Waiting for the 4th

If we wave the flag long enough, maybe it will be the fourth of July?

This is the front porch.

Tess went to the Dentist last Monday and no one got hurt. She got to play with her first friend Gena and kiddo's from Cheyenne and had a great time. Gena even posted some pictures of Tess on her blog, which you can find here: http://goodtimes2003.blogspot.com/ Everything I know about blogs I copy from Gena. She is the one to blame for my new layout. :)

Tess calls everyone her "friend" now. She happily introduces me to everyone. "This is my friend Daddy."

Eric and I have both been so busy it is hard to see straight, but we haven't driven off the road yet.

Go Speed Racer

Photo from the first annual Palen downhill sled races. Tess won the award for the most rides. Cooper for the shortest ride. Eric for the most trips pulling the sled uphill and Wendy for the biggest wreck. Tune-in next year.

We had a wonderful Christmas - hope you did too!

Eric got an elk license this year and has spent the past few weekends out hunting with my dad, who also got a license. Pictured is Banjo in his hunting get up. Happily, Eric was able to get an elk shortly after this picture was taken. Banjo is only three and this was his first experience with gun shots. Banjo stood still and wasn't phased a bit. I think they may have caught the hunting bug.

Next is a photo of the house progress. Things have been moving quickly and everything is now framed and enclosed.

Of course, Tess thinks that this is a great dancin' floor.

Some of our Glendo friends roped us into being on the Rodeo Arena committee. The committee sponsors the chariot races in Glendo so we spent last weekend gambling and outriding. Eric, of course, was the outrider, helping to catch the horses at the end of the race and to get them in the gates. It was 3 below and the wind was blowing a gale both days of the races. I helped with the calcultta and gambled, my job was much easier - taking other people's money and loosing my own.

I turned 35 this weekend. I feel older and wiser -- hope you do too.

First Haircut

Tess said goodbye to her long locks today. She is going to have a harder time twirling her hair while sucking her thumb, but she doesn't look quite so much like a wild child. She is very proud that she got her hair cut and now says "mom don't touch my haircut." It is pretty darn cute.
I am slowly learning to deal with her independence. Yesterday, I was instructed to "go away." When I tried to explain that "go away" wasn't a very nice thing to say to momma, I was instructed to "go away, Please."

More construction pictures

Pouring cement for the foundation.
And Tess posing, stomping and running on the floor, which she calls a "bridge."

Scary

Boo! Happy Halloween from the little mummy! It didn't take her long to learn the "treat" in trick or treat!
Here we are at Cottonwood Hall for the Coleman/Paisley/Collins Halloween extravaganza! We hope this is an annual event, as it was great fun! It took Tess a while to warm up to all the wild kids in costumes, but once they brought out the cold spaghetti, she thought things were a-ok. Except, she preferred to eat the spaghetti rather than find the eyeballs. That's grandma with the blue hair in the background.
This scary monster is a 7000 pound slab/step of concrete at the back of our house, where there used to be a porch. We needed it out of the way to pour the new walls and foundation. After attempts to move it with a backhoe and skidsteer, Pops had to bring the loader to get it to budge. Seems like "more power" is a common theme in my posts.
We finally got it away from the house, but still couldn't pick it up.
So with chains we drug it to the center of the hole where it will become a permanent part of the new crawlspace! 100 years from now someone will wonder, "what were they thinking?" That is, until they try to move it!

More power

Tess, like her mother, appreciates a good mixer. We made cookies for weaning on Saturday and Tess thought the mixer was the funniest thing she had ever seen. She laughed and laughed and laughed. Of course it didn't take long for her to figure out that eating the cookie dough was even more fun.

Big 'ol Mess

We have started working on the house and Tess tells us it is a "Big 'ol Mess."

Here she is modeling her new snow boots, she loves shoes. She has now learned about the camera and wants me to take her picture all the time. Hopefully I can now have more pictures. Before, 2 out of 3 were blurrs.

