I guess we're a real farm now...

...we've got ourselves a tractor!  And a haybine, hay rake and baler.  Let me back up.

When we originally thought of moving from town, owning and keeping up a farm never crossed our minds.  But now since we have about 12 acres of field and sheep that require hay in the winter, it was only natural to think how we might harvest the hay.  So we bought a hay rake.  And then a baler.  And then a haybine.  A little backwards, yes.  And then finally, we bought a tractor.

This particular tractor was in WI, a good 3.5 hr drive from us, and the guy could only meet Matt at 7 pm our time.  This meant Matt would be driving in the dark for a few hours through a stretch of country laden with deer.  So I suggested making a family trip out of it, getting a hotel so the kids could swim and driving back in the morning, with or without the tractor depending on whether it was a good one.  The tractor was a much lower price than others Matt has looked at and he knew if he didn't get there soon it would be snapped up by someone else.

So we got our hotel and the kids had a blast.  Karl learned to jump in without his life jacket on and then swim to the side and Clare jumped in several times and dunked under (a hard thing for her) and she also swam from end to end with no flotation, new skills for both of them.  Lena learned how to flip over onto her back and float (with her puddle jumper on) and Nora learned how to jump in off the side and dunk under.  They all accomplished new things in the water so that alone was worth the hotel.  Swim lessons that might have accomplished less cost twice as much.

The tractor was perfect for us, just a minor issue of power steering that needs fixing.  It came with a loader and brush hog so those were nice bonuses.  But it was very heavy and certainly over the weight limit for our trailer.  So we prayed we'd make it home in one piece.  And we did make it to Michigan.  About one hour from home the trailer blew a tire which was not really a surprise with the amount of weight it was hauling.  Matt ran the kids and I home (because we are not much help and usually a hindrance for things like that - I do think Matt enjoyed the quiet ride back to the trailer to take the tire off.)  He bought a new trailer tire at a nearby town, the shop put it on the rim and Matt ran it back and put it on the trailer.

Here are the kids on the "new" Massey Ferguson - actually the tractor is a '68 so not anywhere near new.

Today was a chicken butchering day.  So the kids played on the tractor and ran around while Matt butchered chickens.  I prepped lunch for my cousin and kids who were coming over to get their chickens and my dad who was coming to pick up his chickens, and I watched the kids, of course.  The kids had plenty of weeding to do in their gardens after our recent trip to MN (more on that later) so that kept us busy for a good part of the morning.

Nora was fascinated with the chicken butchering; Karl indifferent; Clare squeamish and Lena didn't really have a clue.  She did like watching the chicken plucker though.