What's been happening!

Needless to say, a lot's been happening around here since we last updated in March! That would be the reason for not updating! ;)

To cover it all: God is gracious and good, we are blessed in FAR too many ways to even remember, we have waaay too much fun and adventure together and we're thankful for every moment together!

Now, for more details.

April

We got a 20x40' high tunnel greenhouse the first week of April. We conquered the adventure of assembly by ourselves with prayer.

We had a freak wind storm with 80+ mph winds.

We lost the greenhouse.

We definitely see God's hand in it all! The tomatoes, peppers, and okra that we'd planted in the greenhouse are ALL still there and thriving!

And what a blessing they are! Using our fresh bell peppers and tomatoes I made the best omelets I have ever tasted the other day. I'm not boasting on me, I said they tasted good, that's the Creator's doing, I didn't say they looked good!

One huge accomplishment was finishing quilting our quilt!

Now I need to put the edging on, but I lack motivation there because I'm not sure how to do the corners.

Some dear friends of ours gave us their old riding lawn mower! That's been a real blessing! My Beloved loves to have a healthy good looking lawn and it's been much nicer for him to have the riding mower instead of a push mower. It's been great to have and has brought tons of laughs and adventures, because sometimes it a little stubborn while turning!

May

My sister and I spent the day with our good friends Christine and Karen. David had meetings so we went to the mall and walked around, had lunch, and caught up on all of life's adventures! It was a blessing to get to spend that time together!!!

We've done lots of work in the garden and are praising the Lord for the harvest. Our sugar snap peas did excellently. We've also planted lots of new trees. It is so delightful to work together on the land the Lord has given us to "dress and to keep", Gen 2:15. We're very thankful for the wisdom passed down to us from friends, like Mr. Morris. We know we're doing well when we can keep up with him, at least in planting times! My diligent and driven darling is very thorough in researching all kinds of information (about everything!) concerning gardening. He is quite knowledgeable on gardening so I love learning from him and laboring together to optimize the whole works!

I turned one year older in May, and my precious Beloved made my birthday very special and memorable! He has such a servants heart and I am so honored and blessed to be his bride!!! We love and treasure each other so much! And my family had a fun party and our friends the Wilsons made the occasion very special too!

David caught his first freshwater fish!!! :)

He caught several others that evening too!

We helped our neighbors butcher some chickens again!

It was very fun working together! David is a hoot with the chickens! He gets 'em all relaxed and ready. :)>

On Memorial Day weekend we were able to have our friends the Wilson's spend the night with us! They've been very hospitable to us and we've spent quite a few nights in their home, so it was fun to get to return the blessing!

My Uncle, Aunt, and brand new VERY FIRST cousin visited from California for Mother's Day! It was really great to get to spend time with them and with the rest of the family!

Dad, Mom, and their first nephew Austin. They'll be great grandparents someday!!!

June

Gardening, gardening, gardening. We've been doing lots of that. My dear family came out one evening for supper and bean picking!

We had a ton of green beans and were very thankful for their help in the harvest! We also had a lot of fun working together!!!

Enough green beans were picked to send a grocery sack full home with them and still have enough to can (for the first time! and with the canner provided by God through David's oldest sister and her husband) 9 quarts!

Although that's minuscule compared to our neighbors sixty something quarts, we were delighted to have any green beans at all! We have also had the opportunity to share a booth at our local farmer's market with our neighbors!

That's been a lot of fun! David even brought one of our Cayuga ducks the first Saturday!

Folks sure enjoyed that!

We got another set of chicks to replace the ones that we purchased in February because they were all eaten by predators. We've been feeding these sea minerals and they are doing incredibly well!!! They're maturing quickly and have had no problems like sticky bum or bleeding when they molt and get their feathers so they're not picking on each other as much! It's been a blessing! My creative husband designed and welded an electric chicken house for them.

The house can be electrified without harming the chickens because they will never be grounded. A chicken will jump into the house, avoiding all grounding, where as a predator will step one foot at a time up into the house while being grounded by his other feet. ZAP! Predator is scared out of his fur and the chickens are alive to lay eggs etc.!

July

A Watusi cow joined the farm for 6 days! She showed up in the pen with Annabelle, eating our sea minerals and enjoying the company.

After searching for her owner to no avail, they found us and tried to load her up and take her home. It didn't work. She's now roaming the neighboring 134 acres.

David and I tried to herd her back into our fences but that didn't work. It was totally worth the effort though, as we two lovebirds got to go back to the spot overlooking our homestead where we got engaged 2years and 2months ago to that very day!