Tess had the opportunity to gather with her Prosser cousins this week. Pictured are Brock, Darci, Cami Ann, Evan, Austin and Tess. One had to be fast with the camera, as most of my pictures had blurs where the little ones were suppose to be.
Unfortunately, the gathering was for the funeral of Tess's great grandfather Dean, which was a sad event, but he accomplished many things in his life which we will remember for many years to come.
Below is Clay, who is now 5 months old. Nowadays they include photos on AQHA registation papers, so I have photos of him from every angle.
Tess started with a new babysitter this week, as her former babysitter is due to have another baby of her own in a month or so and thought four would be too much. She is adapting well, as when I went to pick her up she said she didn't want to go home because she "have to finish playing Lego's first, mama."

Watermelon crop

Tess loves watermelon, so we planted some in our garden this summer and here are the results. She had to settle for "pink watermelon" but that was good enough. Watermelon growers in Wyoming can't be choosey. This one at least tasted a bit sweet, the first looked and tasted like cucumber on the inside.

Don't try this at home

The Supervisor

I left out the pictures of Eric 12 foot up in the bucket operating a chain saw.

Almost there

"Good-ole-red-cow-who-got-struck-by-lightening" was the finishing touch

Bumps and Bruises

We started out last week with Eric getting up at four-thirty to take two horses to the ranch horse competition at the state fair. There must have been a full moon as the three year old decided he had never seen a gate in his life. To make things better, loading and unloading from a trailer was part of the competition and his mare fell out of the trailer, put a big gash in her hock and took skin off plenty of other places. Dr. Foland happened to be in the audience and helped get her stitched and wrapped up. This was the start of the horse infirmary.

The next day another mare turned up bit on the nose by a rattlesnake. So with her nose almost swollen shut, she took a bed in the infirmary. They both seem to be recovering and now just gimp to get attention. I was beginning to think I was bad luck when our neighbors dog, who we were watching while they were out of town showed up with porcupine quills, but we got those handled too and now all creatures of the four-legged variety are happy and healthy.

But I had forgotten those of the two-legged variety when Saturday Tess forgot to explain to Sugar the difference between her finger and horse cake. Just when we had forgotten those tears and we were trying to take control of the garden Tess bailed head first from a swing and now has a giant red and black and blue scrape and scab from her hair line to her lips. But we still made it to the fair again to check out the carnival and had a nice picnic at a friends.

The garden is still out of control by the way, so if anyone out there has a hunkering for zucchini, carrots, beans, beets, lettuce I can set you up, especially if you are interested in zucchini the size of a walrus.

Tess also went to a Casper Rockies baseball game and had a blast! If only I were smart enough to transfer photos from my phone to the computer....

Tess watched the feedlot sort at the county fair last night and thought " I can do that," so today she tried out her saddle on Banjo.

More two year old pictures. Tess is big into swimming now, so we spend a lot of time talking about "swimmin at the beach." Normally, we have been going to the little swim beach near the marina, but last weekend we brave the crowds and went to Sandy Beach to watch the Hobie Cat regatta. It was fun and beautiful.

Pops refurbished my old trike so Tess has been practicing on a shiny "new" trike that looks pretty sharp. She still will ride for about 30 seconds, then tell me its "your turn" so I've been hitting my lips with my knees and peddling around on a trike.

In other news, I was appointed to be a part-time magistrate, so if you commit a crime or have a small claim, you'd better hope the "real" judges aren't sick, on vacation or somewhere else in the district.

Eric's colt named Clay is going to have to change his name to brown. Eric's been teaching him manners. He had been spending all his free time working on the corrals by the house and they look great. He was in a ranch rodeo recently and an Extreme cowboy race in Glendo and had fun.

My Mom's a slacker

and is just now posting photos from my second birthday party. The party was actually a week or two after my real birthday - but a party is a party and I had fun - especially singing.

Two weekends ago I went to UTAH with mom, and grandma and pops for the Curtis Family Reunion. I got to sleep in a sheepwagon restored by my GREAT uncle Don which was great fun. I also saw LOTS of my cousins of all shapes and sizes and generations. I called them all "guy" or "kid" and played at 100 miles an hour when I wasn't crying, nothing in between. Mom made a quilt with her cousins, and there were all sorts of wild toys and great dutch oven meals that Curtis's are famous for. I even discovered punch bags and spud nuts which are Utah treats. Riding 700 or so miles in the car wasn't as bad as my mom had expected, she drove fast. You may not know it but 2 year old can see lots of elephants and alligators out the window between here and Utah. I was fascinated with the stuffed penguin at Little America and thought we all needed to sit on the floor and stare at it for awhile.

