The Farm

We spent the weekend at "The Farm" with my husband's brother and his family. The Farm is an estate owned by my sister-in-law's family. It's been in the family for generations. This was our second time to visit. We had a blast. It was great to see family and for Bubba to meet his Aunt and cousins and see some cows and horses. We also got to swim in the pool both days which the whole family loves to do. The only part that really sucked is that the three hour car ride took us almost six - typical sucky I-95 traffic. The pool more than made up for it in my opinion.

While we were there we talked a lot about family histories. My sister-in-law had all kinds of stories about her family. In fact, she said one side of her family has a family tree painted on the wall of a nearby golf course clubhouse (the house used to belong to family) and it goes way back. There is also a painting of one of her ancestors in the Pentagon. Pretty cool to know stories about different people in your lineage.

I've been working on my family tree on Ancestry.com for a few years. I'm not getting too far since no one knows (or is telling) very much about certain parts of my family. In fact, past my grandparents, I'm not sure of anything. Kind of stinks.

My husband asked a good question on the way home yesterday - what makes some families keep track of relatives, stories, family ties, etc. and not others? I think part of it has to do with the ancestors themselves. It seems as if family was really important to my sister-in-law's relatives so they kept track of things like lineage and made sure to tell family stories to the next generation so they could be remembered and passed down. 

I remember my grandmother telling me stories when I was young about the family but I can't get her to write them down. Since it was 25 years ago or more, I don't really remember them. And to be honest I listened to them as bedtime stories, not as stories I might want to remember. I was young, what did I know?

I've given both of my parents and my living grandmother "My Life" type books that ask questions or have room for family stories - I did this years ago and none of them have done anything with them. Of course, other than periodic journal writing, I haven't kept very good track of my own life story. Guess I should probably start if I want to be able to remember enough to tell Bubba stories...

Got My Bottle?

One of the reasons I love The Pioneer Woman blog is her photography. Especially the photos of animals. Not just animals, but farm animals. I guess one should say ranch, but to me they are amazing farm animals. Cattle, horses, wild mustangs, dogs...lots and lots of animals...

The last couple days, Pioneer Woman blogged about her two new bottle calves. Two amazingly cute things that need to be bottle fed, who knows how often, throughout the day. As soon as I saw the pictures of the black one (the other one is named Braemie), I was reminded of the "Got Milk?" ads. You know, the ones with celebrities and a milk moustache?

So, I just spent way too long (tried Adobe Photoshop first and then Power Point which was much easier) making my own little ad. I'm sure Pioneer Woman already thought of it, (who wouldn't after seeing the photo?) but here is my take. Please don't judge Pioneer Woman's photography skills based on this slide - go check them out on her blog, you will be impressed.

[Update: trebord to the rescue!! I cannot believe, after all those years as a Power Point Ranger, that I missed learning how to make a PP slide into a JPEG when it was so simple. So, the bottle calf in the "ad" looks more like it should (previously printed/scanned to make a JPEG) - you should still go to Pioneer Woman's blog and look at her photography (don't let the "woman" in the title deter you) she's got some awesome stuff.]