We celebrated the 4th with our beloved neighbors and many friends. (click to view the whole group.)

My frugal and visionary husband did the calculations to determine that $1 can buy you a piece of land roughly the size of a dining room table(seating 8+) at $1500 an acre. Because of this practical mental picture, we've been having fun teasing about how much land you drink when you get a coke etc. So, because of this, it was decided between our neighbors and ourselves that we would not waste the money God had entrusted to us on fireworks.

When one has a vision of things to accomplish, it makes "sacrifices" such as that something to have great joy in. But, (you knew that was coming) we did decide to buy ONE firework, at half price, making it about $o.47 per person. It was the best firework we'd seen all evening! :) We have since determined that we will only purchase gun powder type fireworks for wedding celebrations and we'll partake of the non-gunpowder type daily as we enjoy loving each other through life! ;)

Blackberry picking is upon us. My folks have a "secret" spot that we went to last year and got a ton blackberries (and scratches!)!

So, we've been making plans to go again this year and reap the bounty! Lord willing, we should be able to get three good pickings off of this one spot. And we're looking forward to it! It's amazing to see how the Lord has made the ground to bring forth fruit for us to utilize. One little piece of land can produce so much if well tended! "(15) And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it... (18)And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him..." Genesis 2:15,18

The Lord has definitely been blessing David's work! It's amazing how the Lord provides! Thank you to everyone who has been praying for that! I'm very blessed to have such a diligent and hard working husband, be it work on the farm or web design!

I guess another thing that we've been up to is volleyball! Lots and lots of it! I love watching David play! He's amazing out there! On some occasions I'll look over at him and he's suddenly flying about 4ft. off the ground! That's my Man!!!

There's a whole lot I've missed,but you can see a few more of our adventures on our neighbor's blog. They've been such a blessing to us opening their home to us and taking us under wing! We're "The Neighbor Kids". We have SO much "Good Godly Fun" and Adventures with them!

I guess that's about it, except for the BEST and MOST exciting news that we have saved for last. There's a billion different ways to say it, but I guess the simplest and best is to say that...

The LORD has richly blessed us and we are expecting our first precious baby, due in December!

We are so thankful and excited! Our family is definitely excited about it too! We're roughly 20weeks along and everything is going just fine! And before you ask, we're not "opening our presents before Christmas" and finding our if it's a boy or girl. It's way more fun and adventuresome to wait til he/she is out to find out!!!

"And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." Genesis 1:28

You can look at this picture to prepare yourself for Decemeber! Hehehe. It's our nephew Micah.

"The LORD has done great things for us; whereof we are glad."

Psalm 126:3

Any photos with bright crips colors or that are of the two of us are taken by a Morris, assumably Anna Morris.

Announcing...

The New Member of the Ahlgren Farm!!!

This update is slightly delayed... by about three weeks! But I only know of one dear person who's missed not having something new to read here (Maybe next time they're anxious for a new post they should write about what they think we've been up to!) ;)> This true tale was mostly finished two weeks ago but the computer crashed, so we lost nearly all that was written, so that was a major set back! I'm also a slow and deliberate writer... I can talk fast, but if I'm writing a story, I don't do it fast!

After making preparations late Friday night...

... at a tad after ten Saturday morning we headed out to procure something that we pray will one day be quite useful on the little homestead the Lord has blessed us with!Following a quick stop for supplies at Atwoods, we headed on out to the middle on nowhere! After a few minutes of driving around the middle of nowhere, we found our destination; a family owned and operated dairy farm! We pulled into the drive, grinned excitedly at each other and hopped out of the truck! My dear husband eventually found the lady (wife of the co-owner) working there and she gingerly pointed to about 10-15 calves in pens over yonder telling us that the weaned calf we came to look at was over there. Moment of silence. My dear husband kindly told her that we have no idea which ones are for sale etc. so she offered to go show us. Thank you!

As we were checking out the calves, there was one big beautiful calf that was out roaming free amongst the others. We asked about her, and the lady told us she was sold, but she got out hopes us for a beauty. While looking the calves over, we kept in mind the advice from our friend Jonathan who has done a lot of livestock judging, he said he hadn't judged dairy cattle, but to make sure they look healthy and agile! After looking at several several Holstein/Jersey crosses and a one sickly full breed, David again asked about the other calf wondering about. As it turns out (blessed Providence!) she wasn't sold, just nearly spoken for! A local man that buys a lot of Holsteins was interested in her. My wise husband later commented that if a "Holstein Man" was interested, than she's what we want!

