Jude, born Aug. 13th

Sweet Ana!!

Rock climbing at Garden of the Gods

Jonathan giving us a wave from the top!

Fall in Iowa!

After Colorado, we continued east and remembered why we love living in the west when we hit the heat and humidity of the flat land!! The people we love always make it worth it though. :) We stopped in Basehor, Kansas, to see my friend Heidi and her husband Ron. It was so good to see them! They have since welcomed their first child, Weston Reynold. Congrats!!

We made our way to our current spot, my hometown of New Hampton, Iowa, to spend some time on the farm with my older sister Vicki, her husband Matt and their three girls. My younger sister, Kristin, husband Elijah and their son (soon to be two sons in Dec.) are only 20 minutes away so it's a double bonus! We are having a great time so far! Jonathan is staying busy working in Matt's shop fixing combines and soon will be helping with the fall harvest. It's a lot of long days and hard work but he's adjusting to farm life quite well! My days have been spent running, helping with the kids, visiting my parents in Minnesota, reading and enjoying the peacefulness of the farm.

Here are a few pics as of late:

Mayzie and Landen. They're best buds. :)

Some of the combines Jonathan has been working on!

The beautiful Iowa skyline.

Vicki and Mayzie at a roller skating party!

Maya and Jonathan

The skating rink brought back memories for Vic & I!!

Baby Kirstyn..she is such a joy!!

We'd love to hear the latest and greatest in your lives, so please keep us updated!!

SHE SAID YES!!!

This past weekend, on 10.2.10, something significant, life-altering happened to me...I asked the woman of dreams I wouldn't dare to dream if she wanted to spend the rest of her life with me.

SHE SAID YES!!! and my life changed forever :) :) :)

Nicole and I are getting married!!

Saturday morning 3 of my best dudes and I went to a wholesale flower shop and picked up some gorgeous daisies and purple spider mums.

We drove to Snowbasin ski resort and proceeded up the Gondola to "plant" them at the top. My beautiful fiancé's free-spirit makes it extremely hard for one to plan things she doesn't know about...though this time precious little Georgia played a role ;)

She is the littlest one of the three kids Nicole nanny's for. She got the stomach flu on Thursday and lovingly passed it on to Nicole on Friday. We had planned on hiking to the top of Snowbasin Saturday afternoon (after Sean and I helped Sam plant a ton of flowers around his house...yea, yea, the truth got stretched a bit :). So me and the 3 dudes are on top of the mountain planting away and I get a text from my then girlfriend saying she wasn't feeling well and probably wouldn't be able to hike. I look around at a view from 9000 ft up and wonder what now...kinda hard to figure out a backup plan! Prayer always helps though.

I can't tell you how much He stretched me through this whole process. Everything, I'm telling you, every last detail came together for this to work that week! I didn't even have a ring until Wednesday, but a month before I knew the 2nd was the date. GOD, in His faithfulness, brought everything together perfectly! I knew this would be no different, but knowing it and acting on it are two very different things. I texted everyone asking them to be praying and tried to convince Nicole of resting and coming up later for a drive and maybe a short hike. Being the warrior that she is, just as I was heading home I got a text saying she was on her way!! Excitement is far too weak of a word to describe the feelings swirling around inside me. Having picked up said stomach flu myself on Monday, I am in awe of Nicole's strength and commitment in listening to the small, still voice inside her telling her to go! You are such an inspiration babe!!

We drove the scenic way up to Snowbasin and I suggested we take the Gondola up and hike around the top (it was still a good twenty minute hike to the very top). She welcomed the idea and away we went. Near the top we veered off the trail to a little ledge that showed the glorious mountains all around and a special little spot directly below that said, "Marry Me" surrounded by a heart. Once she put everything together in her head (the not feeling the greatest thing worked out to my advantage) she looked at me and exclaimed, "YES!!" What more could a man wish for!! :) I am naturally a planner and have been trying to work on some more balance in that area of my life and was praying that GOD would give me the words that her heart needed to hear the most in that moment rather than planning a speech out. Turns out I didn't need any words at all :)

We spent the rest of the afternoon on top of the ridge line watching the sunset and celebrating with a little dinner and Reisling...ok so maybe I was only one that got to enjoy the Reisling, sorry babe!

We both agree it was the most perfect day and exactly what it was supposed to be. Thank you GOD, You are amazing!!