Thursday, July 24, 2008

5 little Upchurchs wrestling in the bed...



Taken 7-24-08

Two happy boys-

Aunt Joanne sent a package in the mail, and it arrived today. The boys like the neck ties that are meant to be soaked in water to activate cooling beads for cooling hot bodies. Those should come in handy for the big brothers when they work out in this TN heat!
The recipes look good, too!
Thanks, Aunt Joanne!


Our New Van!

Playing Rhythm with the youth....


Tuesday, July 15, 2008

A bit from Jess...

Hey Everyone,
Mom invited me to contribute to this blog, so I'll be popping in occasionally to write a bit!

Today we went to the Livestock Auction, the first time in months to go when they are selling goats and cattle. A friend of mine wanted us to buy his goats, rather than have the meat buyers get them. (I'll get you some pictures soon, they are VERY pretty! They have a blue/purple sort of tinge to their hair, it's really pretty.)
Then we went to a friend's house to swim! We all had a good time, the water was warm, and even Mom got to enjoy herself (Amber and I finished before the others, and watched Isaac for her). Those swimming lessons that we took actually worked, and after a bit of nervousness the first time, Jacob, Amber, Bethany, Rebecca, and I are swimming around the deep end of the pool! (This is a major thing for me, because I've always been terrified of water, and panicked without a noodle or some other floatation device in the deep end!) Jacob and I love to dive to the bottom of the pool and swim there, especially when playing tag, Bethany and Rebecca can't follow us!

~Jessica
Btw, I now have a blog, here is the link: http://trucksr4girls.blogspot.com/

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Snake!

A little over a week ago, we got some fertile eggs from a friend's hens to put under our broody hen. She sat on those six eggs for a week, and then two disappeared. No sign of egg shell to say the hens had destroyed them. But what else could have become of them?
Then, for many days, their egg production was down by about 4 to 6 eggs a day. Two more of the fertile, marked eggs disappeared a few days later, and this morning, there were none left. There was conversation on the way home from church today about possibly needing to replace these hens who seemed to be eating their eggs. (They have been known to do it!)
Well, I went out to their pen to give them some hot dog buns, opened the coop door, and what I saw gave me a HUGE case of the willies!


My manly husband went out there with a hoe, an ax handle, and a pair of picker-uppers, aka the Golden Retriever. He wrestled the 5 foot plus beast out of the coop and onto the ground where it proceeded to coil, strike, and then hide its head under its coils. He grabbed it with the picker-upper and put it into a huge trash can.
We hauled it way down the road to a wet ditch away from all houses and released it. It did not at all appear to be poisonous, so we didn't want to hurt it, we just wanted it to quit eating our eggs! It shouldn't need to eat for days.
Tyler is supposed to be posting the video clips he took of the whole fiasco on YouTube, so he can send the link to anyone who might want to see it. It was FUNNY!