Spring on the Farm

This has been spring break time for the grandchildren, so naturally they have spent it at the farm.  Normally April is the perfect season in Kentucky, but this year it has been winter far longer than we like.  I had high hopes of enjoying the boys' week off of school by spending lots of time in outside activities.  What we actually did was hunt things to do in slowly warming weather. 

We spent one fun afternoon going to the movies.  Who knew it would cost as much as a down payment on a small house to take three boys to an afternoon movie.  Now I remember why I would sneak candy bars and pop corn in my purse when my kids were little.  After that adventure, the cost of buying a movie and having popcorn and a movie at home seemed a cheap way out!  Eventually, the week did turn off pretty and the boys and I were able to have a picnic in the park and attend a local animal park.  So the week for them turned out pretty well.

If you are married to a farmer and you have a cold, wet spring it is not a fun time.  Hubby has a list of things to do that he has literally been working on all winter.  "When the weather breaks", he would mumble in front of the fire, "I need to get the barn painted."  Or, he would mutter while driving to town, "As soon as it dries up some I want to fix the gate in the lower field."  The list is never-ending and always growing.  That's farming.  The jobs are always there.

This week, with daylight savings time in full effect and the days now lasting until bedtime, hubby has been rushing home from work to change to farm clothes and run from one spring chore to another.  Working frantically until dusk (about 8:30-9:00) he struggles to utilize every minute before it gets wet again.  This week with three hungry boys in the house, waiting until 9:00 to eat isn't an option, so I found myself cooking and feeding all night.  All I wanted was for everyone to finally get fed and go to bed so I could.  (I'm not near as spry as I once was and chasing three boys all day wears me out!!)

So, when a friend in town called to say they were initiating the patio with a cook-out, I literally jumped at the idea.  A whole night with adults and maybe even a few adult beverages--count me in!  Saturday arrived and plans were made to drop the kids off at their home before continuing on to the patio party.  I figured with two grown men on the farm and one teenager in the house, I surely could get a bath and get dressed.  I was in the middle of lathering my hair when I heard a disturbance at the door of the bathroom.  Figuring if it was bad enough I would hear more,I hurried on.  When I emerged from the bathroom I was met by three serious and quiet faces, two of them tear streaked.  "What happened", I queried.  Immediate tears flowed.  Oh, Oh, this could be bad. 

"I didn't mean to break it but I had to"  sobbed the littlest one.  "Break what?" I asked. "The little door" he responded, "I had to kick it to get out!"  "Out of where?"  "The trunk."  "What trunk?"  "In the car."  At this point I took a deep breath and lined the two little boys up.  "OK", I said sternly, "How did you get in the trunk and WHY WERE YOU IN THERE!!!"  Grandma's control was cracking a little by then.  It took a few more questions but the story finally was out.  They had noted that I used the dash button to open the trunk to unload our picnic supplies when we got home .  So they used it to open the trunk and then proceeded to crawl in.  (The reasoning on this is still a little vague.)  The older one then pulled the trunk closed.  It wasn't until it latched that they realized they were in the dark and couldn't open the trunk.  That's when they remembered that there was a little door behind the armrest in the back seat that opened into the trunk.  (Two car seats in the back seat with two bored little boys led to the discovery of this about two minutes into their first ride in the new car!)  So they kicked until the door broke open.  The four-year old then crawled through the hole, but the 6-year old wouldn't fit.  So he directed the little one to crawl to the front and punch the button to open the trunk, releasing him.

Thank goodness they knew of this escape hatch.  I shudder to think how long it would have taken us to find them in the garage.  The upside of the adventure is that I had two very chastised and well-behaved little boys for the rest of the evening.

Oh, the patio party. 

Hubby reported that he would be ready to go just as soon as he finished plowing the garden and the neighbor's garden and checking the cows and...........

I called and told them we would be glad to come to the next one, providing it was after the time change and and the onset of freezing weather!!