Quinton is three

Mr. Quinton turned three, and has gone from zero to potty trained in less than two weeks. His smile repertoire is quite entertaining.

Thanksgiving 2014

We met with the Tueller side of the family for Thanksgiving in Geneva, Idaho at the Geneva church. It was fun. But then we had two days of stomach issues (the washing machine ran non-stop from 1am to 11am). We decided to spend the down time catching up on the Hobbit movies and reading books. 

The kids table. Chayce and Payge tried to help their younger cousins since their dad had to work that day. At the table, left to right, were Jessie, Chayce, Quinton, Rogan, Payge, and Lizzy.

Payge, with a mischievous look. She has recently confused 'delicious' and 'malicious' , so dinner was malevolent. Matthew is on the end in this picture, but was doing his best to avoid the camera. 

Tried to catch grandpa Tueller playing cards with cousin Lizzy. Grandma Tueller tried to duck out.

Behind Grandpa and Lizzy we were playing Nertz. To the left of my mom are Effie, Amy, Jessica; To her right are Mandi, mom's colleague, and Jillian in the background.

The boys getting ready to go feed the cows, riding the hay wagon behind grandpa's tractor. We had a brief snowball 'fight' - I was really just a target. 

Zachary and Quinton on top of a half ton hay bale. 

The whole crew (Mandi was with us too) on the hay wagon. We drove out into the snow covered field and pushed the hay off. Zachary helped put manageable chunks out for the shorter people to push over the edge to the cows. 

After feeding the cows, Quinton got a ride in the cab to reload the hay wagon. 

After returning from Geneva, and when Zachary was feeling better, we tried a makeshift rocket stove with bricks. We went through three designs and could boil water, but the inconsistency in the brick shape and the holes in the bricks made it difficult to retain heat. I want to try again, but will keep redesigning it in my head at night when I can't get to sleep.

A view from the top of the stove

The front of the rocket stove

I should have started this back in August, or at least September. But I finally got my winter indoor greens going. 

Once getting the children feeling better, Jillian decided it was time to decorate. The children requested the tree be in the living room instead of the entryway. Here is what they came up with.

November 2014

Early November campout with Zachary and my boy scouts. 

After camping, we harvested our carrots.

The lemons are almost ripe

Quinton wanted to climb the mountain, so we walked up to the base (which was enough for him once we got there) and took some pictures.

Lillyth, being cute

Quinton couldn't sit still for a physics demo at USU, so we walked the halls and tested the elevators, and, at one point, put him in this 'jail'.

I rounded up several extra hens from friends would didn't want to take care of their birds who no longer laid and had my scouts over for a lesson on poultry processing. Fortunately, one of the other leaders and his friend were experienced and taught me, and the boys, what they were doing.

Sweet boy

Quinton couldn't find any flowers outside to give his mommy. So he brought her some dry beans that missed being harvested and a sprig of aphid-ridden kale that had been missed by the deer and chickens. Now its snowing. Good bye garden.

Correction: he's not a boy. He's a buh-ihhhhhhhhhhhg boy.

Pumpkin soup

Behavior was getting a little out of control after (not so hallowed)ween. So we promised pumpkin soup (which the children abhor) for getting school work or chores done late. School work was done by 10am, the house is still clean, and Jillian turned the soup into pie. The mild hint of sausage and onions is actually quite good, and the children didn't notice.

October's end

I think this picture is in an earlier post, but for comparison purposes...

...we finish adding sand and climbing holds on walls of three different heights (two on the right of the slide, the largest on the left). I caught the children putting chickens down the slide and forbade them from doing it again. So they would take the chickens to the top, and throw scratch seed at the bottom, tempting the chickens to slide or glide to the bottom of their own volition. It was like they were recreating the garden of Eden, throwing some fruit of the tree at the bottom of the slide.

We harvested the last of our grapes and bottled several quarts of fantastic juice. We worked on the grapes 6-ish weeks later than last year and got much better results.

Little Rosie with grandma Tueller.

Grandpa Tueller and Mr. Q.

We've learned that Egyptian onions establish formidable colonies - we lost a quarter of the soil in this garden box when attempting to move them. Since we had planted around 100 traveling bulbs from the tops of these plants elsewhere, we composted these to reclaim the space in the garden. 

Our purple pod beans were too stringy for eating or canning, so we let them get large and harvested the seed. White chili later this winter?

Zachary, Payge, and I went on a short hike up a draw behind our house. Zachary didn't care to join us up the north wall of the draw where attempted to get some panoramic views of the valley. My camera phone was not up to the task, so I won't post the results here.

Back at the trailhead, about a 1/2 mile from the house (which you can see in the background if you look close)

Finally got rid of that baby scented vaseline we hated but couldn't ever throw away. I made fire starters by melting it in with beeswax collected from our hives and dipped cotton balls in the mix. 

A test found that these will start with a magnesium striker, a though they are not as flammable as vaseline only starters, they burn longer (12+ minutes).  

Monsters, mascots, and Quinton's "House"

This weekend was a fun combination of football, general conference, beekeeping, and building.

Quinton, wearing the mask to Zachary's Halloween costume. This picture does not do it justice, but the curly hair over the creepy mask made him look like a scary clown.

Zachary and his Grandpa Tueller, watching the USU-BYU football game. USU had their first win at BYU since 1978. Aunt Renee helped us aquire the tickets and drove us down after convening at her house with Steve, Cory, and Bradley Tonks. 

Big Blue was hanging out with the USU fans, and we got this shot of Bradley and Zachary with him.

Rosie, sleeping. We have to wrap her up and squeeze while dancing to get her to sleep, other wise she moves too much to fall to sleep. 

We finished the last two retaining walls of our sandbox and have done the initial backfill. Zachary and Payge helped line up, level, and flush the boards, while Quinton handed me screws. Quinton claims that it is "his house" and wanted to know why I neglected to put a door on it. Payge wondered when we would add a roof. Chayce wants the handholds for the climbing wall. Zach wonders where the sand is. I can't wait for it to be a fort for snowball fights. One step at time. 

Zachary and Chayce insisted on sweeping the grass-less area in front. I finally convinced them to stop since I'll be planting grass and need a medium for the seed. 

The work crew showing off their more-finished-than-it-was-last-week project.