It's a nice day outside today: fifty degrees and sunny.

Mucked out the stable for a total of three wheelbarrows full of manure. There is probably just as much scattered throughout the calves little pasture, waiting to be picked up. Maybe I can pay the kids to do it this afternoon. I also added a wheelbarrow full of rabbit poo and leaves to the growing compost pile. I am letting the layers of chicken poop and straw build up in the coop, but should probably clean that out, too, before it gets too deep.

There's nothing like having your own, natural fertilizer factory. I foresee some happy vegetable plants somewhere in the future.

Grace, More Drywall Talk, and That Thing I've Wanted For Years

It comes in many forms, but the definition is the same in all instances. Grace... Unmerited favor. Being smiled upon even when. Christians, myself included, most often only see grace in big examples, like Christ on the cross, dying for the forgiveness of our sins. It has shown up in other major ways in my life. Like when I was going to marry that guy. All my reasons and arguments were piled high, sewn together with a thin thread of sheer determination, and in one moment, it felt like God pulled the thread and everything fell apart. Or when Chris and I wanted to buy that one house, and it fell through. At the time, it feels painful, not having things work out the way you wanted them to, but looking back, you can see the mess you almost had walked into, and are oh, so thankful.

With such massive instances of grace, it is easy to overlook the smaller ones. Chris bringing coffee to me in the mornings when I wake up growly and grumpy...

Grace even shows up when you are building a house. We could have had the drywall done by now, you know. If only Chris had hired someone to do it, we would be happily working away on paint and flooring. But he didn't. He kept balking, and all the while, I was getting a little put out, wondering if I should go behind his back and hire someone myself.

Then, as you know, cold weather hit, and, as we have no HVAC in the house yet, we realized that finishing drywall in cold weather was tricky. We could heat the place room by room just long enough for the mud to dry. But then our neighbor came to us with the story of another guy that has been building a house over the past few years just like we have. The fluctuation in temperature over the seasons has caused every single joint to crack, and now he has a big mess on his hands. And so there is one more mistake grace saved us from making.

In the meantime, Chris, Terry, and I are chipping away at the un-hung stacks of drywall. Saturday, after Terry helped Chris hang the top part of the vaulted ceiling upstairs, Chris and I worked on the funky, angled pieces and got one side of it done. A few more weekends, and we should have it all knocked out.

Chris has been talking to few more finishers, wondering if we could work out a deal with someone come spring to help with the finishing. Maybe we could could hire a pro to tackle the major parts, and he would cut a break if we did the mudding of the screws and less-significant tight spots. I kind of like that idea. That would give me a good excuse to buy something I've wanted since the first time I walked onto a construction site: a pair of drywall stilts.

Finley

"Do you really want to wear your hair that?" I asked when she emerged from her room on picture re-take day. Her hair was normal in the first photo she had taken at school, but somehow she managed to be bug-eyed, like she was trying to see if her eyes would fall out if she just opened her eyelids wide enough. But this day, she opted for the side-of-the-head ponytail. "I like it this way," she said. And so I let it go, wondering if she will like this photo six years from now.

Of course, most days, she doesn't want even want to brush her hair. "Brush you hair, Finley," I will order her when I see the tangled mess. "Why?" she asks. "So that you will look nice," I say. "Why do I need to look nice?" she asks. Usually I only answer that question in my head. So that no one will think I'm a negligent mother. This is where I finally understand my mother when she would exclaim to me, "People will think you're an orphan!" But, really, what does it matter? I make her brush it anyway.

Some days Most days, I am amazed at who Finley is turning out to be. It's those moments when they don't know you are watching, and you get to see who your kids really are without parental interference...

A few weeks ago, we had a little girl visit. It was Kinzee's first time at our place. She was a first-grader, younger than Joe, but Finley was excited as ever to have a friend to play with. Finley decided to give her the tour of the farm, and all the kids took off running. They hit the play-set first, swinging and climbing for just a moment. Then Finley wanted to show her the berry patch, and off they all ran again. Next came the big pond. The "nature club" (a play area under some trees) was next, but by this time, Zivah was tired and couldn't keep up. Halfway to the nature club (about 50 yards or so), she just stopped while the rest of the kids ran on to the club.

I watched for a minute to see what would happen. I was far enough away that I couldn't hear her, but I could tell that Z was probably crying, so I started walking over. Finley, upon arriving at the club, looked around and noticed that Z wasn't there. She finally spotted Z, then rallied Kinzee and Joe, "Come on!" she yelled, "We need to see what's wrong with Z!" And she took off running back up through the pasture. Upon inquiry, Z sobbed that she had been left behind, and then Finley put her arm around Z and they all walked down to the nature club together.

Know what else makes my heart swell? She wants a truck when she grows up, and she wants a dirt-road driveway (not even gravel) so that the mud will kick up onto the truck to get it dirty. She says trucks looks cooler that way.

[For a glimpse at one of her riding lessons, click here.]

More drywall...

I thought putting up insulation would be the most miserable thing I would do at this stage of the game, but I was wrong.

Chris finished all but two sheets of drywall on the main floor of the house over the Thanksgiving break. Our neighbor, Terry had helped hang all the ceiling and upper walls, then took a well deserved break from us to hunt and spend time with his family. All that is left downstairs is covered up by drywall that needs to go upstairs.

While Chris worked on drywall, I worked on framing out another cubby area upstairs and building temporary doors for the crawl spaces under the roof in an attempt to keep the cold wind from blowing in and sucking out all the heat. When that was finished, we decided to start on the drywall upstairs.

We figured we'd better work on some of the smaller, less convenient areas that Terry would probably not like to work in, so we slapped some drywall up in "the secret passage," then moved on to the cubby in Z's room. I'll tell you what: trying to hang drywall over your head on an over-insulated slant is enough to make a saint grumpy. Or so I tell myself.

I will spare you the details. I don't want to work myself into a bad mood remembering. I will just show you a picture of my finger with the scuffs and small, metal splinters it suffered from the day's work. I know it doesn't look all that bad, but nothing makes you want to cuss more than a drill slipping off a screw and slamming into your finger. I take that back. There are things. But it didn't feel like it at the time.

In the end, we got it finished.

The upstairs is going to take a lot longer with all its crazy corners and angles. I am just daydreaming about the time when the mud and paint is finished and I can start on flooring and trim work. That will be fun.