Our choice was made and we headed back up to the barn to talk with the co-owner (the ladies husband). As we made our way, I murmured to my Beloved that I hoped they didn't tell us, "If you can catch her you can have her!" Once at the barn we haggled out a deal with the co-owner (the ladies husband). You won't believe what her next comment was, "If you can catch her you can have her." Ug. We'd both been feeling somewhat puny and weren't exactly relishing the idea of wrangling a stout looking 5 month old calf! Thankfully, she was kidding! After procuring a tempting bucket of milk and our halter and lead rope, she headed to the battle line!

Here is the calf, the lady, the co-owner (not her husband, hereafter referred to as "old co-owner"), and her husband (young co-owner).

Thus began the "45 Minute Calf Rodeo"! We remained spectators for a while, not wanting to get in the way. But, after getting nowhere for quite some time, David joined the circus! Round and round the little calf would frolic, into one pen then out she'd leap, into an expansive field then back again. I stood back with the owner's three children who were putting on a private circus for me... well, two of them were, the little girl for the most part just stood by sweetly smiling occasionally!

After a while, I tired of the rock and rope throwing exhibitions and sought out a little more excitement! We (My Beloved, the co-owner's wife, the old co-owner, the driver of the milk truck, and me) thought we had the dear little thing caught once; she'd jumped into a pen and got her hind legs caught! The old co-owner grabbed her legs while the co-owner's wife tried to get around front. Well, being the healthy agile calf that she is (thanks Jonathan!) she kicked her way out, gaining her freedom and giving the old co-owner a nice gouge with the fence! Ouch! Finally, the Lord allowed us to maneuver the little darling into a pen with a little shed.

The milk truck driver held a piece of fence to keep the calf in place while the old co-owner got in with her and the young co-owner's wife maneuvered around to get the halter on her! Sweet success! (Thank you Lord!!!)

Next came the long drag to the truck! Hehehe!

Then the trailer shove.

Then the watch-out-for-you-feet tie-up maneuver!
Finished! We were happy, but the calf...

After another stop at Atwoods and grabbing a quick bite at Braum's (the drive through ladies loved the little calf! Hehe!) we were on our way home, with her rocking the truck and trailer the whole way!

Once home, we drove into the pen and excitedly got to work. We tied a rope to a tree in the middle of the pen to tie her up to because we really didn't want to risk a repeat of the morning with only the two of us!

"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." (Gen1:26) After getting her out of the trailer (a little test to see who was going to have dominion over who!) we just loved on her, drug her around a little more, showed her the food and water and tried to get her used to us and our leading.

Here she is getting her first whiff of the electric fence!

After a while she started warming up to us quite nicely! The next day she did even better and started to do much better with us leading her. She even had visitors her second day and she did very with them, even with their shooting,oh she flinched a little, but eventually got used to it!

Since then, we no longer have the camera, so there are no pictures :(, but the calf is doing WONDERFULLY well! Praise God! She's SOOOOO cute and we love her a lot! She eats out of our hands, is easy to lead, follows us around, chases us (playfully, not maliciously like some people's cattle), follows us to the gate when we leave or go get the mail, moos at us when we walk away from her and is just so delightfully fun! It's great to hear a cow on the farm, and seeing her, oh! what a pretty sight! We're very thankful for the Lord's provision of her!

"And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him."(Gen2:20) That last part is where I come in!!! My sweet husband has declared that he will name all of the children and all of the animals, but, God has given me to my Beloved as a helpmeet! ;) Anyway.. the calf's name is...

ANNABELL MOOVETTE ADVENTURE AHLGREN

It's a long story. But that's what it is and there's no way it could ever be anything else! ;)> Most of it was of our (my Beloved's!) invention but then another part is from the help of our neighbors derived from their nicknames for my Beloved and me, Maverick and Mavette (female version of Maverick)! For the record, we only call her Annabelle, and my dear husband says she came running to him this morning when he called for her! Of course, it was time for her breakfast, but we think she is recognizing her name, at least a little!

We pray that the Lord will give us wisdom in raising her, and that she will be healthy and someday give us a calf (for meat) and lots of milk for all kinds of good things! "And for the abundance of milk, that they shall give, he shall eat butter: for butter and honey shall everyone eat, which is left within the land." (Is7:22) Lord willing, we might have some cheese someday too!