Mom and Dad have been busy with work, which means I get a new pair of shoes! I love shoes!

Here are Cole and Tess at the branding last month, I'm a little slow in posting the pictures. Cole and Tess are a week apart and had great fun, at least while Tess wasn't napping!

Its my Birthday!

Tess got to "ride on the CHOO!" for her birthday. We got up early and went over to the Guernsey depot and joined our friends and neighbors Roy, Karen and Zac Bennett for a train ride from Guernsey to Glendo, which was provided by BNSF for only their best employee's. Roy was kind enough to share some of his tickets with us and we got to enjoy the trip through Wendover Canyon and see our place from a different perspective! The train was a refurbished passenger train and it was great fun, and the best birthday present.

Busy Baby

It really doesn't seem like it has been that long since I posted. But here's the short low-down on what Tess has been up to.

Mother's day Tess and I took Grandma Curtis on our sporatically annual trip to Meadowacres Greenhouse, followed by lunch at the Paisley Shawl in Glenrock. We had a nice time and Tess didn't even pull too many flowers at the greenhouse, she did love the water fountain and the resident puppy. That weekend Eric helped out at a team penning clinic up the road from El Rancho. He has done that several times now and always enjoys the practice. Herb and Dennis branded that weekend and I took some cookies and Eric was sorry to miss out.

But, we branded the next weekend and it went well. Tess, Grandma Curtis and I made 32 pounds of bbq beef, I also made scalloped corn, baked beans (although not as good as my grammy's) and apple crisp and cookies. Tess's buddy Cole came from Laramie and we enjoyed getting to see Cole and Tori and Dan, and Cole even wrestled a calf or two. But Tess was REALLY the most impressed with his Thomas the train roundhouse.

Last Monday, Eric got his foot stepped on by one of the horses. He broke his big toe and had 6 or 7 stitches, they are still watching another part of his foot to make sure it is not broken, but we think it is ok. He really only hobbled around on crutches for one day and it didn't take long for him to fire me as his chauffeur. This weekend he was busy digging post holes and back to normal, except he is still wearing sandals.

Tess got to go to the zoo this weekend too. The past couple of weeks she has loved to talk about elephants - "phants," so we went to the zoo and saw the phants and got to see them do phant tricks. Tess also loved the Nordstrom shoe department, because she loves shoes. She ate cuban food and rode in a bicycle taxi - fun time in the city! She didn't so much like the hotel room though.

We finished planting our garden and this morning Tess and I helped decorate veteran and American Legion graves with flags and poppies for the holiday.

First Piggytail

or is it ponytail? I could never remember which is which. It didn't last long as the first thing Tess wanted to do was pull the rubberband out. But it was cute while it lasted.

We actually got some RAIN! and Tess has discovered mud puddles which she calls "bath" . . . we have changed clothes three times today.

Eric had a last minute telephone conference call with the judge today while he was horseback moving bulls. Luckily both the judge and the bulls were patient.

Latest Arrival

"Clay" was born on April 5. Like his mother, he enjoys pinning his ears back and giving attitude. The top two photos are yesterday at about 3 weeks and the bottom picture is his birthday.

Tess thinks the "bebe horse" is pretty cool. She is learning new words and words combinations faster than I can keep up with and is finally getting some hair.

Wintery Spring

Howdy all! We welcomed (sort-a) 18 inches of snow last week. I tried to get some pictures of E and Tess in the snow, but Tess didn't like all the bright sun reflections. You can kinda see the big drift in the background. But this is our yard on March 29. While I got several new child abuse cases as a result of cabin fever (think The Shining) we were plowed out early Friday morning.

Tess is becoming quite the horse helper and she really wants to be in charge of the lead rope and is certain she can do a much better job than dad, and Bobby probably agrees.

Most of the snow is gone now and Tess is looking forward to the egg hunt this weekend and I'm looking forward to my neighbor bringing over his rototiller.